Blogfest...Interrupted!

Today is the day for the "Blogfest...Interrupted" blogfest!  It's being hosted by Sash over at Sash's Secrets.

It's her first blogfest, so share the love!!  Go check out the other entries and put yours up too!

It's 500-1000 word entry where your characters are interrupted in whatever they are doing!  Sounds like fun, eh?  Get to writing, it's today only!


Here's mine below, hope you enjoy it.  I've used part of it before somewhere else, just can't remember where. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

      Dragan’s onyx gaze fell on her throat. Her slender white neck gleamed in the moonlight. She was a few rows over, kneeling down beside a headstone crafted into a somber angel figure. Why she was in a cemetery alone and at night was a mystery to him, but he did not truly care why; she was a meal to him, and nothing more. Yet she was overwhelming his keen senses. He could smell her aroma from his perch atop a crumbling, mossy headstone. She smelled sweetly of vanilla and lavender. Her warmth filled his nostrils, sending him into a frenzy. His hands shook with anticipation. But he knew he must control himself, he mustn’t scare her away. Not yet. He needed her blood inside him.

       Dragan eased off the tombstone, quietly making his way towards the woman he now considered already dead. His quickness landed him directly behind her; his silence left him standing close and undetected. At this distance her sugary scent devastated him; he could taste her now. He shifted momentarily, his boot heel crushing a twig under its weight. She turned swiftly, catching a glimpse of a tall shadow of a man.

      “Hello my dear. I am Dragan of the nightwalkers. I am here to ease your pain.” He smoothed a dark strand of hair away from her face, revealing the sadness in her eyes.

      “Ease my pain? No one can easy my pain. Not anymore.” She lightly ran a finger over the name on the headstone: Marcus Brennan. At that simple gesture she began crying all over again, tears mixing with the fresh rain. Dragan reached down and lifted her to his chest, wrapping his arms around her slim figure easily. She lost all composure then, sobbing into his shirt. He had her now.

      “What’s your name, child?” He angled her chin upwards to see into her eyes.

      “Elaina. My name is Elaina Brennan.”

      “Well Elaina, prepare yourself for death.” Shocked, Elaina tried to pull away, pushing with all her strength against him. Effortlessly Dragan threaded his fingers through her hair and jerked her head back, revealing her soft, porcelain throat. A scream escaped her mouth, as his mouth lowered to her neck.

      Suddenly a brightness filled his vision, a heat emanated from somewhere behind him. “I think you'll have to deal with being hungry for one more minute, Dragan.” Dragan turned slightly, squinting at the fire swirling around Sterling's hands, he would not let go of Elaina. Sterling stood there, feet planted firmly, hands ablaze with supernatural sparks of garnet flame, ready to char him to coals at any sudden movement. He contemplated finishing his meal, gazed into Elaina's eyes, and decided he too would live another day. “Someone is on your side today, my child.” He let her go. She shot out of his arms, headed in any direction that was away from him.

      “Good choice, Dragan. Now, slowly turn around...” Dragan followed her directions. He however, did not stop there. He grinned darkly, eyes piercing Sterling's one last time. In one swift movement he crouched down, throwing all of his weight into his legs, and shot straight up into the night. “Maybe next time, Sterling, it'll be your life I'll have the pleasure of interrupting.” He laughed deep and quiet as he flew through the sky.

  

Review of Beautiful by Amy Reed

"This must be what it feels like to be a piece of meat, to be wanted by someone hungry. This is all I have to do. This is easy. I am delicious."

When Cassie moves from the tiny town where she has always lived to a suburb of Seattle, she is determined to leave her boring, good-girl existence behind. This is Cassie's chance to stop being invisible and become the kind of girl who's worth noticing. 

Stepping into her new identity turns out to be easier than Cassie could have ever imagined...one moment, one choice, will change everything. 

Cassie's new existence both thrills and terrifies her. Swept into a world of illicit parties and social landmines, she sheds her virginity, embraces the numbness she feels from the drugs, and floats through it all, knowing that she is now called beautiful. She ignores the dangers of her fast-paced life?but she can't sidestep the secrets and the cruelty. 

Cassie is trapped in a swift downward spiral tinged with violence and abuse, and no one—not even the one person she thought she could trust—can help her now.

Cassie is a 13 year old girl looking for acceptance at a new school.  She finds a crooked sort of reception into a crowd of other lost children and loses herself.  Though the problem seems to be she never knew herself from the beginning.  She says a few pages in, "It is not hard to change when you were never anything in the first place."  

She begins her descent when a young rebel named Alex grabs her by the hand.  "I don't see her coming."  Cassie doesn't see anything coming, doesn't see Alex and her steam roller that is about to crush everything Cassie knows to be “normal”.  

Her fate is sealed with this line: “I cannot think of maybes. I cannot think of 'What if I turned around right now? What if I went the other way?' There is no other way. There is only forward, with Alex, to the boys who want to meet me.”

When Alex takes Cassie's life by the arm and drags her towards the black hole she will become, she says to herself, “Remember, this is what you want.”  She spends much of her time forcing her mind to accept that she is going to do all the things that these other kids want, anything, anytime, anywhere, so that she will be something, be noticed, be loved.

 

The rest of the story is akin to “going down the rabbit hole” as Cassie falls deeper into madness through engaging in sex, drug use, and alcohol abuse. The author keeps you tuned in at all times to Cassie's emotions, especially when she herself can't quite explain what she is experiencing. “...when really I'm nothing, when really I'm just skin wrapped around fog.”

I love the way the author sneaks in words that create feelings you don't realize are affecting you until later. “Cassie,” James says, and my name sounds like flowers in his mouth.” I can't help but feel how Cassie felt about a boy saying her name; she was completely enamored with the sound. This is just one example, there are many, many more. 

Beautiful was more than just a book I read. I experienced this book as if I were Cassie, as if all her feelings were mine and we were the same mind in the same body. Amy Reed did an exceptional job at making the intangible something you could taste and feel, even if those things were hard to swallow. A 13 year old girl having sex and using cocaine are not things you usually read about, but they happen. This book goes about the telling in a way that you actually understand a little of the why it happens. It lets you in on the deep darkness that creates monsters out of nice girls.

I read a few negative reviews for this book, and though understandable, I think they are misguided. I think I must stand up for this author and her book as much as possible, and say that writing a story like this requires going somewhere a lot of people don't – inside the quiet spaces of your mind – to discover the darkness inside all human beings and share what you find with the world. Great job Mrs. Amy Reed, you shared something through your writing that I could connect with and will never forget.

I don't want to spoil anything, so I will leave it at this:  Read this book.  It is a good read with rough realism.  It will be hard to imagine these young kids doing what they shouldn't be doing, but you won't be able to stop reading.  You will have to find out what happens to Cassie.

I'll leave it at 4 stars, simply because I didn't really care for the ending.  As I said, I will not spoil anything, just want to say that I wanted a different ending.  Still a great book, however.  I definitely recommend it!

On My Wishlist!

It's time for "On My Wishlist"!  It's a meme hosted by Book Chick City.  It's where you list all the books you desperately want but haven't actually bought yet. They can be old, new or forthcoming. It's also an event that you can join in with too - Mr Linky is always at the ready for you to link your own 'On My Wishlist' post over at the Book Chick City blog!


---------------------------------------------------------------------


This week I chose three books, all with one word titles, all sharing a common thread of what lies beneath the surface of human character.

My first one is Beautiful by Amy Reed  


When Cassie moves from the tiny town where she has always lived to a suburb of Seattle, she is determined to leave her boring, good-girl existence behind. This is Cassie's chance to stop being invisible and become the kind of girl who's worth noticing. 

Stepping into her new identity turns out to be easier than Cassie could have ever imagined...one moment, one choice, will change everything. 

Cassie's new existence both thrills and terrifies her. Swept into a world of illicit parties and social landmines, she sheds her virginity, embraces the numbness she feels from the drugs, and floats through it all, knowing that she is now called beautiful. She ignores the dangers of her fast-paced life?but she can't sidestep the secrets and the cruelty. 

Cassie is trapped in a swift downward spiral tinged with violence and abuse, and no one—not even the one person she thought she could trust—can help her now.  (from Goodreads)


I'm excited for this book because it is always intriguing to follow the adventure (positive or negative) that life can take you.  I also like exploring why people do what they do, and this book should deliver.


The second book I chose is Lifted by Wendy Toliver

When 15-year-old Poppy Browne moves from Boulder, CO, to Pleasant Acres, TX, with her professor mother, she has to attend Calvary High even though she's not Baptist. She makes friends with the popular girls and has a date for the Sadie Hawkins dance. Poppy gets caught in an ex-BFF rivalry between her friend Mary Jane and another schoolmate, Bridgette. Then she starts shoplifting. The first time, it's an accident. The second, it's induced by peer pressure. Subsequently, however, it's for the rush. Poppy, Mary Jane, and Whitney steal regularly, and Poppy doesn't know whether or not she can stop. Eventually, she overcomes her fear of disappointing Mary Jane and Whitney, but she still faces the consequences when her mother finds out what she has been doing.




 I'm excited about this book because yet again, it shows what people are capable of under pressure; what sort of things they'll do out of the norm.  It has good reviews, and hopefully when I do mine it'll be the same!  Can't wait to read it!




The third book I chose is a bit different than the other two.  Hater by David Moody

REMAIN CALM DO NOT PANIC TAKE SHELTER WAIT FOR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS THE SITUATION IS UNDER CONTROL Society is rocked by a sudden increase in the number of violent assaults on individuals. Christened 'Haters' by the media, the attackers strike without warning, killing all who cross their path. The assaults are brutal, remorseless and extreme: within seconds, normally rational, self-controlled people become frenzied, vicious killers. 

There are no apparent links as a hundred random attacks become a thousand, then hundreds of thousands. Everyone, irrespective of gender, age, race or any other difference, has the potential to become a victim - or a Hater. People are afraid to go to work, afraid to leave their homes and, increasingly, afraid that at any moment their friends, even their closest family, could turn on them with ultra violent intent.  

Waking up each morning, no matter how well defended, everyone must now consider the fact that by the end of the day, they might be dead.  Or perhaps worse, become a killer themselves.  As the status quo shifts, ATTACK FIRST, ASK QUESTIONS LATER becomes the order of the day...  only, the answers might be much different than what you expect.... 

In the tradition of H. G. Wells and Richard Matheson, Hater is one man’s story of his place in a world gone mad— a world infected with fear, violence, and HATE.


I am EXTREMELY excited for this book, as murder/mystery/sci-fi is right up my alley.  But it just seems the most interesting of the three as far as stretching the human capacity for action under pressure.  I hear it's going to be made into a movie soon.  That should be interesting as well!  Can't wait to read and review this book!

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Those are a few of the many books that are on my wishlist.  I hope you check them out as well!  And head on over to Book Chick City to see what everyone else is hoping for!

Teaser Tuesday (5)

It's time again for Teaser Tuesday, hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading !

Here are the rules:

Grab your current read

Open to a random page

Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)

Share the title author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"The problem with explosions is they nearly always wreak havoc on one's hair.  And when one has to spend one's entire morning having one's hair pinned and curled and twisted just so, having it go up in flames is to be avoided at all costs."

                                                     -Tick, Tick, Boom by Kiersten White
                                                     from an anthology with 12 other writers
                                                              Corsets and Clockwork

 Taken from Amazon:

Dark, urban fantasies come to life in the newest collection of Steampunk stories, Corsets & Clockwork. Young heroes and heroines battle evils with the help of supernatural or super-technological powers, each individual story perfectly balancing historical and fantastical elements. Throw in epic romances that transcend time, and this trendy, engrossing anthology is sure to become another hit for the fast-growing Steampunk genre!

This collection features some of the hottest writers in the teen genre, including: Ann Aguirre, Jaclyn Dolamore, Tessa Gratton, Frewin Jones, Caitlin Kittredge, Adrienne Kress, Lesley Livingston, Dru Pagliassotti, Dia Reeves, Michael Scott, Maria V. Snyder, Tiffany Trent, and Kiersten White.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

So far I LOVE LOVE LOVE this book.  Well, these books.  These short stories.  :) 

Can't wait to review them all!  Hope you pick this up and check it out!

The Muse-ic Writing Blogfest!

Over at Aleatoire there is a blogfest going on that was actually yesterday, but as I didn't find it until today, I will post now, hopefully not missing it by too much.  Sorry!!


You were supposed to pick a song and write something that was inspired by it.  Whatever it may be.  I struggled with mine, I just tried to write without thinking too much about it - just let the song take me away.  So here goes:

Kary drug her feet down the dusty road, her feet blistered and bleeding from the many miles she had walked. All she carried with her was her father's ring, a journal from her mother, and the clothes on her back. The sun seared her already burned skin. Her mind was heavy with dark thoughts of all she'd lost, of all she'd never get back. The only hope she had left in her empty heart was for someone to take her out of her misery. If she knew how, she'd do it herself. Everyone she loved was dead. The world was dead. She was dead.

Being dead wasn't new to Kary. This was her second time around. When she sold her soul to the Big Guy, the deal was simple. Do his bidding until he let her go, or her family would die. Whenever that would be. Now her family was dead; she had a little less motivation to help the tyrant that was Mr. S. Kary stopped, looked at the sky, and screamed through the dust clouds.

“YOU'RE MINE, S! IT'S OVER!” She unclenched her fists and fell to her knees, tears cascading to the ground. Her hands burned on the molten asphalt, but she left them there; she needed to feel the pain. She looked at her father's ring on her left middle finger; a silver band with a cross cutout in the center. She'd left that cross in plenty of people's faces with her sharp left hook. “For you Daddy.” She reached for her mother's journal she had stashed in her back pocket. Such a small, tattered thing, most would hardly think it was beautiful. But Kary knew every word on the old brown pages, every curve of the letters written from her mother's delicate hands. “For you, Mom.”

With all she held precious in her life right there in her hands, she vowed to do anything to stop Mr. S. from doing this to someone else. He didn't deserve to be the King of the Underworld. Not if Kary had anything to say about it.

The song/music video that inspired this short blurb is "New Low" by Middle Class Rut.

Hope you enjoy it!  It's a really great song, IMO.