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Saturday 11 May 2013

REVIEW: Fire with Fire (Burn for Burn, #2)


When sweet revenge turns sour… Book two of a trilogy from New York Times, bestselling author Jenny Han and Siobhan Vivian.


Lillia, Kat, and Mary had the perfect plan. Work together in secret to take down the people who wronged them. But things didn’t exactly go the way they’d hoped at the Homecoming Dance.

Not even close.

For now, it looks like they got away with it. All they have to do is move on and pick up the pieces, forget there ever was a pact. But it’s not easy, not when Reeve is still a total jerk and Rennie’s meaner than she ever was before.

And then there’s sweet little Mary…she knows there’s something seriously wrong with her. If she can’t control her anger, she’s sure that someone will get hurt even worse than Reeve was. Mary understands now that it’s not just that Reeve bullied her—it’s that he made her love him.

Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, burn for a burn. A broken heart for a broken heart. The girls are up to the task. They’ll make Reeve fall in love with Lillia and then they will crush him. It’s the only way he’ll learn.

It seems once a fire is lit, the only thing you can do is let it burn...



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THANK YOU SO MUCH TO EDELWEISS AND SIMON & SCHUSTER FOR PROVIDING ME WITH AN ARC. <3

You don't know how happy I was to land this ARC. I finished Burn for Burn a few weeks ago, and I was in AGONY when I finished reading it. The cliffhanger nearly freaking killed me; I was all like, "Omfg, is Reeve gonna die?" "What the hell is wrong with Mary?" "Are Lillia and Alex a thing now?"To answer your questions; no, Reeve isn't dead. You'll see what is wrong with Mary later. No, Lillia and Alex aren't a thing.

Fire with Fire picks up shortly after the disaster at the Homecoming dance, and Reeve is not dead but injured. This is more but somehow less than what the girls wanted; they never wanted Reeve to get injured, but they're still slightly unhappy because he's not kicked off the football team. The girls got away with what they did to him, but there's a lot of guilt going around. There's poor, slightly crazy Mary who was fucked by Reeve majorly, and now she knows there's something wrong with her and she's trying not to let it show. But she's still in love with Reeve, and that upsets her more than anything; that he was a total jerk to her, and she still loves him even after all this time. The girls concoct a plan to make Reeve fall in love with Lillia, with her possibly breaking his heart later on... an eye for an eye, and all that jazz. But things don't always quite go to plan...

Lillia is undoubtedly my favourite character in this book. I like the fact that she's Asian like me (and she doesn't fall into the stereotypical Asian category, and she's not just on the sidelines either so kudos!), she reminds me a lot of myself besides the whole Asian thing, and probably because she's in the midst of the action. She's the princess of Jar Island, yet she's also an outcast. Her friends, especially Rennie, are being bitches to her, she's confused about her feelings and she's haunted by her experience with the UMass boys. Kat is bold and as brassy as ever, but I love the fact that she's loyal to the people who are loyal to her. I can't say I like Mary very much to be honest; she comes across as a clingy, scared and weak little girl who needs protection and I feel like shaking her and telling her to loosen up - but then again, she undoubtedly had the worst experience of all of the three girls. But I love how the girls have their own distinct voices, that's not usually the case with co-authors and I devoured the story eagerly. Fire with Fire was fairly lengthy but I devoured it in one day, that's how good it was, I found it virtually impossible to put down.

This book is contemporary for the most part, until the very end where there's some weird shit going on from Mary. And maybe her Aunt Bette, she's obviously not quite all there. The thing with Mary was a bit confusing and I was all like, "WTF?!" but I have no doubt that my confusion would be all cleared up later in Ashes to Ashes (which comes out in 2014... omfg, that's ages away. TOO DAMN LONG...). Confusion aside, the ending was major. MAJOR, I TELL YOU. And it ended with a cliffhanger, again. Ugh, do you want me to die or something? I just want to see how things pan out, especially major gossip was supposed to go down before ahem.. that thing happened. But I loveeee how Lillia's story ended in this book, I am totally shipping her with that one boy she shouldn't have feelings for. I am so curious to know how the truth is gonna come out, and how certain people are gonna react to it... it's gotta come out soon, karma's slowly biting them on the ass.

These books are amazing; they're an easy read and they're fast and super enjoyable. I loved Fire with Fire, and it's gonna kill me waiting for the next one.

RATING: 4.5/5

REVIEW: Emancipating Andie



Ever since the one time Andie Weber threw caution to the wind - and paid the price for it - she’s learned that it’s safer and smarter to live life playing by the rules. Now she’s got a great apartment, a steady job, and a wonderful boyfriend in Colin; he’s sweet, stable, and essentially perfect – except maybe for the fact that his best friend is Chase.

Chase McGuire lives his carefree, unstructured life strictly for himself. Dripping sarcasm and oozing wit, he refuses to censor his feelings or opinions for anyone, making no apologies for either and wearing his abrasiveness like a badge of honor. No one has ever gotten under Andie’s skin the way Chase does – and vice versa.

So when Andie and Chase find themselves forced to take a two-day road trip together, they are already dreading an inevitable all-out war. But as the trip progresses, and the undeniable friction that has always defined their relationship slowly begins to wear away their preconceived notions of each other, Andie and Chase discover they both have a lot to learn about life, courage, happiness, and the age-old battle between logic and love.

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Love with your head and you’ll be safe. You love with anything else, you’ll find yourself in big trouble.

I read Priscilla Glenn's debut novel Back to You last year and I loved it. Freaking loved it. There was romance, angst (but not too angsty that I got annoyed) and forgiveness. I was super absorbed into Michael and Lauren's story so you could imagine my delight knowing that Priscilla Glenn had released a new book.

Emancipating Andie is very different from Back to You. Andie is an upright, inflexible and rather rigid girl who lives her life according to the rules. She had a perfect boyfriend, albeit a little boring but he was safe. And that is what mattered. It was actually unnerving to see how much Andie reminded me of myself; she plays it safe, we're content with boring, victims of anal-retentive behaviour and we're both petrified of germs. She meets Chase at a party, and he's everything that her boyfriend Colin is not. Scruffy, impulsive, spontaneous and lives his life YOLO style. After the party finishes, Andie is quite happy to never ever see Chase again.

But when they're forced to take an impromptu road trip down to Florida, everything changes. It is Chase's differences that makes Andie's skin itch, and she gives him a piece of her mind more than once. They have a lot of misconceptions about one another, and Chase enjoys getting under her skin. He is witty, sarcastic and makes no apologies for anyone or anything but funny enough, after the next few days - they realise that there is more to each other than what they initially thought. A shaky friendship forms, and they learn and feed off one another. They learn lessons about love, happiness and doing things for one's self and nobody else. 


“Are you going to put your shirt back on?” she blurted out.

Chase froze, looking over his shoulder at her with the most maddening smile. “Why? Is this bothering you?”


“I just… I mean, what if we get pulled over or something?”


“If we get pulled over, this could only work in your favor,” he said, running his hand over his chest.


Andie tried to stifle a laugh. “My God, you're insufferable.” 

I freaking loved the banter that went on between Chase and Andie. It was hilarious watching Andie act all offended whenever Chase made a comment that was less than polite, and her hatred for swear words haha. But they discussed the most awesome and random things; hitchhikers, chocolate-covered bacon and the appropriateness of names.I personally thought Chase was freaking sexy and arrogant yet oddly insightful and intelligent - and oh my, it is his imperfects that make him an utterly perfect book boyfriend. The chemistry between them two was just off the charts and my thoughts for most of the book was just, "OH MY GOD, JUST MAKE OUT ALREADY."

I would just like to clarify that even though Andie has a boyfriend for most of the book, there is no cheating. I'm glad about that because I'm not a fan of cheating, no matter how well suited the people are for each other. It is rather a clean book (with a few steamy scenes, nothing too graphic though!) and there wasn't any doubt who Mr. Right for Andie was. It was just a question of Andie coming to her senses, realising that there was more to life than what she had always been taught to believe and broadening her horizons. 

I'm not going to lie though; as much as I enjoyed Priscilla Glenn's new book, I didn't quite enjoy it as much as her first one. I was quite ambivalent after I finished reading it, and it didn't make me think for a long time afterwards like Back to You did - in short, it didn't quite have that OMG WOW factor. But this book was still great with a happy ending with a sweet, clean romance with an ending that ties things together nicely.

RATING: 4/5 stars