Showing posts with label Cassandra Clare. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cassandra Clare. Show all posts

Friday, July 3, 2015

BPC: Heartbreaking

Book photo challenge information can be found here: Just One More Page: Book Photo Challenge

July 3rd: Heartbreaking


This stack of books holds a special place in my heart, simply because it is a stack of books that constantly breaks my heart.  I love each and every book on this list, and re-read them constantly. 

Goodread links follow:

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Bibliophile's Wish List: 10.27.13





Lots of stuff is coming out this week! Gotta see how many will make it on to my bookshelf, physical or otherwise.





A Very Klingon Khristmas is the perfect book for any Trekkie this year! This Norman Rockwell-inspired picture book, which releases Tuesday, Oct 29th.  It recounts, in rhyming verse the the treasured children's story of the birth of revered warrior Kahless and celebrates the rich Klingon Christmas traditions originating on Qo'noS and spreading across the Star Trek universe.



Nefertiti in the Flak Tower is a book of poetry by Clive James.  I have not had the privilege of reading some of his poetry.  However, just reading about this book has me curious about his writing and I will definitely have to delve into his writing.  There are, in this book, moving elegies, a meditation on the later Yeats, a Hollywood Iliad, odes to rare orchids, wartime typewriters and sharks – as well as a poem on the fate of Queen Nefertiti in Nazi Germany.  Curious yet?



S. by J.J. Abrams and Doug Dorst is something that will eventually grace my bookshelves, because I adore the things that J.J. Abrams has put out - from the new Star Trek movies to series like Lost and Alias.   Here is the blurb from Goodreads on this one.

One book. Two readers. A world of mystery, menace, and desire.
A young woman picks up a book left behind by a stranger. Inside it are his margin notes, which reveal a reader entranced by the story and by its mysterious author. She responds with notes of her own, leaving the book for the stranger, and so begins an unlikely conversation that plunges them both into the unknown.
The book: Ship of Theseus, the final novel by a prolific but enigmatic writer named V.M. Straka, in which a man with no past is shanghaied onto a strange ship with a monstrous crew and launched onto a disorienting and perilous journey.
The writer: Straka, the incendiary and secretive subject of one of the world’s greatest mysteries, a revolutionary about whom the world knows nothing apart from the words he wrote and the rumors that swirl around him.
The readers: Jennifer and Eric, a college senior and a disgraced grad student, both facing crucial decisions about who they are, who they might become, and how much they’re willing to trust another person with their passions, hurts, and fears.



The Shadowhunter's Codex is a supplemental to the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. This is an illustrated guide to all things Shadowhunter.  This is the manual given to the Shadowhunters, allows them to brush up on the demon languages, use proper stele use, and discover just what a pyxis is.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/98610162@N04/10517565395/" title="Dead Set by orchid_rose_18, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5520/10517565395_7b31003317.jpg" width="316" height="475" alt="Dead Set"></a>

Dead Set by Richard Kadrey, is a young adult urban fantasy/paranormal that is heartwarming and will no doubt keep you enraptured until the very end.

After her father’s funeral, Zoe and her mother moved to the Big City to start over. But life’s not so easy, the money is tight, and a new school brings trials. Fortunately, she has an escape: her dreams. A world of freedom and solace removed from the loneliness and anxieties of real life, Zoe's dreamscape offers another, more precious, gift: It is the only place where she can spend time with her closest companion — her lost brother Valentine.
Yet something is very wrong. An unfamliar — and univited — presence has entered her private realm to threaten Zoe and Valentine, a disturbing turn of events that is compounded by an impossible discovery. A chance encounter at a used record store where the grooves of the vinyl discs hold not music, but lost souls, has opened up a portal to the world of the restless dead. Now, the shop’s strange proprietor is offering Zoe the chance to commune with the father whose passing took a piece of her heart. The price? A lock of hair. Then a tooth. Then...
How far into this eerie world will Zoe go to discover what she truly needs? And once she does, will there be enough left of her to come back?



Cabinet of Curiosities: My Notebooks, Collections, and Other Obsessions by Guillermo del Toro.  I LOVE Guillermo del Toro and cannot wait to add this book to my bookshelves.  Seriously! This book is a visual treasure trove for any del Toro fan.  With pages from his actual journals, notes on Hellboy, Chronos, Pan's Labyrinth and even 2013's Pacific Rim.   All in all, this will be a fantastic inclusion into any fan's bookshelf.

Sunday, July 14, 2013

What's on My Kindle? - The Mortal Instruments

Welcome to the fifth installment of What's On My Kindle?

What exactly is What's On My Kindle?  This is my own little thing that I am going to be getting out every Sunday.  Within this post I'll list a few of the books that are currently on my TBR list on my Kindle.  Some are freebies (or were when I bought them), and others I paid for with gift cards, or had a few spare bucks to spend on a book.

All of them, I fully intend on getting to, at some point (and taking a massive chisel to my to-read list and hopefully hack it down to under 1000, again).

I am crazy for YA Series, and this one ranks amongst my top ten YA series.  The Mortal Instrument Series by Cassandra Clare will be the next book to movie series, that will be turning up in theaters soon. 

This series at the moment has five books in it, and the sixth book is currently in the works and slated for publication in 2014.  I've not read books two through five yet, but they are definitely on my TBR list at the moment and I'm delighting in getting back to the series.  Here are the titles and a bit of a blurb on them, blurbs taken from Goodreads.

1. City of Bones: When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder -- much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It's hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing -- not even a smear of blood -- to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

I will probably begin reading this one toward the end of the year, I'll re-read it before I read further into the series because it's been a little over a year since I last read this book. 

2. City of Ashes: Clary Fray just wishes that her life would go back to normal. But what's normal when you're a demon-slaying Shadowhunter, your mother is in a magically induced coma, and you can suddenly see Downworlders like werewolves, vampires, and faeries? If Clary left the world of the Shadowhunters behind, it would mean more time with her best friend, Simon, who's becoming more than a friend. But the Shadowhunting world isn't ready to let her go — especially her handsome, infuriating, newfound brother, Jace. And Clary's only chance to help her mother is to track down rogue Shadowhunter Valentine, who is probably insane, certainly evil — and also her father.

This one, I am definitely looking forward to, to see how Cassandra Clare progresses her series and I know several people who are greatly invested in this series and highly recommend this series.

3. City of Glass: To save her mother's life, Clary must travel to the City of Glass, the ancestral home of the Shadowhunters - never mind that entering the city without permission is against the Law, and breaking the Law could mean death. To make things worse, she learns that Jace does not want her there, and Simon has been thrown in prison by the Shadowhunters, who are deeply suspicious of a vampire who can withstand sunlight.

Again, I've met people who love this book and who hate it.  I love hearing from other people before I read  books, but ultimately I do not let their opinion impair my own opinion of the books that I read because I don't need anything coloring my reviews.  

4. City of Fallen Angels: The Mortal War is over, and sixteen-year-old Clary Fray is back home in New York, excited about all the possibilities before her. She's training to become a Shadowhunter and to use her unique power. Her mother is getting married to the love of her life. Downworlders and Shadowhunters are at peace at last. And - most importantly of all - she can finally call Jace her boyfriend.

The end of the Motal War - always a good thing right?! I mean really, and the best part is - Clary can finally call Jase her boyfriend.  YAY for love! Love is awesome! Isn't it? But there is always, always a price. 

5. City of Lost Souls: What price is too high to pay, even for love? When Jace and Clary meet again, Clary is horrified to discover that the demon Lilith’s magic has bound her beloved Jace together with her evil brother Sebastian, and that Jace has become a servant of evil. The Clave is out to destroy Sebastian, but there is no way to harm one boy without destroying the other. As Alec, Magnus, Simon, and Isabelle wheedle and bargain with Seelies, demons, and the merciless Iron Sisters to try to save Jace, Clary plays a dangerous game of her own. The price of losing is not just her own life, but Jace’s soul. She’s willing to do anything for Jace, but can she still trust him? Or is he truly lost?

Love has its price.  Finally together, and yet torn apart, when they meet again Jase is now a servant of evil.  However, can he be freed without the ruining of Clary's brother Sebastian?  Even still, is there anyway that Clary can trust Jace again?  Again, mixed reviews on this book, so ultimately when I get to it, we will see how things progress and if I'll enjoy it as much as some of my friends have. 

6. City of Heavenly Fire: Darkness returns to the Shadowhunter world. As their society falls apart around them, Clary, Jace, Simon and their friends must band together to fight the greatest evil the Nephilim have ever faced: Clary’s own brother. Nothing in the world can defeat him — must they journey to another world to find the chance? Lives will be lost, love sacrificed, and the whole world changed in the sixth and last installment of the Mortal Instruments series!

2014! That is the publication date of this sixth and final installment of this series.  Already people are anxiously awaiting the conclusion, to see if the Nephilim will be able to destroy and rid the Shadowhunter world of the greatest evil they have ever faced, Sebastian. Nailbiter to be certain.

This series is definitely on my TBR list and one of those that I'm giving into the hype to dip my toes into the waters of yet another fandom!