Title: Witch Eyes (Witch Eyes #1)
Author: Scott Tracey
Published: September, 2011 by Flux
Pages: 332
Rating:  
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Seventeen-year-old Braden was born with witch eyes. He has the ability to see the world as it truly is: a blinding explosion of memories, anguish, darkness, and magic. The power enables Braden to see through spells and lies, but it comes at the cost of horrible pain.

After a terrifying vision reveals imminent danger for the uncle who raised and instructed him, Braden is lured to Belle Dam, an old city divided by two feuding witch dynasties. Rival family heads Catherine Lansing and Jason Thorpe are desperate to use Braden’s powers to unlock Belle Dam’s secrets, but Braden refuses to become their sacrificial pawn.

To stop an insidious dark magic from consuming the town, Braden must master his gift—even if the effort destroys him.

Final Thoughts:
It goes to show what not reading blurbs can do to you. Based on the cover alone I was expecting something heavy in fantasy, but instead found a book full of teen drama, town-wide family feuds and an underbelly of magic. That’s a good thing, though. It was exactly the kind of book I felt like reading. It was actually lucky that I skipped the blurb, too. The last few lines of it have some of the twists detailed (I’ve removed them from the blurb above). I loved that I managed to fly through this one, staying up til 4am because the chapter endings just wouldn’t let me put it down. With a fun collection of characters including new friends, new boyfriends and frustratingly power-crazy adults, Witch Eyes is one series I’ll definitely be coming back for.

Title: Blessed (Tantalize #3)
Author: Cynthia Leitich Smith
Published: October, 2011 by Walker Books
Pages: 454
Rating:  
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Quincie P. Morris, teen restaurateur and neophyte vampire, is in the fight of her life. Even as she adjusts to her new appetites, she must clear her best friend and true love, the hybrid-werewolf, of murder charges; thwart the ambitions of Bradley Sanguini, the seductive vampire-chef who ‘blessed’ her; and, keep her dead parents’ restaurant up and running. She hires a more homespun chef and adds the preternaturally beautiful Zachary to her waiting staff. But with hundreds of new vampires on the rise and Bradley off assuming the powers of Dracula Prime, Zachary soon reveals his true nature – and a flaming sword – and they hit the road to staunch the bloodshed before it’s too late. Even if they save the world, will there be time left to salvage Quincie’s soul?

Final Thoughts:
Things really turned around for me with this instalment, the first two weren’t exactly books I’d rave about, so I was surprised when I actually enjoyed almost the entirety of Blessed. The extended page count helped with the development and the pacing—generally the plotting just felt better put together. I’d probably like the series a lot more if I had started with this one, but then I would have missed out on all of the character backstory. I really liked the culmination of the two different casts and the change in Quincie’s persona. She still has the restaurant at heart, but she’s got bigger problems to worry about than organising menus and hiring staff.

Title: Eternal (Tantalize #2)
Author: Cynthia Leitich Smith
Published: December, 2009 by Walker Books
Pages: 306
Rating:  
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At last, Miranda is the life of the party: all she had to do was die. Elevated and adopted by none other than the reigning King of the Mantle of Dracul, Miranda goes from high-school theater wannabe to glamorous royal fiend overnight. Meanwhile, her reckless and adoring guardian angel, Zachary, demoted to human guise as the princess’s personal assistant, has his work cut out for him trying to save his girl’s soul and plan the Master’s fast-approaching Death Day gala. In alternating points of view, Miranda and Zachary navigate a cut-throat eternal aristocracy as they play out a dangerous and darkly hilarious love story for the ages.

Final Thoughts:
Apparently this book is set before Tantalize, and so, the entire restaurant-operating ensemble is nowhere to be seen. It reads more like a companion, set in the same world, but in a different city. Unlike the previous book, which focussed on the workings of a restaurant, Eternal delves right into the paranormal. A vampire kingdom full of aristocracy, human servants and dungeons gave this book an entirely different feel. While this one still suffered from some of the same problems as the last one, I found the alternating perspectives gave a better insight into the characters. Plus mixing vampires and angels, how could I resist.

Title: Tantalize (Tantalize #1)
Author: Cynthia Leitich Smith
Published: February, 2007 by Walker Books
Pages: 311
Rating:  
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This is a terrific teenage gothic novel – vampires and werewolves abound! Orphaned and in her uncle’s care, fiercely independent Quincie may be the most over-achieving high-school student around, but even she has her hands full with a hybrid-werewolf boyfriend and the opening of Sanguini’s, her hip vampire-themed restaurant, which turns out to have way more bite than she’d intended.

Final Thoughts:
Things started out okay, but went downhill the further I progressed. While I found it to be a quick read, the main character, Quincie, continually frustrated me with her poor decision making and general lack of observation skills. Also, the sudden renaming of a person just felt weird. Using a stage name in front of the customers is somewhat understandable, but in everyday reference to the guy, I just couldn’t wrap my head around that one. Kieren, the half werewolf, was about the only sensible, almost likeable character out of the lot—yet he was hardly around!

Title: Legacy
Author: Molly Cochran
Published: December, 2011 by Simon & Schuster
Thanks: Simon & Schuster GalleyGrab
Pages: 432
Rating:  
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When her widowed father dumps 16-year-old Katy Jessevar in a boarding school in Whitfield, Massachusetts, she has no idea that fate has just opened the door to both her future and her past. Nearly everyone in Whitfield is a witch, as is Katy herself, although she has struggled all her life to hide her unusual talents. Stuck at a boarding school where her fellow studens seem to despise her, Katy soon discovers that Whitfield is the place where her mother commited suicide under mysterious circumstances when Katy was just a small child. With dark forces converging on Whitfield, it’s up to Katy to unravel her family’s many secrets to save the boy she loves and the town itself from destruction.

Final Thoughts:
Going into this, I was expecting another boarding school story. I’ve read a fair few of them this year and they all had a lot of things in common, so what actually came out of this one surprised me. Beyond the first few chapters, there are hardly any mentions of the school, instead, focussing on the fog-ridden town full of magic and darkness. I enjoyed the premise, but felt like the book dragged on for far too long. Spanning almost nine months in only the first half, things moved quickly, but it still lagged somehow. Thinking back, I enjoyed everything that happened throughout the book, I just felt depleted reading it.

Title: Clockwork Prince (The Infernal Devices #2)
Author: Cassandra Clare
Published: December, 2011 by Margaret K. McElderry Books
Pages: 502
Rating:  
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In the magical underworld of Victorian London, Tessa Gray has at last found safety with the Shadowhunters. But that safety proves fleeting when rogue forces in the Clave plot to see her protector, Charlotte, replaced as head of the Institute. If Charlotte loses her position, Tessa will be out on the street and easy prey for the mysterious Magister, who wants to use Tessa’s powers for his own dark ends.

Tessa finds her heart drawn more and more to Jem, though her longing for Will, despite his dark moods, continues to unsettle her. But something is changing in Will; the wall he has built around himself is crumbling. Could finding the Magister free Will from his secrets and give Tessa the answers about who she is and what she was born to do?

As their dangerous search for the Magister and the truth leads the friends into peril, Tessa learns that when love and lies are mixed, they can corrupt even the purest heart.

Final Thoughts:
I couldn’t wait to start this one, having thoroughly enjoyed Clare’s previous works, but after rushing into Clockwork Prince, I felt slightly let down. It took me four days to read, as I needed to take a break every hundred or so pages. It wasn’t until around the sixty percent mark that I felt I couldn’t put it down. I still enjoyed the book on the whole—both Will and Jem were amazing—but there were moments where I wanted something more exciting to occur, some greater danger. But if you’re in it for the love triangle moreso than the Shadowhunter plot, you’ll love it!

Title: Texas Gothic
Author: Rosemary Clement-Moore
Published: July, 2011 by Corgi Books
Pages: 400
Rating:  
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Amy Goodnight knows that the world isn’t as simple as it seems—she grew up surrounded by household spells and benevolent ghosts. But she also understands that “normal” doesn’t mix with magic, and she’s worked hard to build a wall between the two worlds. Not only to protect any hope of ever having a normal life.

Ranch-sitting for her aunt in Texas should be exactly that. Good old ordinary, uneventful hard work. Only, Amy and her sister, Phin, aren’t alone. There’s someone in the house with them—and it’s not the living, breathing, amazingly hot cowboy from the ranch next door.

It’s a ghost, and it’s more powerful than the Goodnights and all their protective spells combined. It wants something from Amy, and none of her carefully built defenses can hold it back.

This is the summer when the wall between Amy’s worlds is going to come crashing down.

Final Thoughts:
I was expecting something a bit more witchy. Instead, the books spent the majority of its time digging up bones, literally. It took me almost a week to get through this one, which is partially why I rated it as low as I did. The other reason stems from the fact that plot left me confused as to where it was going, what was important, and generally underwhelmed. It wasn’t all bad though, the characters had their fun quirks and nuances, which in a different plot probably would have really interested me. There’s also a cute cowboy next door reigning in the romance front. Definitely for those who enjoy the “I hate you.” “No, I hate you more.” types of romances. Lots of tension!