Blog Tour Review with Giveaway: Sparks of Light (Into the Dim #2) by Janet B. Taylor

Book info:

Title:  Sparks of Light  
Author:  Janet B. Taylor
Series:  Into the Dim #2  
Release Date:  August 1st, 2017
Publisher:  Houghton Mifflin
Pages:  448
Formats:  Hardcover, ebook
Find it: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, iBooks, TBD, Goodreads

Synopsis:

For the first time in her life, Hope Walton has friends . . . and a (maybe) boyfriend. She’s a Viator, a member of a long line of time-traveling ancestors. When the Viators learn of a plan to steal a dangerous device from the inventor Nikola Tesla, only a race into the past can save the natural timeline from utter destruction. Navigating the glitterati of The Gilded Age in 1895 New York City, Hope and her crew will discover that high society can be as deadly as it is beautiful.

Book Trailer Courtesy of The YA Book Traveler

 



My Review:
My rating:  5 stars

This sequel to one of my favorite books of 2016, Into the Dim, definitely did not disappoint.  This time the characters have a different time period that they will have to visit in order to solve their current issues.  Hope's mother is back, but she is suffering basically PTSD from dealing with being left with the cruel man she'd been stuck with back in time.  Not only is she back, but Hope has a new little sister.  Her father is asking for a divorce, happy with his new wife.  This makes one more emotional issue for Hope's mother to deal with.  While Bran had to go be with the woman who had tried to say she was his mother up until now, their enemy, he comes back to see Hope when he can, but when he comes back, he has some alarming news, news that sends them on their next trip back in time.  This time they will need to meet up with Nikola Tesla, and hopefully get him to stop working on the instrument that could mess up the careful time travel the Viators have tried to perpetrate.  This time we have Doug going back, and he's never been able to go because of his seizures.  But since he is best to work with Tesla, being the one who knows the most about what is going on, and kind of a Tesla expert, he is chosen to go, despite Phoebe's pleas about his safety.  Of course the fact that he is partly black will cause issues in how he can be a part of the group back in the time period.  It is after the civil war, but still things are not good for black, or even mixed race people like Doug. 

I liked that not only did we get a glimpse into a world with John Jacob Astor and the Vanderbilt's, a look at Nikola Tesla himself, but a dangerous glimpse into the world of the insane asylums of the time, women being committed by their husbands, the type of experimentation with lobotomies and other cruel procedures.  This added an aspect to the overall story that wasn't expected, but definitely made for a very interesting twist.  While they still also talked about the rules of not knowing about your past self/future self, as well as not changing any big events, like the fire that destroyed Tesla's lab, a very tragic death of someone in the team makes the rules seem like maybe they were made to be bent at the right times.

Of course we're once again left without the villain being brought in, not to mention that there is now someone even more dangerous out there, working with, or around the villain from before.  That means that there MUST be a third book.  And I will be waiting on the edge of my seat to hear news for that one.


Book 1 Info:

Title:  Into the Dim   
Author:  Janet B. Taylor
Release Date:  March 1st, 2016
Publisher:  HMH Books for Young Readers
Pages:  432
Formats:  Hardcover, ebook, audiobook

Find it: Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes and Noble | iBooks

Synopsis:

When fragile, sixteen-year-old Hope Walton loses her mom to an earthquake overseas, her secluded world crumbles. Agreeing to spend the summer in Scotland, Hope discovers that her mother was more than a brilliant academic, but also a member of a secret society of time travelers. Trapped in the twelfth century in the age of Eleanor of Aquitaine, Hope has seventy-two hours to rescue her mother and get back to their own time. Along the way, her path collides with that of a mysterious boy who could be vital to her mission . . . or the key to Hope’s undoing.      

Addictive, romantic, and rich with historical detail, Into the Dim is an Outlander for teens. 

My rating:  5 stars      Check out my review HERE.   

About the Author:

The 2013 winner of the coveted #PitchWars, Janet B Taylor, has four years' experience writing web content for a major television network fan site (CBS) that garners over a hundred thousand hits a day. Janet travels extensively to those places where her novels are set, often roaming around at night to commune with the famous historical figures about which she loves to write. She is a member of several writing organizations, including the SCBWI and the Historical Novel Society, and lives in a tiny town in Arkansas with her family.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Tumblr | Pinterest   



Giveaway:

• 3 winners will receive a finished copy of SPARKS OF LIGHT, US only.

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tour Schedule:

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Week One:

7/24/2017- a GREAT read- Review

7/25/2017- Lisa Loves Literature- Review

7/26/2017- YA and Wine- Guest Post

7/27/2017- Ex Libris- Review

7/28/2017- Once Upon A Twilight- Interview

Week Two:

7/31/2017- Seeing Double In Neverland- Interview

8/1/2017- Adventures of a Book Junkie- Interview

8/2/2017- History from a Woman's Perspective- Review

8/3/2017- Two Chicks on Books- Interview  
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8/4/2017- The Bucket List- Review

Review: A Death-Struck Year by Makiia Lucier

First, thanks to Netgalley and Houghton Mifflin for allowing me to read an e-galley of this back in December.  Second, I will admit that I didn't read the description that well when I first requested it.  For some reason I had in my head that it was going to be a book about a Spanish Influenza strain that hit in the present time, when in reality, it was a historical fiction piece about the time it did actually hit, in 1918.  So while it wasn't what I was thinking, it was still a good book.  Definitely one I would recommend a school library add to its collection.  In fact, it reminds me of another historical book I read a few years ago, this one about Typhoid Mary, called Deadly, by Julie Chibbaro.
A Death-Struck Year takes place in the Northwest part of the United States, Portland, Oregon.  The main character is Cleo Berry.  She lost her parents in an automobile accident when she was younger, one that she was in, and she witnessed her mother slowly dying as they waited for someone to see what had happened.  She now lives with her brother who raised her.  But he and his wife are going out of town for a second honeymoon type of vacation, and since she is only 17, and it is 1918, she must go stay at the boarding rooms of her school while they are gone, and is not allowed to stay home alone, especially since their housekeeper is also going to be out of town.  There have been rumors of this illness in New York, and Philadelphia, all places on the East Coast.  So Cleo and her brother aren't really worried.  But soon the stories have reached the West Coast, and soon the illness has arrived.  All the schools and other public buildings are closed.  Unfortunately if your family cannot pick you up, you have to stay, something that Cleo does not want to do. So she sneaks out to go home.  She also sees a notice that the Red Cross needs volunteers.  And so she decides to go help out while she is home alone.  To her, she wants to make sure no one has to sit and die while waiting for help, like her mother did.  Being a volunteer isn't that easy though.  In her first day she comes across a family, with little children, that she must get to the makeshift hospital that has been set up at one of the theaters that has been shut down.  She stays home alone, unbeknownst to her brother at first, as he thinks that the housekeeper is on her way back.  But the housekeeper ends up staying with her sick family.  Cleo meets a new friend, Kate, who is also working at the Red Cross.  And even finds a bit of a love interest with a military man who is serving as a doctor, Edmund.
While the story has a mostly happy ending, it isn't unrealistic, as Cleo sees more death, the collapse of a man about her age who was extremely healthy seeming only moments before he collapsed.  She has close friends that get sick, and even die.  And she even has her own health scare as she waits for her brother and sister-in-law to come home.  And Edmund isn't just a handsome doctor that she falls for.  He has a bit of a scary past as well, from what happened to him in the war.
Really this was a great historical story, and at the end there are even some notes about the actual history of the time.  As I said before, a great book for a school library, one I would add if I was in a middle school library.

The Testing by Joelle Charbonneau

First, thanks to Houghton Mifflin for letting me read an e-galley of this.  First let me say that this was a pretty good book.  It is one I will definitely recommend to anyone who enjoyed The Hunger Games and wants to read more stories like that.
This is a future America after many horrible wars with other countries, biological, nuclear, just about every type of war I'd guess, from what is left.  The main character is Malencia, or Cia, who is getting ready to graduate.  And she hopes that she will be called to the testing, like her father was.  But graduation comes and goes, even though there was a rumor of a Commonwealth official attending, they don't show up.  At least not that day.  But soon after someone does arrive, and there are 4 people chosen from her town.  Each town has been built back up, the people there are working on some kind of technology or science to help the world get back to what it was, at least easier living, and enough food.  Cia's town has been really good with agriculture, working on the genetics of plants to make hardier strains that can survive in the soils and with the water that has been left polluted from the wars.  They also are working on ways to fix the water and irrigation.  Before Cia leaves for testing, her father pulls her aside, and tells her that the testing is something that he can't remember, they wiped his memories afterwards so he wouldn't be able to give new candidates an unfair advantage.  But he still has nightmares, and he believes things happened that he doesn't want to remember, and so warns her not to trust anyone.  As soon as they get on the road, their official, I think his name is Michael, also seems to be giving Cia clues and hints.  One of the other people from her town going is Tomas, a good friend of hers, someone she's been attracted to, but never figured he would be to her, as he was very handsome, and sought after by most of the girls in the town.  She feels that he is someone she can trust, and she lets him in on what her father told her.  She also tells him when she notices cameras pretty much everywhere they go.  Because their transport was late, they are the last to arrive, and all the other testing candidates watch them as they come in.  They are seen to be probably weak, as their town hasn't had any candidates in a long time.  Although Cia had learned from her father, there may have been a reason for that, a teacher that kept them from going, to save them.  Cia soon learns how deadly the tests can be, even just solving logic problems, or teamwork.  If the stress of the testing gets to the candidates, the officials say that happens.  The final test is the ones leftover being released near what used to be Chicago, and having to find their way back to the town where they began.  They are dropped on their own, and there are no instructions to kill, but some do, to raise their chances of getting to the end?  Or just because that is the kind of people they are?  Don't know.  But the officials don't seem to care.  Cia must decide if Tomas is someone she can really trust, or is she keeping her enemy close.
So, really good story.  But, my only complaint, it was really so close to The Hunger Games.  As I was reading, I just kept feeling like all that had been written just like The Hunger Games.  Now, that's a compliment really, because The Hunger Games are so good.  But for me it was too much the same.  So as I said before, definitely a good read for people who want something just like that.  But as much as I read, I want something new, that I can't figure out what is going to happen, so that I can't stop turning pages.  And while this wasn't boring, I wasn't on the edge of my seat wondering what would happen next.  It was a good read though.  So if  you like this type of book, and don't mind books being too similar to others, you will enjoy it!