Etiquette & Espionage by Gail Carriger

Sophronia is a teenage girl with a dreadful curtsy. Her main hobby is making mischief, to the horror of her mother who had hoped she would be more like her sisters. In order to refine her coarser details, Sophronia is sent away to Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality. Mademoiselle Geraldine's teaches refinement and manners, but also poisons and espionage. It's killing with kindness, except literally.

On the way to school, Sophronia makes friends with Dimity, whose family is a legacy at Mademoiselle Geraldine's. Unfortunately, Dimity is terrible at being villainous. She even faints at the sight of blood, which makes being an assassin somewhat tricky. Sophronia, on the other hand, is a natural. Soon enough, she is climbing across balconies to visit the ship's coal room, spying on battles with air pirates and keeping a contraband mechanical dachshund (Named Bumbersnoot, which is the cutest name ever).

The girls uncover a conspiracy and set out to save their school. It's all very exciting, and very funny. I have been meaning to read Carriger's Parasol Protectorate series for a long time. The Finishing School books seemed like a good place to start. They are set in the same universe. There are also vampires, werewolves, and steampunk. I loved Etiquette & Espionage very much, so I see no reason why I wouldn't enjoy the adult series as well.

I received a copy of Etiquette & Espionage from Edelweiss, courtesy of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. It's available for purchase now.

Stunning by Sara Shepard

Here be spoilers for the previous Pretty Little Liars books (Mostly the newer ones, 9 and 10)

This next installment of Pretty Little Liars focuses on Emily's summer, which involved having a secret baby and almost selling it to a crazy lady. She was seduced by the money and privilege that her baby could have had, but then she takes the baby away at the last second once she realizes that the woman is nutso. In this installment, crazy lady has somehow made her way into the girls' lives. She finds out Emily's real name, and Emily worries that it's just a matter of time until everyone finds out about her pregnancy. Everyone thinks crazy lady is the new A. In other matters, she reconnects with Issac, her baby's father. Since Emily never told him that she was pregnant, that relationship is one secret away from combusting.

Hanna is working on her dad's campaign, which gets a bit tricky when it turns out the crazy lady is one of his wealthy sponsors. Other than that, she works to destroy some nice girl that her ex-boyfriend Mike is now dating. It's really annoying and horrible.

Spencer is really accepted into Princeton and everything seems good...until her family starts hounding her about joining an eating club (I don't know, I'm going to Google it- yes, it's actually a thing). So Spencer, being the uptight girl of breeding and refinement that she is, immediately starts wooing some clubs. She fits in well with the girls in the club, but does the typical uptight Spencer shenanigans. Then some minsunderstandings result in her feeding people pot brownies, which- it happens. If I only had a dime!

Finally, the best goes last! Aria sees her boyfriend's father at Whole Foods wearing women's clothing. She is understandably weirded out, and she tries her best to hide the secret from Noel, which is convenient because they had just had a conversation about not keeping secrets from each other. It's an awkward situation all around.

BIG SPOILER
So, in the end it turns out that Noel knows about his dad's cross-dressing. Spencer fed everyone pot brownies, so she's not in the eating club. She might have a new stoner boyfriend, though. Hanna's ickiness actually wins over Mike. It's gross. It turns out that crazy lady might not actually have been crazy after all. She was grieving the death of her stepdaughter, TABITHA. Crazy lady thought that the girls were taking her money and cheating her out of the baby, hence the crazy. She's not A because she's all shot and dead and stuff.

Ashes by Ilsa K. Bilk

”You only want to brawl. You want a fight. Fighting tricks you into believing you can change the past, even when the past is dead and gone and all of it is ashes.”

It’s a year about a decade or so from today. A sudden electro-magnetic pulse wipes out all electronics. Millions of people died immediately after the pulse. Some were changed.

Alex was one of those who was changed for the better. She had been dying of a brain tumor. After the pulse, she could suddenly taste and smell again. More than that, she could smell the others who changed.

The smell is like rotten meat. Then Alex knows one of the changed are around, brain-zapped cannibal teenagers. Alex, along with a little girl named Ellie and a slightly older boy named Tom, travels to a nearby ranger station in search of aid, and from there the trio head towards Canada. Before they get there, their truck is hijacked by a group of surviving senior citizens. They take Ellie, shoot Tom, and leave them for the nearby colony of Rule.

Alex was likable from the start. She has a giant tumor in her head, but she isn't all mopey about it, and she has great survival skills and an analytical mind that I admire. Ellie was more of an accustomed taste. She is a complete brat at first, and occasionally afterwards, but she turned out to be sort of sweet and lovable. Tom was sort of nondescript, though I did like him as Alex's romantic pairing.

I started Ashes expecting a zombie story, but it wasn’t that exactly. We don’t learn everything behind the pulse and the causes of the cannibals, but we know it has something to do with age and possibly hormones. The first parts of the book are exciting, and I experienced a ton of tension waiting for the cannibals to arrive. Needless to say, they made a great and stomach-turning entrance. The first parts of the book were very tense, then the parts in Rule slowed down a bit. It focused more on Alex trying to fit into a rule-intensive society and pretty much failing. The ending…wow, that ending really kind of sucks, because it’s a huge cliffhanger that won’t be remedied until the next book finally comes out.

I read a copy of Ashes through Netgalley. It's available now.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

"Knock, knock!" "Who's there?" "SPOILERS."
"...Spoilers who?"
(That completely obnoxious "joke" is meant to tell you that there are going to be spoilers from the first two Hunger Games books.)

Previously on The Hunger Games, there was the Capitol. The Capitol is the controlling city of Panem, which was formerly North America. People in the Capitol are incredible consumers. They are shallow and easily manipulated. The Capitol rules over the 12 districts. Most district people are poor and on the brink of starvation. Their children have been forced to kill each other at the Hunger Games for the amusement of the Capitol. Finally, the districts realize that they cannot allow this anymore. They have to put an end to the Capitol's power. They have to fight back. This time, they have to win.

Katniss Everdeen won the Hunger Games. People fell in love with her and her fake/maybe not romance with Peeta Mellark. During the Quarter Quell in Catching Fire, Katniss was taken from the arena by a hovercraft from District 13. District 13 was said to have been completely obliterated by the Capitol. However, all that was simply propaganda. The district simply went underground, building an entire civilization. Unfortunately, District 13 was not able to rescue Peeta. He was taken by the Capitol.

Because she is so recognizable, Katniss is asked to be the face of the resistance. Katniss will be the mockingjay (A hybrid of jabberjays and mockingbirds, symbol of resistance). She films messages for the Districts and the Capitol. At the same time, the Capitol is filming Peeta. He is urging both sides to stop fighting, fearing the great loss of life. Katniss knows that the Capitol is abusing Peeta. President Snow is keeping him alive because Peeta is the one way to get to her. Eventually, District 13 sends a rescue team for Peeta. What they bring back is just tragic. I was sobbing during all these scenes, sobbing just thinking about it. I'm even about to tear up now.

The love triangle gets thrown for a loop, definitely. However, there are also some changes to Gale that make it even more difficult to predict. There's also even more decisions to make in the rebellion. How far is too far to go? Does the ends justify the means? Is it really victory if it turns you into the very thing that you hate?

Mockingjay is just explosive. The entire series is fantastic, but this is just the perfect ending. It's heartbreaking, but ultimately heartening. It's also more satisfying than a million Breaking Dawns, maybe 1 1/2 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (But I still love you, J.K. Rowling!). You NEED to be reading these books right NOW.