Hey Everyone! 

Thank you for stopping  by my stop in the SAVE ME Blog Tour by Jenny Elliot!

Title: Save Me

Author: Jenny Elliot

Publisher: Swoon Reads

Published: 01.06.15

Pages: 309

Acquired: Arc from the publisher

My Rating: 3.5 out of 5

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Synopsis:

Debut-novelist Jenny Elliott’s thrilling romance, chosen by readers, writers, and publishers for the first list in the new Swoon Reads imprint, pours on the tension and danger in an addictive combination that will keep you turning pages!

Something strange is going on in the tiny coastal town of Liberty, Oregon. Cara has never seen a whale swim close enough for her to touch it—let alone knock her into the freezing water. Fortunately, cute newcomer David is there to save her, and the rescue leads to a bond deeper than Cara ever imagined.

But then she learns something about David that changes everything, and Cara is devastated. She turns to her best friend for support, but Rachel has changed. She’s suddenly into witchcraft, and is becoming dangerously obsessed with her new boyfriend….

Cara has lost her best friend, discovered that her soul mate is off limits, and has attracted the attention of a stalker. But she’s not completely alone. Her mysterious, gorgeous new friend Garren is there to support her. But is Garren possibly too perfect?

My Review:

There are certain books that you just have to be in the mood to read. SAVE ME by Jenny Elliot was one of those books for me. I attempted to pick them it up a few weeks back and could just not get into it. But I picked it up again a few days ago, determined to give it one more try and I am glad that I did! 

SAVE ME had by far one of the best first chapters I have ever read. There must have been something wrong with me the first time I picked this up, because I don't know how I could have read through that chapter and not have been hooked. 

On top of an amazing first chapter, other great things about this book was the mixture of all the different elements of the story.  Sometimes mixing different genres together can turn into a chaotic mess, but I thought SAVE ME was executed very well. I specifically liked how certain aspects of the story line kept you guessing until the very end. 

My only real issue with this book was the insta-love. Our main character Cara falls in love within the first few pages. Yes, it is not the perfect relationship and there are obstacles in the way, but that relationship took off a little too quickly for my taste.  But as this being a SWOON READS book, I guess that was to be expected. 

All in all this was a great debut for Jenny Elliot and I will definitely be picking up more of her work in the future! 

GIVEAWAY!

The wonderful people at Swoon Reads have been gracious enough to offer 

a copy to one lucky reader.

Enter below!

Ends 02/01/15

US ONLY 

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Another #FFBC event has came to a close! 

A very special thank you to Sarah Ockler for allowing us to host her 

new book #scandal! 

#scandalby Sarah Ockler

Publisher: Simon Pulse
Release Date: June 17th 2014
Rate: 4.0

Synopsis:

Lucy’s learned some important lessons from tabloid darling Jayla Heart’s all-too-public blunders: Avoid the spotlight, don’t feed the Internet trolls, and keep your secrets secret. The policy has served Lucy well all through high school, so when her best friend Ellie gets sick before prom and begs her to step in as Cole’s date, she accepts with a smile, silencing about ten different reservations. Like the one where she’d rather stay home shredding online zombies. And the one where she hates playing dress-up. And especially the one where she’s been secretly in love with Cole since the dawn of time.

When Cole surprises her at the after party with a kiss under the stars, it’s everything Lucy has ever dreamed of… and the biggest BFF deal-breaker ever. Despite Cole’s lingering sweetness, Lucy knows they’ll have to ’fess up to Ellie. But before they get the chance, Lucy’s own Facebook profile mysteriously explodes with compromising pics of her and Cole, along with tons of other students’ party indiscretions. Tagged. Liked. And furiously viral.

By Monday morning, Lucy’s been branded a slut, a backstabber, and a narc, mired in a tabloid-worthy scandal just weeks before graduation. 

Lucy’s been battling undead masses online long enough to know there’s only one way to survive a disaster of this magnitude: Stand up and fight. Game plan? Uncover and expose the Facebook hacker, win back her best friend’s trust, and graduate with a clean slate.

There’s just one snag—Cole. Turns out Lucy’s not the only one who’s been harboring unrequited love...

Why do I read YA? Lately there is a lot of controversy over adults reading YA. As an almost 30 year old adult, I read YA for many reasons. One of the reasons I read YA can be found in this book. It has been a couple of months since I read a book that made me think. And this book did exactly that. During my own high school days social media was in his initiation stages with dial up modems and AOL trial hours, screen names and instant messaging. Scandals did occur and went around the school with good old fashioned word of mouth advertisement. Fast forward twelve years and social media has expanded and became a completely new, sometimes fun and sometimes scary dynamic. And this story did a great job at opening our eyes and making us understand the danger and harm that can be caused by social media. 

There were several aspects of this book that stood out to me, beyond the over all main scandal described in the synopsis. First off let me say that the author does a wonderful job and capturing the essence of what teenagers are like today. There have been several books in which authors have tried to write like how a teenager would talk, but fail miserably. However to me Sarah Ockler succeeded where others failed. There are also a ton of pop culture references which were fun to read about and made the story feel even more authentic. 

Another aspect of the story that I really enjoyed was the relationship between Cole and Lucy. I know a lot of people felt the relationship aspect of the story was lacking. But I thought that it complemented the story beautifully. To me the romance was not the main point of the story. Yes, it was how our story got started and is a side plot through out the book, but the romance was just the catalyst to the main plot. But throughout it all Cole is there to help Lucy move on from the scandal. This shows his strength of character and him accepting his part in what happened.

But my favorite part of this story, partially because it was one that hit close to home and one in which I could relate to was the relationship between Lucy and her older sister. Yes, I have an older sister and no she is not an actress. But just like Lucy and her sister's relationship, ours did not blossom and become what it is today until we were both older. But just like Lucy's older sister, mine has always been there for me through thick and then some. But unfortunately she not much of a cook, so no mini bunt cakes for me ;) 

Follow the FFBC #scandal blog tour and don't miss anything! Click on the banner to see the tour schedule.

Sarah Ockler is the bestselling author of novels for teens, including The Book of Broken Hearts, Bittersweet, Fixing Delilah, and the critically acclaimed Twenty Boy Summer, a YALSA Teens' Top Ten nominee and IndieNext List pick. Her latest, #scandal, hits the shelves in June 2014. 

Sarah is a champion cupcake eater, coffee drinker, night person, and bookworm. When she's not writing or reading at home in Colorado, she enjoys taking pictures, hugging trees, and road-tripping through the country with her husband, Alex.

Win a prize pack with 4 Signed hardbacks of Sarah Ockler's books: Twenty Boy Summer, Fixing Delilah, Bittersweet, and The Book of Broken Hearts (US Only)

Giveaway is open to US/CAN Only | Must be 13 or older to enter 

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Hey Everyone!

It has been a really long time since I had been able to go to a signing. Unfortunately Nursing school got in the way! But now that it is over I was able to attend not 1 but 2 signing panels this weekend. 

Saturday, February 8, 2014

This signing was at the beautiful Central Library in Downtown Los Angeles. I was really excited for this signing since my friend Courtney who lives down in San Diego was able to drive up to attend it with. Also joining me was my friend Amber and her adorable son Dean. These were the authors who were present.

Unfortunately Robin LaFevers was unable to make it, but I was lucky enough to have met her at a signing last year with Leigh Bardugo.  I had also met Anna Carey at previous event last year, but this was going to be the first time I was going to meet Victoria Schwab, Gretchen McNeal, Melissa De La Cruz, and Margaret Stohl. 

Even though I was excited to meet every single of these amazing authors, I have to admit that I was most excited to meet Melissa De La Cruz. I have been a fan of hers for years, have read almost everything she's ever written, but unfortunately have never been able to make it to one of her signings. 

All the authors were introduced by the amazing head librarian of the Teenscape section of the library. There were some great Q&As and the authors were absolutely hilarious. What I was most interested in was the authors talking about some of their new projects. 

Anna Carey (who btw remembered me from a previous signing- AHHHH :D) has a new book called BlackBird coming out. She couldn't go too much in detail, but she did tell us that it was written in second person. Gretchen McNeal told us about Get Real whose cover was revealed yesterday. Margaret Stohl, who btw is by far one of the funniest authors I have ever met told us about Idols, the sequel of Icons, which she had brought an arc for and was given away in a raffel. She also told us about the new spin-off for the Caster Chronicles. Victoria Schwab spoke a little about her new Middle Grade books, and lastly Melissa De La Cruz talked about and gave away the first book in her new series, The Ring and Crown. 

After about an hour of Q&A we got down to signing! These were the books I got signed for myself! I did also get some books signing for my  partner is crime Patricia and my dear friend Christina from Ensconced in Books. 

 

  

    

     

Sunday, February 9, 2014

This signing was at the Mysterious Galaxy at Redondo Beach. If you live in Southern California and have not been to either of the Mysterious Galaxy locations you MUST GO! I love these Bookstores! At this signing we had 4 amazing authors. Marie Lu, Margaret Stohl,  Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner.

Seeing Margaret Stohl 2 days in a row was an absolute treat! I liked her so much that I finally decided to pick up a copy of Beautiful Creatures just so she can sign it. This was my second time seeing Marie Lu. I attended her signing when Prodigy came out, but had only purchased a copy for a giveaway. This time I bought the box from Amazon and was able to get all them signed. I have YET to read Champion and am dying to know what happens.

And Amie and Meagan were an absolute treat. I had some books for Christina again and Mary (7 in total!) and I waited towards the end of the line since I had so many books to get signed. We had mentioned to them on Twitter that we had a lot of books for them, and Amie had asked me to write out Twitter handles on our name tags. So once I got up there and they saw the twitter handles they were absolutely excited.  And bless them, not only did they sign books for everyone they even signed those beautiful cover posters that I'm sure you have seen on the web.

So here are the goodies I picked up for myself :)

  

   

So whenever my friend Amber has to bring her son to signings with us, she brings a little journal with her that Dean absolutely loves to go to up to the authors and ask them to sign his book for him. And the author's usually have a blast doing it. These were his signatures from this weekend! 

  

  

Okay now on to the GOOD STUFF! You know that I wouldn't go to a signing without thinking about my lovely followers! And since I haven't had any self-hosted giveaways in a while. I decided to make  it a good one. So there are 4 different Prizes to win ! 

**GIVEAWAYS**
Open INT!

1 Signed HB of These Broken Stars

1 Signed HB of Possess

1 Signed PB of Witches of East End

 1 Swag Pack which includes: 

A signed Poster of These Broken Stars,

a signed bookmark of The Unbound, a signed bookmark of Idols

and a singed bookmark of Skylark and a pack of Vicious 

Trading Cards!

   

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE :) 

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