Thursday 30 April 2015

Manga Review : Life is Short, Delinquent Youngster, Love! by Nijino Yuuka



Title: Life is Short, Delinquent Youngster, Love!
Original Title: Inochi Mijikashi, Koise yo Furyou Shounen!
Author: Nijino Yuuka
Artist: Nijino Yuuka

Year of Release: 2013
Genres: Romance, Shoujo, School Life, Slice of Life

Status: Completed 
Chapters (Translated in English): 8
Volumes & Chapters: 

Volume 1 Chapters 0-7





Summary

If you don't date her, you'll die! That was the prediction made to that delinquent boy, but what will be his destiny...?

My Thoughts


Review covers 8 chapters 


Now, let’s see what do we have here today! It’s a nice romance story, with quite a lot of bumps and turns. I read this story about three times, and every time I finished it, I had this stupid grin on my face. Why? Well, it is not just a normal story. The plot of every chapter gives us a little thrill here and there, and you just cannot fall in love with it.

From the title, you get to see that the story will take a fun twist. Meet our main character – Kuroiwa Masayoshi a delinquent who is told by Kami-sama (that’s God in Japanese) that will die if he doesn’t date a girl called Misaki Yuu. Imagine yourself on Masayoshi’s place; would you believe in the talk of some strange old man? No, well, you’re on a right pass, neither did our hero. But that just doesn’t make his day, due to all different misfortunes coming his way and nearly killing him. So, what to do now? There is not much and Kuroiwa Masayoshi goes to all-girl school to confess to Misaki Yuu - a very beautiful girl, who is not approached easily by her classmates due to her beauty. Now most of you would have thought that Masayoshi would have been rejected. Nope, that’s not happening. Yuu agrees without even thinking twice and so their love story begins.

The characters are amazing in both their nature and their development. One of the most interesting ones is the delinquent – Masayoshi. Through these eight chapters, the author shows that sometimes, nope mostly always we – people are judging by the stereotypes. It’s not Masayoshi’s fault that he has red hair and that he always gets in situations where in the end he get injured, but people only see a delinquent in him because of one mistake and no one is approaching him, or even normally talking to him. Misaki Yuu is also an amazing character, she also is alone like Masayoshi and those two suit each other perfectly. Another character, which I liked even though he appeared only once is Yuu’s brother- Tsubasa Misaki. That guy is just super cool. Well, he’s weird as the whole family of Yuu’s but he’s just the best weirdo of all. Who would make an army squad shoot at a 17-year-old just to make a point in Masayoshi not having an ability to be with Yuu?

You’ll get to see the picture, how their love will go on and what will happen to both of them. Will Masayoshi fall in love for real with Yuu? Why did Yuu agree so easily to going out with a delinquent? If you are interested, grab your copy now, or just visit online manga websites to read it. Enjoy it to its fullest. You will laugh, get a but shocked and smile a lot throughout the whole way. Happy reading!

XOXO

Katie 


Rating



Monthly Blog Recap : April




And now our blog recap:


Book reviews:



Manga Reviews:

4 Leaves


Release Day Blitz:

Release Day Blitz : Black Number Four by Kandi Steiner



Book Blitz:

Promo Blitz : Sexy in The City Author Event




Cover Reveal: 

Cover Reveal : Scars by Elena M. Reyes (A Marked Series #2.5)



Waiting On Wednesday:

Waiting On Wednesday #36 Empire of Night



Blog Tours:


Wednesday 29 April 2015

Waiting On Wednesday #40 With Visions of Red


Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill @ Breaking the Spine It’s a chance to showcase upcoming releases we are interested in or drooling over.


With Visions of Red by Trisha Wolfe 

Broken Bonds #1 

29 April, 2015 

Goodreads 

Criminal profiler Sadie Bonds knows blood. Her affair with the gruesome, dark world of killers began long before she started applying her analytical skills to investigate gory crime scenes. She gets inside the killers’ heads, breaks them down, relates to them on an arcane level. She prefers it this way—because it’s safer to ally herself with the villain than the victim. At least, that’s how she’s coped ever since she was abducted and tortured as a teen.
She will never be a victim again.


Now, she’s honed her skills in order to bring justice to these ritualistic offenders. Working alongside her colleagues, armed with sharp wit and a SIG, Sadie always catches her sadist. Until one ruthless serial killer gets inside Sadie’s head, turning the tables. He knows her secrets. Her obsessions. The darkest, most deviant part of her soul.


When she meets Colton Reed, dangerous stakes are raised as he threatens to unravel her control and reveal her darkest fantasies. The sexy-as-sin bondage rigger at an exclusive BDSM club pushes her boundaries, forcing her to acknowledge that side of herself she fears. Plunged into a realm of torture and suffering, pain and pleasure, Sadie balances on the razor-sharp edge of two intersecting worlds threatening to swallow her.


Passion and lust ignite. Dark and light battle. This explosive first installment of the Broken Bonds series sets the exhilarating pace for a cat and mouse game where no one knows who’s really pulling the strings.

What's on your waiting list?


Saturday 25 April 2015

Book Haul & Blog Weekly #43


Book Haul & Blog Weekly is a weekly featute here at Katie's Corner inspired by Stacking Shelves by Tynga's Reviews and The Sunday Post by Caffeinated Book Reviewer.


Book Haul:



Purchased/Freebies:


Uninvited by Sophie Jordan 




NetGalley/Edelweiss:

N/A

Author Request/Tour:



The Guardians of Sin by Jonathan L. Ferrara


Everflame by Dylan Lee Peters





N/A

Gifted:

N/A



Blog Weekly:



Manga Review: Orange by Takano Ichigo
4.5 Leaves

Release Day Blitz : Not Your Hero by Anna Brooks

Book Review : Pool of Echoes by David G. Allen 
4 Leaves

Waiting On Wednesday #39 Very Good Lives

Blog Tour : Twice Lost by Jennifer Field (The Harbinger Series #1) 

Monthly Interview With David G. Allen 


Hello everyone, 

thanks for stopping by. :) Well, my week was okay, i got to go back to University, and my final exams are approaching, and i just had my spring break. I don't know about you, but it's getting hotter and hotter here, in Cyprus. Soon it will be unbearable. 

I am working on many project for my studies as well as my photography club, though i do not think that one of them will be actually held on time... okay, i hope you had a great week, and i wish you a great weekend as well as a fabulous week. stay tuned as i will be having a lot of great reviews and promos in the future :) 

XOXO

Katie

Friday 24 April 2015

Monthly Interview With David G. Allen


Today I am having an interview with David Allen author of an amazing inspirational novel Pool of Echoes. 





Summary (from Goodreads)

Title: Pool of Echoes

Author: David G. Allen

Publication Date: 19 Oct, 2014

Publisher: Self-published 

Goodreads – Amazon – Barnes & Noble







Summary:




In this Inspirational Thriller, Nothing Is Certain But The Truth 

Jordan Mitchfield is heir to a media empire worth billions. He also sees and hears things that aren’t there. 

Then someone close puts him in an insane asylum against his will. 

When it looks like there is no way out but to take his own life, he is stopped. Is it a vision? Is what he’s seeing actually real? Is it even part of this dimension? 

Whatever it is, it opens his cell door and throws him into a dangerous time-travel adventure through his memories. 

As he goes deeper into the Pool of Echoes, he is forced to confront everything he has ever known, reconstruct his own mental health, and play a role in something much larger than himself. 

Fans of Contemporary Science fiction, Action, Espionage, Christian fiction, and Fantasy with a Psychological edge will dive through each exciting moment. 

If you or anyone you know has ever questioned their own self worth, get on board this life-changing thrill-ride. You will never be the same.

Interview:

Katie: Hello, thank you for this interview, how are you?
David Allen: Awesome.

K.: It’s nice to hear. Can you tell us more about yourself?
D.: Sure. I was born in Alaska, and lived there until I was about 21. Then, after some traveling, I moved to Texas. There is a long scar on my right-bottom lip - I don’t know where I got it and noticed it for the first time in kindergarten. My first boss out of high school told me I was so bad at selling that I wasn’t worth the paper printed to train me. I’ve since tried sales 8 different times and after I earned enough to pay the bills every month I stopped. There was no need to prove myself anymore.

K.: My first question will be when did you first start writing?
D.: In kindergarten there was this show on public television called Reading Rainbow. It had that guy - I think he was from Star Trek - LeVar Burton. Anyway, the show collaborated with local affiliates to host writing contests all over the country. My mom heard about it and asked if I had an idea for a story. So the first story I ever wrote was about a mouse that knew the woods really well, and used his skills to evade an owl with a thirst for mouse blood. I didn’t word it like that, but it did well and won a prize. When you’re a kid, you often don’t know if you have talent without some third party validation or passion. For me it was both, but it took until I was 23 to write a novel.

K.: Do you remember the first story you ever read and the impact it had on you?
D: Growing up in church, the first book I heard about was the Bible, and it had a lot of stories. Then my parents took turns reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It took a long time, but those were the earliest books I remember going through, other than short picture-form stuff like The Little Cricket.

K.: Why did you write this book and what are your expectations on its behalf?
D: Pool of Echoes started out as a book designed to teach people how to build the kind of life they want without blaming other people. As the project moved forward, it ended up becoming about self esteem, where we draw our worth from. Did it do what I wanted? Maybe, because I’ve learned the two are highly related. Why do we blame other people? It may be because we don’t feel we have the confidence to take full responsibility for our lives. If that phrase cuts, don’t worry - we all do it sometimes.
It was my first book where I was the only author, so I didn’t expect it to become the next Hunger Games or anything. Still, you expect the best for something you care about.

K.: What’s the story behind your latest book?
D: The last person you would expect to have self esteem issues is an intelligent, attractive young man who is the son of a billionaire.
This is the story about that son, who discovers one flaw in who he is, and it unravels every source of self-worth that he has until he realizes it doesn’t come from external sources.
So, he has schizophrenia, a brother who hates him, and so forth. It just gets heavier and heavier until he learns his lesson. A few people help him along the way for many reasons, the biggest of which is that he has a role to play that can impact an upcoming election.

K.: I loved the book a lot but I had some questions, especially about the concept of Pool of Echoes. Could you tell me more how you came up with such an idea?
D.: I’m still trying to figure that out. It’s a combination of several ideas, like most great concepts are. The first is that to change ourselves, we must reinterpret how we experience the world. An easy solution, and the second idea, was to make a time-travel story. Those stories, however, have many predictable situations that have been done before - so I wanted to make a story that’s like time-travel, but introduces new dangers and complications that nobody has ever seen before. Then the third idea is the story of Naaman the Syrian, who in the Bible was cured of leprosy by washing seven times in the Jordan river. That became the symbol of change, and the catalyst for the whole time travel experience.

K.: What is the greatest joy of writing for you?
D: Giving a sense of wonder - that there is a whole world to explore in just a single idea. Every story I love has that.

K.: What motivated you to become an indie author?
D: Necessity. The book industry is acting a whole lot more like Hollywood - promoting a few major bestsellers based on attached household names, and not doing much for anyone else. I self-published before ever hearing about the heavy hitters like Joe Konrath or Amanda Hocking. When the first book was getting done, I lived in Argentina - a long way from English-language publishers. I didn’t have an agent, and wanted enough control over how to promote the book so it would have the most potential. Now I’ve learned a lot more about being indie, and would consider a publishing deal if I could still write and release other stories while under contract, get my rights back at some point, and the relationship led to great placement in bookstores, airports, and those kinds of places.

K.: When you’re not writing, how do you spend your time?
D: Working a lot. I have two jobs right now, which limits how much time I can devote to a lot of things. This will change in a while, though I don’t have an exact date.
K.: What are you working on next?
D: A fantasy based around Native American culture and setting. What if one Native tribe followed just one God? - that’s one question I’ve been asking. The setting is fictionalized so I don’t upset people if I should get anything wrong.
I’m also working on a series centered around a new kind of spy/hero. The first draft of the first book is already done, and now I’m looking for follow-up concepts before continuing with it.

K.: Can you describe your desk?
D: It’s a portable desk with lockable wheels at the bottom. Everything about the desk can be changed. I try not to work at home because it messes with my head, though I’m at home now.  The desk helps because I can change the elevation and positioning, which makes it feel like I’m somewhere else.

K.: Thank you for the interview. Good luck with the book and I hope to read more of your work in the future.
D: Thank you. Feel free to visit authordavid.com - that’s where I let people know about new stuff. And I have a mailing list so you don’t even need to revisit again and again. I’m giving them a short story based in the Pool of Echoes really soon, exploring the past life of Sam Solomon. It’s going to be great fun. Thanks for having me on!

K.: Today we had an interview with David Allen author of Pool of Echoes. If you haven’t read it yet, here’s your chance, grab your copy and start reading it now. If you want to read my review, you can find it here.  

Thursday 23 April 2015

Blog Tour : Twice Lost by Jennifer Field (The Harbinger Series #1)

Twice lost Banner  

Title: Twice Lost 

Author: Jennifer Fields 

Genre: Paranormal Erotica 

Book Tour: April 20-24 

Hosted by: SBB Promotions

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Synopsis
Jenna Thanatos thought she was ordinary; just your everyday girl with a healthy sexual appetite and a few kinks to boot. After moving to Maine to be closer to her boyfriend, Kyle, Jenna was starting a new chapter in her life. Little did she know, this chapter had more to offer than she ever thought possible.
One night of fun exhibitionism turns Jenna’s world upside down and shoves her face first into a world she never knew existed. Harbinger. Female Harbinger. The thing of legends, a myth foretold by ancient seers, but it couldn’t be true. She was just her. Besides, things like that didn’t exist. After being kidnapped, shot at, chased, and sprouting wings, she wasn’t so sure anymore.
Timoteus, an ancient Harbinger, has been searching for Jenna for years after finding out that she truly did exist, keeping a long-term promise to an old friend to watch over his family line. His duties were to protect her, train her, and make the foretold prophecy come to fruition. After saving Jenna, they find themselves still being hunted, landing Tim right in the middle of an operation he never dreamed could exist.
Benneit Colebrook took over his father’s business after his death last year. When the mention of a female Harbinger was whispered in his ear, he knew he had to have the rare and precious being to add to his collection. And, he would do anything to get her.
Jenna now finds herself in an underground compound with two sexy as hell men, hiding away from the people hell-bent on taking her. Why? She has no clue. Yesterday she was normal, today she’s not only in a fight for her life, but also the lives of all beings that have been disappearing for centuries.
Will Jenna be able to accept who she is and face this new world head-on, or will everything come crumbling down before she has a fighting chance?
Twice Lost Cover
Book Trailer
YoutTube
Buy Links copy
amazon-logo-80x80 BN-LOGO-80x80 Amazon UK
Author Bio Trans
Jennifer's debut full length novel Twice Lost - Book 1 in the Harbinger Series was released in September 2014 under the Forever Red Publishing label. She is currently working on four Novella length books within the Harbinger Series to be released in-between her full length novels just to keep the steaminess going. She currently lives in Western Massachusetts and has a love for adventure that makes her who she truly is. As an avid mountain climber & hiker it is not unusual for her to be hanging off of a 5.9 in the Adirondacks or the Shawangunk Mountain ranges. During the off season of climbing, also known as winter, she attends the New England Center for Circus Arts where she studied static trapeze (think Cirque rather than Circus). She an only child so has her mother to thank for her over active imagination and knack for storytelling. Over the years she's written several short stories of the "naughty" nature. But had never envisioned herself as a writer. Just someone who enjoyed telling a steamy story
Author links trans
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Wednesday 22 April 2015

Waiting On Wednesday #39 Very Good Lives


Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill @ Breaking the Spine It’s a chance to showcase upcoming releases we are interested in or drooling over.


Very Good Lives by J.K. Rowling 

14 April, 2015 

Goodreads 

J.K. Rowling, one of the world's most inspiring writers, shares her wisdom and advice. 

In 2008, J.K. Rowling delivered a deeply affecting commencement speech at Harvard University. Now published for the first time in book form, VERY GOOD LIVES presents J.K. Rowling's words of wisdom for anyone at a turning point in life. How can we embrace failure? And how can we use our imagination to better both ourselves and others?

Drawing from stories of her own post-graduate years, the world famous author addresses some of life's most important questions with acuity and emotional force.

Sales of VERY GOOD LIVES will benefit both Lumos, a charity organization founded by J.K. Rowling, which works to transform the lives of disadvantaged children, and university-wide financial aid at Harvard University.

What's on your waiting list?


Tuesday 21 April 2015

Book Review : Pool of Echoes by David G. Allen



Summary (from Goodreads)

Title: Pool of Echoes

Author: David G. Allen

Publication Date: 19 Oct, 2014

Publisher: Self-published

GoodreadsAmazon – Barnes & Noble







Summary:


In this Inspirational Thriller, Nothing Is Certain But The Truth 

Jordan Mitchfield is heir to a media empire worth billions. He also sees and hears things that aren’t there. 

Then someone close puts him in an insane asylum against his will. 

When it looks like there is no way out but to take his own life, he is stopped. Is it a vision? Is what he’s seeing actually real? Is it even part of this dimension? 

Whatever it is, it opens his cell door and throws him into a dangerous time-travel adventure through his memories. 

As he goes deeper into the Pool of Echoes, he is forced to confront everything he has ever known, reconstruct his own mental health, and play a role in something much larger than himself. 

Fans of Contemporary Science fiction, Action, Espionage, Christian fiction, and Fantasy with a Psychological edge will dive through each exciting moment. 

If you or anyone you know has ever questioned their own self worth, get on board this life-changing thrill-ride. You will never be the same.


My Thoughts:


Hello everyone and welcome back to Katie’s Corner! Today is Tuesday, meaning it’s time to cover an awesome book. What do I have for you today? I got this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. Truth be told I got it somewhere in October or November 2014 and due to my studies couldn’t review it. But as promised my spring break equaled to me reading, so apologies to everyone who has been waiting for me to review this book. I’m ready to share y thoughts right now.

The subtitle: “inspirational Novel” suits this book very well. When I first started reading it, no, way before I started reading it, I was expecting something absolutely different, but whatever I got was quite astonishing and a really great new approach to our memories and self-development. David Allen constructed an absolutely realistic world with characters as if from life and not just fictional ones. The very concept of Pool of echoes was very interesting, though I didn’t really get how it actually allowed people to visit their memories and change stuff. I thought that it was cheating. Instead of overcoming his difficulties now, Jordan went to the past and gave hope to his old selves so that he could be reborn. I believe it’s cheating, but to come up with such idea is also great.

I am still confused with some things mainly with Nathan coming in all Jordan’s memories to kill him. Okay, I got that he was a demon, but then again if he was a demon it must have been Jordan’s subconscious that made him, so why couldn’t he not just think about him. But, well how he overcame him was also great. The paradox theory was also well though of. And it made quite a lot of sense. Another thing which was really confusing was why he had to kill himself – Jay 66, I mean he killed his future-self, which to me made absolutely no sense, but then again I might have missed something important when I wanted to understand the concept behind the voices.

Probably I just confused you even more, but what I would like to tell you is that this book is very easy to read. It does confuse you in the beginning, but you’ll find logical explanation to everything. Are you ready to dive into pool of echoes and to be reborn as a new and better person? Well, grab your copy now! I believe you will enjoy it a lot.

For my reader exclusively, I’ll be contacting David Allen and I would ask him to give me an interview regarding this book so I guess either to the end of April or beginning of May I might have an interview to share with you, if you would like to ask any questions just comment them below and I’ll add them on the list. Stay tuned for more reviews as well as promos here, on Katie’s Corner. Happy reading!

XOXO


Katie


My Rating: