Random Reads #709, June 19th

Random Reads is a monthly meme (that I'm going to do weekly) hosted by I'm Loving Books to read some books that have been on our TBR piles for a long time. Using Random.org, I got 3857 which turned out to be Catch Me by Parker Blue! It's been on my TBR pile since February 16th, 2015, and I added it because I love her writing and this series! What about you guys? Happy reading!

Parker Blue Author Page

The Story: I got all of the Demon Underground series from NetGalley that was out at the moment, and it was just a fantastic series, and I just had to read more! They were just such great books! And now I want more, though I'll have to reread them, since it's been forever since I've read them!

Website

Series: Demon Underground.

Demon Underground: Bite Me and her site, my review, Try Me and her site, my review, Fang Me and her site, my review, Make Me and her site, my review, Forget You and her site, my review, Dare Me and her site, my review, Catch Me and her site, my review.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading #47, April 30th

It's Monday! What Are You Reading is a weekly meme hosted by Book Journey where we share what we read this past week, what we hope to read this week...and anything in between! This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well...you never know where that next "must read" book will come from!

What happened in the past week:

Weekly Memes:
It's Monday! What Are You Reading #46
Teaser Tuesday #55
WWW Wednesday #55
WOW #51
Will the Time Come #47
Third Sentence Thursday #38
Random Reads #22
First Lines Friday #43
Follow that Blurb Reading Challenge Update 44
A-Z Book Challenge Update 17
The Reward Challenge Round 40
Follow Friday #25
2012 Dystopian Reading Challenge Update 17
YA Historical Fiction Update 12
Last Letter First Letter Reading Challenge Update 5
In My Mailbox #46
I Have An Update #45

Week 17 Reviews:
Bloodrose
The Nightmare Garden
Waterfall
Cascade
Torrent
Pants on Fire
Bite Me
Try Me
Fang Me
Make Me
Monument 14
The Savage Grace
Claiming the Highlander
The Warrior
Angel Eyes
Lord of the Wolves
That Fatal Night
A Temptation of Angels

Tours:
Titanic 2012
 
OK, so I got 29 posts in 7 days, and I read some really great books, and I can't wait for next week!
 
So this week I want to read Honor Bound, Erebos, Monstrous Beauty, Seraphina, Run from Fear, The Peculiars, and Shadow and Bone. I know, not that much, but I'm going to try just telling myself that I want to read 1 ebook a day! It makes making this post way shorter!
 
Currently Listening To: She Will Be Loved by Maroon 5
Currently Reading: Run from Fear by Jami Alden
Currently Watching: My Shows!

 To some men honor is just a word...

Jeannette Boucher, a young French beauty from a family left penniless by the revolution, must marry against her will to save them all from ruin. But almost immediately after the vows are spoken, she learns that her old English husband is impotent—and in his desire for an heir, he plans to compromise her in the worst way. Determined to escape such a fate, she stows away on one of His Majesty’s frigates. But a woman alone is in constant danger.

To Lieutenant Treynor, honor means everything...

Born a bastard to a wayward marquise, Lieutenant Crawford Treynor was given to a poor farmer to raise and was maltreated until he ran away to join the Royal Navy. Treynor is determined to prove he’s as good as any other man and rise to captain his own frigate. But once he finds Jeannette aboard The Tempest he must decide whether to return her to the man he knows would abuse her—or risk everything, even his life, to keep her safe.

 Fierce, seductive mermaid Syrenka falls in love with Ezra, a young naturalist. When she abandons her life underwater for a chance at happiness on land, she is unaware that this decision comes with horrific and deadly consequences.

Almost one hundred forty years later, seventeen-year-old Hester meets a mysterious stranger named Ezra and feels overwhelmingly, inexplicably drawn to him. For generations, love has resulted in death for the women in her family. Is it an undiagnosed genetic defect . . . or a curse? With Ezra’s help, Hester investigates her family’s strange, sad history. The answers she seeks are waiting in the graveyard, the crypt, and at the bottom of the ocean—but powerful forces will do anything to keep her from uncovering her connection to Syrenka and to the tragedy of so long ago.

Four decades of peace have done little to ease the mistrust between humans and dragons in the kingdom of Goredd. Folding themselves into human shape, dragons attend court as ambassadors, and lend their rational, mathematical minds to universities as scholars and teachers. As the treaty's anniversary draws near, however, tensions are high.

Seraphina Dombegh has reason to fear both sides. An unusually gifted musician, she joins the court just as a member of the royal family is murdered—in suspiciously draconian fashion. Seraphina is drawn into the investigation, partnering with the captain of the Queen's Guard, the dangerously perceptive Prince Lucian Kiggs. While they begin to uncover hints of a sinister plot to destroy the peace, Seraphina struggles to protect her own secret, the secret behind her musical gift, one so terrible that its discovery could mean her very life.

In her exquisitely written fantasy debut, Rachel Hartman creates a rich, complex, and utterly original world. Seraphina's tortuous journey to self-acceptance is one readers will remember long after they've turned the final page.

 With each step she takes, he tracks her every move, waiting for the perfect time. The perfect revenge. Until then, he'll watch her . . .

RUN FROM FEAR

More than anything, Talia Vega wanted to leave behind her harrowing past. Moving eight hundred miles away, she succeeded . . . until the one man who knows her darkest secrets wanders into the restaurant where she works. Now the agonizing memories come crashing back-along with an undeniable desire for Jack Brooks, the ex-Green Beret who rescued her from a sadistic monster two years ago.

Jack Brooks knows that showing up unannounced is a purely selfish move. Talia doesn't need his protection anymore, but he can't get the raven-haired beauty out of his mind. And when a twisted madman is hell-bent on resurrecting her torturous past, Jack vows to do anything to keep her safe-even risk his own life to save the only woman he's ever loved.

 This dark and thrilling adventure, with an unforgettable heroine, will captivate fans of steampunk, fantasy, and romance. On her 18th birthday, Lena Mattacascar decides to search for her father, who disappeared into the northern wilderness of Scree when Lena was young. Scree is inhabited by Peculiars, people whose unusual characteristics make them unacceptable to modern society. Lena wonders if her father is the source of her own extraordinary characteristics and if she, too, is Peculiar. On the train she meets a young librarian, Jimson Quiggley, who is traveling to a town on the edge of Scree to work in the home and library of the inventor Mr. Beasley. The train is stopped by men being chased by the handsome young marshal Thomas Saltre. When Saltre learns who Lena’s father is, he convinces her to spy on Mr. Beasley and the strange folk who disappear into his home, Zephyr House. A daring escape in an aerocopter leads Lena into the wilds of Scree to confront her deepest fears.

Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters who feast on human flesh. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee.

Alina Starkov has never been good at anything. But when her regiment is attacked on the Fold and her best friend is brutally injured, Alina reveals a dormant power that saves his life—a power that could be the key to setting her war-ravaged country free. Wrenched from everything she knows, Alina is whisked away to the royal court to be trained as a member of the Grisha, the magical elite led by the mysterious Darkling.

Yet nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. With darkness looming and an entire kingdom depending on her untamed power, Alina will have to confront the secrets of the Grisha…and the secrets of her heart.

Week 17 Reviews: Bite Me, Try Me, Fang Me, Make Me

From Goodreads:
Life after high school is tough enough without having to go 15 rounds with your inner demon. Val Shapiro is just your ordinary, part-demon, teenaged vampire hunter with a Texas drawl. And a pet hellhound named Fang. Soon enough she finds herself deep in the underbelly of the city, discovering the secrets of the Demon Underground and fighting to save those she loves. Whether they love her back or not.

From Goodreads:
This part-demon teen vampire fighter and her faithful terrier hellhound are once again patrolling the dark city streets of San Antonio, Texas. Val's hunky human partner, Detective Dan Sullivan, is giving her the cold shoulder since she beheaded his vampire ex-fiance. Vamp leader Alejandro is struggling to keep the peace between vamps, demons and humans. The mucho powerful Encyclopedia Magicka has been stolen, someone in the Demon Underground is poisoning vamps, and Val's inner lust demon, Lola, is getting very restless since Val's now partnered with sexy Shade, the shadow demon with the blond good looks of an angel. The second book in Parker Blue's Demon Underground urban fantasy series plunges readers deeper into a heady world of passion, friendship, intrigue and mystery. 

From Goodreads:
The vampires want it. The demons want it, too. And someone is willing to kill Val for it. 

Val and Fang have to find the powerful Encyclopedia Magicka before either of San Antonio's warring underworld factions locate it or the consequences will be deadly for the entire city. As usual, Val's vampire enemies (they still call her The Slayer) want her dead. Even some of her fellow demons may be less than trustworthy, since they'd like to grab the legendary book of spells before she does. Val has a personal claim to the Encyclopedia--her demon father left it to her when he died--but someone stole it recently. And that can't be good.

Battling vamps and dodging demons, Val struggles to unravel the mystery and find the thief. At the same time, she's fighting her attraction to sweet, sexy Shade--her favorite shadow demon. Rumor has it that Val will lose her part-demon, vampire-fighting powers if she gives herself to him.

With a crowd of vamps and demons out to trick her or kill her, it's not a good time for her to risk her job as the city's best vampire hunter by falling in love. The stakes are high and aimed right at her heart. But Lola, Val's hungry little lust demon, doesn't like being denied. Will Lola finally get her way?

What's a part-lust-demon-teen supposed to do? Whatever it takes.

From Goodreads:
Shapiro has a secret she's desperate to keep—she's lost her slayer powers. As the new guardian of the Encyclopedia Magicka, Val expected the books to give her powers to replace those that disappeared after she lost her "V card" to Shade. But the encyclopedia exacts a price for every spell, making the job of guardian a tricky proposition.

When a rogue demon kidnaps Val’s roommate Gwen and Micah, leader of the San Antonio Demon Underground, Val is plunged into the middle of a Solomon's Choice. The rogue wants the dangerously potent Encyclopedia Magicka in exchange for her friends' lives; the succubus leader of the Demon Underground in Austin is demanding the books be destroyed rather than let them fall into the wrong hands and wants Shade for herself, swearing to do everything she can to prevent Val's turning over the books. 

The kidnapping isn't the only crisis Val faces. She's been betrayed by Fang. Demons and vampires are disappearing. The vamps of the New Blood Movement are forcing Val to keep the terms of her agreement to work for them to combat this new threat. 

The Demon Underground is challenging Micah's leadership, and everyone is depending on a now-powerless Val to set things right. Val needs all the help she can get. Even if it means forgiving Fang and spending time with a dangerously sexy cowboy-vampire.

My Review:
This was a fantastic series! I just had to keep reading them! I loved being in this world, I loved Parker Blue's writing, and these characters are just amazing! I loved every word, and since this didn't feel like the end of the series, I want more!

Val was such an awesome character! And so were the others! I loved that she named her succubus side Lola, and then used Lola's strength to fight vampires. And then things get complicated, with each subsequent book! I loved it!

This world, it's got demons and vampires, and magic, and betrayal. And the Encyclopedia Magicka, well, that is a pretty important piece to own! And seeing what it causes, well, yeah, it complicates Val's life, more then it should!

I just loved reading these books, and I can't wait for more, and I want more! So good!

Author: Parker Blue
Series: Demon Underground #1, 2, 3, 4
Read: April 23rd, 23rd, 23rd, 23rd-24th, 2012
Source: NetGalley
Reason Why: They sounded fantastic, and they're 2012 Dystopian novels!
Publisher: Bell Bridge Books
Published: September 30th 2008, February 19th 2010, January 1st 2011, April 15th 2012

Bite Me:

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars

Try Me:

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars

Fang Me:

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars

Make Me:

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars