Bookworm Strikes Again

Okay, I'm officially a word-nerd. I stayed up late last night to read the new Robin McKinley book and loved it. I think she's one of my favorite authors.

Chalice by Robin McKinley

Marisol is new and unexperienced, but she must keep her land together. As the Chalice of the Circle she binds and witnesses everything that happens in the Willowlands. Most new Chalices have been apprenticed before they must take hold of the land yet Marisol had no idea when her cellar filled with honey mead, her goats began giving milk almost too fast for her to take care of them, and her hives were literally overflowing with honey.

But she doesn't have much time to get used to her new job because the new Master is coming, he who will help rule the Willowlands is coming back from the Priests of Fire. He more Fire now than human and Marisol must bind him to the land and the people to him if thier homes are not going to be torn apart by the outblood Heir. If she fails, all of Willowlands will be lost.

Chalice is the story of a simple farm girl who must make the choice between life and death for her people and land. Will she have the wisdom to make the right choices?

The Best New Reads

The 13th Reality by James Dashner

This is my current new read and I can hardly put it down to write this. Atticus (also known as Tick) finds his life forever changed when he receives a simple yellow envelope with a challenge: Solve the clues to save many lives or burn the letter and the madness will end.

He holds out while being chased by assassins, hornets let loose in his room, and smokey-looking phantoms whose cry will turn his brain to mush, but will he live and figure out the magic words by the deadline or will he be one who fails.

Join a wild crew of characters that covers the world and beyond and defeat the horrible Lemon Lady (aka Mistress Jane) and solve the clues before Tick does.

Before Midnight by Cameron Dokey

Here's another fairytale re-write, and one of the best so far. Dokey puts a strange twist on the classic tale; the stepmother is very kind yet unhappy, not cruel. After being forced to marry Etienne de Brabant and being sent to his country estate, she tries hard to settle in and learn the staff including the young Cindrillon.

Cindrillon has been raised by the wise, old housekeeper and doesn't want to hurt her new stepmother so hides her identity. Will she betray her father, or herself? Will she make it to the ball or hide in the house, unknown? Does her father ever acknowledge her? At what of the handsome stableboy Raoul?