JUST ONE OF THE ROYALS

By: Kate and Leah Rooper.

Rate: 💥💥💥💥

Year: 2018

Genre: YA Contemporary Romance.

“Living a lie so well, it consumed my truth. But lies are empty. And now, I’m left with nothing.”

The perfect summer reading.

Just One of The Royals, is the story of Danil the bastard prince, his love for his family and his journey to find the right answers to where he belongs. And Madison an aspirant actress with big dreams and biggest heart.

I love Prince and Princess’ stories. I like to think that I’m part of those stories and this book wasn’t an exception. It’s cute and funny, actually, it’s hilarious, I found myself laughing to death in multiples scenes. Yes, there is some resemblance to The Princess Diaries but with unique statements.

The characters are great and the narrative flows really well. But there is more, much more: Intrigue, a mean Queen, a villain, friendship turned into romance and loyalty.

My only concerns were the slow pace at the beginning and the abruptly end. Also, this book is supposed to be standalone, but I feel like I needed to read the first one Just One of the Boys in order to have a better understanding of Hayden and Alice relationship, which shouldn’t be necessary. Although, it got me curious about the book and I I’m going to read it, as I’m going to read the next one Just One of the Falcon which tells Eva and Tyler’ story.

If you are looking for a sweet read, fresh and cute to spend a relaxing afternoon under a tree, this book is for you.

100% Recommended.

I received an ARC from Entangled Publishing, LLC. Through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review. And I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Note: Image was taken from google.com

SPIES, LIES, AND ALLIES

Title: Spies, Lies, and Allies

By Lisa Brown Roberts

Genre: Y/A Contemporary Romance.

Year: 2018

Rate: 💥💥💥💥

Cute and funny. A lovely story about friendship and romance.

The book is about Laurel, a teenager working in her dad’s company, a place nothing like she expected but, where she would discover the true meaning of teamwork.

I enjoyed the reading. The narrative is good, and I can overlook some telling and repetitions because of the mention of wonderful movies that I love.

I liked the concept and definitely, the author has a wide acknowledge of teenager’s world. The pace, dialogues, and descriptions are great in most parts of the book. However, If I’m being honest, I had a hard time going through the first 20%. It wasn’t about the pace or the narrative, it was about the main character’s motivations and the settling of the story, I don’t think it was as strong as the rest of the book.

My other problem is the protagonist. She is so insecure and the weakest character in the story.  The secondary characters are fantastic, they aren’t what the reader would expect and that was what I liked the most, and of course, there is Carlos, the love interest, he’s everything that a teenager girl could ask in a friend and in a boyfriend.

This is my third book by the author and I found the same issue with the protagonist in her other books. However, I’ll keep reading Lisa Brown’s stories, I believe she can write a strong female lead as she writes her stories.

 This book deserves four solid stars and I 100% recommended.

I received an ARC from Entangled Publishing, LLC. Through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review. And I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

About the author:

Award-winning romance author Lisa Brown Roberts still hasn’t recovered from the teenage catastrophes of tweezing off both eyebrows, or that time she crashed her car into a tree while trying to impress a guy. It’s no wonder she loves to write romantic comedies. 

Lisa’s books have earned praise from Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and the School Library Journal. She lives in Colorado with her family, in which pets outnumber people. Connect with Lisa at www.lisabrownroberts.com.

Author Links: 

Author Website: WWW.LISABROWNROBERTS.COM

Author Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/LBROWNROBERTS

Author Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorLisaBrownRoberts/

Author Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lisabrownroberts/

Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8287979.Lisa_Brown_Roberts

Excerpt from Spies, Lies, and Allies:

“Let’s see where helping me on my project falls on this list.” Carlos picks up a pen and clicks it, eyeing me from underneath ridiculously long lashes.

Cautiously, I take a tiny step toward his desk so I can read the list.

“Number three.” I point to the napkin. “Teamwork.”

He nods and underlines the word. I notice he’s added numbers six through ten. Nothing is written next to those numbers, except for ten, next to which he’s drawn a smiley face.

“What’s that for?” I point to the smiley face. He leans back in his desk chair and grins up at me.

“Not sure yet.”

My heart throbs in my chest and my imagination is off and running, fantasizing about number ten.

Carlos points to number five: nicknames. “I think this is where we left off at lunch.” He clicks his pen repeatedly and I resist the urge to snatch it out of his hand. “I’d prefer not to be nicknamed for a pasta, but I gave you a cereal nickname, so…” He shrugs but keeps his eyes on mine.

“I…pasta…what?” He’s not making sense.

He bites his bottom lip, and I have no trouble picturing what will make me “smiley face” if we ever make it to number ten. Also, I’m pretty sure he’s a mind reader because his gaze drifts down to my lips, then back up to my eyes.

“The Manicotti. Who is it?” He glances across the room. “Elijah? He can be sort of cheesy.”

My mind analyzes his words, sliding them around like one of those puzzles where you have to move a string through twisted metal. And then it clicks.

“You read my notebook! You’re the one who—” Panic zings through me as I remember what I wrote about him, Carlos is trouble, and his editorial comment, True. Is Carlos adorable?

Apparently, I’m not the only spy around here.

“Why’d you pick this desk?” I’m desperate to change the subject.

“I like the view.”

“But it’s better by the windows.”

“Depends on which view we’re talking about.” He gives me a cryptic smile, one that makes my stomach dip. “Anyway, I saved your notebook. You’re lucky no one else read your notes.”

Mortified and defiant, I cross my arms over my chest. “You didn’t have to read it. You could’ve just returned it.”

“I was just checking to make sure you’d listed all of Mr.

Mantoni’s rules.”

“Uh huh.”

Across the room, Elijah stands up and stretches. He glances at us, an amused smirk twisting his lips like he knows something I don’t.

Carlos writes on the napkin again. Number six: healthy disagreement.

“You’re kidding, right?”

His responding grin packs more heat than it should.

“I think we’ve gone off track.” I’m proud of how calm I sound, even though my nerve endings are exploding like firecrackers.

Buy links: https://entangledpublishing.com/spies-lies-and-allies-a-love-story.html

Note: Information and Pictures provided by Entangled Publishing.

Z is for ZERO

Zero regrets,

Zero fears,

Zero second-guessing.

Take the risk,

Live the adventure,

Enjoy the journey,

Because the best of life is to be alive.

Note: Pictures were taken from google.com and AtoZchallenge website.

X is for...XENNIALS

Why do we feel like outsiders sometimes?

The answer is because we’re special. Let’s see:  

As children we played outdoors, engaged in games we made ourselves, a long time before the advent of gaming consoles, we wrote actual letters for our friends and passed notes in class.

We weren’t able to coordinate meeting using text or WhatsApp, we had to use a receiver to call to our friends’ houses, speak to their parents and then finally we could talk to our friends, without not privacy, btw.

 We don’t always have a cell phone, but we grew up watching their development.

We don’t always have an iPod. When we were teens, we recorded cassettes from the radio. I remember the adrenaline and the excitement when a favorite song was played, and we get to press the rec button on time.

We use social media but can remember living life without it. Before social media we needed to rely on our best friend and her ability to gossip, so we can have information about the boy we liked.

The internet was not a part of our childhoods, that’s true, but also, it’s true that computers existed and there was something special about the opportunity to use one.

 Economically, Xennials have seen it all. They are old enough to remember the end of a long period of growth (following a small recession) in the 1990s, but they came of age around the time that the “dot-com bubble” burst and saw the decline and major recession of the 2000s. In other words, they were first given a sweet taste of the good life and then kicked in the face.

Xennials aren't too much of any one thing, it’s more like a unique situation of balance.

Some people say that Xennials are the lucky ones.

Like I said, we’re not lucky.  we’re special. 

Note: Images and sources were taken from www.google.com & atozchallenge web site. 

W is for...WISHES

“Star light Star bright,

 First star I see tonight,

I wish I may,

I wish I might,

I have a wish, I wish tonight. “

Pick and star, make a wish, dream about it and then work to make it real.

Never stop dreaming,

Never stop fighting,

  

Note: Images were taken from google.com & 

atozchallenge website.

U is for... UNWANTED

“What he doesn't want is to get caught.”

 “Well, I would rather get caught, than die.”

“This is your fault Jake, so, shut up, and jump!”

We were the doomed boys, the unwanted ones, Society called us orphans.  I called us survivors.

Last year, Will, Tommy and I escaped from the bullshit system. Finally, we were free and because of me, maybe until today.

Will was the oldest one, I didn’t know what we would do if he was caught.  I scared away that thought and mentally smacked the back of my head and I just did what he said. I ran.

           My leg hurt, it was a bad landing when I jumped from the fire-stair, but I needed to keep going a little longer and we would be safe. Will always has a plan B.

“You’re an idiot.” Tommy had been yelling at me for the past five minutes and I barely could catch my breath. “That’s the first rule moron! Don’t do anything stupid.”

            “Look, I didn’t want to steal it, the food was going to expire soon anyway, it was going to end in the trash, I don’t know why the asshole clerk called the cops?”

“Because it’s shoplifting, idiot.”

“You’re right,” Of course he was, I just was pissed off, sometimes life wasn’t fair, and now Will was in trouble because of me. “I’m going to the police station.”

            “Jake, you listen to me very carefully, you’ll stay here, and we’ll wait for Will. Now give me that backpack, I’ll make us something to eat. Moron.”

             It was almost eight in the morning and Will never showed up. I left all my money and a note next to Tommy’s bed. It didn’t matter he would never understand why I left.

 I was walking around the corner when a hand pulled me into the alley. Shit! I almost had a heart-attack.

“Where the hell do you think you are going?”

“Will!” I blinked twice to be sure it was him. I hugged him, knowing he was okay.

                                                                     ***

            “Next town will be better,” Will said and he smacked the back of my head, and then Tommy did it as well.

“The hell!” They were laughing, and I was laughing too. I didn’t care where we were going. I got my brothers and that was enough for me.

Note: Images were taken from google.com & atozchallenge web site.

T is for... True Love

She liked the mysterious look in Will’s eyes. It was kind of unsettled and right at the same time.

He had a tattoo inside his left wrist and another one on his shoulder. She saw it once, one day of many days she was hiding from her mother, she went to the park and sat on the bench faking to bury her face in a book. But she was watching him, waiting for him.

The guys started their basketball game and Will showed up a few minutes later. He finished his cigarettes and crushed with his running shoe.  Will took his shirt off and joined the game.

She couldn’t take her eyes away. Will was so much beauty in just one person.

Could she love him that much even if she had never spoken to him before? Because she indeed was in love.

Note> Images were taken from google.com & atozchallenge website.

S is for...SUMMER CAMP FROM HELL

My life sucks!

Why did I agree to come here?

This place is worst than hell…

There is no cell phone reception or internet for start, but there are mosquitos and nature everywhere.

I don’t know anybody and thanks God for that, because people here seem so chirped and happy and cheerful, like if they were in a constant baby shower party.

And don’t get me to talk about the creepy forest. Why does this place have to be next to the most dangerous place in the world? A forest, a forest!

I want to go home but then I would have to expend the

 rest of the summer with my stupid new stepmother without school as an escape.

I hate my mom, and I hate my dad.

“Abby, honey, you’ll love it. This is going to be an experience you’ll with remember forever. My parents said.

And I’m afraid they were right, this is going to be a nightmare for life.

Note:  Images taken from google.com & atozchallenge website.

M IS FOR... MERMAID

Some men saw her as a joke, others fear her, but all of them love her.

Women despised her beauty. They said she was a Mermaid’s daughter, 

with the power of hypnotizing any male at the village and beyond.

Some people thought she was the devil itself. How if not, can somebody

explain she could knock down a guy double her size.

Selene, her name was famous among sailors and their families. 

And now she was back.

Two years had passed since the last time she was home, 

just in time to celebrate her twenty spring, but she had better a plan than a party, 

and soon everyone will know.      

Note: Images was taken from atozchallenge.com

LOVE LIFE AND THE LIST. A BOOK REVIEW

Title: Love Life and The List.

By: Kasie West

Genre: Y/A Contemporary Romance.

Year: 2017

RATE: 5 STARS

I fall in love with West’s writing at the moment I read “The distance between us.” Since then, my admiration for this writer has been going up and up.

Kasie West has a gift for describing beauty hidden inside of a complex world.  Her stories are full of different challenge and Love Life and the List is not different.

This book tells Abby’s story, a 17 years old artist girl, and how she was told, her art didn’t have a heart, so she makes a list of things she needs to do to find her heart.

But what she found was much more, she found her voice, she found that changes are not something bad, as long you keep your true self-intact, but more important she found out how to fight for herself.

With a father always away, with a mother with an peculiar anxiety, I have to say that the writer worked this sensitive issued remarkable well, and being in love with a best friend that he didn’t want to acknowledge her feeling, Abby’s world is not as perfect as everybody thinks it is.

As usual West narrative is effective, very powerful and the characters have a clear distinctive voice.

I loved every part of this book and I loved the heroine, I loved her journey and especially I loved she was strong and no a whiny teenager with a broken heart.

And the best part is, this is the first standalone book in a series of three.

100% Recommended.

Note: Pictures were taken from goodreads.com and atozchallenge.com

KISS

A first Kiss scene:

He moved slow, closing the distance between them, He lifted his hand to take away a lock of hair from her face, and gently he placed his hands on both sides of her neck. She had a horse racing when her beating heart should be. She closed her eyes and for a sec forgot to breathe.

She felt the brush of his lips in hers, very light and sweet at first, like cotton candy, then, their mouths began to move in an intense rhythm and she could feel the taste of his lips, of his tongue. One of his hands went from her neck to her back bringing her closer to him. She had her hands on his waist, then she moved them slowly toward his back underneath his jacket, touching his muscles made from steel, very aware of his entire body; she felt she was going to faint when he bit her lower lip.  She had been kissed before, but this felt like fireworks on July Fourth. 

Note: Pictures were taken from google.com and atozchallenge.com

C is for....COURAGE

“Don’t do it.”

“There is not another choice.”

“There is always a choice.”

Phillips, gave a step forward to the door ignoring the words of his younger brother. A hand gripped his left arm, Phillips was surprised by Gabriel’ strength. Someday his little brother would take the lead, but right now he was still the head of the family, the one who made the decisions and he had decided.

“Let it go, Gabe, everything is set. They are waiting,” Phillips pulled his arm free, and walk out his room, he went all the way down the marble stairs, leaving behind the house, crossing the grounds of the family property with Bash on his heals imploring.

“He’s going to kill you.”

“It’s a duel a first blood, maybe nobody will die tonight.” Phillips didn’t stop, he continue his way to the barns.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Why?” Phillips stopped and look at his brother with all the intensity of his blue eyes, “let me tell you why, there is only one thig that matters, honor. All the money in the world is useless if you don’t have honor. Listen to me very careful Gabe, nobody will step over our name, no as long as a member of this family can defend it.”

Gabe held a sob. “If you go all go with you, I’ll be you witness.”

“Octavius is my witness. You take care of the family, take care of mom and our sisters.” Phillips give him a smile, “I’m good with guns little brother. Trust me, I’ll see you again. I promise.” Phillips kissed the head of his brother and jump onto his black stallion.

Note: Pictures were taken from google.com and atozchallenge.com

A is for ADRIAN

The sound of the sirens faded soon enough to join the silent night.  But Adrian didn’t stop. His palpitations were drums in his ears, black spots filled his vision, his lungs begged for air.

How long Adrian had been running? His chestnut hair was glued to his forehead and neck, his legs weren’t there anymore, instead, he had two big pieces of concrete and even though he was still running.

It was self-defense. He shouldn’t have listened to that woman. He should have stayed. What did she know? He didn’t do anything wrong…did he?

No, no, no.

Adrian’s legs finally gave up and he landed on his knees. Panting, he grabbed his chest trying to hold his heart. Was this how a heart-attack feels? He was going to die in a dark alley alone like he had always been.

It wasn’t fair. Life wasn’t fair. It had never been with him, still, he had hope. Adrian worked hard to graduate from high school this year. He thought that maybe someday he would go to university and become a lawyer so he could help others like him to find fairness.

He had never cried before, what was the point? But now what else Adrian could do? He was going to die, nor he was going to jail and in either case, his beautiful angel wouldn’t even know that he existed.

    His angel was the most extraordinary creature he had seen on Earth, Adrian fell in love with her the first time he listened to her playing the violin. He should have said something to her. There were so many things he should have done, there were so many things he wanted to do.

The noise of a trash can lid knocking onto the floor made Adrian jumped on his feet. He looked around with his hands into a fist, a famished cat came out from the garbage, lonely and a survivor like him.

Adrian closed his eyes.

Breathe, exhale, breathe, exhale. One more time.

He wasn’t going to die today.

He wasn’t going to jail.

This time, he was going to win.

Life owed him, and he was ready to claim it.   

Note: Images were taken from google.com and atozchalenge.com

ELEANOR AND PARK

ELEANOR AND PARK

By: Rainbow Rowell

Genre: Y/A Contemporary Romance

Year: 2013

Actual Rate: 4.5 stars

“…Set over the course of one school year, this is the story of two star-crossed sixteen-year-olds—smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try…”

“Two Misfits, on extraordinary love.” This is absolutely true.

There weren’t two people more different to the world than Eleanor and Park…

There wasn’t a love so unique, that the one it grew up inside of the pages of this book.

My heart is still swollen from such beautiful writing. Rainbow Rowell’s narrative style is effective, powerful, sad and touching.

The dialogues were impeccable, and they helped the story to flow properly, not too fast, not too slow.

The relationships between the two main characters and between them and the other characters, pushed out readers different feelings; Anger, compassion, happiness, and so on.

 Every character was well done portrayed but Eleanor and Park were a master piece.

I connected with Eleanor from the start. My heart shattered for her. In some point, I wanted to hug her. Eleanor’s pain was so real that made me think in those girls around the world that are suffering as much as Eleanor, and nobody is listening at them, because they don’t have voice…I really hope that people realize how important is to care  for other human being.

Now, About Park, well, he was a different kind of hero, but a hero with Capital letters. Park was the personification of how much a boy can love a girl.

I want to believe that for every Eleanor there is a Park out there.

100% recommended.  

Best Phrases:

“He knows I’ll like a song before I’ve hear it. He laughs before I even get to the punch line. There’s a place on his chest, just below his throat, that makes me want to let him open doors for me.

There is only one of him.”

“You saved my life she tried to tell him. Not forever, not for good. Probably just temporarily. But you saved my life, and now I’m yours. The me that’s me right now is yours. Always”

   Note: Images taken from A to Z challenge web site and google.com