BookBranch

“In this war, there are only two outcomes: victory or madness.”

Publisher Description:

Time is running out for the good guys. But what happens when you don’t know who the good guys really are?

Noah and Sadie: newly initiated into an underground cell so covert they don’t even know each other’s real names. Trained for combat on the nano level, they are thrust into a war they can barely grasp. 

Vincent: feels nothing and cares for no one. Fighting a personal battle with Bug Man, the greatest nano warrior alive.

The Armstrong Twins: wealthy, privileged, fanatical. Are they the saviors of humanity or authors of the darkest conspiracy in history?

On one side: Charles and Benjamin Armstrong’s Nexus Humanus. On the other: a group of teen hackers who call themselves BZRK.

Twenty-first-century warfare that takes place on the macro and nano level for the highest stakes: humanity’s free will.

It’s time to choose sides.

Keep reading

Want to see the Hunger Games on March 21st in your city? Lionsgate is offering a chance to see an advanced screening in select cities across the US. All you have to do is tweet the appropriate hastag for your city, and the four cities with the most tweets by March 1st will be chosen for an advanced screening. To get into these advanced screenings, you’ll have to enter in “Sponsors” contests. 24 people will win tickets to each advanced screening. There will be no tickets for sale.

You can find your city’s hashtag at http://screenings.thehungergamesmovie.com.

May the odds be ever in your favor!

(Source: mockingjay.net)

gonefans:

Michael Grant’s new series debuts tomorrow with the first book, BZRK! It is the first of a series, and the storyline already began last year on the Internet, in a news-making transmedia experience. It already has a movie deal, and is certainly a must-read for fans of the Gone Series.

We’ll be posting a review soon, but here’s some excerpts from other reviewers:

“With simmering pots of sexual tension, near-nonstop action, and the threat of howling madness or brain-melting doom around every corpuscular corner, Grant’s new series is off to a breathless, bombastic start.”

          - Booklist, Starred Review

“You must get this book. That is all.” 

          - Andrew Smith, author of The Marbury Lens

As for the rest of the books in the series…

“Okay, how about this: the President of the United States, under the influence of nanobots. commits a gruesome crime and she’s caught by the hacker collective Anonymous?”

          - Michael Grant

We’re certainly excited! If you read the book, leave your thoughts as a fan of Gone in our submission box and we’ll include them in our review.

You can buy BZRK from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or your local independent bookstore.

Look at this quote from Wikipedia:

“Woody Harrelson revealed in an interview on MTV Movie Night that he has signed on for four films. This suggests that Mockingjay, the final book in the series, will be adapted into a two-part film.”

How does this make you feel? Is there a sudden influx of Harry Potter copycatting going on? 

Publisher Description:

In search of a future that may not exist and faced with the decision of who to share it with, Cassia journeys to the Outer Provinces in pursuit of Ky - taken by the Society to his certain death - only to find that he has escaped, leaving a series of clues in his wake.

Cassia’s quest leads her to question much of what she holds dear, even as she finds glimmers of a different life across the border. But as Cassia nears resolve and certainty about her future with Ky, an invitation for rebellion, an unexpected betrayal, and a surprise visit from Xander - who may hold the key to the uprising and, still, to Cassia’s heart - change the game once again. Nothing is as expected on the edge of Society, where crosses and double crosses make the path more twisted than ever.

Review:

4/5

I’m very conflicted about how I want to rate this book. I can’t decide between three or four stars. So for the sake of Matched, I’ll give it four.

After reading Matched I was so eager to start Crossed, but unfortunately it just didn’t live up to my expectations. I just found it to be too much filler, as if its only purpose is to bridge the events between book one and book three. There’s a lot of running, a lot of camping, a lot of reading and a lot of annoying in this book. To start, it differs from Matched in that the chapters swap between Cassia and Ky, and although I usually really enjoy books that utilise this feature, I found myself getting confused here. I couldn’t differentiate between Cassia and Ky. They were written far too similarly, their voices almost the same. 

Did the story actually go anywhere? I appreciate that we needed to know the events leading up to the point where they are now, but I think there would have been benefit in throwing in more action and suspense. It’s just 300 pages of “oh I love you” and then BAM, something happens.

Also, I don’t understand why Cassia mentions how Ky keeps himself at distance from her. He obviously doesn’t, and so it just seems like this was thrown in for the sake of trying to make Ky seem more mysterious and “dark”. I didn’t get how Indie was supposedly in love with Xander? Where did that come from? She’s never met him! And why none of them will just tell Cassia Xander’s secret. It’s not even that much of a big deal.

It’s not all bad though (thankfully). I really enjoyed Eli’s character, he was written well, although I sometimes thought they undervalued him. He’s 13, not 3. I liked how Cassia and Ky aren’t separated throughout the whole book, that we get some pleasure in seeing them reunited. 

The best thing about Matched to me was the dystopian society element. I loved reading about the regulated lives of the characters, and I couldn’t wait to learn about how Cassia will (obviously, necessarily) fight against them. This book just lacked that, but that just ups the suspense for the next book tenfold.

I was searching the web for some news on the new Hunger Games movie, and lo and behold look what I came across! According to a poll by Next Movie, it gathered a huge 51% of the overall votes from movie fans, citing it as the movie that is garnering the most excitement this year. “Twilight: Breaking Dawn - Part 2” managed to obtain a whopping 45%, though, so it wasn’t close behind. This being said, I think us here at Bookbranch have to agree with the majority. We can’t wait for March to come around so we can finally see one of our favourite books on the big screen. What about you? Do you agree? What book adaptation movie are you looking most forward to this year?

.  

Oh look, a photo of Katniss and Gale! *Ooooooooh*

Source: http://movies.msn.com/movies/article.aspx?news=692540

Publisher Description:

Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days. 

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color. 

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war– and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now. 

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior. 

Review:

4/5

Okay, where to begin?  

Let’s start with how I thought this book would plan out, and how wrong I was. I read this book on the premise it was like X -Men. I’d read a quote somewhere citing this, so I got stuck in, expecting awesome superhero kick-butt scenes and powers flying around everywhere like ZAP. But, as above states, I was wrong. 

Basically, it’s a romance book. Now I’m not one to shy away from romance. Some of the best books I’ve read have had romance in them. In fact I think romance can sometimes make a book, because it makes you care more for the characters. However, I found the romance in this awfully fast. But that’s just me. As I began reading I loved the writing style. The prose was almost poetic, with similes and metaphors flying about like it was nobody’s business. I found the whole numbers thing very clever, and I loved the scribbled out words, as if we are actually reading Juliette’s diary. But this quickly changed. As I worked through the writing, it became excessive. It became unnecessary. It became annoying. Yes, we get that you can write, you can stop shoving intricate metaphors in our faces now. I just feel the story would’ve flowed much nicer if we hadn’t had to meander for five minutes, reading that she’s walking up mountains made of air. 

Also, I was irked by how perfect they are. Every male seems to fall in love with Juliette, and they’re only stopped by the fact if they touch her they’ll die. And the book is rife with depictions of Adam’s perfectly chiseled body. And my God why do they all keep running their hands through their hair?! Stop! It’ll get greasy! 

The last few chapters brought this book up a whole star for me. Finally, we got some answers. The plot lines were nicely cinched, but there are still enough loose threads to make we want to read the next book. I was excited about the ideas proposed, and I’m excited to find out what’s going to happen.  

So, 4/5 stars. And I’m really looking forward to the next one. Mafi  is an excellent writer with a brilliant mind, but some small things stopped this book being perfect for me.