 |
| Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the lovelies over at The Broke and Bookish. For more information on how to participate, please check them out! | | | |
If there's something good I have to say about 2013, it was the authors. I grew ridiculously fond of the Thirteeners, one and all, and I'm looking forward to the talent that is unfolding in 2014!
I tried to steer toward the must-haves that already had covers, which is why a few of my favorite titles are not on the list. Not to worry - they'll get their day pretty soon!
The Murder Complex (The Murder Complex #1) by Lindsay Cummings
An action-packed,
blood-soaked, futuristic debut thriller set in a world where the murder
rate is higher than the birthrate. For fans of Moira Young’s Dust Lands
series, La Femme Nikita, and the movie Hanna.
Meadow Woodson, a
fifteen-year-old girl who has been trained by her father to fight, to
kill, and to survive in any situation, lives with her family on a
houseboat in Florida. The state is controlled by The Murder Complex, an
organization that tracks the population with precision.
The plot
starts to thicken when Meadow meets Zephyr James, who is—although he
doesn’t know it—one of the MC’s programmed assassins. Is their meeting a
coincidence? Destiny? Or part of a terrifying strategy? And will Zephyr
keep Meadow from discovering the haunting truth about her family?
I've been waiting for this one since before it had a cover. I personally love Moira Young's Dust Lands and anything involving a girl who knows how to be strong and tough and defend her family. The cover just adds to the gritty feel of the blurb and the author's world.
add on goodreads | releasing june 10 2014
Dorothy Must Die (Dorothy Must Die #1) by Danielle Paige
I didn't ask for any of this. I didn't ask to be some kind of hero.
But when your whole life gets swept up by a tornado—taking you with it—you have no choice but to go along, you know?
Sure,
I've read the books. I've seen the movies. I know the song about the
rainbow and the happy little blue birds. But I never expected Oz to look
like this. To be a place where Good Witches can't be trusted, Wicked
Witches may just be the good guys, and winged monkeys can be executed
for acts of rebellion. There's still the yellow brick road, though—but
even that's crumbling.
What happened?
Dorothy. They say she
found a way to come back to Oz. They say she seized power and the power
went to her head. And now no one is safe.
My name is Amy Gumm—and I'm the other girl from Kansas.
I've been recruited by the Revolutionary Order of the Wicked.
I've been trained to fight.
And I have a mission:
Remove the Tin Woodman's heart.
Steal the Scarecrow's brain.
Take the Lion's courage.
Then and only then—Dorothy must die!
I grew up in Oz. Even as a little girl curled up on the couch with my nose buried in a book full of words written before I was born, I could feel the inherent girl power within it: princesses ruled, a man who was a false wizard and an usurper of the throne was removed by a said princess, and little girls defeated foes twice their size.
That being said, I have mixed feelings about Dorothy - the traditional protagonist - being the bad guy, but I'm also all for stories being turned on their heads. It'll be interesting to see how this one turns out!
add on goodreads | releasing april 1 2014
The Girl from the Well by
Rin Chupeco
A dead girl walks the streets.
She hunts murderers. Child killers, much like the man who threw her body down a well three hundred years ago.
And
when a strange boy bearing stranger tattoos moves into the neighborhood
so, she discovers, does something else. And soon both will be drawn
into the world of eerie doll rituals and dark Shinto exorcisms that will
take them from American suburbia to the remote valleys and shrines of
Aomori, Japan.
Because the boy has a terrifying secret - one that would just kill to get out.
This is probably my most wanted title of the year. You probably already know about my obsession with Japan, right? And last year, though I've always been crazy about anime, I went on a dark, horrorish-specific binge - that in spite of me being a total, blood-hating baby, so I ended up having to press mute and squeeze my eyes shut quite a few times.
That being said, this is most definitely up my alley. I've been following Rin's blog since she announced her book deal, and I can't wait to see how it turns out!
add on goodreads | releasing august 5 2014
Falls the Shadow by Stefanie Gaither
When Cate Benson was twelve, her sister died.
Two
hours after the funeral, they picked up Violet’s replacement, and it
was like nothing had ever happened. Because Cate’s parents are among
those who decided to grant their children a sort of immortality—by
cloning them at birth. So this new Violet has the same smile. The same
laugh. That same perfect face. Thanks to advancements in mind-uploading
technology, she even has all the same memories as the girl she replaced.
She also might have murdered the most popular girl in school.
Or
at least, that’s what the paparazzi and crazy anti-cloning protesters
want everyone to think: that clones are violent, unpredictable monsters.
Cate is used to hearing all that, though. She’s used to standing up for
her sister too, and she’s determined to prove her innocence now—at
whatever the cost. But the deeper she digs for the truth, the further
Cate's carefully-constructed life begins to unravel, unveiling a world
filled with copies and lies, where nothing and no one—not even her
sister— is completely what they seem.
In a pulse pounding debut,
Stefanie Gaither takes readers on a nail-biting ride through a future
that looks frighteningly similar to our own time and asks: how far are
you willing to go to keep your family together?
I don't think I need to really say anything about this one. I mean, the summary says it all, right? Would you honestly turn down something this heart-pounding? Clones, murder and manipulation, oh, my!
add on goodreads | releasing september 16 2014
Blackfin Sky by Kat Ellis
When Sky falls from
Blackfin Pier and drowns on her sixteenth birthday, the whole town goes
into mourning – until she shows up three months later like nothing
happened.
Unravelling the mystery of those missing months takes
Sky to the burned-out circus in the woods, where whispers of murder and
kidnapping begin to reveal the town’s secrets. But Sky’s not the only
one digging up the past – the old mime from the circus knows what
happened to her, and he has more than one reason for keeping quiet about
it.
This has a very Imaginary Girls feel to me, and since that is one of my favorites, I'm hoping this will strike a chord in me as well!
add on goodreads | releasing may 14 2014
Sekret (Sekret #1) by Lindsay Smith
Yulia’s father always
taught her that an empty mind is a safe mind. She has to hide her
thoughts and control her emotions to survive in Communist Russia,
especially because she seems to be able to read the minds of the people
she touches. When she’s captured by the KGB and forced to work as a
psychic spy with a mission to undermine the U.S. space program, she’s
thrust into a world of suspicion, deceit, and horrifying power where she
can trust no one.
She certainly can’t trust Rostov, the cruel
KGB operative running the psychic program. Or handsome Sergei who
encourages her to cooperate with the KGB. Or brooding Valentin who tells
her to rebel against them. And not the CIA, who have a psychic so
powerful he can erase a person’s mind with his own thoughts. Yulia
quickly learns she must rely on her own wits and power to survive in
this world where no SEKRET can stay hidden for long.
I've gotten to know Lindsay through Twitter the past year. She's sweet, knowledgeable and enthusiastic - and so is the summary for her debut. I used to be obsessed with Russian history back in middle school, particularly the tragically doomed Romanov family. But espionage, history and dystopia blended with it? Dream come true.
add on goodreads | releasing april 1 2014
Extraction (Extraction #1) by Stephanie Diaz
Clementine has spent her
whole life preparing for her sixteenth birthday, when she’ll be tested
for Extraction in the hopes of being sent from the planet Kiel’s toxic
Surface to the much safer Core, where people live without fear or
starvation. When she proves Promising enough to be “Extracted,” she must
leave without Logan, the boy she loves. Torn apart from her only sense
of family, Clem promises to come back and save him from brutal Surface
life.
What she finds initially in the Core is a utopia compared
to the Surface—it’s free of hard labor, gun-wielding officials, and the
moon's lethal acid. But life is anything but safe, and Clementine learns
that the planet's leaders are planning to exterminate Surface
dwellers—and that means Logan, too.
Trapped by the steel walls
of the underground and the lies that keep her safe, Clementine must find
a way to escape and rescue Logan and the rest of the planet. But the
planet leaders don't want her running—they want her subdued.
Yes, yes, yes! Ladies and gentlemen, this is the debut that will rock your shelves this year. I had the pleasure of pre-reading a draft of this for Stephanie, and it is definitely all that the summary promises and then some.
add on goodreads | releasing july 22 2014
Half Bad (Half Life Trilogy #1) by Sally Green
In modern-day England,
witches live alongside humans: White witches, who are good; Black
witches, who are evil; and fifteen-year-old Nathan, who is both.
Nathan’s father is the world’s most powerful and cruel Black witch, and
his mother is dead. He is hunted from all sides. Trapped in a cage,
beaten and handcuffed, Nathan must escape before his sixteenth birthday,
at which point he will receive three gifts from his father and come
into his own as a witch—or else he will die. But how can Nathan find his
father when his every action is tracked, when there is no one safe to
trust—not even family, not even the girl he loves?
This is really, really my cup of tea: spicy (witches, witches and more witches!), flavorful (a modern-day London with a fantastic twist) and obviously willing to leave a haunting aftertaste. Can we forward-fast to March already?
add on goodreads | releasing march 4 2014
Stolen Songbird (The Malediction Trilogy #1) by Danielle L. Jensen
For five centuries, a
witch’s curse has bound the trolls to their city beneath the ruins of
Forsaken Mountain. Time enough for their dark and nefarious magic to
fade from human memory and into myth. But a prophesy has been spoken of a
union with the power to set the trolls free, and when Cécile de Troyes
is kidnapped and taken beneath the mountain, she learns there is far
more to the myth of the trolls than she could have imagined.
Cécile
has only one thing on her mind after she is brought to Trollus: escape.
Only the trolls are clever, fast, and inhumanly strong. She will have
to bide her time, wait for the perfect opportunity.
But something
unexpected happens while she’s waiting – she begins to fall for the
enigmatic troll prince to whom she has been bonded and married. She
begins to make friends. And she begins to see that she may be the only
hope for the half-bloods – part troll, part human creatures who are
slaves to the full-blooded trolls. There is a rebellion brewing. And her
prince, Tristan, the future king, is its secret leader.
As
Cécile becomes involved in the intricate political games of Trollus, she
becomes more than a farmer’s daughter. She becomes a princess, the hope
of a people, and a witch with magic powerful enough to change Trollus
forever.
I fell in love with Clare B. Dunkle's Hollow Kingdom series in 2012 - though I don't think I ever got around to reviewing it here, as with many things I loved in 2012. Ah, well. In any case, this sounds a lot like it - and trolls? Yes, please! I love faeries, but I think they are rather overdone at this point.
add on goodreads | releasing april 1 2014
The Story of Owen by E.K. Johnson
Listen! For I sing of
Owen Thorskard: valiant of heart, hopeless at algebra, last in a long
line of legendary dragon slayers. Though he had few years and was not
built for football, he stood between the town of Trondheim and creatures
that threatened its survival. There have always been dragons. As far
back as history is told, men and women have fought them, loyally
defending their villages. Dragon slaying was a proud tradition. But
dragons and humans have one thing in common: an insatiable appetite for
fossil fuels.
From the moment Henry Ford hired his first dragon slayer,
no small town was safe. Dragon slayers flocked to cities, leaving more
remote areas unprotected. Such was Trondheim's fate until Owen Thorskard
arrived. At sixteen, with dragons advancing and his grades plummeting,
Owen faced impossible oddsarmed only with a sword, his legacy, and the
classmate who agreed to be his bard. Listen! I am Siobhan McQuaid. I
alone know the story of Owen, the story that changes everything. Listen!
Dragons are a huge soft spot for me. My current WIP also is centered around them, so this must be the year of scaly, fire-breathing reptiles for me! The idea of a dragon epic in our present day is humorous and endearing. I can't wait to see how it turns out!
add on goodreads | releasing march 1 2014
Are any of my anticipated debuts on your list? Any that you think I should know about?
