Review: Untraceable by S.R. Johannes

Author: S.R. Johannes
Pages: 315
Publisher: Kindle
Source: Review Copy (thank you!)
Synopsis: 16-year-old Grace has lived in the Smokies all her life, patrolling with her forest ranger father who taught her about wildlife, tracking, and wilderness survival. 

When her dad goes missing on a routine patrol, Grace refuses to believe he’s dead and fights the town authorities, tribal officials, and nature to find him.

One day, while out tracking clues, Grace is rescued from danger by Mo, a hot guy with an intoxicating accent and a secret. As her feelings between him and her ex-boyfriend get muddled, Grace travels deep into the wilderness to escape and find her father. 

Along the way, Grace learns terrible secrets that sever relationships and lives. Soon she’s enmeshed in a web of conspiracy, deception, and murder. And it’s going to take a lot more than a compass and a motorcycle (named Lucifer) for this kick-butting heroine to save everything she loves.

Buy the Book (Amazon/

It took me forever to read Untraceable. That shouldn't say much about the quality of the book though since I was actually very interested in the plot. Untraceable is a very unique book and it's very well done. I enjoyed reading about all the Survival Skills and that part was fun.

I'll start this review with a confession. I somewhat stupidly thought this book would be a paranormal mystery. I didn't read any reviews beforehand and the synopsis gives none of the twists away. I kept expecting something to happen and it took over a hundred pages for me to realize that, no, this was no paranormal. The author wrote a contemporary mystery.

After I realized that, the story flowed much more smoothly. There is an incredible amount of suspense in Untraceable. There are clues and suggestions everywhere that lead to a surprising ending. I honestly had no idea what to expect. Johannes writes a very unique plot twist and revelation that was probably the last thing I was expecting. I love that this story was unexpected. There was so much tension but I felt at times the story was slow. I was so confused- I had no idea what was happening and how to solve the mystery. For someone like me, some more hints would have been welcome. That being said I was impressed with the mystery.

The characters were a diverse group. I liked that a lot. Grace herself was independent and had this very admirable strength. There were many moments that I found I could relate to Grace, especially when she was vulnerable. She wasn't a bland character; she had personality. The side characters were well done too. I ended up being very upset with the actions of one specific character which was surprising because I never knew I cared that much about them.

Overall, Untraceable wasn't my usual type of read. That had its benefits but I would have liked to find the story more gripping. I know that other readers didn't have the same issue so take this with a grain of salt. If you enjoy a suspenseful mystery consider Untraceable. 3 stars,

***

The Weekly Progress (Where have you been all my life Edition)

Aloha! The last few weeks were incredibly busy but it's winding down so this is the perfect time to do a Weekly Progress post. I have a lot planned for this week. I will post fairly often since I'm going to be scheduling posts a little more now and I feel way less stressed than the last few weeks.

Books Read

I was honestly not that impressed with this week's books. I'm not sure if I was just not in a reading mood or what, but I had high hopes for all of these books and I didn't get what I was looking for. I didn't connect very well with the characters in The Maze Runner although the plot was interesting. The Catastrophic History of You and Me was very slow at times, and Dreaming Awake (sequel to Falling Under which I adored) was underwhelming to me. Maybe I was really picky this week (I probably was) but I didn't love any of these books. 

Currently Reading

Maybe this is the book that'll get me out of my funk? 

Stuff I did while I was away

I went to some Teen Author Week events. I co-blog for the library, so I had some fun being a reporter and writing transcripts and taking pictures of the events. I met Leslie Livingston, Catherine Austen, Max Turner, Alex Sanchez, and Mariko Tamaki. 

I also got my G1 and went driving for the first time! I love it; I'll try to take official drivers ed classes in March. 

Recap of posts (ICYMI)

Believe it or not, I did post something while I was away. I posted my review of Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft (4 stars, check it out!), My Personal Yearbook, and Witch Hunt. I also wrote a bit about spoilers in blogs and my theory when it comes to them. 

That's it for last week!

I had a decent week but I'm hoping for more next week. I'll leave you with Rihanna's Where Have You Been, a song that is way too darn catchy (if not a little annoying). 

Review: Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft

Author: Jody Gehrman
Pages: 293
Publisher: Magic Genie Books
Source: Review Copy (thank you!)
Synopsis: Falling in Love, baking a magical cake, fighting an evil necromancer—it’s all in a day’s work for Audrey Oliver, seventeen-year-old witch-in-training. 

When her mother goes missing and her twenty-one-year-old witchy cousin shows up out of the blue, Audrey knows something’s gone horribly, dangerously wrong. Now it’s up to her to get her own magical powers up to speed before everyone she loves is destroyed by the sorcerer intricately connected to her mother’s secret past.

Buy the book (Amazon)

Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft was another really fun read. There was so much good about this book. There were actually no real flaws and I enjoyed reading this.

I liked that the characters made an impression on me. I could clearly picture them and their different personalities. Audrey feeling like a wallflower, Meg shining with infinite coolness, Bridget's sweetness... Each character had some defining traits that stood out very well and none of them were boring. I also thought Audrey was a nice character to connect to. She had insecurities but she's a cool person that would do anything for the people she loves. I adored her habit of writing things down in a notebook type thing. The voice in the writing, sarcastic and insightful, was also really well done.

I'm going to talk about the writing shortly because I really liked it. I don't know enough about writing to be too technical but there didn't seem to be any mistakes whatsoever. Everything flowed so very well and I got into the story and was swiping page quickly. Especially at the end- that was kind of crazy. There were a lot of great one timers and stuff. Only thing I'd maybe nitpick about is one of the references- I know it's impossible to keep to date on current pop culture references but if an author doesn't use the right reference it will date their book.

There really isn't much to complain about in this story. I got to read another story about witches, which is awesome. They're not done- there are still so many possibilities with all the cool stories they could have so I love reading about witchcraft. I liked Audrey's world- it fit the story and was original. There were some new concepts that I'd love to explore.

Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft is another novel meant to entertain and it does a pretty darn good job. It's funny, it made smile, and I was totally into it. Sometimes though, I would have liked if some characters were more defined and if the story went in more depth (i.e. Dallas, and the villain's motivation). I'm glad this is a series and the world will hopefully be explored more in the future.

If I can find the sequel, I definitely hope to read it. Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft is one of those books that's a pretty good package and solid in every aspect. I did try to include negative things in my review for the sake of balance, but there is no major or real issues. Overall, Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft is pretty great so I'm giving it 4 stars.

****

Thoughts on Book Bloggers' Spoiler Theory Dilemma

This is something that has annoyed me a lot as a blog follower. See, I'll be browsing the Interwebz looking for new books when I stumble upon a review for this incredible book I've been dying to read for, like, ever. I'll open up the blog page, stare lovingly at the cover, read the synopsis, and then I'll finally take a peek at the good stuff- the review.

And I'm always left a bit upset when I see that there is a spoiler warning in the review. Like, for a review of an ARC or a book that has been released less than two weeks ago, the blogger is posting spoilers in their review. That somehow bugs me a lot. I notice it's a personal thing though- I haven't heard of anyone else finding this very annoying.

I'm not going to tell anyone to blog because who the hell am I to do that, so this spoiling thing left me with a question.

When is it appropriate to post spoilers on a blog? 

This answer depends a lot on the type of blogger you are and the type of blog you have. So there is no real answer. 

For me, I hate seeing spoilers in reviews. A review should inform me about the novel without mentioning the specific content. I know that it's hard though to write a good review without any detail. I've written a lot of awful ones because I didn't know what to say other than mentioning some crazy plot twist, especially if said crazy plot twist defined the book for me. 

I also assume most authors hate to see spoilers of their books if their books are new (I'm not sure about this- confirm in the comments?). I've been spoiled for one of my favourite series before and if you've met me in person you'll know how insane that drives me. I try my best to forget about the spoiler (it was tiny, I read it in a split second before realizing it was something I shouldn't know) but some stuff just sticks with you no matter how much you want to throw it away. 

The thing I'm iffy about is when it comes to discussion posts like this or feature posts. See, the point of a book blog is to talk  write about books. That's kind of hard though if you go by the rule of never spoiling anything ever. I want to talk about all the incredible series I read with the insane plot twists and go in depth and rant and gush and have fun. I'm not sure if I should do that. 

It would make me very sad to ruin someone else's reading experience. I try not to ever spoil, even if people ask me to. At the same time, I'm a little burnt out with talking constantly about new books and debuts in series. Most of what I read are books in the middle of series and it's hard to feature these books because to describe the later books there needs to be some sort background information, which would spoil the books. 

That's my dilemma. (I'm prone to extreme exaggerations, if you haven't noticed already.) 

To spoil or not to spoil- that is the question! When do you think it's okay, or if it is even ever okay to spoil on your blog?

Review: My Personal Yearbook

Pages: 63
Publisher: Prufrock Press
Source: Review Copy (Thank you!)
Description (from Prufrock Press): Kids will love looking back at their copies of My Personal Yearbook, complete with reflections about their lives, lists of favorites and hot trends, letters to their future selves, and more. Created by the editors of Creative Kids magazine, the fill-in pages of this book are full of color, cool graphics, and fun activities to help kids document their current passions and interests. Activities include creating a soundtrack for one’s life, making a mock social media page, writing an autobiography, preparing a Twitter-style feed documenting a day in their lives, creating a photo timeline, compiling friends’ advice and reflections, writing a bucket list, taking quizzes about their lives, and much more. Kids will not only enjoy filling in the many pages of this personalized yearbook, they’ll love looking back at it for years to come.

My Personal Yearbook is a fun activity book suitable for I'd say just about everyone. It's something that I've been doing every week or so, and I always end up writing on more pages than I thought I would.

I love the colours and illustrations. The layout is superb- everything just looks so good. It invites some weird doodles and haphazardly taped pictures. It's so authentic and I love that. It's something I have fun with now and in the future I'll appreciate doing. The only layout thing I don't like is that the book is not a hardcover. I think if it were it would be even cooler. It would have a scrapbook or photo album-like feel. It's something so important- you look back at this book and it will remind you of your life, so I'd like it if the binding was sturdier so I could write on it, and heavier so I could stick papers and drawings in that wouldn't fall when I move the book. If that's the only thing I have against the layout you know the book is awesome.

The pages are very complete and are so interesting! There are a lot of topics that I wouldn't even have considered writing down and I had a lot of fun thinking of my year so far. I always left some stuff black because I know times will change. This isn't just a book- at times it's an activity. It's a wonderful time to reflect the past and contemplate the future. The book tries very hard to capture your personality. There are features like "Dear Blabby" where you write a fake advice column which is really cool to look back on and see if you're opinions changed. There's page for texts, tweets, cool stuff, world issues, slang words and translations, and so many other things that are a part of daily life and that I'd want to remember.

I love this book. It's something I do every once in a while, and even after I've posted this review I will keep using My Personal Yearbook. Life is so fast sometimes; I always try to keep a diary or journal but it never works out. Sometimes I just want to slow everything down and appreciate my life, and My Personal Yearbook helps a lot with that. It's something that I want to complete and be proud of. It's decently long (a little over 60 pages), which means that there's enough to do to cover the entire year.

I recommend this book for everyone (especially students) who want to save a year in their life in a colorful, fun book. You won't regret it because it's a blast.

Review: Witch Hunt

Author: K.C. Blake
Source: Review copy (thank you!)
Synopsis: A magical game of Hide n Seek begins.
Find the missing player and win.
The game resets; everyone forgets and starts to play it again.

Starr Hughes hasn’t believed in magic since her mother died. As a reporter for the school paper, she believes in hard facts. Hiding under the headmaster’s desk, planting bugs, and breaking into a fellow student’s home are all on her to-do list. So when she hears the mysterious group known as the It-Squad are about to start playing a secretive game, she wants to know more. She’s especially interested in the group’s gorgeous leader, Dylan Winchester.

With her boy-crazy best friend at her side, Starr is going to discover that not only are witches real, they need her help. Someone is using the game to steal their memories, their powers, and perhaps their lives.

Buy the book (Amazon /)

Witch Hunt is an entertaining book. It has what I call "readability". It's something that makes the reader pick up the book and instantly get into the story. There were a few things that I didn't like at all, but for some reason I just very much enjoyed the writing style of Witch Hunt to the point where the faults didn't bug me that much.

I'll start with my biggest issue. I didn't feel like any of the characters were realistic or likable. A lot of the plot was also unrealistic although I could accept that since the story wasn't meant to be realistic; just fun. I didn't like Starr at all in the beginning but somehow she grew on me. Privacy is so important to me, and Starr completely disregarded it. She was a classic snoop and I don't like those type of characters (or people) at all. That's a me thing though. I was a bit surprised that I didn't like most of the characters. They were so flawed and I didn't feel like their redeeming qualities were enough to, well, redeem them. So let's just get it out of the way that this is not a character oriented book.

The plot on the other hand was entertaining. I loved the premise and I had fun with what was happening. I keep saying the word entertaining because that's what this book was. Fun, and light. I always knew what to expect from this book: that I'd get into an engrossing read. The only part of the plot I didn't enjoy was something character related. I guessed the villain from the beginning so there wasn't much unexpected stuff happening.

After finishing Witch Hunt, I kind of love the world. This is the second book in the series but each book is about new characters so it isn't necessary to read the first book (I didn't). It was obvious to me though that the setting is somewhere with a lot of room for great stories. There's so many possibilities in this world. I would have enjoyed a few more details about the magical details but that didn't take away from the fun. It's been a while since I read about witches and now I'm wondering why it's been so long.

If you're looking for a light and fun read with a bit of magic, danger, and love, you should try Witch Hunt. 3 stars,

***

The Weekly Progress (Sucky Last Week and ALL the Ebooks Edition)

I wasn't feeling very well last week. I signed up for too many things and it was too much. I also didn't feel very well, so it wasn't a very good week. However, you guys on the blog were incredible. Cover Wars was a true battle. Thank you all for voting! I'll be posting the new Cover Wars soon. I didn't read much last week either, but I did some on Saturday. Two witchy books perfect for October! 

Books Read

I enjoyed both of these books. There aren't enough (new) books about witches and I've always loved that kind of thing. I'll have a review for both of these posted in Halloween week so stay tuned! 

Currently Reading

I haven't started it so I can't tell you what it's like, but I'm hoping it's good. It sounds like fun. 

Next I'll Be Reading

r

Oh look, more for review ebooks. Uncontrollable is the sequel to Untraceable, so I truly hope I like the first book. Wolf Pact, I'm very excited to read. It's Bliss' story from the Blue Bloods series. 

Random Thoughts

This week I've read entirely on my Kobo. And I loved it. I know, ebooks! There's nothing like holding a book, but after carrying my Kobo everywhere with me all week I started to appreciate it. It's relaxing and light. I can change the font and write notes and find the definition of words I don't know. I don't want to really like it but I do. That doesn't mean I'm not reading print books anymore. I'll probably read them mostly, but ebooks are truly growing on me. I mean the Kobo is so light and pretty! 

Recap

Last week I talked about scary books and creepy stuff for a Book Blogger Confessions post. I also posted a review of, not a YA novel, but something with some good crossover appeal, The Talk-Funny Girl. 

***

The other aspect of the title for this post is sucky last week. I didn't post near anything I wanted to post. I wish I could say I'm anticipating being a little less busy this week, but I'm not. I'm blogging for my city's library and it's Teen Author Week so I'll be covering those, and it's also my birthday on Tuesday. Overall, busy but I hope I can manage at least a couple posts. Anyway, thanks for visiting! Have a great week!