Shadowland

Shadowland (Immortals #3) by Alyson Noel

*Spoiler in here, if you can really spoil this book.
Ever and Damen are unable to solidify their eternal bond because Ever added her blood to the elixer that saved Damen.  Now, if their bodily fluids mix, their immortal souls willl perish and be sent to Shadowland.  Ever wants more than anything to rectify the situation.  Damen at first decides that this is all because of bad karma that he caused by being so self centered for 600 years. 
Ever tries to persuade the elusive Roman to give her the information she needs.  Roman in turn tells her she will have to pay the price (which Ever imagines is probably sex, but turns out to be saving her friend Haven from death by having to decide if Haven becomes immortal or dies). Damen decides to dress like he shops at Wal-mart and ride the bus in order to turn his karma around.  Pointlessness.....upon pointlessness.
Ever gets a job at a psychic shop.  The owner, Jude, turns out to be a major player in their immortal game.  It seems that we now find Jude has followed Ever throughout her lives and that he may have also been her boyfriend/lover.  Damen thinks that because he has persued Ever throughout time, that he has actually negated her agency to choose and now leaves her to spend time with Jude and decide once and for all whom she wants to be with.  In the mean time, he cares for two twin witches that left Summerland in the last book, and have now lost their magik.
The whole book was like an after-thought/segue (and not a smooth one) to book #4.

Rating 3   I can connect with the whole I wish we weren't damned to hell if we touch each other......meh, okay, that's horrible.  But the rest of the story was blah.  Ever's friendships are dull and shallow.  Ever and Damen can't do anything but wish they were together.  The whole Jude ordeal may have been interesting if we were ever given anymore information than 'he followed her through every life'. 
Rating PG........honestly I can't remember....they can't do more than kiss with a magic forcefield between them so it couldn't have gotten too bad.

Blood Promise (Vampire Academy #4)

Blood Promise (Vampire Academy #4) by Richelle Mead

Spoilers.........
Book #3 ends with Dimitri becoming Strigoi and Rose running off from the Academy to end his life.

Rose has taken off to Siberia in hopes of tracking Dimitri back to his hometown.  She promised to kill him if he ever became one of the undead.  She meets up with Sydney, an alchemist.  This is a new twist in the VA books.  An alchemist is a human that is like your basic 'men in black'.  They clean up after Strigoi have been killed.  Syndey is able to lead Rose to Dimitri's family.
Rose quickly learns that Dimitri's mother and sisters have no idea of his death.  She is obligated to come clean with the terrible events that she hasn't yet come to grips with.  The family comes to love Rose and treat her like Dimitri's widow.  They do not know that Rose has come to kill him.
Eventually Dimitri finds that Rose has come to hunt him down.  He takes her to an estate in Siberia.  She is held captive.  Dimitri tries to convince her that he is the same but better as a Stigoi and that Rose she allow him to turn (he calls it awaken) her so that they can be together.  During her captivity, Dimitri drinks from Rose and she becomes addicted to the vampire endorphins. 
During her travels, Rose meets another bonded pair, like Lissa and herself.  The woman is a spirit user and is able to help Rose learn more about Spirit and healing.  As she is away from the academy, Lissa finds another friend in Avery, the new headmaster's daughter.  The deeper their friendship grows, the stranger and more dangerous Lissa begins to act. 
It all comes to a head, when Rose must decide to become Strigoi or die.  She searches for some clue that Dimitri is still himself and still in love with her.  When she realizes that this isn't true, she knows she must kill him and return to Lissa before Avery kills Lissa.

The more I read about Rose, the more I like her.  She reminds me a little of myself.  I'm not totally into the whole bondmate thing though.  I still don't find myself really feeling for Lissa.  I was more interested in the to kill or not to kill your soulmate issue.  I guess I'm not really like Rose........she was able to descern if there was any real Dimitri left in the Strigoi Dimitri.  I would have taken one look, seen the man I loved and probably did whatever he wanted.  This book did contain more Rose/Dimitri and less Lissa, so even though there was no happy ending, it was a likeable book.

Rating 4   Love me some Dimitri.
Rating PG 13  Sensualality, swearing, danger, fighting, drug use (vampire endorphin), crack whores (blood whores but the same general idea)

Night World Vol. 1

Night World Vol. 1 by L.J. Smith

This book contains three books; Secret Vampire, Daughters of Darkness, and Spellbinder.

Secret Vampire has a good premise; Poppy finds out that she is dying of pancreatic cancer and doesn't have long to live. She has a male best friend, James, that she has always had feelings for, feelings he has never returned. Now that she is dying she finds the reason he has been so aloof is because he is a vampire and member of the Night World. A world that she is never supposed to know about. James decides to turn Poppy into a vampire even though it is against the law of the Night World. He and Poppy are soul mates and they decide to chance the wrath of the Night World rather than be apart.

Daughters of Darkness
Three vampire sisters, Rowan, Kestrel, and Jade, run away from their vampire hometown. They move to a small town on the west coast where they can live without having their lives run by the elder vampires. This is where Jade and her brother Ash meet their soul mates. Unfortunately, their soul mates are human.

Spellbinder
Thea is a teenage witch. She has just moved to Las Vegas with her cousin/sister Blaise to live with their grandmother. Grandmother is an old Crone, one of the witch leaders. The two girls have moved from place to place because of Blaise's misuse of magic with human boys. Now Thea falls head over heels for a human boy. She thinks they are soulmates. Blaise wants to kill him in order to save Thea from being discovered and killed by the Night World for breaking the law.

The books were teen entertainment. The first book probably had the best idea behind it. After that it was kind of like watching daytime soaps.

Rating 2.5 I didn't hate it. I was far from loving it. Not intense enough.
Rating PG Killing, murder

The Time Taveler's Wife

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audry Niffenegger

Okay..........eep! This really isn't a book review per say. I just saw the movie based on the book. In general I do not condone book to movie. They are almost always ruined with poor casting or creative license. However, I loved this movie almost as much as I loved the book. The movie concentrated more on Clare and Henry and not as much on their surrounding family and friends (whom I didn't like anyway). Also the movie took out all of the parts of the book that made it rated R. Can you believe the movie was cleaner??? In the book Clare was a trash mouth, which just made me cringe. I still fell completely in love with Clare and Henry........and especially Henry. I cried my eyes out from beginning to end.....probably because I already knew the story. So, if you are ever going to see a book to movie......this is the one.

Book Rating 5 So emotional and unique. It is one of my top faves ever.
Book Rating R This is the part that makes me hesitate recommending it to anyone I know. Clare truly has the mouth of a convict, not a woman. I'm sure there are other parts also but it's been about a year since rereading it and I only remember Clare.

Kissed by an Angel

Kissed by an Angel by Elizabeth Chandler

This book is actually a trilogy..Kissed by an Angel, The Power of Love and Soulmates. I would really classify this as a three part story, not really three separate books.

Ivy and Tristan are teen sweethearts. After a short but intense romance Tristan and Ivy are in a fatal car wreck. Tristan dies and becomes an angel. Ivy lives on but suffers the loss of Tristan. Before Tristan's death Ivy had a strong belief in angels.....Tristan did not. Now Ivy no longer believes. If angels exist they would have saved Tristan. Tristan now must fight against Ivy's disbelief in order to make contact with her and assure her of his undying love.
As Tristan tries to work through those around Ivy to make her aware that he still exists, he finds that his death was not an accident. Ivy was the original target and now her life is in danger.
Tristan gets help from a sassy angel named Lacey. Together they finally break through Ivy's disbelief and help her to see the peril all around her.

The opening scenes of the book did not inspire me. I quickly concluded that the characters were shallow and unlikeable horny teens.......completely without depth. I pressed on. I wish the author had begun somewhere else and skipped the whole first chapter. Eventually I came empathize with the characters.......I even shed more than one tear. I ended up really liking the book but the flaws seemed to intensify because of the opening scene. At times I felt like the editor may have been smashed. Places and conversations seemed choppy. Ivy's 8-9 year old brother seemed more like he was 5. All of the parents were disgusting idiots. And I am not sure that the whole 'mystery' held much water once it was resolved.

However.......you know my penchant for soulmate love. I had to push on. Once the characters began to develop I really liked what I was reading. They were definitely 'characters' but I guess they have to be in order to keep you entertained for nearly 700 pages. Gregory ......rich and insane step-brother. Ivy.... sweet, intelligent victim of circumstance. Eric....high as a kite. Beth....semi psychic, bleeding heart wanna be authoress. Suzanne......shallow stunning beauty with an ugly name. Will.......mysterious and underplayed boy next door. Tristan......the perfect boyfriend, full of undying love. Lacey.....spunky, flaky actress turned angel looking for a mission. At one point I felt like it was being narrated by the narrator of Arrested Development....why I don't know but it pushed me over the edge and then I really liked it! Put it all together and it wraps up in a fairly nice bow.

Rating 4 Once the characters develop there is enough investment in them to get you through to the end. Plus you know.....you can't go wrong with a soulmate.
Rating PG Even though the opening scene (which was a mistake) seemed to be the end of a dirty teen scene.....it never became explicit. And the stepbrother thing was weird but not graphic.