Shade by Jeri Smith-Ready

Shade- Jeri Smith-Ready
Age group- 14+/YA
Pages- 309
Published by Simon & Shuster
Learn about it  here
Buy It here
Rating- 4 stars


 

Like all teenagers and children born after the shift, Aura has a special talent, she can see and here ghosts. The fact that ghosts exist is a normal thing now, and everything relates to them. Places are "black boxed" and people wear red to repel them, Aura's Job even relys on them. Shes a translator for a law firm, translating what the ghost is saying in court, so that they can resolve matters after their death. Shes devoted her time to figuring out how the shift happened and how to reverse it. all until a certain ghost changes everything.

Aura's at her boyfriend, Logan's birthday party when something devastating happens. He dies. He's gone from auras world, well, almost, see Logan died suddenly, and hes not ready to move on. Auras not either. Dead Logan is almost as real as ever, and shes not ready to let go quite yet, and a hot foreign exchange student, Zachary, makes holding on to Logan a lot harder than she thought.

This book really surprised me. It was better than I thought it would be. I liked  how everyone  could see the ghosts, and all the technology they had for them. The plot and ending was very good also, although a bit predictable. The author is pretty good, but not the best. I haven't read any thing else though from her though, so I may be mistaken.

Overall this book is pretty good, I think If it had anything else as a subject then it would have been 2 stars, but the whole world Jeri made up was pretty cool, thats the main reason I liked it. You can tell she spent a lot of time on the details and how everything works. I love authers who let their immagination run wild, and pull it off. The setting had very fue holes, the plot moved quickly, even though i don think she characterised well enough, I was satisfyed with the book, and if she comes out with A sequel. (im pretty sure she will) I'll read that one also.


xo Dana

Bloom by Elizabeth Scott

Bloom- Elizabeth Scott
Age group- young adult
Pages-231
Published by Simon & Shuster
learn about it here
Buy it here
Rating- 3 stars

Lauren has, well, everything. At least that's what other people think. She has a popular best friend, decent grades, and the boyfriend every girl would kill for. Dave is popular, nice, smart, and caring. plays sports, actually listens when Lauren speaks, doesn't push her, is religious, has the perfect family and is completely in love with her. Everything should be perfect right? 

It takes the arrival of an old time friend Evan Kirkland, to bring Lauren out of her fantasy world. She realises how unhappy she is with Dave. Hes perfect, he loves Lauren. The only thing is, Laurens not so sure she loves him back. But staying with him is the right thing to do. That's what everyone else would do. She cant leave Dave, then she would be as bad as her mother leaving her father. The last person Lauren wants to be like is be like her mother. 

She trys to suppress her feelings for Evan. She trys to do whats right, but Dave has all these plans for the future, plans that no matter how hard Lauren trys, she can't see herself in. Meanwhile, her time with Evan has become a sacred time where she can be herself, all of her, not the perfect version of Lauren that Dave sees. The more shes with Evan the harder she falls. Now she just has to make a choice, before someone else makes it for her.

Lets start off with saying I love Elizabeth Scott. Well I like her at least, considering that I have never met her before... But I read Stealing heaven, and You, Maybe a few years ago and loved them. There's just something about her writing. Its elegant, light, happy and all ways has a good ending, with the exception of A Living Dead Girl, that is.

Bloom was what I expected it to be, Wich Isn't either a good or a bad thing. There are some deep problems lauren is facing, but its not too depressing, which is good. And the romance is great, But it's just not the best book I've ever read.  One thing I did realy like though was the fact that Evan used to live with Lauren when she was a child. That part was kind of cool and I think the book would be too forced if Lauren and Evan haden't known even before.

Again, Im not saying you shouldn't read it, no way. There are definatly people out there who would absolutly love this book. Its just not my style. but I definatly sugest checking it out. :)