Review: The Potion Diaries

Tags

fantasy, magic, potions, teen, YA

When the Princess of Nova accidentally poisons herself with a love potion meant for her crush, she falls crown-over-heels in love with her own reflection. Oops. A nationwide hunt is called to find the cure, with competitors travelling the world for the rarest ingredients, deep in magical forests and frozen tundras, facing death at every turn.

Enter Samantha Kemi – an ordinary girl with an extraordinary talent. Sam’s family were once the most respected alchemists in the kingdom, but they’ve fallen on hard times, and winning the hunt would save their reputation. But can Sam really compete with the dazzling powers of the ZoroAster megapharma company? Just how close is Sam willing to get to Zain Aster, her dashing former classmate and enemy, in the meantime?

And just to add to the pressure, this quest is ALL OVER social media. And the world news.

No big deal, then.

Review

I really enjoyed this book, I devoured it in one sitting. It was magical romantic and had lots of potions in it, which I love.

The premise was clever and very well thought out. The setting was beautiful although I never found out where it was, America maybe. I liked the use of our world with magic built in. The potion making was brilliant, I could not have asked for more on that front. The Hunt was clever and full of surprises.

Eve and Lyn was extremely inventive and well written. It was fun to read from Eve’s point of view.

Kemi’s POV was more of action packed and for that I was thankful. She was clever and worked things out rationally and always stuck up for what she knew was right. I was also good to see her let her guard down at times, she was confident of herself but also relied on others when needed.

Zain was a good love interest. He was there often but although I felt I always knew what was going to happen with him Kemi didn’t. At times it was a little predictable.

I would recommend this to anyone who loves fantasy.

4 out of 5 stars

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ARC Review: Lying Out Loud

Tags

fiction, love, lying, romance, Ryder Cross, teen, the duff, YA

Sonny Ardmore is an excellent liar. She lies about her dad being in prison. She lies about her mom kicking her out. And she lies about sneaking into her best friend’s house every night because she has nowhere else to go.

Amy Rush might be the only person Sonny shares everything with – secrets, clothes, even a nemesis named Ryder Cross.

Ryder’s the new kid at Hamilton High and everything Sonny and Amy can’t stand – a prep-school snob. But Ryder has a weakness: Amy. So when Ryder emails Amy asking her out, the friends see it as a prank opportunity not to be missed.

But without meaning to, Sonny ends up talking to Ryder all night online. And to her horror, she realizes that she might actually ‘like’ him. Only there’s one small catch: he thinks he’s been talking to Amy. So Sonny comes up with an elaborate scheme to help Ryder realize that she’s the girl he’s really wanted all along. Can Sonny lie her way to the truth, or will all her lies end up costing her both Ryder and Amy?

I received a free copy of this book via netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

At first I wasn’t sure of this book, it’s didn’t hold my attention, but about a third of the way in I could not put it down. I stayed up until 4am last reading it (Not something I do often, I like my sleep). I know this was a companion novel to The Duff, but that didn’t really matter to me, yes Wes and Bianca were in it a little, but for all the contributed they might as well have been random characters.

Sonny was a good main character, very hyper and a lot going on in her life. I know it’s what the whole book was about but some of the lies really annoyed me. She didn’t treat her friend Amy very well. She also seemed to take some the Rush’s hospitality for granted.

Amy, I was glad she gained her voice later in the novel and stopped putting up with Sonny’s schemes and bossing. She was always a good friend even when she was mad.

Ryder was a nice love interest, I like how Sonny got to know him then started to like him, it wasn’t insta-love which is good. Insta-love annoys me. He also had a lot going on in his life which is good to see all sides of characters. Also he didn’t judge Sonny on her upbringing, he judged her on her actions.

Since this took me a while to get into and I would have liked a little more too the ending pertaining to Ryder, I am only going to give it 4 stars.

4 stars out 5