Giveaway: Cinder by Marissa Meyer Audiobook

First giveaway of 2012! :) For anyone who would like to try Cinder, but have no time to read, this is perfect because you could listen to it instead during commute or in the car! Description of the novel:

Even in the future, the story begins with Once Upon a Time…. Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth's fate hinges on one girl. . . . Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She's a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world's future.

If you would like to see the trailer of the novel, click here!

Now for the giveaway rules!

Entries:

+1 Mandatory! Be a GFC follower

+1 Tweet or retweet this link (leave username): https://twitter.com/#!/StopDropandRead/status/155802243277402113

+1 For every other way you spread the word online (blog, tumblr, etc. simply leave link for each)

Open to US mailing addresses only. Giveaway ends on January 31, 2012 11:59 PM EST.

The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler

Title: The Future of Us

Author: Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler

Age Group: Teens

# of Pages: 356

My Rating: 4.5/5

It's 1996 and the internet is not yet wildly used. Emma receives a new computer from her father so her friend Josh gives her the new AOL CD-ROM to install. After Emma installs the program, she lands on a page called Facebook. Except, Facebook is not yet invented!

Emma can see her profile from the future with details of her life in snippets. After getting over the initial shock, she sees this as a chance to fix her future! Josh worries that she may be messing up their future completely by attempting to correct the little things in the present.

It's rare for me these days to request a novel to review because I have a huge TBR pile and am so busy these days. But when I skimmed the synopsis of this novel, I had to read it! I was looking forward to the end result before I even started!

What I found to be amusing was that Emma took everything from Facebook that her future self wrote so seriously. I know for a fact that when I complain about something on Facebook, it really is not a big deal as it sounds. Even if it is, it's not like my world is coming to an end. But Emma doesn't understand that and takes everything for word. She attempts to avoid one of her future husbands by tracking him down and decide not go to the university that he goes to. The more paranoid she got, the more I started to get irritated with her character. I supported Josh's stance on leaving it all alone. However, his future is that he would get married to the prettiest girl in the school and have a successful life. So I could understand that Emma criticized him because he might not want to ruin his perfect future.

I very much enjoyed this novel because it has such a unique concept. I always wanted to have a glimpse of my future to see what it is like if I am going at the pace I am right now. I think people would find this novel appealing because of the overall idea of being able to alter your future if you know exactly what will happen. I know I would be a hypocrite and say I won't, but I am pretty sure I would tweak somethings here and there.

The one thing that kept this novel from a 5/5 rating is [MINOR SPOILER ALERT] the fact that it doesn't reveal the future of either characters at the very end. I was so peeved! I was hoping that in the future once Facebook did come out for Emma and Josh, they would go on it. Then the story would end with Emma or Josh updating something that concludes everything. But, unfortunately not. [SPOILER ENDS]

I think this is a fun and non-cliche novel that anyone (especially for those who lived through 90s and uses Facebook today) can read.

Review copy provided by Penguin Group Canada.

Trailer Tuesday: Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Title: Cinder

Author: Marissa Meyer

Description: Even in the future, the story begins with Once Upon a Time…. Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth's fate hinges on one girl. . . . Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She's a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world's future.

There will be an author event on January 9th at 7 PM EST on Facebook and Twitter. So save the date!

https://www.facebook.com/MarissaMeyerAuthor
https://twitter.com/marissa_meyer

Wishing you all an amazing 2012

I would like to thank all of my readers, new and old, for sticking around with me. I know that updating and reviewing books have been extremely slow compared to what it used to be a couple of years ago, but blogging definitely was and is still part of my life.

I can't say that I will be picking up the pace anytime soon. Since I first started blogging up until now, so many changes have occurred in my life. Believe me, if you knew me in real life, I have changed drastically since the beginning of my book blogging days. Other things started to take priority in my life, therefore reading and reviewing had to take a backseat. So I am grateful if you haven't given up on me. I hope if anything, that this blog is a resource archive for manga and young adult readers. I'll continue to review the books I read, although it will take time.

For the blank slate of 2012, I wish you and your family all the best in health and fortune. May you pursue your wildest dreams by taking one step at a time and make it come true. It's a new year and it can be a new you.

Happy New Year!