January 2017 Book of Choice Giveaway Hop

Thanks to Lonna at FLYLeF for hosting this giveaway.  I'm opening this giveaway up internationally to anyone who is able to accept a book from either The Book Depository, or else an Amazon gift card.  You can enter in the Rafflecopter below, and then hop along to the other blogs listed underneath that. 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

2017 Challenges Announcement Post

Well, tomorrow a new year starts.  And everyone is hoping for 2017 to be better than 2016 seemed to be.  I haven't quite figured up how I've done on all my 2016 challenges yet, I figure I'll do that tomorrow. I do know that I will not be hosting any challenges next year, probably not even my usual September is for Sequels.  But today I want to share the different challenges I plan to participate in for the coming year for sure.

The Blogger Shame challenge is a cheeky way to admit our guilt...and go about fixing it. Tackling those review books that have slipped through the cracks over the years. Any review book over 4 months past due is game!  This is hosted by Herding Cats and Burning Soup.  I am going to try to work on the books that I downloaded to Kindle from Netgalley, because they don't expire, and that way by participating in this, I will also help my Netgalley score!  There will be two check-ins for this challenge: 

Mid Year Check In: First week of June

Wrap Up Post: Last week of December

• My goal is 4 books for 2017:  Lair of Dreams by Libba Bray, Places No One Knows by Brenna Yovanoff, The Giant by Lex Thomas, Stealing Snow by Danielle Paige

This challenge is to help get us discussing books and book blogging, so talk about whatever you want as long as it’s relevant to book blogging. Discussions can be book related or book blogging related (or generally blogging related—no discussions about things that are completely off-topic like travel or fashion, etc). Discussions can also be about you personally if it’s a get-to-know-you type post.  This one is hosted by Feed Your Fiction Addiction and It Starts at Midnight.  I tried this one last year, but didn't quite reach my goal,  so I'm going to set it a little lower this year.

• My goal is to do 4 discussion posts throughout the year, which makes me working towards the Discussion Dabbler level of 1-10

This challenge is hosted by Somewhere Only We Know and Words Fueled by Love and is for all of you series readers who are scared to death of that last book in the series. You anxiously await it. You stalk it. You get your hands on it as soon as possible. But then…you put off reading it for fear that it might not be everything you thought it would be. Or, maybe you just have a backlog of series started and you need to finish that last book.   I fall into the last group, I just never seem to get to the last one at times.  Partly because of all the new books coming out.

• I plan to do level 3 and get 12 done.  Here are the series I'm hoping to finish:  The Taking by Kimberly Derting, Covenant series by JLA, The Last Star (5th Wave series) by Rick Yancey, The Crown (The Selection series) by Kiera Cass, The Black Key (The Lone City series) by Amy Ewing, Untamed (Splintered series) by AG Howard, Dead Ever After (Sookie Stackhouse series) by Charlaine Harris, Eternally Yours (Immortal Beloved series) by Cate Tiernan, Fire and Ash (Rot and Ruin series) by Jonathan Maberry, Rogue (Croak series) by Gina Damico, Third Strike (The Slayer Chronicles) by Heather Brewer, Reborn (Altered series) by Jennifer Rush, and Library of Souls (Miss Peregrine's series) by Ransom Riggs

This challenge that is hosted by My Reader's Block ties in well with the fact that I have a whole 5 shelf bookcase that is full of TBR books. And not just nice even rows of books on each shelf, but books piled in until there is no room to set anymore books on the shelves.  I have over 300 physical books, last time I counted, waiting for me to read.  Books I've won, from past BEAs, books I HAD to buy when they came out, or books I found for a great deal at either Half Price Bookstores or Dollar Tree stores.  I've decided to start out with the lowest level and if I do more, I do more.  Some of these will be for another challenge too.

• Pike's Peak: Read 12 books from your TBR pile/s:  Here are my proposed 12 books:  The Countdown by Kimberly Derting, The Crown by Kiera Cass, Untamed by AG Howard, Dead Ever After by Charlaine Harris, Eternally Yours by Cate Tiernan, Fire and Ash by Jonathan Maberry, Rogue by Gina Damico, Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Cordova, Queen of Hearts by Colleen Oakes, Lair of Dreams by Libba Bray, Tease by Sophie Jordan, and Maplecroft by Cherie Priest

If I can get more read than those 12, I definitely will.  

I participated in this challenge last year.  Hosted by Because Reading and Trips Down Imagination Road, it is a challenge where you can set different types of goals, blogging, writing, reading, and even personal.  This year I've chosen blogging and writing goals.

1. Blogging:   Label all post titles to whether it is an ARC, e-book, or an audiobook.  Comment on at least 7 different blogs a week - which includes answering all my own blog comments every day instead of letting them add up.  Get an image created to show the number of stars I give a book.  I have an idea, just need an artist to do it for me.  Had my sister in mind, but I suspect that is no longer an option after a falling out we had in November, not that I had any idea when/if she might ever get to it anyway. 
2. Writing:  Finish my NaNoWriMo story from several years ago,  Digging Up Love, and see if I can also finish this past year's NaNo, Fault Lines.   Write a short story every week according to a challenge my writing partner and I have thought about doing.  Set up at least one hour a week that is dedicated to writing every week.

I will set up a Goodreads goal as soon as the website opens it up for the 2017 goals, and I plan to set it at 250 books for the year.

Whew!  Those are all my challenges for 2017.  While you're here, today is the last day to enter my Let's Get 2016 Over With Giveaway Part 4.  But come back on Sunday for a new giveaway, Book of Choice, sponsored by FLYLeF.

Top 10 of 2016 - Day 5: Books I'm Looking Forward to in 2017

Welcome to Day 5!  Today's topic is what are the top 10 books you're looking forward to in 2017.  This challenge is sponsored by Fiktshun, Tales of a Ravenous Reader, Two Chicks on Books, and Dark Faerie Tales.  If you decide to join in, make sure to sign up at one of their sites on the linky.  This is a bit of a hard one, I came up with about 15 or 16. But I'm going to try to stick with ones that have covers already. 

1.

2.

3.

Since these are the last two in the same series, I'm putting them both as one spot on my top 10.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

The ones that I really wanted to mention but don't have covers are:

• Buns (Hudson Valley #3) by Alice Clayton
• One Dark Throne (Three Dark Crowns #2) by Kendare Blake
• Head-Tripped (Ad Agency #2) by Nicole Archer
• Reign of Serpents (Blood of Gods and Royals #3) by Eleanor Herman 

And while you're here, make sure you go enter my Let's Get 2016 Over With a Giveaway - Part 4.

Winter 2017 Comment Challenge Sign-Up

I really enjoyed participating in this over the summer, it helped me meet some great new bloggers! So in order to help myself continue meeting more bloggers and make myself keep getting out there and commenting on other blogs like I hope other people will comment on mine, I've signed up once again to participate in this Challenge hosted by Lonna @ FLYLēF and Alicia @ A Kernel of Nonsense.  If you didn’t sign-up for January, but would like to participate in February, look for the sign-up post to go up on January 2nd. Sign-ups are open until January 26th. Let’s start the new year off by spreading lots of comment love and make meaningful connections with other book bloggers. 

Review: Prude by Jordan S. Gray

Book info:
Title:  Prude
Author:  Jordan S. Gray
Series:  Labeled #1
Genre:  New Adult Romance
Published:  September 12th, 2016
Source:  free copy from Xpresso book tours for review
My rating:  5 stars

 The name of this is what caught my attention first, and so I asked to read a copy for review.  And as you can see by my 5 star rating, I loved it!  So, if you promise not to give my secret away, I downloaded this while I was at work one day, and I actually read about 36% just while I was at work that day.  I couldn't stop!  This book made me tear up, it made me laugh, I just loved it!

The book starts with one of the main characters, Rebecca, gets dumped by her boyfriend in front of a bunch of people on campus, and one thing he does is calls her a prude.  Right afterwards, another guy comes up, and he tries to ask her out, but he's only doing it for a bet.  Shortly after that, she gets to one of her classes and it turns out that the jerk who asked her out on a bet, Derek, is in that class.  Even worse, they end up getting paired together on a class project.  
Now Rebecca just wants to keep her perfect GPA, and when Derek picks a presentation to do, instead of a paper like she wants to do, she is so worried about if it will cause her grade to go down.  She's not good with speaking in front of people.  

Of course, Derek continues to tease her about being a prude, and in a way she keeps acting that way.  Rebecca does things that make me crazy, like spooning with him one night, and then telling him the next morning that she just wants to be friends.  And then he is really secretive about his family, and really you have no idea why.  Towards the end something comes around that scared me that it might be another bet. But the way it goes definitely makes the last 10% edge of your seat.  I read this book in 2 days.  There were gushy romantic parts that made me smile like a love-sick idiot.  The kind that I love in a book.  In the end I was even more happy to find out that there will be another book featuring one of the other characters in the book.  I'm actually getting ready to read and review it soon!  

If you enjoy a hard to put down read with lots of emotional ups and downs, and an HEA, this is the book for you! 

Top 10 of 2016 - Best Book Boyfriend

Welcome to Day 4! Today's topic is best book boyfriend, which is a fun one for me because this year I found my top book boyfriend ever, followed by the runner up for the top one EVER!  This challenge is sponsored by Fiktshun, Tales of a Ravenous Reader, Two Chicks on Books, and Dark Faerie Tales.  If you decide to join in, make sure to sign up at one of their sites on the linky.  Today my choices are in order for the top two, then after that they are just a kind of random order.

1.

Nate Sawyer.  I love this guy.  I loved him so much that I made a tshirt I had to wear to show the author at NOLA Storycon back in October.  I can't imagine ever loving any book boyfriend more than him.  

2.

Mal Ericson.  This guy makes me laugh, is so very sexy and attentive to his woman.  Along with the book above, I pick this book up and reread it constantly.  It sits on my bedside table for that exact reason.  While he is hot on this cover, in the book his  hair is probably not my normal preferred style for a guy, and when we meet him in the first book in the series he supposedly has a nose ring, but we never hear about it in this book.  But I'd be okay with it, as much as I love him.  I want to try to make a shirt about  him for when I get to meet the author at Apollycon in March.  So stay tuned for that.

3.

Aelyx, my favorite alien since Daemon Black from the Lux series by JLA.

4.

Still  love Eight Beaufort.

5.

I know, I know, so many of you can't stand the way Reed is in this book, and honestly, I may actually have liked his brother Easton better.  But still.

6. and 7.

Jackson and Death.  I love them both.  I wish that Evie could pick Jackson until he dies, since he is mortal, and then she could spend the rest of her time with Death.  But I'm not done with the series, so maybe that will still happen?

8.

Nash Donovan.  Now, I'm not a huge fan of the guy on the cover, and really I love all the Marked Men, but Nash was my favorite in the series, so he gets a spot in the list.

9.

So, while Daemon Black and Roth have both been my JLA book boyfriends, I finally met Seth and Aiden this year.  And, I know he's the bad guy, and I do love Aiden too, but Seth totally wins.  And I think I'm going to get to meet the model for Seth at Apollycon!  

10.

I normally don't think about Italian guys, even though I am part Italian, but Marcello definitely won me over.

Those are my top book boyfriends of 2016.  Who are your top boyfriends?

Also, while you're here, there's still a few days left to go enter my Let's Get 2016 Over With Giveaway - Part 4.

Cover Reveal: The Talisman Chronicles by T.M. Franklin

My new release, The Talisman Chronicles, is coming on January 17th - and it doesn't have only ONE cover - it has SIX!

The Talisman Chronicles is a six-part serial, which will be released every Tuesday from January 17th-February 14th. It builds off the Amazon best-selling short story WINDOW and tells the story of a group of teenagers who find some unusual items in an old chest . . . items that give them incredible powers.

But they receive those gifts for a reason. And one day soon, they'll need to use them to fight for us all.

Add The Talisman Chronicles to your Goodreads TBR HERE.

Grab WINDOW, The Talisman Chronicles, Episode 1 HERE.

Or follow T.M. Franklin on AMAZON to be notified when the books are available.

And if you'd like to join the Talisman Chronicles Release Day Party - with giveaways all day long on January 17th, join the Enchanted Publications Facebook Event page. It's going to be a blast!

Top 10 of 2016 - Day 3: Best Debuts

Welcome to day 3!  Today’s topic is Best ________ Of 2016 (Readers/Bloggers choice. Please fill in the blank with ONE or more of these topics - Villains, Contemporaries, Dual POV's, Novellas, Adult titles, New Adult titles, Love Triangles, Couples, Bad Boys or Debuts. REMEMBER - this list MUST be from books you've READ in 2016)  I chose best debuts, because I read several this year that really blew me away.  So I tried to pick ones that were not only ones I read this year, but were debuts this year.  This challenge is sponsored by Fiktshun, Tales of a Ravenous Reader, Two Chicks on Books, and Dark Faerie Tales.  If you decide to join in, make sure to sign up at one of their sites on the linky.  Okay, here we go, most likely in no particular order.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Okay, technically this didn't come out in 2016, but it was this author's "debut" story, and I read it this year, so I'm counting it.

9.

10.

Again, this might not technically be a debut, because it is by two authors who are already published. But this was the first they published under this pseudonym, so I'm going to use it to round out my top 10.  

Hey, while you're here,  make sure you stop by Let's Get 2016 Giveaway - Part 4 and enter!

Waiting on Wednesday: Just Dreaming (The Silver Trilogy #3) by Kerstin Gier

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine where we spotlight upcoming releases that we're eagerly awaiting.  I've chosen the final book in a trilogy that I can't wait for!  I saw it a month or two ago on another blog with a cover finally.  I've already emailed the publishers for an ARC, even though they probably won't make one.  The firs two books, Dream a Little Dream, and Dream On, were really good.  I also loved the Ruby Red trilogy by this author.  Here's the blurb from Goodreads for this final book:

A dream traveler faces the greatest challenge she's yet encountered in this gripping third and final book of the Silver trilogy.

The course of dream travel never did run smooth—at least, not in Liv Silver's experience. Able to visit other people's dreams (whether they want her to or not), Liv has solved mysteries, unearthed difficult truths, fought madmen, and escaped life-threatening peril, all from the comfort of her own bed. But Liv's troubles are just beginning.

A rocky romance, a malicious blogger with a hidden identity, a wedding, and a classmate (or two) dead-set on revenge all await Liv in this action-packed conclusion to the Silver trilogy.


Have you read any books by this author?  How about this series?  What book or books are you eagerly awaiting this week?

And while you're here, make sure you go enter my Let's Get 2016 Over With Giveaway - Part 4.

Let's Get 2016 Over With a Giveaway - Part 4 (US Only)

Week 4 starting now, and will end earlier since Sunday is the first of 2017!

Okay, 2016 has really started to end the year with a bang! And not a good one!  Since my last giveaway, we've lost both George Michael and Carrie Fisher!  People are going about trying to save Betty Green now.   We've lost so many other big names this year, Gene Wilder, David Bowie, and Prince just to name a few.  I'm so glad that I got the chance to see Prince in concert once in my lifetime.  Not to mention that today they mentioned that Stan Lee just turned 94, and I hope that doesn't jinx him!!!  There has been such craziness with politics, I won't go into specifics, as that is part of the problem, but it's been so crazy that family members have been split because of this.

I've had some good things happen, I got to go to the NOLA Storycon and meet some of my favorite authors, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Samantha Young, and Jay Crownover were my very very favorites.  I won NaNoWriMo for the 2nd time by writing my full 50,000 words.  I've had a few publishers start sending me things without me having to reach out to them first.  So I feel like my blog might finally be getting where I want it to be.  I've been reading a ton of books this year.  I bumped my goal on Goodreads up over 50 books for the year compared to last year.  I got a new tattoo. I got picked to be a volunteer at Apollycon 2017!  So hopefully next year I can add that to a good thing, especially since I cannot wait to meet Anna Todd, the books that I am in love with and got a tattoo for.  Not to mention Kylie Scott is going to be there, and I am so in love with her books!

One thing that I totally need to work on is all the books I have that I don't know when I'm going to get to.  I've been taking a lot of them to my school library.  I figure that way they'll get the chance for other people, my students, to read them, and when I have time or am in the mood for one of them, I'll still know where they are to check out and read.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of books I have that are ARCs or else my library already has, or maybe they're not in good enough condition that I can put them in my library.  And this is where I'm setting up a giveaway.  Below are the books that I'm looking to get rid of through a giveaway, or there a few newer ARCs I might be willing to trade for other ARCs if you want them.

 I have one last item you can pick as one of your two books.  A year ago my sister asked me if I wanted to buy a coloring book that a friend of hers had created.  It's very neat, but it's not really my style of coloring book, but it is so darn cool!  If you're interested, you can pick this as one of your two choices!  Here is a picture of the coloring book:

So, if you see any ARCs you'd like to trade for, you can always let me know in the comments.  Otherwise, what I plan to do is pick two winners every week for the rest of December, and I am going to fill a box with 4 or 5 books from the pictures above.  Newer, older, ARCs, finished, etc.  They will most likely be surprise boxes. But we'll see how I feel when I draw the winners, I may let them come pick what four books they want!  Or at least pick one or two to go with two that I pick.

And in each box, I will include some swag and book samplers I have.  Here are pictures of the swag I have.  I would be willing to trade any of it for ARCs I'm looking for as well!

You can see some temporary tattoos in the picture on the left.  Along with some post cards, and an Epic Reads book of new titles.

So, I think I know what new goals and challenges I will participate in for my blog next year, although I do still need to reflect on how 2016 went.  One thing I haven't had time for is as many posts with GIFs as I enjoy.  So enjoy this one, and then go enter the contest in the Rafflecopter below it!

a Rafflecopter giveaway