Book Blitz: Excerpt + Giveaway- Marionette by TB Markinson

Hi, guys! We have a great book blitz for you today. Without much ado, let's get to what YA Bound has in store for you.

Marionette

by T.B. Markinson 

Release Date: 11/07/13

Summary from Goodreads:

At the age of seventeen, Paige Alexander had it all planned. She wrote a letter, sat in the bath, and slit her wrists. Her plan failed.

Her best friend, Alex, is dead.

Paige can't get over her twin sister blaming her for a tragic event in their past.

Colorado is in the midst of voting on lesbian and gay rights and Paige is terrified to come out of the closet, fearful for her life.

Many people in Paige's life are keeping secrets from her. Will she piece everything together before it's too late?

In this gripping first-person narrative, a young college student grapples with more than first loves or coming of age. In a world filled with homophobia, suicidal feelings, and a dysfunctional family, Paige cuts her wrists in an attempt to free herself from the crazy life that's all she's ever known.

Could there be new lessons in store for Paige? With the help of her girlfriend, friends, and a compassionate therapist, can Paige find the safe space she needs to heal, grow, and cut her strings?

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Buy Links:

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Excerpt:

I know people say they have emotional baggage. Do they know what they’re talking about? I have baggage. I’m not bragging about it. I’m just stating the simple truth. I’m an effed-up individual who dwells on the past and tries to numb myself constantly. I don’t use drugs, although I’ll drink. I just numb myself by disappearing when I’m with people.

Jessica thinks I need to stop my destructive behavior. Sure, sure. I’ll just plant my feet firmly on the ground and stop. If only it were that easy. If it were, then I’d do it. At least I think I would do it.

I don’t mean to knock Jessica. I love her. God, I love her. But I don’t know how to explain to her … how to tell her that I’m broken. Beyond repair. There’s not enough glue to put me back together.

Maybe the issue is me. I know that seems obvious. I slit my wrists, after all. No one made me. I did it. But hear me out. Millions of people have difficult lives, yet they still function. Again, I swear this isn’t a Bell Jar moment. I’m not bonkers. Confused: yes. Scared: check. Angry: most definitely. I spend most of my time annoyed with people. Why do they have to be so fucking stupid?

I like to study history. The history of the little guy. Don’t get me wrong, kings, queens, explorers and shit, they’re all cool, but I like to see how the little guys make it. How do they survive hardship? Like Elie Wiesel—he survived the Holocaust for Christ’s sake, and then he wrote a book about it. I read that book a lot. If he could survive that, why can’t I survive my past? Why do I always go back? I didn’t live in Auschwitz. My home life sucked. Sucked big time. My parents are horrible people. They do not like me, not one bit. But my home isn’t Auschwitz, and my parents are not Nazis. Why can’t I be a survivor, be like Elie?

It isn’t like I always go back to a particular incident. I’m not a time traveler. (This isn’t a Slaughterhouse-Five scenario either. I’m not Billy Pilgrim.) I just check out. I don’t know where I go, but I’m gone. I’ll stop talking—that’s another way to become invisible. I might nod my head, act like I’m listening. I’m not. Most people, though, don’t really care whether anyone else is listening. Many people don’t even notice. They just want to talk. They just want to feel as if someone is listening. How many people really care what others think? Not many, from my experience. That’s one of the hardest things to live with, feeling alone. Even when I’m with others I feel alone. Even more so. I don’t think many people can relate to me. I know I can’t relate to them. I feel like I’m on the outside, looking in.

Disappearing all of the time has perpetuated this feeling of being alone. Logically, I should stop disappearing. But my brain doesn’t think logically. I’m not sure how it thinks, but I don’t feel logical.

I feel … well, I don’t know how I feel. Confused. Scared. Angry. Alone. But now that I think about it, I’m not sure that’s true. At times, I’m sure I feel all of those emotions. Other times, I don’t feel. Not at all. I don’t get it. I wish I could, but I don’t.

Explanations—that’s what I seek. I’ve always been one who wonders who, what, and why, which is just another reason I love to study history. Every history test has those “who am I?” questions, and I nail them every time. In fact, I’m a brilliant student. I don’t mean to brag. I’m just stating the facts. School and I get along. I have a photographic memory; some think that’s cheating, but I can’t change it. It’s nice if you want good grades.

But when it comes to asking those questions about myself. Who am I? What am I? I can’t really answer them. They seem fairly obvious, right? I’m me. I’m a girl. And I’m not one who wants to be a boy, even if I’m in love with a girl. I think people who think that are idiots. Usually, though, they don’t see that. I wish idiots would recognize that they’re idiots. Life would be so much easier if others said, “Don’t bother with me, I’m an idiot.”

Let’s start again, at the beginning. I slit my wrists. My girlfriend came home. She went ape-shit. I got stitches in both arms. I felt a little like Frankenstein—the monster I mean, even if that’s not really correct. Everyone thinks the monster’s name is Frankenstein, so I’m not about to correct them and tell them it was the doctor’s name. My point is that I was patched back together and told to be normal, to be human. Victor Frankenstein, the scientist, didn’t try to teach the monster, but at least Jess is trying to teach me how to be normal. How to be human.  

About the Author:

T. B. Markinson is a 39-year old American writer, living in England, who pledged she would publish before she was 35. Better late than never. When she isn't writing, she’s traveling around the world, watching sports on the telly, visiting pubs in England, or taking the dog for a walk. Not necessarily in that order. She has published two novels: A WOMAN LOST and MARIONETTE.


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Review- Rule by Jay Crownover

Goodreads Summary:

Opposites in every way . . . except the one that matters 

Shaw Landon loved Rule Archer from the moment she laid eyes on him. Rule is everything a straight--A pre-med student like Shaw shouldn’t want--and the only person she’s never tried to please. She isn’t afraid of his scary piercings and tattoos or his wild attitude. Though she knows that Rule is wrong for her, her heart just won’t listen.

To a rebel like Rule Archer, Shaw Landon is a stuck-up, perfect princess-and his dead twin brother’s girl. She lives by other people’s rules; he makes his own. He doesn’t have time for a good girl like Shaw-even if she’s the only one who can see the person he truly is.

But a short skirt, too many birthday cocktails, and spilled secrets lead to a night neither can forget. Now, Shaw and Rule have to figure out how a girl like her and a guy like him are supposed to be together without destroying their love . . . or each other.

REVIEW:

Ah, ha! Just when I thought that Rule as a book was the most predictable book ever and the super long chapters were getting on my nerves, and all the angst, anger and drama were getting a bit irritating, I was greeted by a super sweet ending. 

Rule is the story of Shaw who has been in love with her best friend Remy's twin brother Rule since she first laid eyes on him. She has her own family problems and the Archer family accept her as one of thier own. Rule, however, wants to be independent, live his own life and have nothing to do with what others think about him. When Shaw and Rule spend Shaw's birthday night at Rule's place, everything between the two changes and they then begin to slowly fall in love. 

In so many ways, Rule reminded me of so many book bad boys I've previously read and loved. He was a little attitudinal to me, but overall I enjoyed seeing him change and grow as and how times called for it. Shaw was a good enough girl but some of her actions peeved me. Nonetheless, as a couple, Shaw and Rule were super hot and super sweet. I even liked getting to know both their families, as weird as they were, and also their friends. Which is why I'm quite excited to read Jet, the next book in author Jay Crownover's Marked Men series. 

New Adult books these days are just getting so easy to figure out. I can almost tell you the whole story after just reading one chapter from each of the protagonist's point of view. It went the same way with Rule and I tend to quite revel in the fact that I'm now so well versed with NA story lines. 

Rule was a sweet and hot read that I and trouble getting into but I enjoyed by the time I finished it. 

RATING:

Release Week Event- You Were Mine by Abbi Glines

We're celebrating the release of YOU WERE MINE  by New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author Abbi Glines! 

Title: You Were Mine (Rosemary Beach)

Author: Abbi Glines

Publisher: Atria Books (December 2, 2014)

Goodreads
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From #1 "New York Times "bestselling author Abbi Glines comes a brand-new Rosemary Beach novel about Tripp Newark and his hidden romantic past with Bethy Lowry.

In the eyes of the wealthy playboys who frequent Kerrington Country Club in Rosemary Beach, Tripp Newark is a hero. Under pressure from his parents to become a lawyer and lead a conservative, upper-class life, Tripp disappeared from town five years ago to travel the world, forfeiting the opportunity to inherit millions. Yet few know what he was really running from...

Bethy Lowry was unraveling long before her boyfriend drowned in a riptide trying to save her after she'd had one too many drinks--again. A trailer park kid working as a cart girl among the wealthy patrons of Kerrington Country Club, Bethy has always been impressionable. But five years ago, before she earned her reputation as a hard-drinking, easy girl, she had spent a single summer with Tripp Newark that changed her life forever...

EXCERPT

Tripp

Present Day…

I sat on my Harley and waited for Bethy to walk out of the clubhouse. Woods had been texting me Bethy’s work schedule every two weeks, and I made sure she made it home from work safely every night. It wasn’t stalking her, exactly. It was just the only way I could remain sane.

Watching over her was all I had. If I got too close, she flipped. The last time I’d tried to talk to her, she'd started screaming. I hadn’t been able to calm her down. I was watching her lose herself slowly. And it was tearing me up.

So I followed her to work everyday, and I followed her home every night. Once she was safely in her apartment, I often sat parked across the road and watched her window until it went dark. She never looked at me, even though I wasn’t hiding the fact I was following her. There was no use in hiding it from her.

The last words she’d actually spoken to me -not screamed at me, because there'd been a lot of that- had been eighteen months ago on the beach when we'd lost Jace. My cousin, my best friend, and the love of Bethy’s life. He’d drowned saving her life when she'd wandered into the ocean drunk and got caught in a riptide. Losing him had taken a part of my soul. He’d been the little brother I never had. He’d been the good Newark heir. He’d been everything I should have been but wasn’t.

And we had loved the same girl. Although he never knew it.

Watching her pull away from life more and more each day was so damn hard. Jace wouldn’t have wanted this. He would have hated it. He loved her more than he loved himself. Seeing her like this would break his heart.

Bethy swung her long dark hair over her shoulder as she stepped out of the clubhouse. The shorts she wore had once been tight and cupped her perfect round bottom. But just like she'd lost the will to live, she’d also lost weight. Too much.

The need to hold her and help her heal was so fucking strong. But she didn’t want me. I hadn’t realized how badly she hated me until I’d returned to Rosemary Beach a little more than two years ago. I'd run like hell eight years ago from a life threatening to suffocate me. My father wanted something for me that I didn’t want, and I hadn’t been able to see my way out.

I had been eighteen years old and scared, because in three short months, one sixteen-year-old girl had become my sole concern in life. Bethy had stolen my heart the summer I met her at Rush's party. When I'd been ready to throw away the life I'd been planning for the past year in order to be with her, my father had reminded me of just how much control he had over me.

I wouldn’t have been able to keep Bethy if I'd stayed. That wasn’t the life he’d let me have. So I'd run, hoping that when I came back in two years, when she was old enough, I could take her with me. But first, I'd needed to escape.

I watched as Bethy opened the door to her old beat-up Ford Taurus and climbed inside. The stiff way she held herself and the way she kept her focus turned away from me told me she knew I was here. She expected me to be there.

Once she would have broken into the biggest, most beautiful smile in the world and run into my arms. But that was the past. I had broken that. I had broken her, and I hadn’t even known.

GIVEAWAY

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About the Author:

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today bestselling author of TWISTED PERFECTION, FALLEN TOO FAR, NEVER TOO FAR, JUST FOR NOW, WHILE IT LASTS, BECAUSE OF LOW, BREATHE, THE VINCENT BOYS, THE VINCENT BROTHERS, THE EXISTENCE TRILOGY.

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Review- Mine to Have by Cynthia Eden

Summary-

Is he a hero…or the villain?

When Elizabeth Ward sees Saxon Black rushing into the backroom of The Blade—a low end bar in Miami—she isn’t sure if he’s there to save the day…or just to raise some hell. But she’s being held hostage, and he’s her best hope of survival. Within minutes, she’s away from the jerks with the guns and riding fast and hard on the back of Saxon’s motorcycle. 

Death stalks them.

Saxon has been working undercover for far too long. When he finds sexy Elizabeth—with a gun to her head—he knows he will do anything to keep her safe. But once he gets her away from her abductors, the threat to her isn’t over. Someone has put a price on Elizabeth’s head, and if Saxon can’t keep her safe from the danger stalking her, then she’ll be dead.

Their lives are both on the line.

As their enemies close in, Elizabeth and Saxon must go on the run. And the longer they are together, the hotter their attraction for one another seems to burn. Saxon vows not to let anyone hurt her, no matter what he has to do, because he’s falling fast for Elizabeth. He’ll stop the killers on her trail, and then he’ll have her. Forever.

Review-

I am a huge fan of Cynthia Eden's Mine series so when the latest installment, Mine to Have came out, I got right to it. Mine to have is Saxon and Elizabeth's story. We'd met Saxon in the previous book and I was really intrigued by him. He definitely lived up to all my expectations and I thoroughly devoured Mine to Have.

Elizabeth is our heroine. We dive right into the action from the first page itself with Elizabeth being rescued by Saxon. What she doesn't know is if Saxon is rescuing her or if he is just taking her hostage. Like all Cynthia Eden heroines, I loved Elizabeth. She was sweet and innocent yet brave. She was wildly attracted to Saxon yet she knew how impossible it was for them to ever really be together.

Then we have Saxon. He totally stole the show for me. Saxon is a foul mouthed, rough around the edges kinda guy. He has worked undercover for most of his life and now he just wants to get it over with. What he doesn't expect is to stumble into Elizabeth on his last case. He just can't let her go, try as he may.

I loved the chemistry between Elizabeth and Saxon. There were sparks flying all over the place. They had such a banter going on that I loved all the conversations between them. On the surface, the hope for Elizabeth and Saxon getting a happy ending was zero but they both worked for it. It just made the end result even sweeter.

We get to see many characters in Mine to Have. Victor, who is like Saxon's brother, had a major chunk of role and I think his book will be next. I am super excited for it. With amazing twists and turns, steamy romance and suspense, Mine to Have was a great addition to the Mine series.

Trailer Reveal- The Letting by Cathrine Goldstein

Hi, guys! We have a great book trailer reveal for y'all today, hosted by YA Bound for author Cathrine Goldstein's The Letting. Let's see what's in store for you! 

The Letting

by Cathrine Goldstein 

Release Date: 12/15/14

335 pages

Summary from Goodreads:

What if the Devil doesn’t know he’s the Devil?

This is the question Veronica “Ronnie” Billings poses to Phoenix, her sworn enemy, the leader of the Peaceful Revolution, and the one she loves.

Kidnapped by Phoenix’s rebels, Ronnie learns how wrong she has been. She had no idea that her patriotism was wasted on a corrupt government. Ronnie was proud to be a Leader; taking hundreds of harvested girls to the Letting facility. After all, she was saving them from future Couplings and bringing them to the safety of the New World. Or so she thought…

Confused, Ronnie realizes the only way to discover the truth is to trust her heart. Together, Phoenix and Ronnie devise a plan to stop their corrupt government and preempt the dangerous rebel coup which is approaching. But when their plan goes awry, will Ronnie be strong enough to save Phoenix, her country, and herself?

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Buy Links: Amazon

About the author:

Given my love for cities and all that is gritty, my new obsession with trees really has me stumped. (Sorry.) Maybe it's because trees are the inspiration behind my new YA/NA novel, theLETTING.

Whatever the reason for my new infatuation, some things remain constant -- like my love for: coffee (although sadly, it's now decaf); yoga; Luna bars (I am petitioning for them to bring back Chocolate Raspberry!); running in my neighborhood; Hemingway; Bukowski... and, above all, my husband and my girls.

I am the author of the bestselling novel, Sleeping With Mortals: The Story of a New York Mistress, and I'm also a playwright. I have my B.A. in English and my M.A. in Theatre. 

Author Links: Website│Goodreads│Twitter│Facebook

Trailer Reveal Organized by:

I hope you liked that trailer. Let me know your thoughts on the same in the comments below. Thank you for stopping by, and happy reading! 

Top Ten Tuesday #39

Top Ten Tuesday is a bookish meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

This week's topic is: 

top ten books I am looking forward to in 2015

Well, I'm not one to read books as soon as they come out. I take my own time in getting to some book, so I'll be modifying this question as per my reading preferences and this is what I'll be telling y'all: 

top ten books on my shelf i am looking forward to finally read in 2015

Here's my list:

 

 

What books are on your 2015 list? Let me know in the comments below. Happy Tuesday and happy reading! 

Super Srishti Giveaway (India only)

Hi, guys! It's December, and both Janhvi and I love this month. So, to kick off this sparkly and wintery month, we have a giveaway for you. This time, we are giving away two books published by Srishti Publishers and Distributors. Srishti is a publishing house that will always be very close to our hearts and we love to help them in our own way. So we're going to give away a copy of author Disha's Because Life is a Gift :) and author Abhisar Sharma's a Hundred Lives for You. This is an India only giveaway that'll run as per our normal giveaways, so let's get on to it! Also, both the books will be given to one winner. 

 

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT BECAUSE LIFE IS A GIFT :) ON GOODREADS

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT A HUNDRED LIVES FOR YOU ON GOODREADS

GIVEAWAY: 

Giveaway rules are simple:

*Giveaway is open for residents of India only,

*Enter by filling out the Rafflecopter form below. 

*Only one winner will be picked and will get both the books. 

*Once the giveaway is over and the winner is picked, they will be emailed and will have 48 hours to respond or else we'll be compelled to pick a new winner. 

*The books will be shipped by us, The Readdicts.
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a Rafflecopter giveaway

That's all there is to it, guys, Thank you so much for stopping by, and may the odds be ever in your favour! Also, thank you Srishti!