BOOK REVIEW: THE GIRL UNLEASHED BY JUDITH BERENS

Title: The Girl Unleashed

Author: Judith Berens

Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult

Published on: August 3, 2019 by LMBPN Publishing

No matter the century, being a teenage vampire is hard when there’s no one around to teach you how to be cool, date and lift a car out of the way without getting caught.

 

Vickie has grown into a rockstar vampire with her powers, but she can still cause harm. Not a good way to stay hidden when everyone has the number to TMZ and a camera in their pocket. Selfie with the teenage vampire anyone?

Social media can bite worse than a vampire’s fangs.

That’s not her only problem. The Circle may be gone, but a government agency is looking into supernatural activity and everything points at Vickie. Big brother is not happy.

To make matters worse, Alexis and Vickie clash over misunderstandings and Vickie’s desire for more independence. Can the girls get past their disagreements and work together as a family?

Vicki’s danger meter is going off and she can sense a threat to her new family.

Can Vicki right some wrongs and make up with Alexis before she finds herself in an even worse situation?

Find out in The Girl Unleashed.

Book five in the Last Vampire series marks a turning point. Protagonist Vickie Hewitt managed to take out a threat that loomed over her throughout four books. As a vampire, there was a group of people bent on killing her. That she is just fourteen and harmless did not stop them. The group, known as the Slayer Circle, caught up to Vickie at last. With the help of a surprising ally, Vickie managed to kill the Circle members. It was a thrilling fight, though it felt a little underwhelming to me. With how menacing the Circle sounded, their defeat felt a little too easy. 

Now that the Circle is gone, Vickie can go back to leading as normal a life as she can. As the last vampire, she’s alone in the world. Luckily, Craig Watson and his daughter Alexis have been there for her since she woke up. Vickie has adjusted well to living as a high school student. She’s a star athlete now (competing in cross country) and has a boyfriend, Eric. He’s one of Alexis’s longtime friends who developed a crush on Vickie soon after they first met. Their relationship is going really well. Vickie’s clueless about dating in the twenty-first century, though. She comes from a time where parents married their children off at fourteen. I kid you not!

BOOK REVIEW: CHRYSALIS BY BRENDAN REICHS

Title: Chrysalis

Author: Brendan Reichs

Genre: Science Fiction

Published on: March 5, 2019 by G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers

The stunning finale of the Project Nemesis trilogy from New York Times bestselling author Brendan Reichs.

 

The 64 members of Fire Lake’s sophomore class have managed to survive the first two phases of the Program—and each other. Now, they alone have emerged into the dawn of a new era on Earth, into a Fire Lake valley that’s full of otherworldly dangers and challenges. Although staying alive in this broken world should force Min, Noah, Tack, and the others to form new alliances, old feuds die hard, and the brutality of the earlier Program phases cannot be forgotten. But being a team isn’t easy for the sophomores, and when they discover that they may not be alone on the planet after all, they’ll have to decide if they’re going to work together…or die together.

The quest to save humanity continues in this final entry of the Project Nemesis series. With the way Genesis ended, the author could have satisfactorily wrapped it up as a duology. Min Wilder, the main protagonist, managed to save all 64 members of her sophomore class. They went through Phase Two of Project Nemesis for millions of years while Earth healed from an apocalyptic event. Thanks to living as data inside a supercomputer, the students experienced all that eternity in a few months. Now they’re back in physical bodies in the real world.

It’s been a few months since Min and her classmates emerged from the supercomputer. They returned to a vastly different Fire Lake than they remember. Along with Noah, her boyfriend, Min’s built a fledgling community. Project Nemesis left them with every supply humanity could need, stored in a decommissioned missile silo. For the moment, their world is small. The student’s former town of Fire Lake is now an island surrounded by a vast ocean. There’s nothing around, except for an island a day’s sail away.

BOOK REVIEW: THE GIRL IN PLAIN SIGHT BY JUDITH BERENS

Title: The Girl in Plain Sight

Author: Judith Berens

Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult

Published on: July 15, 2019

New semester. New classes. New challenges. Can a 400-year-old teenage vampire learn to control her powers enough to manage the halls of public school? And not bite anyone of course…

Vickie is making friends with a new girl, someone Alexis doesn’t trust. Alexis is starting a romance with Will, and Vickie smells trouble. Are the girls worried about the wrong things or can they help each other out?

But new world, new problems. The girls end up on social media, and Vickie has been warned not to talk about vampires, but will she listen? Let’s hope she doesn’t overshare with her new friend trying to impress her with a few vampire tricks.

But Dad has a way to get the girls to focus. Vickie and Alexis have to get jobs if they want money to spend on hanging out with friends.

It’s all so normal until… it isn’t…

The family’s attention is divided until the Circle shows up at the house. It’s going to take a team effort to survive. Has Vicki made enough allies to stand next to her and fight? One wrong move and the Circle will finally kill the Last Vampire.

Join the battle in the halls of high school and the deadly streets with The Girl in Plain Sight.

 

It’s the start of Vickie Hewitt’s second semester at Clear Lake High. She’s a fourteen-year-old vampire who woke up after four hundred years asleep. Craig Watson and his daughter Alexis found Vickie during their trip to Austria. Months later, Vickie has assimilated to the modern world really well. Thanks to Alexis’s guidance, Vickie has managed to blend in among society. She likes her new life, even if her parents aren’t there for her anymore. They (along with all other vampires) were killed by a group called the Slayer Circle.

On the subject of the Circle, they are still around. Yes, it’s been four centuries and the group continues to operate. They believed they’d eliminated all vampires from the world. Only, they found out there’s a vampire living in Milwaukee. After a bit of investigation, the Circle has discovered Vickie. They’ve been keeping an eye to see how much of a danger she is. But Vickie’s living as a regular teenage girl. She hasn’t hurt anyone…at least not out of malice. All Vickie wants is to live her life and be left alone. Unfortunately, the Circle have other ideas.

BOOK REVIEW: THE GIRL WITH A SECRET BY JUDITH BERENS

Title: The Girl With A Secret

Author: Judith Berens

Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult

Published on: June 26, 2019 by LMBPN Publishing

Vickie’s a 400-year-old teenage vampire in a suburban public school. Combine that with vampire strength and speed, mix in typical teenage impulse control and trouble follows.

Her new dad, Craig and adopted sister, Alexis are having trouble helping Vickie keep her identity under wraps – especially as classmates realize there’s something different about her.

Is time running out? Reports of a Last Vampire are getting back to the centuries old Circle. Dedicated to hunting down vampires, they are getting closer to tracking her down.

Her vampire senses are on high alert and she senses the impending danger to her family, if she doesn’t get distracted...

Can Vickie handle dating, homework, boys, and hanging out like an average teen, and protect her new family?

Will she be able to deal with the threat by herself or will it take a family effort? Will everyone survive… this time?

 

The books in this series are rather short, so I’m going through them quickly. This is the third entry in the Last Vampire series. The main character is Victoria “Vickie” Hewitt. She’s a fourteen-year-old vampire from Austria. Craig and Alexis, a small American family, found Vickie there and decided to bring her with them. She had no one else left in the world after sleeping for centuries. Vickie and Alexis are now almost as close as sisters. They attend the same private school, Clear Lake. It’s been a few weeks since Vickie enrolled. She’s made a few new friends so far.

Despite being at Clear Lake for a short time, Vickie’s already made an impression. She has her first-ever crush on a boy, Eric. Vickie has no experience dating, but she wants to see where things could go between her and Eric. He’s a cross country runner, so Vickie decides to join the girls’ team. She figures it’ll allow them to spend more time together. Vickie will have to control her powers, though. She’s much faster than anyone. Given Vickie’s struggle to rein in her nature, I was surprised Craig and Alexis let her join cross country. At least Alexis is there for most of the meets to keep an eye on Vickie.

BOOK REVIEW: THE SECRET CHILD BY CAROLINE MITCHELL

Title: The Secret Child

Author: Caroline Mitchell

Genre: Thriller, police procedural

Published on: March 7, 2019 by Thomas & Mercer

DI Amy Winter knows evil. She's lived through it

Four-year-old Ellen is snatched by a stranger in the dead of night. Her devastated mother, Nicole, receives four identical phials and a threatening note in a familiar scrawl that chills her to the bone. But she always knew this would happen. She’s been expecting it for years . . .

According to the note, one of the phials is poisoned. Nicole is given a deadly challenge: if she drinks one, the sadistic kidnapper will notify the police of Ellen’s location. The sender claims to be Luka Volkov but Luka is supposed to be dead, killed long ago in a fire that haunts all those involved.

DI Amy Winter is still reeling from the discovery that she is the daughter of a serial killer, and her childhood trauma only makes her more determined to bring Ellen home. When another child is taken, Amy finds herself in a race against time. To rescue the children, must she seek help from the one person she wants to forget?

 

This is the second novel in the DI Amy Winter series. I enjoyed the first book enough to continue with the next ones. The main character is Amy, a Detective Inspector. She works for the Notting Hill station. Amy heads a special unit that handles high-profile cases. After years in the force, she’s proved herself as one of the best investigators in the English police. Recently, Amy found out about a reason why she may be so good at her work. Amy happens to be the daughter of Jack and Lillian Grimes, a pair of serial killers known as the Beasts of Brentwood.

Since Jack is dead, Lillian took it upon herself to reveal the truth to Amy. She seems to be as wicked as you’d imagine. Now that Lillian has given up the burial sites of her and Jack’s victims, Amy expects she’s done with her. Unfortunately, Amy brought evidence to light that might set Lillian free. Amy hopes that won’t happen. At least one good thing came out of the experience. Amy reunited with Sally-Ann, the older sister she thought was dead. Sally-Ann is in a relationship with Paddy Byrne, an officer under Amy’s command. He's one of her most trusted colleagues.

BOOK REVIEW: THE GIRL IN THE BACK ROW BY JUDITH BERENS

Title: The Girl In the Back Row
Author: Judith Berens
Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult

Published on: June 4, 2019 by LMBPN Publishing

High school means classes, making friends, hanging out, cutting classes… and keeping your fangs to yourself. Watch out world, this teen’s bite is worse than her bark.

Welcome to public school Vampire teen. Keep an eye out for the ones who would rather put you back in a box, but this time forever.

Vicki is getting a crash course in teenage life, if she can just keep her true nature hidden.

Her new dad is still dealing with the loss of his wife and finding a new job. Now he’s got a 400-year-old teenager who can push over a car. Good luck setting a curfew.

Fortunately, she wants to make new friends more than mayhem. Too bad others aren’t going to make that so easy.

There’s a dark force looking for the last vampire, and all those paranormal powers are going to come in handy to keep herself and her new little family safe.

But how do you master your inner vampire when there’s no one left to teach you and suburbia just isn’t ready to find out, not everybody who gets put in a box stays there?

Can Vicki blend in and be a typical teenage girl? Will she be able fight the urge to use her smarts and speed?

Join Craig, Alexis and Vicki on the next part of their adventure, as they adjust to living with each other and keeping Vicki’s true nature a secret.

After reading The Girl Behind the Wall, I thought it was good enough to continue the series. It was a bit of a short read, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t entertaining. This sequel continues the story of Victoria Brommer. She’s a fourteen-year-old vampire who was in a deep sleep for 400 years. Victoria’s parents hid her in their castle in Austria to protect her from an evil group. Four centuries later, Craig and his daughter Alexis stumbled upon Victoria. They realized what she was right away. It took a few weeks for Craig and Alexis to warm up to Victoria. The two bring her back to the United States with them.

For safety reasons, Victoria now goes by Vickie Hewitt. Craig managed to enroll her at Clear Lake, the same private high school Alexis goes to. It wasn’t hard for Vickie to pass the entrance tests. Vampires in this series can learn stuff extremely fast. Vickie also doesn’t drink blood; her diet is just like a human’s. There does exist a vampire race that sucks blood, called Sanguinaries. It appears there are none left, though. Vickie is perhaps the only survivor of a crusade that claimed her parents’ lives. The evil group, known as the Slayer Circle, sought to eradicate all vampires. They are confident their mission was accomplished…for now.

BOOK REVIEW: BE THE GIRL BY K.A. TUCKER

Title: Be The Girl

Author: K.A. Tucker

Genre: Young Adult, romance

Published on: January 21, 2019, self-published

From the internationally bestselling author of Ten Tiny Breaths and The Simple Wild comes a poignant novel about a girl trying to change her future while evading her past.

Aria Jones is starting over. New postal code, new last name, new rules. But she doesn’t mind, because it means she can leave her painful regrets behind. In the bustling town of Eastmonte, she can become someone else. Someone better.

With the Hartford family living next door, it seems she will succeed. Sure, Cassie Hartford may be the epitome of social awkwardness thanks to her autism, but she also offers an innocent and sincere friendship that Aria learns to appreciate. And Cassie’s older brother, Emmett—a popular hockey player with a bright future—well … Aria wishes that friendship could lead to something more. If he didn’t already have a girlfriend, maybe it would.

But Aria soon finds herself in a dicey moral predicament that could derail her attempt at a fresh start. It is her loyalty to Cassie and her growing crush on Emmett that leads her to make a risky move, one that earns her a vindictive enemy who is determined to splinter her happy new world.

 

Most of the books I read are part of a series. I slightly prefer those because it means you spend more time with the characters (it’s great when you like them). Still, there are times I feel like reading a standalone book, which is why I picked Be The Girl. This is a young adult romance from an author who has written great novels in the genre. The main protagonist is Aria Jones. At the start of the story, she and her mother Debra have just moved to Eastmonte in Canada. It’s obvious something bad happened that caused the move.

Part of the reason the Joneses moved is because Debra got divorced. She found out her husband had a secret family somewhere in the city. The jerk didn’t even love Aria anymore. She’s starting to move past it, though. Aria is ready to start a better life. Debra and Aria decide to stay with the latter’s elderly Uncle Merv. He’s been living alone ever since his wife passed away. Uncle Merv’s house needs a lot of TLC, which makes Debra get a little carried away. She spends tons of money renovating first one thing, then another. Debra can afford it--she used to be a successful lawyer.

BOOK REVIEW: THE GIRL BEHIND THE WALL BY JUDITH BERENS

Title: The Girl Behind the Wall
Author: Judith Berens
Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult

Published on: May 13, 2019 by LMBPN Publishing

Would you adopt a 400-year-old teenager? How about one with fangs?

Vicki was put into a deep sleep and has no clue centuries have passed. That is, until she’s accidentally woken up by a father and daughter on a vacation.

Cars? Cell phones? What’s an Instagram? How can Craig and Alexis explain the world?

No one said educating a teenage vampire would be easy.

First they have to figure out how to get her back to the United States without anyone figuring out she’s not quite human. Public school should be interesting.

Cheerleading tryouts, driving lessons, unreal power and fangs?

You try telling her no. She’s a new kind of modern-day teenager. But for Alexis, she’s just a new sister… with bite.

Join Vicki, Craig, and Alexis on a journey that will change their lives - in The Girl Behind the Wall.

 

 

Vampire fantasy is among my favorite supernatural fiction. I find them (and fairies) intriguing. When I read the synopsis for this book, I looked forward to reading it. The premise is compelling to me: a girl who suddenly wakes up after four hundred years. That she’s a vampire made it more interesting. She’s Victoria, a fourteen-year-old living in Austria whose parents put her in a deep sleep. They sought to hide her from some unknown danger. It appears Victoria’s parents met their demise, so she got stuck in stasis in her castle for centuries. Finally, a pair of tourists stumble into Victoria by chance.

The other protagonists are Craig and Alexis. They went on an impromptu trip to Austria after Craig’s wife (Alexis’s mother) died of cancer. The two wanted to check out for a little while before facing the rest of their lives. Craig and Alexis are renting the castle where Victoria remains hidden. One day, Alexis finds a clue that leads her to a section of the castle no one knows exists. After much cajoling, Alexis convinces her father to see what’s inside that hidden section. To their dismay, they discover a coffin…and inside is Victoria, looking exactly the same as she did in the early sixteen hundreds.

BOOK REVIEW: RECURSION BY BLAKE CROUCH

Title: Recursion

Author: Blake Crouch

Genre: Science fiction, thriller

Published on: June 11, 2019 by Ballantine Books

“Gloriously twisting . . . a heady campfire tale of a novel.”—The New York Times Book Review

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Time • NPR • BookRiot

Reality is broken.
 
At first, it looks like a disease. An epidemic that spreads through no known means, driving its victims mad with memories of a life they never lived. But the force that’s sweeping the world is no pathogen. It’s just the first shock wave, unleashed by a stunning discovery—and what’s in jeopardy is not our minds but the very fabric of time itself.
 
In New York City, Detective Barry Sutton is closing in on the truth—and in a remote laboratory, neuroscientist Helena Smith is unaware that she alone holds the key to this mystery . . . and the tools for fighting back.
 
Together, Barry and Helena will have to confront their enemy—before they, and the world, are trapped in a loop of ever-growing chaos.

 

Ever read a novel that turned out to be way deeper and more layered than the premise suggested? Recursion is a prime example. It’s a hard sci-fi novel mainly set in present-time New York City (as of 2019). The main characters are Barry Sutton and Helena Smith. Barry is a seasoned NYPD detective. He’s divorced and had a daughter who died in a tragic hit-and-run years ago. Helena is a gifted neuroscientist searching for a way to reverse or stop the effects of diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Barry and Helena don’t know each other at first. They even live on opposite corners of the U.S. The story begins with Barry failing to prevent a suicide. A woman jumped from a building after being unable to endure FMS any longer. False Memory Syndrome is a mysterious affliction that’s emerged recently. Sufferers claim to have vivid memories of a life that never happened. Barry is intrigued after his encounter with the woman. He decides to get to the bottom of what FMS is and where it came from.

BOOK REVIEW: BOUNDARY HAUNTED BY MELISSA F. OLSON

Title: Boundary Haunted

Author: Melissa F. Olson

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Published on: December 3, 2019 by 47North

Months after her battles in Wyoming, Allison “Lex” Luther is still struggling with the aftereffects of the psychic attack she suffered—and with the new developments in her own magic.

Then Lex’s boss, the cardinal vampire of Colorado, passes along a strange request from her counterpart in Atlanta. Hundreds of Civil War spirits have abruptly vanished in Beau Calhoun’s territory, and he wants Lex to figure out why. In exchange, Beau can help her understand boundary magic, which runs in his family line as well.

Despite her trepidation, Lex journeys to the Deep South, where she discovers that ghosts are everywhere…and that her host’s intentions are more complicated than he promised. It seems his teenage descendant is being hunted, and both Beau and Lex fear the young woman’s boundary blood may have made her a target.

With Atlanta’s history looming over her every move, Lex will have to face Beau’s ghosts—and her own—to prevent a boundary magic attack she never dreamed possible.

 

 

Here it is: the fifth (and hopefully not last) book in the Boundary Magic series. It takes place in Melissa F. Olson’s Old World stories. Boundary witch Allison “Lex” Luther is back for another adventure. This time it’s not Maven—her boss and the cardinal vampire of Colorado—who gives her an assignment. Lex is surprised to hear someone has requested her assistance. Maven got a call from Abner Calhoun, the cardinal vampire of Atlanta. He wants Lex to help him sort out a problem with ghosts in his city. Lex is apprehensive at first, though. In the previous book, she suffered a terrible psychic attack done with wraiths—the most wicked kind of ghosts. Since then, Lex has had a sort of phobia of them. Understandably, Lex isn't in a hurry to go to one of the most haunted cities in the country.

Lex hasn't told anyone about her issue, though. She mostly agrees to go to Atlanta to help Maven. The latter's been working to set up a countrywide government for the Old World. If Lex convinces Calhoun to lend his support, Maven's project will be one step closer to becoming reality. In preparation for this, Maven's also been teaching Lex about Old World politics. Calhoun is known for being rather...eccentric. Lex thinks Maven has a low opinion of him, but the latter denies this, claiming Calhoun's just unusual. The guy did earn a funny nickname, because he turned four of his buddies and dubbed them the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

BOOK REVIEW: BOUNDARY BROKEN BY MELISSA F. OLSON

Title: Boundary Broken

Author: Melissa F. Olson

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Published on: March 19, 2019 by 47North

Years ago, boundary witch Allison “Lex” Luther made a promise to an alpha werewolf. Now, just when the supernatural community in Colorado is enjoying a period of hard-won peace, the alpha turns up at Lex’s door to call in his marker. Two of his pack members have disappeared in the Colorado sand dunes, and he needs safe passage to hunt for them.

With her friend Simon Pellar along for backup, Lex ventures into the dunes to search for the missing couple…but what they find is only the opening move in an ambitious assault against those who hold power in the Colorado Old World. An old enemy has returned to tear their peace apart, and Lex is soon embroiled in politics she doesn’t understand, from a time before she had magic.

To save her friends and her way of life, Lex will have to cross every line she’s drawn since learning what she is—and it may still be too late.

After taking a break from the series, Melissa F. Olson is back with the latest Boundary Magic novel. This book takes place a while after the events of Boundary Born. The Old World has enjoyed a good period of peace. Things have been so calm that the protagonist, boundary witch Lex Luther, is chomping at the bit. Maven (her boss and the cardinal vampire of Colorado) hasn’t had any big assignments for Lex in a while. Lex is eager to do something a little more exciting than running errands. Little does she know, she’s about to find out how real the proverb “be careful what you wish for” is.

An unexpected visitor comes calling at Lex’s house. He’s Ryan Dunn, the alpha of the Cheyenne werewolf pack. Lex owes him an old favor, and he’s come to collect. Ryan wants Lex and Quinn (a vampire enforcer and Lex’s boyfriend), as Maven’s representatives, to escort him to the Dunes. A couple of his wolves went missing there. When Lex calls Maven to let her know, the latter only gives the go-ahead because of the owed favor. The operation needs to be done in secrecy, though. At least that isn't out of Lex's and Quinn's experience.

BOOK REVIEW: STARSIGHT BY BRANDON SANDERSON

Title: Starsight
Author: Brandon Sanderson
Genre: Science Fiction, Young Adult

Published on: November 26, 2019 by Delacorte Press

All her life, Spensa has dreamed of becoming a pilot. Of proving she's a hero like her father. She made it to the sky, but the truths she learned about her father were crushing. The rumors of his cowardice are true--he deserted his flight during battle against the Krell. Worse, though, he turned against his team and attacked them.

Spensa is sure there's more to the story. And she's sure that whatever happened to her father in his starship could happen to her. When she made it outside the protective shell of her planet, she heard the stars--and it was terrifying. Everything Spensa has been taught about her world is a lie.

But Spensa also discovered a few other things about herself--and she'll travel to the end of the galaxy to save humankind if she needs to.

After months of anticipation, I was at last able to read Starsight. The first book doesn’t end with a cliffhanger, but I was still piqued. The main character, fighter pilot Spensa Nightshade, is back for another adventure. Six months have passed since the final battle in Skyward. Spensa (callsign “Spin”) narrowly saved her people from an attack that would have been catastrophic. She’s now not only a full-fledged Defiant Defense Force pilot. Spensa is legit a lieutenant. That impressed me. Spensa's come a long way from the outcast daughter-of-a-coward she used to be.

A returning character has a new role as well. He’s Cobb (callsign “Mongrel”), Spensa’s old flight instructor. He got promoted to commander of the DDF. If you recall, the DDF’s raison d’etre is to fight the Krell. They’re an alien race that have been at war with humans for decades. The Krell have kept humans stuck on Detritus the whole time. Spensa recently found out why. Her ship has an AI called M-Bot, and he hacked into Krell databases at the end of Skyward. The intel was useful for the DDF, but now things have changed. It appears the Krell want to eradicate humans rather than keep them isolated.