Review: Every Last Breath (The Dark Elements #3) by Jennifer L. Armentrout (Series Ender Challenge #6)

This book I had to buy as soon as it came out, even though I just now got around to reading it!  I finally went ahead and picked it up over some other books I was thinking about reading, so that I could go ahead and add another book to my series ender challenge total.  As always, I just loved the book, and loved getting more time with my one of my favorite book boyfriends, Roth.  If you haven't read the first two, White Hot Kiss and Stone Cold Touch, then you should probably click on the titles in this sentence and read those reviews first, because this will have spoilers for the first books.

Well, as we left off in the last one, we found out who the Lilin was.  And it had taken over the body of someone so close to Layla, Sam.  They were able to get away from it in the meetup at the beginning, partly because they found out that hurting the Lilin also hurt Layla.  Layla learns that the souls that the Lilin takes don't just go where they should, like Sam's should go to heaven, they go to hell.  Layla's new mission, until she can figure out a way to fight the Lilin, is to save Sam's soul from hell.  To do that, she finds out she needs to talk to Death.  Roth's friend/co-hort Cayman, helps her figure out how to do it.  At the same time, Cayman tells Layla that she needs to hurry up and decide who she wants to be with, who she truly loves, Roth, or Zayne.  If you know me, I've been team Roth the whole time.  And I was not disappointed.  Sorry, a bit of a spoiler, but it happens early on in the story, so even as I read, I was always wondering if something would happen to take Roth away, he is on the in trouble list with his boss, you know who.  And in that case, would she be able to return to Zayne? 

Layla also decides to get her first tattooed familiar, and it is a fox.  Her plan to go to see Death is one that she knows she has to keep a secret from Roth, because there is no way he would let her go.  And she doesn't want him going to hell because of the whole being in trouble thing.  So she and Cayman devise a plan for her to get there.  Now, in the meetup with the Lilin, Layla finds that she has wings with feathers.  She soon learns there is more to the story of her mother, Lillith.  While Zayne is not happy with Layla's decision, he knows that she is still not evil, like the rest of the Wardens may think. And so he does his best to try to keep the "good" guys fighting with her.  Of course those that she knew and was friends with before have never doubted her.  And Zayne's father, who was like a father to Layla himself, also will see the error in his judgement from before. 

There will be more good guys lost, but in the end, Layla and Roth, and Zayne and the others will get to what needs to be done in order to save the human race from an apocalypse and hell on earth. 

A wonderful, fitting end to this story.  So many sexy scenes with Roth and Layla.  I love seeing just what Roth's familiars are like when they're in hell, and what they can change into, especially the kittens!  As always, I'm just led to want to read more of Armentrout's stories, and I will be certain to continue stocking up on them as I can!

Review: Evertrue (Everneath #3) by Brodi Ashton (Series Ender Challenge #5)

This is a book that I'm way behind on reading.  I got a copy through the YA Book Exchange website before it closed down.  The first book I got as an egalley, and really enjoyed.  You can read my review of it here:  Everneath.  I read the 2nd book as part of my September is for Sequels Challenge back in 2013.  I had won an e-book copy of it, and you can read my review of it here:  Everbound.  Now, of course since this is a review of the final book in the trilogy, there will be spoilers for the first two books for sure.  So you might want to stop reading now if you haven't started reading either of them yet.  I feel like this was for sure a good way to end a trilogy.  For the most part I was very happy with it.

In the last book, Nikki was able to rescue her boyfriend Jack.  Unfortunately Cole wasn't being quite as helpful as he'd seemed.  Or he was, but he'd done it for his own selfish reasons, he wanted to take over the Underworld by making Nikki his queen.  During the rescue mission he forced Nikki to feed off of him enough that she became the same as him, an Everliving.  And while she is now home with Jack and trying to get back to being a normal high school girl, she starts having issues.  She knows she needs to feed off of a soul now, but even though Jack offers to let her feed off of him, it doesn't seem to work.  They can't find  Cole, even though they know he has Nikki's heart.  But when they try to steal her heart back from his apartment, all of a sudden, Cole shows back up.  He is in Nikki's summer class, but looks different to everyone, except her, she still knows it is him.  He tells her that she will slowly need to feed more and more, and can only feed on the person who has her heart, which is Cole.  And eventually the only way she will be able to stay alive is to go do the 100 year feed in the Everneath.  But things go wrong for Cole, and when the Everneath goes into a fighting mode, the Queen not giving up easily, Nikki and Jack will need to go down and fight.  To save Nikki's soul, as well as to try to destroy the Everneath if they can.  In a way they get Cole to help them, with or without his knowledge of their true plans.

The ending is happy for the most part.  Of course there are some losses, and not everything goes as planned.  But it is good to see that love can win, and to find that while Jack does love her, Cole really has as well.  A good conclusion to a good series.  And now I'm eager to read what the author has coming out next!

Review: End of Days (Penryn and the End of Days #3) by Susan Ee (Series Ender Challenge #4)

This is a series that I really have loved, and the ending was to me, the perfect way to end the trilogy.  I was first introduced to the series when I attended my first BEA back in 2012 and I got a copy of the first book, Angelfall.  I won a copy of the 2nd book about 2 years ago, but silly me, I didn't get around to reading World After until this past year.  I've started keeping a book up in my bedroom to read in case I don't want to mess with bringing my Nook upstairs, or whatever book I'm reading at the time.  Plus paperbacks are good to read when I'm taking a bubble bath.  As with the other books in this series, I feel like once I picked this up, I was sucked right back into the story.  For the most part it kind of updated me on everything that had happened before, but without any info dumps or other going back in flashbacks, etc.  Now, if you haven't read the first two, you should go click on the link above of the one you are ready to read and read that review. Because I can't promise there won't be any spoilers for those books in my review of this final book.

This book picks up basically right where we left off in the 2nd book.  Penryn is with Raffe.  He has recovered his angel wings, and needs to find someone to reattach them and take off the demon wings he has because of Beliel.  Beliel has been captured and he tries to tell Penryn that Raffe isn't quite the good guy she seems to think he is.  And so Beliel shows Penryn a memory having her touch him, where he pulls her into the underworld.  She sees him without eyes, and sees him being tortured by the demons who are there.  But when she steps back, a hellion comes out of the memory with her.

Her sister Paige is kind of the leader of the locust creatures that Uriel had created to start a plague among the humans and begin the apocalypse.  But there is one of them out there, they call him white streak, who wants to take control. And so there will be a fight for Paige to gain control, and be able to try to use them to help the humans.  Penryn must convince the humans in the Resistance to give her sister, and her crazy mother, a chance to help.

Penryn and Raffe decide to go into Beliel's memory and pull out the other Watchers, the ones who will follow Raffe in his campaign against Uriel.  Through this Penryn finds out just what made Beliel as bitter as he is.  Bringing the angels back isn't as helpful though, as they'd hoped.  It turns out that the competition chosen to decide between Raffe and Uriel is a hunt, of humans.  So while Raffe wants Penryn to go and hide until it is over, she will refuse.  She will do what she can to try to save the other humans, convince them this is their last chance to stand against the angels that have destroyed their lives, and maybe, just maybe, win their freedom back.

But all of this will be a problem for the romance or feelings developing between Raffe and Penryn. The ones that he refuses to give in to, following the rules that landed all his Watchers in the underworld before with their love for "daughters of men."  Because if he succeeds and wins over Uriel, then he will be going back to Heaven, and there will be no more contact most likely between the two.  So not only is Penryn fighting for her life, she is doing it all while knowing that in the end she may lose this angel that she loves.

I love the characters, and I love the chemistry between Raffe and Penryn.  I love the Dee and Dum twins.  Really all the ways that things happen are so good, there is no lack of death or sacrifice on the part of both sides, and the end, the end I loved!  I'm so happy that it ended that way.  Another great angel story, with post-apocalyptic bits and also romance, and science fiction with the creatures that have been created.  Also a quick read, and I highly recommend it to everyone!

Review: Unforgiven (Fallen #5) by Lauren Kate (Series Ender Challenge #3)

First, thanks to Delacorte Publishing and Edelweiss for allowing me to read an egalley of this book.  I just listened to books 2-4 in this series over the past month or so.  And then I saw this pop up on Edelweiss and I was very excited to read it.  I really have to say that I wasn't disappointed, it was a good story, and definitely a good addition to this world.  I did have one issue, that kind of kept it from being a 5 star review on Goodreads, but I'll mention that at the end of my review. 

So Luce and Daniel had their ending in Book 4.  And I really like the way we pretty much got to know how the rest of their story would go.  But how many people kind of wondered about Cam?  Cam, the bad boy, the one who started trying to seduce Luce in the first book.  In book 3, we got a glimpse of a romance that may have led to Cam being the angel he is when we first get to know him. A girl named Lilith, who he had been going to marry a long, long time ago, bibilical days I would guess.  They ended up not getting married because she would only get married in a church as that is what her family would expect. But see we learned in book 4 that the fallen angels could not go into churches.  So since he couldn't do that, they fought, because he wouldn't tell her why he didn't want to get married in the church, and they split up.  Now the story Cam had always told, isn't quite what happened, and we learn the true story in this book.

Cam finds out that Lilith is in hell, because of a deal she made with Lucifer.  And her hell is basically growing up over and over in the worst lives, and never being able to realize her dream, and then once that is over, she starts all over again.  I think that her different hells never last much longer than the amount of time Luce would get before she would die.  Cam decides after all that happened with Luce and Daniel, that maybe he wants to try again with the girl that he's never forgotten.  And so he makes another deal with the devil. That if he can get her to fall in love with him before the current hell she is in ends, he will save her from ever having to go through that again, and also get to be with her.  But if he loses, then he has to go to hell, never to leave, and to be Lucifer's right hand man.

Of course Lilith is in high school, and she is an outcast, no friends, a family with no father, a mother who is not very nice, and a younger brother with life-threatening health issues.  Cam remembers how much music was a part of Lilith before, and as her sees her here, she still loves music.  And so he enters high school, and tries to get her to start a band and perform.  Deep inside Lilith though, is the hate that she doesn't remember, but whenever she sees Cam, there is something in the back of her mind bringing it up.  And just when it seems like things might be going well, Lucifer drops in, and starts setting more obstacles in Cam's way.  Like for one thing, Cam starts aging, pot belly, losing his hair, wrinkles, and even worse, he starts getting goat/demon hooves.  Fortunately he is able to hide his feet in boots.

Cam must overcome all the obstacles and still win Lilith, basically by the prom in this hell she is in.  So many ups and downs, every time Cam seems to be ahead, some new obstacle pops up, usually put into motion by Lucifer.

As I said, a great story, a great way to spend more time with Cam.  While I always rooted for Daniel in the other books, you definitely are rooting for Cam to get the girl this time.  And after what we learned about Lucifer in the last two books, I so wanted to be able to step in and punch him every time he caused problems.

Okay, the one thing I didn't like, well I don't feel like I got a good closure, don't know what happens to the two at the end of the book like we did with Luce and Daniel.  Will they get to be together?  On Earth?  In hell?  In heaven?  I need to know!  I would love another book, although I'm not quite sure that it would take a full novel to finish the things I want to know.  Not a cliffhanger ending, just not all the things I want to know.  This is a great series, and I can't wait until next fall when the movie for the first book comes out in theaters.

2015 Series Ender Challenge

 

I really try not to join into challenges this late in the year, but this one just fits so well with books I've already read, as well as my September Sequels Challenge, that I had to go ahead and join in.  Here are the rules:

Challenge Guidelines:

1. This challenge will run from January 1, 2015 until December 31, 2015.
2. Anyone can enter. You don’t have to have a blog just as long as you review your books somewhere: on your blog if you have one, Amazon, Goodreads, Shelfari, etc.
3. Any genre, length, or format is acceptable as long as it is the last book in a series where all books in the series have been published and no more books are currently intended to be published in the series. If an author makes a decision somewhere during the year to add on to the series, we will count both the original last book in the series and the “new last” book in the series assuming the author isn’t going to write more than one additional book. Last book published in a series doesn’t count if more books are expected to be published.
4. You can list your series enders ahead of time or do a singular wrap up post. If you decide to list them up front, feel free to change them throughout the year as necessary.
5. When you sign up in the linky, please use the direct link to your post about joining the 2015 Series Enders Reading Challenge. If you don’t have a blog, please post about it on Facebook or Twitter and include that direct link as your sign up.
6. You can sign up until December 15, 2015. This allows you to join the challenge at any time during the year.
7. On the 25th of every month, we will post a wrap up on both Somewhere Only We Know and Words Fueled by Love with a giveaway and a place for you to link up your reviews for the month. The monthly giveaway will be open until the next wrap up post goes up (ex. From January 25th 2015, to February 25th 2015). For each link to a review, you will get an (1) entry into a drawing for that giveaway. This will be open internationally.
8. Monthly giveaway prizes will be an e-book of your choice up to $10 (USD).
9. If you miss a wrap-up post and giveaway, you can link your review the next month. Please do not try to link to one review twice. We will be verifying these.
10. December will be the wrap up for the entire year. All reviews linked from January through December will be entered into a Grand Prize giveaway.
11. You don’t have to follow Somewhere Only We Know or Words Fueled by Love to participate in the challenge, but you do have to follow both of us in order to be entered in the giveaways.

Levels: (how many series enders you are planning to read)
Level 1: 1 – 5
Level 2: 5 – 10
Level 3: 10 – 15
Level 4: 15+

I am going to do Level 2.  I've done two so far this year, Mania (The Nightwalkers #3) by J. R. Johansson and Ensnared (Splintered #3) by A.G. Howard.   For my September Sequels Challenge, I have these 3 planned:  Infinite (New Souls #3) by Jodi Meadows, Evertrue (Everneath #3) by Brodi Ashton, and End of Days (Penryn and the End of Days #3) by Susan Ee.  I know that's only 5, but I plan to throw at least one more in, probably either Requiem ( Delirium #3) by Lauren Oliver or Every Last Breath (The Dark Elements #3) by Jennifer L. Armentrout.  If I get any others done, then I may make it to 10. But I'm not going to stress too much about it.

If it sounds good to you, here is how you sign up:
To join the challenge:

1. Write a blog post about joining the 2015 Series Enders Reading Challenge on your blog. For those of you who would like to participate but don’t have a blog, post about it on Facebook or Twitter.
2. In your post, please include: the button, a link back to the sign up page, a link to both Somewhere Only We Know and Words Fueled by Love, the level you hope to achieve, and (optional) a list of the series you hope to complete.
3. Place the button for the challenge in your sidebar (use the “grab this code” at the bottom of the post here).
4. Link up in the linky using the direct link to your post/tweet/etc.

Review: Mania (The Night Walkers #3) by J.R. Johansson (Series Ender Challenge #2)

First, I have to thank the author, as well as Netgalley and Flux publishing.  I first came to love this series back in January of 2014 when I read Insomnia, the first one, after winning it in a giveaway.  I got the 2nd book, Paranoia, as an egalley from Netgalley last summer, when I was not fortunate enough to get to meet the author on the last day of BEA.  A couple weeks ago I got an email from the author asking if I was still interested in reading and reviewing this third and final book in the series.  Of course I hopped on the chance!!  She emailed me a copy, and right about the same time I remembered that I'd also seen it on Netgalley and requested it there as well.  And I have to say I loved this book as much as I loved the first two, which if you click on their titles, you can go to my reviews.  Obviously if you haven't read those two, most of what I say her won't make sense, and will be spoilery. But if you have read the first two, then I shouldn't be giving anything away with my summary.

This book not only is back in Parker's life, but we get to also see from his brother Jack's viewpoint.  When the last book ended, the Takers' headquarters had been destroyed by Parker's and Jack's father.  Unfortunately their father also died.  The good news is that supposedly their father had figured out a new type of vaccine that would help the Takers to be able to dream and sleep.  So that they wouldn't have to take over people's lives like they did.   Unfortunately the leader of the Takers, Cooper now that his father is dead, still wants the elixir they had been given that would help them to be able to take over people for good and as they put it, be gods.  Chloe, Cooper's sister, also a Taker, has now started to go along with Jack and Parker and Finn. When she let Finn go, her family basically disowned her.  And now all she wants is to help make the serum that will give her a normal life.  But their dad didn't just leave instructions.  He left clues to get to bits and pieces of it until they had it all added together.  And along the way they get one more thing to deal with, Parker gets kidnapped and taken by Cooper and his group.  Once there the scientists start injecting him with all kinds of things that make his life miserable, to the point where he can only hope to die.  Jack is given 10 days to make the original serum, which his dad didn't leave any instructions for.  So of course the time is spent doing their best to find all that is needed for the new "cure" in time to save Parker.

Another great story.  I like both viewpoints, really helped to see just what was going on, as well as getting a look inside some of the characters you might not otherwise have had time to learn about.  And it was so great getting back to Finn.  I love Finn.  His funny t-shirts, all of it.  So it was really fun to have him back.  There is lots of danger in this.  Times we don't know for sure if someone has betrayed the group.  Or if someone else might be able to help even though they are on the wrong side.  I liked all the different/new ways they were able to do things in dreams, and even finding more about what started all of the different things they're dealing with.  The ending was pretty set, although I can see that maybe, some day, there could be another book, and I would not be opposed to that!  A great finish to a favorite series of mine.   

Review: Ensnared (Splintered #3) by A.G. Howard (Series Ender Challenge #1)

I got an ARC of this from trading through the YA Book Exchange with Jane from Much Ado About Books.  I didn't get around to reading it last weekend though, about a week after I got it.  But once I picked it up, it was all I could do to put it down in order to do things like sleep, work, drive, etc.  This review is going to be soooooo hard!  I loved it so much, but a lot of what I loved would be spoilers for other people, and I really don't want to ruin it for anyone.  So I'll do my best to be unspoilery.  Of course, if you haven't read the first two, I won't be able to help you with that, there will be things from those books.

We begin where the last one had left off.  Alyssa is on the train on her way to try to get the entrances to Wonderland opened back up.  Her dad has learned that all of the things that made her and her mother "crazy" are true.  And that at one time he was a part of all of it.  Alyssa's heart feels messed up thanks to when Red had been sharing her body.  Her mom is stuck in Wonderland, and Jeb and Morpheus are trapped in AnyElsewhere where they landed with Red.  There is an iron dome over AnyElsewhere that keeps magic from being used.  And Alyssa is so worried for Jeb, afraid that Morpheus either won't protect him, or will do something to keep Alyssa from ever getting to spend time with Jeb.  We learned in the last book that Alyssa and Morpheus's child will be what is needed to save Wonderland, to help with the imagination and dreams.  But Alyssa wants a life with Jeb as well.

Alyssa's father comes from a family that protects the two entrances of AnyElsewhere to keep things living there from getting out.  With her newly met Uncle, she and her father go in to try to save Jeb.  Only Jeb has changed.  Something about going into the world at the same time as Morpheus and Red has changed him, and he is cold to Alyssa.  He seems to be unable to forgive her.  While Morpheus has done his best to protect Jeb, Morpheus has lost his magic to Jeb it seems.  And along with that, he has told Jeb everything detail of the things that he and Alyssa have, making Jeb so unforgiving as he doesn't hear the whole truths, only what Morpheus chooses to tell him.

To save the world, they must capture Red, get through to Wonderland, and recreate all that has been destroyed.  But in the end everything will come with sacrifices. Some that may seem too great to survive, will in the end be just what is needed and even make their lives better in their own ways.

Can I just say, wow. The heartbreak, the sadness, the wonderful world, the beautiful imagery, the layer upon layer upon layer of story.  Things may turn out the way we want, but not in the way we think.  As I mentioned above, everyone has to give things up.  Even to a point, Morpheus.  One thing that I loved the most, I can't really even share, because I don't want to spoil that part about the ending for those of you who haven't read it yet!  And what is even more exciting is that the author posted today that there is a possibility of a follow up novella, here is the evidence from Twitter:

If I hadn't been at work on Wednesday when I saw this, there would have been some yelling and screaming going on!!  I need more of this world!  One thing that tells you how much I loved this, everyone knows that I never have time to re-read anything anymore.  But I want so much to go back and re-read all three of these books because I know I missed out on beautiful images from the land of Wonderland because I was in such a hurry to read and know what would happen.  The way the author writes is so wonderful, so beautiful, such an imaginative wonderful world.  Better even than the original stories that inspired her.