Welcome back to my blog! It’s that time of the week again where I bring you another First Lines Fridays post! I took a break for a bit because I was overwhelmed/on vacation. To read my last FLF, click here.
First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?
Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!
Today’s First Lines
Julia’s world was blue.
Blue was everything. Blue was safe. Blue was home.
How she longed to see red.
She could glimpse it from the alley in which she crouched. The forests of the Red were ever present, cradling an encroaching on stone and blue paint. The tops of the trees danced over the stuccoed walls of the buildings that formed the Blue: the last city on earth.
‘They’re coming out,’ Claudia whispered.
Can you guess what book it is? I recently received a copy from the author and I’m looking forward to reading it!
The Gilded King by Josie Jaffrey
In the Blue, the world’s last city, all is not well.
Julia is stuck within its walls. She serves the nobility from a distance until she meets Lucas, a boy who believes in fairytales that Julia’s world can’t accommodate. The Blue is her prison, not her castle, and she’d escape into the trees if she didn’t know that contamination and death awaited humanity outside.
But not everyone in the Blue is human, and not everyone can be contained.
Beyond the city’s boundaries, in the wild forests of the Red, Cameron has precious little humanity left to lose. As he searches for a lost queen, he finds an enemy rising that he thought long dead. An enemy that the humans have forgotten how to fight.
One way or another, the walls of the Blue are coming down. The only question is what side you’ll be on when they do.
If you’re interested in The Gilded King, you can purchase it onAmazon (affiliate link)!
Disclaimer: Most posts made on this blog will include affiliate links, identified by the phrase (affiliate link). As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. This comes at no additional cost to you.
Today I’m bringing attention to the book The Other Side of the Whale Road by K.A. Hayton. I’ll take you through the blurb, about the author, and a few tour excerpts!
Premise
‘The Vikings are better armed than we are. They have long, heavy axes that can take a man’s head from his shoulder. I know this because I see it happen’
When his mum burns down their house on the Whitehorse estate, sixteen-year-old Joss is sent to live in a sleepy Suffolk village.
The place is steeped in history, as Joss learns when a bike accident pitches him back more than 1,000 years to an Anglo-Saxon village. That history also tells him his new friends are in mortal peril from bloodthirsty invaders. Can he warn their ruler, King Edmund, in time?
And will he ever get home?
Book CWs: For a list of warnings, tropes, and representation for this book, check out its page on BookTriggerWarnings.com.
About the Author
K.A. HAYTON was born in Lincolnshire and read English at Sheffield University. She lives in Suffolk with her husband and has two daughters. The idea for The Other Side of the Whale Road came from her study of old English poetry at university, and from living in a place where Anglo-Saxon history feels very close.
What readers have to say
I have found Joss to be a remarkable young boy, and a very intriguing character. He is honest, strong, kind, humble, and caring, and the way he deals with the things that should be impossible is one of a kind. The adventures he faces, as well as all the hardships he fights are incredibly moving and definitely worth a read.
The Other Side of the Whale Road is such a remarkable and powerful book that I couldn’t help but love. The characters are so incredibly interesting and likeable, especially our main character, sixteen-year-old Joss. The whole aspect of time travelling back to the Anglo-Saxon era was so fascinating to read about, gripping me until the very last page.
Very well done, super well written, a main character you really root for and it’s even a great educational read. Absolutely recommended for any teenager, young adult or in fact older reader like myself.
I award The Other Side of the Whale Road a full 5 out of 5 stars. Readers get the downtrodden foster kid theme alongside a feel-good journey to the past. I’ve never seen this done before, and K.A. Hayton did it so well. If you get the chance to read this book, I encourage you to pick it up. It was a fast read at only 230 pages, but there is a lot of content spread through its pages so, it felt much longer.
Disclaimer: Most posts made on this blog will include affiliate links, identified by the phrase (affiliate link). As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. This comes at no additional cost to you.
TheWriteReads tour for The Other Side of Whale Road by K.A. Hayton is starting tomorrow! To help you all follow along with the tour, I’ll be listing the tour schedule below (using the reviewer’s Twitter username) along with links to where you should be able to find the posts on that day.
If you’re interested in subscribing to TheWriteReads’ mailing list for information on future tours, just DM @The_WriteReads on Twitter!
I look forward to reading everyone’s thoughts! The Other Side of Whale Road will be out in September 2021. If you like what you see, you can preorder it today!
Welcome back to my blog! It’s that time of the week again where I bring you another First Lines Fridays post! To read my FLF from last week, click here.
First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?
Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!
Today’s First Lines
The secret is how to die.
Since the beginning of time, the secret had always been how to die.
The thirty-four-year-old initiate gazed down at the human skull cradled in his palms. The skull was hollow, like a bowl, filled with bloodred wine.
Drink it, he told himself. You have nothing to fear.
Can you guess what book it is? It’s the sequel to a popular book that was made into a film. I’m not actually sure if they have connecting storylines though. I haven’t read either of them lol.
The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
WHAT IS LOST… WILL BE FOUND
In this stunning follow-up to the global phenomenon The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown demonstrates once again why he is the world’s most popular thriller writer. The Lost Symbol is a masterstroke of storytelling – a deadly race through a real-world labyrinth of codes, secrets, and unseen truths…all under the watchful eye of Brown’s most terrifying villain to date. Set within the hidden chambers, tunnels, and temples of Washington, DC., The Lost Symbol accelerates through a startling landscape toward an unthinkable finale.
As the story opens, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned unexpectedly to deliver an evening lecture in the U.S. Capitol Building. Within minutes of his arrival, however, the night takes a bizarre turn. A disturbing object – artfully encoded with five symbols – is discovered in the Capitol Building. Langdon recognizes the object as an ancient invitation…one meant to usher its recipient into a long-lost world of esoteric wisdom.
When Langdon’s beloved mentor, Peter Solomon – a prominent Mason and philanthropist – is brutally kidnapped, Langdon realizes his only hope of saving Peter is to accept this mystical invitation and follow wherever it leads him. Langdon is instantly into a clandestine world of Masonic secrets, hidden history, and never-before-seen locations – all of which seem to be dragging him toward a single, inconceivable truth.
As the world discovered in The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons, Dan Brown’s novels are brilliant tapestries of veiled histories, arcane symbols, and enigmatic codes. In this new novel, he again challenges readers with an intelligent, lightning-paced story that offers surprises at every turn. The Lost Symbol is exactly what Brown’s fans have been waiting for…his most thrilling novel yet.
If you’re interested in The Lost Symbol, you can purchase it onAmazon (affiliate link)!
Disclaimer: Most posts made on this blog will include affiliate links, identified by the phrase (affiliate link). As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. This comes at no additional cost to you.
If you follow me on Twitter (or if you’ve clicked the Trope-ical Readathon Info tab on my blog) then you know that my partner and I host a month-long readathon in March and August.
The readathon is team-based with six teams:
Team Romance
Team Science Fiction
Team Fantasy
Team Mystery/Horror/Thriller
Team Contemporary/Literary/Historical Fiction
Team Non-Fiction/Poetry
I am part of Team Romance which means the prompts I have to satisfy are the following:
There are two ways to satisfy a Common Challenge: either the book has the given trope OR it satisfies the alternate prompt. To challenge myself as much as possible, my TBR is solely based on tropes and not on any of the alternate prompts.
Without further ado, here is my planned TBR!
Absent/Dead Parents Trope: Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater
Time Loop Trope: The 7 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
Found Family Trope: One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston
Coming of Age Trope The Fascinators by Andrew Eliopulos
Food Themes Trope Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala
Blast from the Past Trope Peril at the End House by Agatha Christie
Mixed Media Trope Good Girl, Bad Blood by Holly Jackson
(Post) Apocalyptic Trope The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey
Historical Figure Trope The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu
All Happens in One Day Trope All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban
Multiple POV Trope Royal Holiday by Jasmine Guillory
The New Kid in Town Trope: Horrid by Katrina Leno
Retelling Trope: The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo
Team Challenge 1: Sports Romance Trope Head Over Heels by Hannah Orenstein
Team Challenge 2: Second Chance Romance Trope These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong
Additional Books: In addition to the above books, I also have several books I need to read during the month for reviews/tours. I’m also planning on reading one team book from each team.
Down with the Dance by C.T. Walsh ~ The Box in the Woods by Maureen Johnson ~ The Meeting Point by Olivia Lara ~ XOXO by Axie Oh ~ What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad ~ Murder on the Red River by Marcie R. Rendon ~ Dear Senthuran by Dear Senthuran ~ She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan ~ The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline ~ A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers
If you want to participate, you can find all of the info here! If you share your TBR before registration closes on August 8th, you’ll be entered in a Book Depository giveaway!
TheWriteReads tour for Fireborn by Aisling Fowler is starting tomorrow! To help you all follow along with the tour, I’ll be listing the tour schedule below (using the reviewer’s Twitter username) along with links to where you should be able to find the posts on that day.
If you’re interested in subscribing to TheWriteReads’ mailing list for information on future tours, just DM @The_WriteReads on Twitter!
Thank you so much to Rachel at https://www.rachelsrandomresources.com/ and C.T. Walsh for allowing me to be part of this experience and also providing me with a complimentary physical book and blog tour media kit!
About the Author
Besides writing fun, snarky humor and the occasionally-frequent fart joke, I love spending time with my family, coaching my kids’ various sports, and successfully turning seemingly unsandwichable things into spectacular sandwiches, while also claiming that I never eat carbs. I assure you, it’s not easy to do. I know what you’re thinking: this guy sounds complex, a little bit mysterious, and maybe even dashingly handsome, if you haven’t been to the optometrist in a while. And you might be right.
My goal with my writing is to engage young readers with fun and adventure. With so many competing forms of entertainment available to our kids (and so many of them mindless), I really try to provide a reading experience like no other.
I value the importance of combining fun with learning and life values. My stories are humorous and adventurous with strong characters and solid life lessons with some potty humor sprinkled in. You gotta give the kids what they want…Hey, it’s better to read fart jokes than to play video games, right?
Book CWs: For a list of content/trigger warnings, tropes, and representation for this book, check out its page on BookTriggerWarnings.com.
Premise
Meet Austin Davenport, whose fabulous luck landed him on this earth only eleven short months after his brother, Derek, putting them in the same grade. While Austin’s brain power is unmatched, it appears as if his brother got all the athletic gifts and the family butt-chin, meaning their parents love Derek more than Austin, or so it seems.
Join Austin on his journey through the tumultuous waters of middle school as he navigates the swampy and undeodorized hallways and explores the depths of the cafeteria’s seafood surprise.
Oh, and someone is plotting to take down the Halloween Dance, the one that Austin has his sights set on, so he can take Sophie Rodriguez, a girl way out of his league, but who doesn’t seem to know it.
Can he stay one step ahead of the new principal who has it out for him? Will Austin figure out who the perpetrators are? Will he save the dance in time? Will he wear a diaper on a stakeout?
This first in a planned series of twelve will have you ROFLing like you never have before.
The funny and fast-paced nature of this series is meant for middle grade and early young adult readers.
Review (No Spoilers)
Down with the Dance is definitely a book that I would have adored as a kid. It’s got all of the elements that contemporary children/middle-grade books tend to have: exaggerated adult caricatures, a plethora of fart jokes, an awkward protagonist, a peer bully, and an amazing sense of humor.
The book follows Austin Davenport, a middle-schooler who happens to be in the same grade as his evil older (non-twin) brother. His brother is 11 months older than him and I tried to figure out why they’d be in the same grade but then decided that schools are just weird like that and went with it. I have an October birthday and was told that I was lucky I got placed in the “right” grade because of how late in the year it is. One of my friends is 12 days younger than me and was placed in the grade below me. AND YET my cousin who is two months younger than me was placed in the same grade as me. Basically nothing makes sense.
The narration of Down with the Dance is told in first person, something that I thought added much of the humor. Austin is the perfect mix of angst, nerd, and awkward. And he was unexpectedly hilarious. Even though I am a 27 year old adult, I still found this book really enjoyable. It’s definitely not realistic, and the adults annoyed the heck out of me with how irresponsible they all were, but I don’t think the target audience would care about that at all.
Austin’s love interest Sophie Rodriguez was probably my favorite character of the book. She was incredibly kind, understanding, and assertive. Partway through the book there’s the classic misunderstanding trope, but once this is figured out, she is quick to apologize and admit her mistake. I admired her personality a lot.
Austin’s adventures in middle school are far from over! The end of my copy had a chapter preview of the next book and it already sounds like a hoot. Feel free to follow along with the rest of the tour (schedule below) and if you’d like to purchase Down with the Dance, you can find it on Amazon US (affiliate link) or Amazon UK!
Disclaimer: Most posts made on this blog will include affiliate links, identified by the phrase (affiliate link). As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. This comes at no additional cost to you.
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