Waiting on Wednesday: Bits and Pieces (Rot and Ruin #5) by Jonathan Maberry

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 a book that is novellas for a series that I am a fan of that have been grouped together to make one book that will be put out in print.  I also have a bit of a personal connection to the stories because one of them I named through a contest on Facebook, Tooth and Nail.  The ebook has a thank you to me at the beginning of the story, and I'm hoping to see it in print now as well!  If you are  zombie fan and haven't read this series by Jonathan Maberry, you need to pick it up.  I haven't actually read the last book yet, so I don't know how it will end, but I have loved all of the books so far.  Here is the blurb about this book of short stories from Goodreads:

Return to the zombie apocalypse wasteland that is the Rot & Ruin in this short story collection from Jonathan Maberry.

Benny Imura’s zombie-infested adventures are well-chronicled in the gripping novels Rot & Ruin, Dust & Decay, Flesh & Bone, and Fire & Ash. But what else was happening while he was on his quest? Who were the others navigating the ravaged landscape full of zombies?

Bits & Pieces fills in the gaps about what we know about First Night, surviving the plague, and traveling the land of Rot & Ruin. Eleven all-new short stories from Nix’s journal and eleven previously published stories, including “Dead & Gone” and “Tooth & Nail,” are now together and in print for the first time, along with the first-ever script for the Rot & Ruin comic books.

So, have you read this series yet?  I'm so excited for the 11 short stories, especially ones I have not read yet.  What book are you eagerly awaiting this week?

November is for Novellas Challenge #7: Tooth and Nail (Benny Imura 3.5) by Jonathan Maberry

Now there are actually several other novellas earlier in the series, many of which were free, I just need to get them onto my Nook and read them!  But this is one that is near and dear to my heart, even before I read it.  If you've been following me for awhile, you've probably heard me talk about how I got to help name this one!  In fact, as I was reading, and I got to page 3, where I saw this:

That's me that it says special thanks to first!!!  And let me say, I am so glad this is the novella I get to have my name in, it was soooo good!  Totally left me hanging at the end, wanting to keep reading!  I haven't read book number 4, so now I'm probably going to have to check it out from school and go ahead and read it so I can see what happens and if anything else from this short novella will make its way into the story.

In this story we meet up with Benny and Nix and Lilah and kind of with Chong at the Area 51 Sanctuary that we left them at in the last book.  They're training, but Benny is having trouble dealing with their trainer.  We also meet a group of girls that are all that is left of a once larger group of survivors.  We meet them as they come across the reapers, Saint John's group, who are traveling to try to find the towns that Benny and his friends came from.  They've met another one of the Zombie card characters we've heard about Iron Mike Sweeney.  They think they've killed him in trying to get answers about the towns.  Only when Brother Marty goes back to check, he's gone.  The whole time Saint John and Brother Marty talked to him, they both felt there was something very strange about the man.  He had red eyes first off, so right away weird.  It also seems the reapers have made it to the Sanctuary as Benny finds when he goes off on his own after a frustrating training session.  And something that is really cool?  I haven't read the Joe Ledger series, but he shows up in this book, as well as I believe he was in book 3.
A really good in between story.  Can't wait to read book 4 now, although I'm almost scared to, as I'm not sure I want the story to end!  And because I have to share it every time I read one of his books, here is my photo of when I met the author at BEA back in the summer of 2012.

Flesh and Bone (Benny Imura #3) by Jonathan Maberry

I have to say thanks to Mr. Jonathan Maberry himself for this book, because when I won the contest to help name one of his e-novellas, my prize was an autographed ARC of this very book!  I had intended to read it as part of my 2nd Annual September is for Sequels Challenge, and while I did start it in September, I didn't actually finish it until the 1st of October.  It was a good lead up to really get me back in the mood for The Walking Dead to start up again.  The only reason it took me so long to read it was because of how busy I seem to be.  Not because it wasn't good.  Because as usual with this series, as soon as I picked it up, I could barely put it down again to do the things that needed to be done.  I just love this world, and finding out what happens to the characters.  Now unfortunately there will be some spoilers in the next paragraph if you haven't read the two books before this one, so you may want to stop reading now, knowing that the series just keeps getting better!
Where we left off, there were only four of the crew left, Benny of course, his girlfriend (?) Nix, his best friend Chong, and The Lost Girl, or Lilah as everyone now knows her name.  Benny's older brother Tom having been shot in the last book, and fortunately not coming back as a zombie, so that Benny wouldn't have to quiet his brother, like he and Tom had been forced to do to their own parents.  Chong and Lilah seem to have a bit of a relationship.  Well, we know Chong has a crush on her, even though Lilah calls him a boy from the city who can't take care of himself.  But she does show that she has feeling for him in return when as she leaves to go find the parents of a little girl, she unexpectedly kisses Chong.  Now this little girl is named Eve, and she got separated from her parents by some people that we come to learn are called The Reapers.  They are basically a death cult.  People who don't see the reason for going on after all that has happened, and so they go around trying to get people to either join them, or they will usher them into the next life, or "the darkness" as they call it.  They do this by "opening red mouths into their skin".  Wounds, fatal wounds obviously.  The leader of this cult, well there are kind of two.  We do find out later that one leader was a serial killer before all the zombie plague started.  The other leader, a woman, well, not sure exactly what her deal is, other than she wants to get to the Sanctuary.  A place she's heard has food and doctors and everything to take care of people.  Throughout the story all four of them get separated at some point.  We learn about all the wild animals from zoos that escaped.  And that animals up until now haven't gotten the virus.  Although that may be changing as Lilah finds out in the story.  We also get to meet one of the people from the Zombie cards as well.  Where the book leaves off is kind of disheartening in a way.  I'm not sure that I liked it.  I'm hoping we can pick up from that ending with the fourth, and what I believe is the final book in the series.  Although I will be sad to leave the characters and this world behind.  I guess that means I will soon have to move over to the other zombie series by this author.
If you're a fan of zombie books, this is a definite read for you.  All four of the books in the series are now out, and the e-novella that I got to help name, Tooth and Nail, is now available.  Below I've shared two pictures.  Me with the author, Jonathan Maberry, at BEA 2012.  And 2nd is the autograph inside my copy of this book, proving my part in helping with naming the novella.  

Happy 4th Blogoversary to Me!!

I'm so excited to share my 4th Blogoversary with all my followers, old and new!  It's been a great year, met a lot more authors at the Romantic Times Convention that took place in my hometown of Kansas City this past May.  Finally figured out how to use Edelweiss and I got some cool e-galleys from that.  And I finally got a library job for this school year!  And of course I'd love to share the fun of this with you!  While I won't be doing the all month thing that I did last year, too busy with my new job this year, I intend to have a good giveaway this time.

Looking back at last year's post, I see that it has been a year since I won the contest to name one of Jonathan Maberry's novellas to his Rot and Ruin series.  Tooth and Nail came out just a bit ago, and you can click on it's title in this sentence to go buy it if you want to!

Since it is my 4th year, I'll give away $40 to either Barnes and Noble or Amazon.  And since I haven't had a chance to celebrate the fact that I hit 1500 followers, I'll have a 2nd prize of $15 to either Barnes and Noble or Amazon.  There will be a 3rd prize of some swag I have from the Romatic Times Convention and other Swag I have.  And, if by chance I make it to 1600 fans by the end of the month, I'll add $10 to the first prize, and $5 to the 2nd and 3rd prizes.  How does that sound?  Good?  I hope so.  Thanks to all of you who have followed me and commented.  I appreciate all of you, and enjoy reading your blogs as well!


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Happy 3rd Blogoversary to Me!!!

Today is the big day!  The day that Lisa Loves Literature actually began!  While it was not the first day of my blogging about books, it was the day that I started to develop this blog into what it has now become.  The day that I really dedicated myself to talking about the books I was reading.  As I've mentioned before, I'd been kind of reviewing books and movies, and just kind of journaling about my life.  It was spread out between My Space, Live Journal, and I think one other place that I can't remember.  It might even have been here on Blogspot, but under a different blog name.  My friend Charlotte, who I featured on Tuesday (go check out the post and enter a giveaway!!), was blogging over on Blogspot, and so I decided to follow her lead, and change my blog to just books.  I mean that is one of the reasons I have always loved my job at Barnes and Noble so much, because my co-workers were people who understood just standing around and talking about books, and getting excited about books, etc.  Unfortunately we've had cuts in the number of hours we can have people scheduled, so that part of the job happens less, as we don't often get that much time to talk about books while we're working, and there are less of us there at a time to talk.  As you have seen so far this month, I'm going to be posting about reasons why I blog, and other posts so you can get to know me better, of course along with my normal reviews, as I finish a book, or as scheduled reviews.  I also will have a couple author days, one as part of the Authors Are Our Rockstars Hop, and another as an author I feel like is a friend now.

When I met Jonathan Maberry at BEA 2012

Before I move on to the big giveaway, I want to share some exciting news I got on Tuesday of this week.  First some back story, Monday night I was playing around on Facebook and I noticed that Jonathan Maberry, author of the Rot & Ruin zombie series, had posted a little contest wanting people to give him ideas for a title for his new short novella e-book that takes place between the 3rd and 4th book in the series.  I had several ideas that I posted, but one of my first ones was chosen.  So look for the e-book Tooth & Nail next year, and know that the title was my idea!


Okay, and now for the giveaway!!  In honor of 3 years of blogging, I've decided to give away a $30 gift certificate to Barnes and Noble.  And in the hopes to increase my blog following, I'm going to run this giveaway until the end of the month,August 31st, and when I reach 600 followers on GFC, I will add $10 to the gift card making it $40.  And for every 50 more followers I gain after that, I'll add another $10 to the gift card.  It'll be interesting to see after a month how many new followers I can get, and how big of a gift card I'll be giving away.  And keep checking by for other giveaways this month too!

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