Guest Post: Jessica Veri on My Life After Now

Jessica has close ties with the HIV/AIDS world. How has this affected her and her friend’s lives personally, and how does Jessica think MY LIFE AFTER NOW will contribute to ongoing HIV awareness initiatives?

Thank you so much for the opportunity to write a guest post for your blog! I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to talk a little bit about My Life After Now.

Though I don’t have HIV personally, I feel like it’s always been around me. When I was little, I had a family member who died from AIDS. I didn’t know much about what that meant at the time, but I knew how sad it made my family.

Then, for a while, HIV/AIDS was everywhere in pop culture. It seemed everywhere you looked during my teen years the entertainment industry was referencing the AIDS crisis. Salt-n-Pepa’s “Let’s Talk About Sex,” Janeane Garofalo’s character waiting for her test results in Reality Bites, the musical Rent (which I was obsessed with—okay, still am), Pedro on The Real World: San Francisco, Jenny in Forrest Gump, Stone and Robin on General Hospital… But then that all kind of dropped off.

In the early 2000s, it seemed people kind of stopped talking about it. At least, they weren’t talking about it as much or with the same vehemence as they had in the ’80s and ’90s. That’s probably because, thanks to advancements in medication, people aren’t dying from AIDS at the rate they used to. So the whole issue is a little “out of sight, out of mind.”

A few years ago, someone close to me found out they were HIV-positive, and suddenly the issue was brought back into the spotlight for me. When’s the right time to go on medication? What do you tell someone you’re dating? Should you tell your co-workers or not? Will you ever be able to have children of your own? People with HIV/AIDS have to think about all these questions, and so many more, every single day.

I decided to write My Life After Now because I wanted to do something to help get the HIV/AIDS conversation going again, especially with teenagers. It’s a subject that’s gone largely ignored in YA literature up until now, yet it’s a huge part of our world. Hopefully this book will be a step toward filling that gap.

~~~

Thank you so much for stopping by, Jessica! My review will be posted soon. Be sure to add My Life After Now on Goodreads and check out Jessica's website. 

Waiting on Wednesday (90)

This Song Will Save Your Life by Leila Sales 

Making friends has never been Elise Dembowski’s strong suit. All throughout her life, she’s been the butt of every joke and the outsider in every conversation. When a final attempt at popularity fails, Elise nearly gives up. Then she stumbles upon a warehouse party where she meets Vicky, a girl in a band who accepts her; Char, a cute, yet mysterious disc jockey; Pippa, a carefree spirit from England; and most importantly, a love for DJing.
Told in a refreshingly genuine and laugh-out-loud funny voice, THIS SONG WILL SAVE YOUR LIFE is an exuberant novel about identity, friendship, and the power of music to bring people together.

September 17, 2013/Farrar, Straus, and Giroux (BYR)/288 Pages/Young Adult 

-- I am a huge fan of contemporary YA and this sounds fantastic! I adored both of Leila's previous novels and I am sure This Song Will Save Your Life will be just as hilarious and relatable. 

Links: Author's Website/Goodreads 

                                               Waiting on Wednesday Is Hosted By: Breaking the Spine

Review: Spell Bound by Rachel Hawkins

Spell Bound by Rachel Hawkins 

Hailed as “impossible to put down,” the Hex Hall series has both critics and teens cheering. With a winning combination of romance, action, magic and humor, this third volume will leave readers enchanted.
Just as Sophie Mercer has come to accept her extraordinary magical powers as a demon, the Prodigium Council strips them away. Now Sophie is defenseless, alone, and at the mercy of her sworn enemies—the Brannicks, a family of warrior women who hunt down the Prodigium. Or at least that’s what Sophie thinks, until she makes a surprising discovery. The Brannicks know an epic war is coming, and they believe Sophie is the only one powerful enough to stop the world from ending. But without her magic, Sophie isn’t as confident.
Sophie’s bound for one hell of a ride—can she get her powers back before it’s too late?

Review: 

I have completely fallen in love with this series. After picking up the first book on a whim, I have quickly worked my way through the entire trilogy. With lovable characters, a unique plot, and non-stop action, the Hex Hall series is one I will definitely always recommend. Spell Bound was a wonderful ending to the trilogy.

Spell Bound picks up (in a way) right after Demonglass ended. Since that book ended on such a cliffhanger, I started Spell Bound with so many questions. Luckily, we get a lot of things answered right off the bat, but there are still quite a few things that are not answered. Spell Bound does move at a rapid clip, though, and a ton happens. While Hex Hall and Demonglass might have been a little less serious, things are intense and much, much darker in Spell Bound. There were times when I just could not stop reading and this book brought out a lot of emotions from me.

Sophie is definitely one of my all-time favorite YA characters. She is sarcastic, funny, smart, brave, and just so real. Everything she goes through, she faces it realistically. Her relationships with various characters develop and strengthen over the course of the book and I have to say that this series also has some of my favorite secondary characters. From the Brannicks to Jenna to Archer to Cal... all of these characters were better developed and affected Sophie's story in so many ways.

Archer Cross... words cannot describe how much I adore that boy. His dedication to Sophie, his own snark and humor, everything about him is perfect for Sophie and whenever his character was out of the scene I was missing him.

There were a ton of plot twists that shocked me throughout the course of the story. Especially once I got about halfway through Spell Bound, Hawkins was pulling out all of the stops and I just had to read straight through to the end-- even when several intense and terrible things happened! There were a few especially startling twists that I cannot spoil, but just be prepared to be an emotional wreck by the end of Spell Bound!

All in all, this was an enjoyable and intense ending to what has become one of my favorite series. While there were a few things I didn't love about Spell Bound, as a whole, this was a highly enjoyable and satisfying end to the Hex Hall trilogy. If you have not read this series yet, I suggest you start with the first book ASAP and try and have copies of the rest of the series on hand, because you will just have to know what will happen next. I am especially excited for Hawkins next series, a spin-off of this series coming out in May featuring Izzy.

Overall: 4.25 out of 5 stars

March 13, 2012/Hyperion Books/327 Pages/Young Adult/Book Three

Source: Library

Other books in this series: Hex Hall (Book 1) and Demonglass (Book 2)

-- plus, a  new spin-off series is coming out in May of this year. The first book is called School Spirits!

Links: Author's Website/Goodreads 

Stacking the Shelves (6)

Here are the books I've received over the last couple of weeks! They all look very interesting and I am beyond excited to start reading them.

For Review:

Panic by Sharon M. Draper

The Rose Throne by Mette Ivie Harrison 

Spies and Prejudice by Talia Vance 

Rotten by Michael Northrop 

The Program by Suzanne Young 

Fox Forever by Mary E. Pearson 

That Time I Joined the Circus by J.J. Howard 

Let the Sky Fall by Shannon Messenger

What did you get this week?

Stacking the Shelves is Hosted By Tynga's Reviews 

Giveaway: Nobody and Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

(I'm sorry this post didn't go up as scheduled!)

Anyway, I'm thrilled to be hosting a giveaway for two awesome-sounding books: Nobody by Jennifer Lynn Barnes and Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes! One lucky winner will get to be the proud owner of a finished copy of each of these books. 

For more information on Jenn and her books please check out her blog. 

Please fill out this form to be entered!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

US and Canada Only. Ends on March 17. Good luck! 

And if you do not win, here are three places to purchase the books:

Barnes & Noble = http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/nobody-jennifer-lynn-barnes/1110503726

Amazon = http://www.amazon.com/Nobody-Jennifer-Lynn-Barnes/dp/1606843214

Indiebound = http://www.indiebound.org/book/9781606843215

Waiting on Wednesday (89)

A Most Dangerous Deception by Sarah Zettel

A warning to all young ladies of delicate breeding who wish to embark upon lives of adventure: Don't. Sixteen-year-old Peggy is a well-bred orphan who is coerced into posing as a lady-in-waiting at the palace of King George I. Life is grand, until Peggy starts to suspect that the girl she's impersonating might have been murdered. Unless Peggy can discover the truth, she might be doomed to the same terrible fate. But in a court of shadows and intrigue, anyone could be a spy—perhaps even the handsome young artist with whom Peggy is falling in love . . . History and mystery spark in this effervescent series debut.

November 5, 2013/Harcourt Children's Books/320 Pages/Young Adult/Book One 

-- I adore historical fiction and add in royalty, murder, romance, and impersonation and I'm hooked! This sounds like it will be an exciting new series! 

Links: Author's Website/Goodreads 

Waiting on Wednesday Is Hosted By: Breaking the Spine