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Book Review

Title: Not Long Ago

Author: Susan Royal

Genre: Historical/Romance/Time Travel

Rating: ****

Review: The opening to Not Long ago was great we meet Erin who is desperately seeking work and is set up as an assistant for a rather eccentric author called March as she is to help him research his new book if she can stick it out. The opening “prologue” was very interesting and I couldn’t wait to see how it comes into play later on. After being offered the job March immediately put Erin to work helping him organize his notes and research material. While Erin is a little wary of March I had a feeling they were going to get along very well. After a few weeks of working with March he acquires a mysterious artefact and when he and Erin touch it they are transported to a mysterious place. The pair have somehow landed in the Middle Ages and now have to seek help from the Lord of the county; Lord John. Until they figure out how to return home Erin and March have no choice but to learn how to blend in with the primitive society. The old fashioned language used was a little bit of a struggle for me but once you get used to it you realize the novel is expertly well written.

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Book Review

Title: Emerald Green

Author: Kerstin Gier

Genre: YA/Historical/Fantasy

Rating: ****

Review: So Emerald Green is the third and final book of the series and I couldn’t stop freaking out when I got my hands on it. I’ve been a massive fan of this series for a while and to be able to finally finish it was so exhilarating yet to also be quite honest a tad disappointing. I don’t quite know what it is about this series I mean the writing is honestly nothing extremely special and the plot can do with a bit of tweaking but I guess it’s just the characters. I love Gwen as character so I really wanted to find out what happened to her and whether the circle ended up being closed.

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Book Review

Title: Sapphire Blue

Author: Kerstin Gier

Genre: YA/Historical/Fantasy

Rating: ****

Review: Sapphire Blue picks up where Ruby Red left off, shedding light on the events that transpired when Gideon and Gwen encountered Lucy and Paul when they weren’t supposed to be there. Now they are nowhere close to completing the Circle of Twelve and suspicions are now arising as to who may be tipping off the time travellers’ every move. People think it was Gwen, even Gideon, and now in between getting the hang of time traveling and proving that she’s not a traitor, Gwen also has to figure out just what it is the people around her aren’t telling her when the Circle is completed. But nothing’s easy, and Gwen might have the power to go back in time, but can she figure things out before it’s too late?

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Book Review

Title: Ruby Red

Author: Kerstin Gier

Genre: YA/Historical/Fantasy

Rating: ****

Review: Sixteen-year-old Gwyneth Shepherd appears to be an average British teenager: going to school, detesting her uniform, and hanging out and watching movies with her best friend, Lesley. But there is more to Gwen’s story than homework and boys. Gwen’s family has a deep, dark secret, a secret originating from the 1500s, and around which a complete network of scientists, doctors and even a secret society has formed.

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Book Review

Title: Kiss of Deception

Author: Mary E. Pearson

Genre: YA/Romance/Dystopian

Rating: *****

Review: The opening to Kiss of Deception was brilliant, we meet Lia who is the first daughter of the House of Morrighan who is to be wed to the Prince of Dalbreck and we follow her through the pre-wedding ritual some of which are slightly brutal. It is made painfully clear from the outset that Lia doesn’t want this marriage and it is purely a political alliance agreed upon by her parents. There is also mention of gifts that are passed to the first daughters and they present at womanhood but Lia doesn’t have a gift. As Lia and her attendant Pauline leave for the wedding they make their escape into the forest which they had planned earlier.

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Book Review

Title: Shatter me

Author: Tahereh Mafi

Genre: YA/Dystopian/Romance

Rating: *****

Review: The opening to Shatter me was great we meet Juliette who has been locked up in a mental asylum for a long time when she is given a cellmate in Adam. At first she is terrified of him but over the weeks they are locked up together she begins to open to him but won’t ever allow him to touch her. It turns out Juliette can kill people by touching them and this is why she is being isolated in a cell, she also realizes she already knows Adam as they went to school together but he doesn’t remember her. After weeks of being locked up they are suddenly removed at gunpoint and Juliette believes she is walking to her death. This isn’t so, it turns out Adam is a soldier and was locked up with Juliette to test her and she apparently passed. Adam’s commanding officer Warner wants to make a proposition with Juliette but we don’t know for what yet.

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Book Review

Title: The Ghosts of Ukuthula

Author: Rick McBee

Genre: Action/Historical/World Literature

Rating: *****

Review: The opening of The Ghosts of Ukuthula was great, there is politic intrigue, espionage and murder all in the opening chapter and I was hooked. We start the story in Durban, South Africa in October 1989, this immediately suggests to me as a reader that there will be time and location skips in the duration of this novel. We also meet Dirk Van Zyl, an intelligence agent during an information meeting with the Russians about disrupting the transfer of power to black leaders.

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