Finding Center by Katherine Locke

Title: Finding Center (District Ballet Company #2)

Author: Katherine Locke

Publisher: Carina Press

Release Date: August 17, 2015

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

Zed and ballet are my two greatest loves.

But a tragic accident ripped them from Aly’s life six years ago and it took all her strength to get them back. She’s had a long road to recovery and has returned, dancing full-time for The District Ballet Company and carrying Zed’s child. But Aly is slipping. Each day becomes a fight to keep her career from crumbling under the weight of younger talent, the scrutiny of the public eye, and the limitations of her ever-changing body. A fight she fears she’s losing.

I’m scared Aly is broken to her core.

Zed recognizes signs, but he doesn’t know how to fix her. The accident left him with his own demons, and while he wants nothing more than to take care of Aly, it’s getting harder the further she spirals. When Aly’s life is threatened and Zed’s injuries prevent him from saving her, he’s never felt so useless, so afraid he is no longer capable of being the man Aly and their child needs.

With new life comes new hope. And with their fractured lives already hanging by a thread, Aly and Zed must discover if they have what it takes—both together and apart—to rebuild and carry on.

Earlier this summer I finally read Katherine Locke’s Turning Pointe and Second Position and loved reading about these two flawed ballet dancers. And I wanted more. With Finding Center, I got everything I wanted and loved reading this story. 

Six years ago, everything fell apart for Zed and Aly. Slowly, they’ve been working and finding their way back to themselves. Now they’re together, and though it’s a battle everyday, everything is going well for them. But Aly is pregnant again, and all her old fears are coming back. Zed wants nothing more than to be there for Aly and to be what she needs, but he can only do thatZed has his own demons to fight. Zed and Aly are hanging on, but everything could fall apart again at any moment.

Just over a month ago, I read Second Position and pretty much tore through it. Though it didn’t end up being exactly what I wanted, I fell in love with the story and the characters that Katherine Locke wrote. I got attached to Zed and Aly, I got fully invested in their story. And when I finished reading, I wanted more of them. So Finding Center? Exactly what I wanted and exactly what I needed when I read it. Where Second Position was surprisingly dark, Finding Center was somewhat lighter. There were still plenty of moments where the story took a darker turn. I mean, how can it not being a story about an alcoholic and a ballerina who suffers from anorexia and anxiety, amongst other issues. While the first book was about Zed and Aly reconnecting after being away from each other for four years, Finding Center was about them finding their way. It led to many touching moments that warmed my heart, sometimes even bringing me close to tears. I was happy to be able to read this part of their story. And more than anything, I absolutely loved how it all came full circle and ended.

I already loved Zed and Aly after reading Second Position and I love them even more having now read Finding Center. When this part of their story starts, they’ve been together for two years and are slowly finding their way. Reading their story, I can see that it’s not always easy for them, but they do their best, being there for each other and supporting each other.  Even though it’s not perfect, and Aly and Zed both have their flaws, I just love their relationship, the way that they are there for each other and that being together makes them want to be their best self. I’m not going to lie, there were quite a few moments when Zed and Aly totally brought me to tears (the good kind) and that made me love them more. And, like I’ve said already, I loved the way their story came full circle and they more than got their happy ending. And that happy ending made me so happy for Zed and Aly. And there were more tears involved on my part, because that’s apparently how I roll. 

I loved Katherine Locke’s Finding Center even more than I loved Second Position. This story made me smile and it made me cry and it gave me the happy ending I was so hoping for for these characters. And even though they got their happy ending, I wouldn’t be opposed to more stories about Zed and Aly.

The Boy Most Likely To by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Title: The Boy Most Likely To

Author: Huntley Fitzpatrick

Publisher: Dial Books

Release Date: August 18, 2015

Source: Borrowed ARC

Buy the Book: Amazon / Book Depository / Indigo

A surprising, utterly romantic companion to My Life Next Door—great for fans of Sarah Dessen and Jenny Han.

Tim Mason was The Boy Most Likely To find the liquor cabinet blindfolded, need a liver transplant, and drive his car into a house.

Alice Garrett was The Girl Most Likely To…well, not date her little bother’s baggage-burdened best friend for starters.

For Time, it wouldn’t be smart to fall for Alice. For Alice, nothing could be scarier than falling for Tim. But Time has never been known for making the smart choice, and Alice is starting tow wonder if the “smart” choice is always the right one. When those two crash into each other, they crash hard.

Then the unexpected consequences of Tim’s wild days come back to shock him. He finds himself in a situation that isn’t all it appears to be, that he never could have predicted…but maybe should have.

And Alice is caught in the middle.

Told in Time’s and Alice’s distinctive, disarming, entirely compelling voices, this novel is for readers of The Spectacular Now, Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, and Paper Towns.

Huntley Fitzpatrick’s My Life Next Door is one of my favourite books of all time. When I heard that there would be a companion, I was over the moon. When I found out that the companion would be about Tim, my excitement level sky-rocketed. So The Boy Most Likely To? It exceeded any and all expectations I may have had.

Tim has never been someone people rely on. He’s always been a bit of a screw-up and he knows it. Now he has to face the consequences of his past. When his father decides that it’s time for Tim to finally man up, Tim finds himself living above his best friend’s garage and trying to put the pieces of his life back together. What he didn’t expect is that is for his past to come back and turn his life upside down in a whole new way. Alice Garrett knows better than to get involved with her little brother’s best friend. She has enough on her plate with her own family without getting caught up in Tim’s problems as well. But Alice can’t seem to stay away from Tim and before she’s able to stop herself, she’s in the middle of everything and she can’t deny her feelings for much longer. 

I’ve already said it, but My Life Next Door is one of my favourite books of all time. There’s just so much I love about the story and the characters and I will always want more. When I found out that Huntley Fitzpatrick was writing a companion about Tim and Alice I was over the moon. They were both characters I thought had their own story to tell and getting to read that story was absolutely fantastic. The Boy Most Likely To went beyond any expectations I may have had. The story was moving and emotional. While reading, I went through what felt like the entire range of human emotions. I would smile and laugh about Tim’s antics or Alice’s exasperation with him. But then a few pages later it would feel like I had just been punched in the gut. I was basically a mess after I finished reading. I was smiling through my tears. And when I say tears, I mean full on ugly crying. As much as I loved the story, there was more than one occasion when I wanted to yell at the book or throw it across the room because I was NOT HAPPY with what was happening. But I knew it was what needed to happen in the story which only made me cry that much more. The Boy Most Likely To was just an emotional read, there’s no way around it. But it was so worth it and I couldn’t have asked for better for Tim and Alice’s story.

After reading My Life Next Door, I already had a huge soft spot for Tim. Even though he might not have been the main focus of that story, I was curious about him and I wanted to know more about him. It just felt like he had so much to tell and I am so happy he got to tell that story in The Boy Most Likely To. Tim was the furthest thing from perfect. For the better part of his life he was a screw up and he knows it and he wants to do better and he was trying. And that made me love him so much. And Tim was responsible for so many of the emotions I had while reading, the happy ones and the heartbreaking ones. I could seriously go on about Tim all day long because I loved him that much and he has officially become one of my favourite book boys of all time. And Alice. Well, Alice was not quite who I thought she was going to be. She always seemed like someone who doesn’t take crap from anyone. And she didn’t. But at the same time, she was someone who would always put everyone else ahead of her, regardless of the sacrifices she had to make in the process. So while I was reading, I wanted Alice to finally do something for herself. And I wasn’t the only one who wanted that for her and that made me happy. And in case you were wondering, George and Patty, the two youngest of the Garrett family, are just as hilarious and adorable as in the first book.

Huntley Fiztpatrick’s The Boy Most Likely To was so much more that I could ever have hoped it would be. It was an emotional read that hit all the right notes and left me wanting more. I can only hope that Huntley Fitzpatrick will continue writing about the Garrett family in the future.

Cover Reveal - Missing Dixie by Caisey Quinn + Giveaway

I am so excited to be part of this weekend cover reveal blitz for the final book in Caisey Quinn's Neon Dreams series, Missing Dixie. I've been lucky enough to read the book already and I can tell you that it was definitely the kind of conclusion I was hoping for for this series. So keep on reading for a look at the cover, some teasers and a giveaway. And if you haven't seen it already, be sure to head over to the USA Today cover reveal featuring a chat about NA with Caisey Quinn, Cora Carmack and Sophie Jordan.

Pre-Order Missing Dixie

Amazon / Barnes & Noble / HarperCollins Publisher

Fighting for redemption…

I’ve lived most of my life in darkness, beneath the shadows of secrets and addictions. The last thing I ever wanted to do was hurt the only girl I’d ever loved—the one who brought me into the light. In my entire life I’d made one promise—a promise I’d intended to keep. I’ve broken that promise and now I have to live with the fallout. Dixie Lark hates me, and I have to tell her that I love her. I also have to tell a truth that might destroy us forever.

Can she love me even if she can’t forgive me?

Learning to move on…

Gavin Garrison broke his promise to my brother and he broke my heart in the process. I may never love anyone the way I’ve loved him, but at least I won’t spend my life wondering what if. We had our one night and he walked away. I’m finally beginning to move on when my brother’s wedding and a battle of the bands brings us back together.

Our band is getting a second chance, but I don’t know if I can give him one. How do you hand your heart back to the person who set it on fire once already?

Teasers!

Want a glimpse at some of what's to come in Missing Dixie? Check out the teasers below, they won't disappoint you and will definitely leave you wanting more.

Giveaway!

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The Blue by Lucy Clarke

Title: The Blue

Author: Lucy Clarke

Publisher: Touchstone

Release Date: August 11, 2015

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

In the tradition of Alex Garland’s The Beach, a spine-tingling adventure novel about a group of friends whose journey around the world on a yacht turns from a trip to paradise into a chilling nightmare when one of them disappears at sea.

A group of friends.

A yacht.

And a disappearance-at-sea that turns paradise into a chilling nightmare.

Lana and her best friend Kitty leave home looking for freedom—and that’s exactly what they find when they are invited onto The Blue, a fifty-foot yacht making its way from the Philippines to New Zealand. The crew is made up of a group of young travellers bitten by wanderlust, and it doesn’t take long for Lana and Kitty’s dream of sea-bound romance to turn into reality. 

Both women fall under the hypnotic spell of The Blue, spending their days exploring remote islands and their rum-filled nights relaxing on deck beneath the stars. But when one of their friends disappears overboard after an argument with another crew member, the dark secrets that brought each of them aboard start to unravel.

At turns gorgeously scenic and entirely haunting, The Blue is a page-turning thriller about friendship, freedom and wanting to leave the past behind. 

Though they aren’t what I typically gravitate to, I enjoy a good mystery or thriller every once in a while. Granted it often leads to me having to turn on all the lights in my house, but I still enjoy reading them. When I was told about Lucy Clarke’s The Blue, I was intrigued and having now read it, I’m happy to report it was plenty mysterious.

When they meet the crew of The Blue, Lana and her best friend Kitty feel like they have found the freedom the have been looking for traveling across South East Asia. It doesn’t take long for them to feel right at home from the yacht. Spending their days exploring remote islands in the Pacific and their nights on the deck drinking with the crew. But during the passage from the Philippines to New Zealand, things change. When one of the crew goes overboard, everything starts to fall apart. No one knows exactly what happened that night, and soon everything that The Blue was is unraveling.

As someone who reads primarily YA, good thrillers can be hard to come by. I guess it’s hard to get as dark and twisted as you can with more adult books. That’s all to say that there aren’t as many thrillers in YA as I would like. It’s not YA, but when I heard about Lucy Clarke’s The Blue, my curiosity was piqued. I wanted to find out more about this story featuring a group of young travellers sailing on a yacht in the South Pacific. Like with any good mystery, the synopsis didn’t necessarily give me much to go on, but it was just enough for me to want to know more. And so I started reading. And the way the story was told, alternating between the present and the past, made it so I just kept reading. Every time I thought I was going to be getting an answer to one of my million questions, the story would switch timelines and I would have to keep reading to find out more. I know, being forced to read more is such a hardship. The story was engrossing. I got caught up in the mystery, trying to figure out what exactly happened on the night that one of the crew members went overboard. And I wanted to know why Lana wasn’t on The Blue anymore, what caused her to leave the yacht behind when she seemed so happy on board. Like I said, I had a a lot of questions while I was reading. And those questions got more than answered. And that ending. I did not see that coming. At all. And it kind of left me rethinking everything I had just read. In a good way.

Despite jumping back and forth in time, the main focus of the story was definitely Lana. Out of everyone on The Blue, she was whose story the reader is following. Because of that, it honestly felt like at times Lana was the only sane person on the yacht. After one of the crew members went overboard, she was the only one who wanted to find out what happened, who wouldn’t just let go of the fact that one of them had died. Or at least that’s how it felt cause I didn’t really know what was going through all the other characters’ minds. Where I knew pretty much everything about Lana, I didn’t really know much about the other characters. All I really had to go one was whatever Lana thought about them. And that just added to the element of mystery in this story. There was definitely a “who did it” element to the story, and the answer to that question was revealed one little bit at a time. And that ending I mentioned? Even when Thought I had a handle on just who everyone in this story was, I had to go ahead and re-evaluate it all. The bottom line is that if you decide to read The Blue, be prepared to completely re-evaluate everything you think you know about someone every time a new piece of information is revealed about them.

Even though it’s not a book I would necessarily pick up on my own, I really enjoyed reading Lucy Clarke’s The Blue. The story was engrossing and the mystery kept me on the edge of my seat. If you’re looking for a good mystery this summer, this is the one.

Blackmail Boyfriend by Chris Cannon

Title: Blackmail Boyfriend

Author: Chris Cannon

Publisher: Entangled Crush

Release Date: August 11, 2015

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

Sometimes, blackmail is the only weapon a girl has…

Haley Patterson has had a crush on golden boy Bryce Colton for ages. But when she hears a rumour that he hooked up with her she gives him a choice: be her boyfriend for a month to show other guys that she’s dateable—despite her overprotective and very intimidating brothers—or deal with the angry-cage-fighting boyfriend of the girl he actually did hook up with.

Bryce didn’t know the other Haley even had a boyfriend. He was just trying to get his ex off his back. And now, not only is he being blackmailed, he’s being blackmailed by an honor student. His new “girlfriend” has two three-legged dogs, her father meows grass at the country club, and she’s…well, difficult. And different.

Can something so fake turn into something real?

There are times when I read the synopsis of a book and though I’m curious about finding out more and the story sounds like something that would be totally up my alley, I’m still completely unsure about what I’m going to get. Most recently, that happened with Chris Cannon’s Blackmail Boyfriend, but it all worked out for the best. 

When Haley Patterson shows up at school and hears that she hooked up with golden boy Bryce Colton, she’s surprised considering she has no memory of that happening. Because it didn’t happen. But Haley is ready to make the best of this situation. If she can get Bryce to pretend to be her boyfriend for a few weeks it might prove to everyone else that she’s dateable despite her overprotective older brothers. Bryce never thought that hooking up with a girl at a party would lead to blackmail. But now he’s stuck. Either he pretenders to be Haley’s boyfriend or he gets beat up by the other Haley’s, the one he actually hooked up with, boyfriend. Now Haley and Bryce need to make the best of a difficult situation. And maybe the feelings floating around aren’t as fake as they seemed.

I’m not going to lie, when I first read the description of Chris Cannon’s Blackmail Boyfriend I was somewhat confused. I mean, I kind of understood what the story was going to be but at the same time I didn’t really know. But I was curious about the story all the same. It sounded like it had the potential to be a lot of fun. I mean, who doesn’t love a good story about blackmail. As it turned out, Blackmail Boyfriend was a lot of fun. It was a story that had more to it than I thought it would. Honestly, I was expecting cheesy fake romance that turns into cheesy real romance. And yes, the story absolutely was this. But there was more to it than that. I loved seeing the friendships between Haley and Jane and between Bryce and Nathan. I loved seeing the different family dynamics that were at play. At the end of it all, Blackmail Boyfriend was just a fun story to read. It allowed me to escape while I was reading and made me smile a whole lot.

I liked Haley right from the start. I loved that she wasn’t afraid to go for what she waned and there wasn’t a whole lot that she let get her down. I mean, in her shoes, I don’t think I would have been able to turn a hook up rumour into a blackmail scenario. So I gotta give her some respect for that. But generally speaking, Haley wasn’t afraid to speak her mind, often much to Bryce’s confusion and surprise. And Bryce wasn’t exactly who I thought he was going to be (kind of a recurring theme with this book, it seems). I’ll be honest and say that I may have had some pre-conceived notions about who I thought he was going to be, but he proved me wrong and that made me like him all the more. As much as I loved Haley and Bryce, I have to also mention Jenna and Nathan, their respective best friends. Though they weren’t the main focus of the story, I really liked seeing their friendship and relationship develop right alongside Bryce and Haley’s. 

Chris Cannon’s Blackmail Boyfriend was a pleasant surprise. This was a fun story with a little more depth than I thought I was going to get. If you’re looking for a light and fun read, this is it.