"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly event courtesy of Breaking the Spine that showcases much anticipated upcoming releases.

The Pledge

Author: Kimberly Derting

Publishing date: 11/15/2011

from goodreads:

In the violent country of Ludania, the classes are strictly divided by the language they speak. The smallest transgression, like looking a member of a higher class in the eye while they are speaking their native tongue, results in immediate execution. Seventeen-year-old Charlaina has always been able to understand the languages of all classes, and she’s spent her life trying to hide her secret. The only place she can really be free is the drug-fueled underground clubs where people go to shake off the oppressive rules of the world they live in. It's there that she meets a beautiful and mysterious boy named Max who speaks a language she's never heard before . . . and her secret is almost exposed.

Charlie is intensely attracted to Max, even though she can’t be sure where his real loyalties lie. As the emergency drills give way to real crisis and the violence escalates, it becomes clear that Charlie is the key to something much bigger: her country’s only chance for freedom from the terrible power of a deadly regime.

I'm a language nut so this book had me at first sentence. Also, it reminds me a bit of Jasper Fforde's Shades of Grey although the sorting here is by language not the chromatic spectrum. This is a book I am definitely looking forward to! Besides, the cover is gorgeous aaaaand I've always loved Charlie as a girl's nickname.

A day or so ago Aimée was asking via Twitter about creating a Q&A vlog and she must have gotten lots of replies in the affirmative and so she had a post on her blog asking for questions. She answered some of my questions (yay, sort of geekily excited about that!) including one that I keep seeing about Henry in which people say he isn't like Hades, which I don't think is true at all. All of the answers were interesting and it's definitely something worth checking out if you loved The Goddess Test. Thanks, Aimée!

I am sort of freaking out right know. It's almost the same sort of feeling (maybe) as if I was contacted due to winning a signed copy of Divergent - except I, you know, haven't. (Appendages still crossed for that one.) 

If any of you have ever read my 'who, me?' page then you've had a glimpse as to how much I love music. Music is my heart. There's rarely a time when I'm not listening to it. After putting on my seat belt it's the first thing I do in my car. I write to music, read to music, fall asleep - you get the picture. A good song is like a good book with the lyrics as the story and the instruments the finely sculpted words that make it whole. 

The musical love of my life is the Dave Matthews Band. I've been to about 40 concerts, have their entire discography and can relate a song of theirs to basically any emotion. My boyfriend likes to play a game where he'll turn on my DMB playlist in iTunes and play less than a second of a song only for me to be able to guess the title. (I've never been wrong yet.) 

You might be wondering, kaye, what does this have anything to do with a book blog? Well, Eleni over at La Femme Readers had a post that asked what our other hobbies or interests were and I meant to make a music post but I wasn't sure how to fit it in. However, Nikki Van Noy has written a book in memory of their 20th anniversary entitled So Much To Say (after a song title) and somehow I just realised it was on the list as a galley and I scooped it right up. 


I am beyond ecstatic at being able to read this. Funny the way it is indeed.

Author: Elana Johnson

Publication Date: 06/07/2011

Publisher: Simon & Schuster 

Pages: 404 (416 as a finished copy)

Source: e-ARC

 Synopsis: 

Vi knows the Rule: Girls don't walk with boys, and they never even think about kissing them. But no one makes Vi want to break the Rules more than Zenn...and since the Thinkers have chosen him as Vi's future match, how much trouble can one kiss cause? The Thinkers may have brainwashed the rest of the population, but Vi is determined to think for herself.

But the Thinkers are unusually persuasive, and they're set on convincing Vi to become one of them...starting by brainwashing Zenn. Vi can't leave Zenn in the Thinkers' hands, but she's wary of joining the rebellion, especially since that means teaming up with Jag. Jag is egotistical, charismatic, and dangerous--everything Zenn's not. Vi can't quite trust Jag and can't quite resist him, but she also can't give up on Zenn.

This is a game of control or be controlled. And Vi has no choice but to play.(goodreads)

The book starts off with our Goodie main character, Violet, meeting up with her friend Zenn one evening in the park. Nothing sounds out of the normal here until we realise that both of them are breaking a handful of rules each to even meet each other, let alone the fact that a girl is meeting a boy, even if he is her match. Zenn has a present for Violet but before she can open it they are spotted and Violet is arrested and put into prison. At her completely fixed hearing she meets Baddie Jag and it's instant sparks between them, even if she is sentenced to be exiled in the Badlands (and even if she was just meeting with her longtime boyfriend a day or so before). 

I was all set out to like this book. And, don't get me wrong, I did like it, or the idea of it. However the story was all over the place and not consistent enough to allow me to follow along. From the very first page we are thrown into Violet's word with only her occasional explanation to help us understand what's going on. It's action action action right from the start which wouldn't be a problem if it were explained somewhere along the line, which, for me, it wasn't. We get more questions than answers as we find out more and more about why a simple trip to the park evoked such a strong reaction from her government.

The relationship between her and Jag seems incredibly unsteady and almost rushed and at numerous times do they run away from each other with proclamations of never speaking to each other again, only for Violet to be mollified when he calls her 'babe'. (That alone threw me off every. single. time.) Violet was completely in love with Zenn, but forgot about him rather quickly, although thought about him often enough that it really made her relationship with Jag seem untenable.

I wanted to like this book but too many elements didn't work for me. I feel like I'm in the minority, though, so please try it out when it's released. The ideas are there and when they are they're good  - such as the very end; I give Elana credit for that ending. The writing and story otherwise were just not my cup of tea.

This week I almost feel inundated, mainly because a few of the books that I added mid last week I haven't finished yet, although I think I might put them back onto the to-read list. Thing is, I have an appointment with an opthamologist on Tuesday and so I've been trying not to strain my eyes by reading which, suffice to say, is really really hard. Anyhow, here is my IMM via The Story Siren.

Library: 

XVI, Julia Karr (gr)

The False Princess, Eilis O'Neal (gr)

Abandon, Meg Cabot (gr)

The Gathering, Kelley Armstrong (gr)

I am rather excited about reading XVI . Dystopian anything is my favorite genre and I've had my eye on this one for awhile. And 16 seems to be a popular age in YA novels, I've gathered. Old enough to make teenagers an adult without having them be too old to be set in this sort of book? That's my theory.

Galleys:

Possession, Elana Johnson (gr)

Forbidden, Tabitha Suzuma (gr)

I added Possession as it's been on my list for a little bit now but I finally read it last night and it had all the right elements but the construction wasn't quite there for me. Maybe I'll write a mini-review for it sometime soon. 

Curious - how do you guys read your e-galleys? I read them all through Adobe Digital Editions and I find the sizing of the pages there to read a bit cumbersome, not to mention the things it does to my eyes. Some of them can be read on a Sony eReader which I don't have (we have a Kindle) but I've never used one of them. If you've read some on there how is it? 

Whoo. That's that. I can't wait to see what you all are reading!

Author: Deb Caletti

Publication Date: 04/05/2011

Publisher: Simon Pulse 

Pages: 320

Source: Library

 Synopsis: 

Clara's relationship with Christian is intense from the start, and like nothing she’s ever experienced before. But what starts as devotion quickly becomes obsession, and it's almost too late before Clara realizes how far gone Christian is—and what he's willing to do to make her stay.

Now Clara has left the city—and Christian—behind. No one back home has any idea where she is, but she still struggles to shake off her fear. She knows Christian won't let her go that easily, and that no matter how far she runs, it may not be far enough....(goodreads)

This was the first book that I've ever read by Deb Caletti so I had absolutely no expectations going in, which ended up being perfect as Stay was a great all-around read. I can't say that I loved this book due to the topics it raised as that would seem callous, but it is something that I think people should read. Books with content like this are incredibly important and if anyone knows any others that they thought were well done I wouldn't mind if you left a note.

Stay alternates from chapter to chapter going back and forth between Clara's experience with Christian and the present day, the timing of which is less than a year apart so it isn't at all jarring. Clara meets Christian at a basketball game and when their eyes met it was instant attraction. Here's a quote from the beginning that I adored:

"He had this accent. It was lush and curled, with the kind of lilt and richness that made you instantly think of distant cities and faraway lands - the kind of city you'd see in a foreign film, with a snow-banked river winding through its center, stone bridges crossing to an ornate church...The other guys in that gym - they watched ESPN and slunked in suburban living rooms and slammed the doors of their mothers' minivans. See - I had already made him into someone he would never be, and I didn't know it then, but he was doing the same with me, too."  - Stay (4)

This perfectly exemplifies the way they met, immediate and hot, as well as Caletti's writing style. She has a way with choosing just the right phrases and even words that not only fit the book overall but specifically fit the individual character which really helps you imagine everything in your head as it happens. One of the best parts of all of the descriptions are Clara's footnotes that relate people and events as she knows them to the reader that helps everything flow that much more smoothly. Some of them are purely factual, some are amusing, but all of them are told from her POV. We also see Clara point out a lot of things about other people that we alone reading may not have seen, but now that she's told us it makes some of the other characters more vibrant.

All of the non-main characters were nicely developed with Clara's Dad being my favorite. He's witty, smart, and completely straightforward. There's an interesting back story with him as well and everything is tied up by the end of the book - no loose ends and it provides a nice sort of B-mystery to the main plot. One thing I really enjoyed about Clara's Dad - and some of the other characters, I'll let them remain nameless for now - is that they all mainly talk like every day people with some modern slang and it fits. Sometimes it hangs on the tip of my tongue as I read and it throws me off because it doesn't quite work, but here it does and just goes to flesh out the characters.

I could go on. I really enjoyed this book even if by the end I was hugging one of my cats and peering over my shoulder. Many thanks to Deb Caletti for venturing onto this topic and covering it so well. If it can help even one person then it is more than worth it.

Okay, so admittedly, I rarely participate in giveaways that require you to post something on Twitter, Facebook or even your own blog but this one is different. As you probably may have guessed I sort of have this ridiculous love affair with Divergent. I want to share this book with everyone despite me not having written my own review of it yet. And I'll probably end up rereading it before I do write it.

And so Miss Carolina Valdez Miller is having a fabulous giveaway of a SIGNED COPY of Divergent over at her blog and you all should have a chance for it! I am still hoping and hoping that Veronica will come to New York for signings, but until then let us all live vicariously through this opportunity.

Go heeeere to enter!

Good luck, everyone!

My brain's a little frazzled by blogger having been down (and still being down in some respects as posts and comments are missing - I apologise! I did reply!), so here's a nice and easy post as a part of Parajunkee's Follow Friday.

This week's question is: 

Q. The Blogger Apocalypse made me a little emotional. What is the most emotional scene in a book that you have read lately?

I just finished Deb Caletti's Stay last night and I'd probably have to say that the entire book was one big emotional ride. By the end I was sort of peering over my shoulder and hugging whatever cat hopped onto my bed.

Last month I also was reading again A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin in anticipation of the upcoming release of A Dance With Dragons and, again, that book was...intense. I know it's not YA, but I'm still wholly in love with that series.

Also, unrelated, there was a post of Entwined that got eaten by Blogger but should be restored at some point. I scheduled it for yesterday afternoon - at least it worked this time! I missed you guys, hope everyone is well.