Blitz: Between the Notes

Between the Notes

by Sharon Huss Roat 

Release Date: 06/16/15

Harper Teen

382 pages

Summary from Goodreads:

When Ivy Emerson’s family loses their house—complete with her beloved piano—the fear of what’s to come seizes her like a bad case of stage fright. Only this isn’t one of her single, terrifying performances. It’s her life.

And it isn’t pretty.

Ivy is forced to move with her family out of their affluent neighborhood to Lakeside, also known as “the wrong side of the tracks.” Hiding the truth from her friends—and the cute new guy in school, who may have secrets of his own—seems like a good idea at first. But when a bad boy next door threatens to ruin everything, Ivy’s carefully crafted lies begin to unravel . . . and there is no way to stop them.

As things get to the breaking point, Ivy turns to her music, some unlikely new friends, and the trusting heart of her disabled little brother. She may be surprised that not everyone is who she thought they were . . . including herself.

Debut author Sharon Huss Roat crafts a charming and timely story of what happens when life as you know it flips completely upside down.

Buy Links:

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Unquotables from BETWEEN THE NOTES by Sharon Huss Roat

I love books you can open to almost any page and find beautiful quotes that transcend the story. You know, the kind that get printed on a background of clouds or sunsets as inspirational quote graphics? BETWEEN THE NOTES has a few such utterings. Probably. But I prefer the strange, awkward quotes that are sometimes even more humorous when taken out of context. For today’s book blitz post, I flipped to some random pages and found these gems:

“I’ve always thought sheep should have different names for singular and plural. Like, one sheep and two sheepies. Or one shep and two sheep.”

No looking like a possessed sea anemone today.

DO THESE CORNFLAKES LOOK LIKE STONEHENGE OR IS IT JUST ME?

“That sucketh.”

Standing in a puddle is always a nice place to discover your footwear isn’t waterproof.

“I have to go throw gravel now.”

About the Author

Sharon Huss Roat lives in Delaware with her husband and two kids. When not writing books for young adults, you might find her reading (YA of course), planting vegetables in her backyard garden, or sewing costumes for a school musical. BETWEEN THE NOTES is her first novel.

Author Links:

   

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Review: The Family (Tour)

The Family by Marissa Kennerson

ASIN: B00ZPUMII2
Pages: 320
Source: Fantastic Flying Book Club

Publication Date: October 8, 2014
Appearance:

 Just like any average seventeen-year-old, Twig loves her family. She has a caring mother and a controlling father. Her brothers and sisters are committed to her family’s prosperity…

All one hundred eighty-three of them.

Twig lives in the Family, a collective society located in the rainforest of Costa Rica. Family members coexist with values of complete openness and honesty, and they share a fear of contagious infection in the outside world.

Adam—their Father, prophet, and savior—announces that Twig will be his new bride, and she is overjoyed and honored. But when an injury forces her to leave the Family compound, Twig finds that the world outside is not as toxic as she was made to believe. And then she meets Leo, an American boy with a killer smile, and begins to question everything about her life within the Family and the cult to which she belongs.

But when it comes to Family, you don’t get a choice. 

Hello everyone! Welcome to my review for The Family by Marissa Kennerson. Be sure to click the banner up above to check out the other amazing tour stops!

I haven't read a lot of books that deal with the cult life so diving into this book was super intriguing. The whole mentality of everyone in the Family is so twisted compared to what I consider normal. The idea that a whole community can see one individual person as their personal savior and believe everything he says even if it's the most ridiculous thing ever just blows me away. The faith that each individual member has in Father scares me because they will be willing to literally give their lives to him. 

It was so interesting to see Twig grow from a mindless "zombie" to someone who has the ability to think for herself. It's almost funny to see her go from fearing the touch of an outsider because of their "disease" to falling in love with Leo. Her character goes from being a follower to that of an independent and that process teaches her more about herself as in individual. I really enjoyed seeing her relationships with Leo and her mother grow and how she learns to evaluate the relationships she was with the members of the Family to see how deep they really know her.

Adam, like I mentioned before, scares me so much because he is just a powerful character who abuses the power he has for his own self benefit. I am still confused as to why he even started the Family in the first place but the control he has over each individual member is just terrifying and fascinating. His charisma and charm coupled with his manipulative nature makes him a terrible person on the same level as some pretty bad villains.

Since we're talking so much about characters, let's talk a bit about Leo. There's a bit of insta-love going on between him and Twig since they met in a hospital and a relationship just happens. I'm kind of torn between really liking him as a character and being doubtful to how their relationship even works out. Then we have Avery, Twig's mother, whom I have a love hate relationship with. I admire her for stepping out of her "shell" and facing the problems she'd been hiding from but at the same time I want to yell at her for pulling her daughter into her own mess. And have I mentioned how freaking creepy Adam is?

The overall writing style is so gripping and thrilling that I had trouble putting this novel down. I enjoyed the story immensely and it was so cool to have a look into the cult life. Definitely check it out if you're interested! 

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Marissa Kennerson received her B.A. in English Literature from the University of California at Berkeley. Before earning her master’s degree in psychology and art therapy, she worked for Wired and Glamour. She lives in California with her family. The Family is her first novel (Full Fathom Five Digital) and will be coming out October 2014.

4 out of 5 stars

   

Foreverly Obsessed,

Mini Review: The Curse of Crow Hollow

The Curse of Crow Hollow by Billy Coffey

ISBN: 0718026772
Pages: 416
Source: BookLooks
Publication Date: August 4, 2015

Appearance:

Everyone in Crow Hollow knows of Alvaretta Graves, the old widow who lives in the mountain. Many call her a witch; others whisper she s insane. Everyone agrees the vengeance Alvaretta swore at her husband s death hovers over them all. That vengeance awakens when teenagers stumble upon Alvaretta s cabin, incurring her curse. Now a sickness moves through the Hollow. Rumors swirl that Stu Graves has risen for revenge. And the people of Crow Hollow are left to confront not only the darkness that lives on the mountain, but the darkness that lives within themselves.

Hello everyone! Welcome to my long awaited review for The Curse of Crow Hollow by Billy Coffey. I received this all that way back in August and it's been such a long time, I apologize for not putting this up earlier.

The whole premise of the story is what attracted me to requesting this book in the first place and when I first started reading, I was definitely intrigued. The story is told with a type of narration that seems so natural and compelling, you can't help but be dragged into the story. It all opens up with some teenage drama and angst over a diamond bracelet and the desire to fit in. The book itself is so creepy and gripping at times, but at other times it just seems to drag on for forever. In school, we're taught to "show not tell" with our writing and as much as I enjoyed the writing style, it was just too much telling to the point where the novel dragged on and on. Other than the engaging writing, I felt pretty disconnected from everything else. Since everything is so complex and there is so much to be told with the story, it gets difficult to keep track of everything that is going on. The amount of minor characters is overwhelming and each one of them has a significant story that contributes to the story. Overall, I enjoyed the idea of the story and the ideas of mob mentality and superstition, but the general delivery was a bit difficult to swallow.

*Huge thanks to BookLooks for providing a copy to review. All thoughts are 100% my own*

3 out of 5 stars

  

Foreverly Obsessed,

#NOTD: Pastel Princess + Review of Born Pretty Soft Stamper

Hello everyone! So today I'm going to be reviewing the Born Pretty Store's squishy marshmallow stamper and the metal decoration wheel. These products were kindly sent to me from Born Pretty Store for review. They also gave me a 10% discount code which I'll link at the bottom to share with you guys so be sure to use if it you want to make a future purchase! Alright let's get into the tutorial and review~

What I Used:

(L-R): Revlon Treat and Boost, Tempest (Sinful Colors), Unicorn (Sinful Colors), Tickled Pink (Wet n Wild), Clear Nail Protector (Wet n Wild)

Born Pretty Store Scraper, Born Pretty Store Stamping Plates No. 03 and No. 25, Metal Decoration Wheel

Born Pretty Store 4cm Sticky Stamper

Steps:

1. Apply a base coast to protect your natural nails.

2. Apply a light purple and yellow polish to fingers of your choice. I decided to stamp on yellow so I painted my ring/thumb (left hand) and thumb/pointer/pinky (right hand). The rest I painted a light purple.

3. Apply a bit of top coat and place a diamond metal decoration on your left hand and a crown metal decoration on your right hand.

4. Using the purple polish and the Born Pretty Store Plate No. 25, use the princess and rose design to stamp on two fingers of your choice. I stamped the princess design on my left hand thumb and the rose on my right hand pointer. Then using the Plate No. 3, stamp on the fairy tale like swirls on the remaining pastel yellow nail (pinky on my right hand).

5. Apply top coat to seal in your design.

Final Product:

Left Hand

Right Hand

Comparing the Sticky Stamper with my regular double ended stamper

Using a pen, I pushed down on the sticky stamper and you can see that it's very squishy

My double ended stamper is a bit harder 

I used the same purple polish as above to try out this mirror frame (No. 03) and the stamper picked it up perfectly. 

The general idea behind a sticky stamper is that its sticky surface will pick up the polish more easily and the squishy rubber will conform to your nail easier without messing up the base polish underneath. When stamping, I usually wait 15-20 minutes for my base colors to dry completely so I avoid smudging but to test out the claim, I stamped after 5 minutes and my base colors weren't messed up at all. 

In terms of how great it picks up polishes, I'd give it a 5/5 because I used to have trouble picking up the mirror frame (above) with my regular stamper but the sticky one picked it up perfectly on the first try. Since the surface is sticky, it is recommended that you do not use removed to clean off any excess polish remaining so I simply used tape to remove the polish. 

Upon first receiving it, the package was extremely oily and I found that it didn't stamp very well so I recommend washing your stamper head with some dish soap (not hand soap because they have moisturizer) to remove the oiliness. Also since it is a sticky stamper, it will pick up every single piece of dust so I am storing mine in a small Paris Baguette cupcake container.

For the metal decoration wheel, I love the little designs and the fact that they dual sided. However, I think the black side is the only side you're supposed to be seeing because of the additional detail. These didn't really work on my nails and I found that they kept lifting on the sides. Also, I don't know if it was because my base color was a bit thick, but after pressing the decoration on my nail, the nail polish covered some sections and pooled up in others. It might be because my nails are more curved that it is lifting, but I think these would be awesome as decorations on cards rather than nails.

The Sticky Stamper: 5/5 

Metal Decoration Wheel: 3/5

Foreverly Obsessed,