Waiting on Wednesday: A Bunch of Reads

I couldn't pick just one this week so I decided to steal the approach of highlighting several books.

I enjoyed Shiver more than I initially thought I would but I didn't think I'd have trouble waiting for Linger. Until I started hearing about other people reading it. Then I felt jealous. Then I read the synopsis. I really think Maggie Stiefvater has a way with words. I am very excited for this read now!

The sequel to Shiver follows the story of Grace and the wolves of Mercy Falls.

Maggie says: "It's about after. What happens after you discover there are werewolves in the wood, after you've fallen in love for the first time, after you've lost what you think you can't live without, after you've become someone you can't live with."

...grace...

This is the story of a boy who used to be a wolf and a girl who was becoming one.

Just a few months ago, it was Sam who was the mythical creature. His was the disease we couldn't cure. His was the good-bye that meant the most. He had the body that was a mystery, too strange and wonderful and terrifying to comprehend.

But now it is spring. With the heat, the remaining wolves will soon be falling out of their wolf pelts and back into their human bodies. Sam stays Sam, and Cole stays Cole, and it's only me who's not firmly in my own skin.

Linger doesn't come out till something like June 2010 from Scholastic Press. Too far away!

This World We Live In by Susan Beth Pfeffer



Okay as I will reveal in an interview I did for Debbie, this is my most anticipated read for the coming year. I think the reason is that Alex Morales haunts me. I still think about The Dead and the Gone on a regular basis! Unfortunately, I missed out on a chance to get my name entered for an ARC. But that's okay, I'll just storm the bookstore on release day! :) I love the cover, it fits in perfectly with the series.

Here's the back cover copy if you can handle it:

The heart-wrenching companion to the bestselling novels Life as We Knew It and The Dead and the Gone.

It's been a year since a meteor collided with the moon, catastrophically altering the earth’s climate. For Miranda Evans life as she knew it no longer exists. Her friends and neighbors are dead, the landscape is frozen, and food is increasingly scarce.

Miranda and her two brothers spend their days scavenging for food and household items, while their mother stays at home and desperately tries to hold on to the ordinary activities of their previous life. But they all know that nothing is truly normal in this surreal new world they live in.

The struggle to survive intensifies when Miranda’s father and stepmother arrive with a baby and three strangers in tow. One of the newcomers is Alex Morales, and as Miranda’s complicated feelings for him turn to love, his plans for his future thwart their relationship.

Then a devastating tornado hits the town of Howell, and Miranda makes a decision that will change their lives forever.


Hell Fire by Ann Aguirre



I really enjoyed Blue Diablo and I look forward to the next book in the series quite a lot. Probably because I have a little thing for Chance. Shhh, don't tell Corine!

I’m still a redhead. Before we left Texas,
I touched up the roots with Garnier
Nutrisse 64-R, and then I had some
tawny apricot highlights put in. I guessed
that meant I intended to keep this color
for a while. Symbolic—I’d made a
commitment, at least to my hair.

As a handler, Corine Solomon can touch any object and know its history. It’s too bad she can’t seem to forget her own. With her ex-boyfriend Chance in tow—lending his particularly supernatural brand of luck—Corine journeys back home to Kilmer, Georgia, in order to discover the truth behind her mother’s death and the origins of her “gift.”

But while trying to uncover the secrets in her past, Corine and Chance find that something is rotten in the state of Georgia. Just a few miles away, no one seems to know Kilmer exists. And inside the town borders there are signs of a dark curse affecting the town and all its residents—and it can only be satisfied with death…

Coming in April 2010 from ROC Penguin
(by the way I'm looking for some new urban fantasy series that are kind of like this one...not too much sex, but an interesting story with good writing. If you have a recommendation let me know. Whenever I try to pick them on my own they aren't that good.)

Listen by Rene Gutteridge


I've been waiting for this one since I saw it in Publisher's Lunch when the book was sold! It was even offered for a blog tour, but my email went to spam and I was too late to sign up.

Someone is listening...

The quaint, close-knit community of Marlo was the ideal place to live...until someone started posting private conversations online for everyone to read, word-for-word. Now it's neighbor against neighbor, friend against friend, as careless comments and hurtful accusations turn the town upside down. Violence and paranoia escalate, and the police scramble to find the person responsible before more people get hurt, or even killed.

But what responsibility do the residents of Marlo have for the words they say when they think no one is listening?

Coming in February 2010 from Tyndale Publishers.

Crossing Oceans by Gina Holmes

I've been reading Gina's blog for what seems like forever and I have no doubt that this book will be something special. It certainly sounds good.



Sometimes love demands the impossible

Nothing deepens a stream like a good rain . . . or makes it harder to cross.Jenny Lucas swore she’d never go home again. But life has a way of upending even the best-laid plans. Now, years after she left, she and her five-year-old daughter must return to her sleepy North Carolina town to face the ghosts she left behind. They welcome her in the form of her oxygen tank-toting grandmother, her stoic and distant father, and David, Isabella’s dad . . . who doesn’t yet know he has a daughter.

As Jenny navigates the rough and unknown waters of her new reality, the unforgettable story that unfolds is a testament to the power of love to change everything—to heal old hurts, to bring new beginnings . . . even to overcome the impossible.

Coming in Summer 2010 from Tyndale Publishers.

If You Follow Me by Malena Watrous



In this beautiful and deftly written debut novel, recent college graduate Marina moves to rural Japan shortly after her father’s suicide, finding work as an English teacher and unexpected solace through comic yet heartfelt interactions with her Japanese supervisor and new neighbors

Should be pretty obvious why I'm interested. Releases March 2010 from Harper Perennial.

That's all for this time! Tell me, which book looks the best to you? Are you looking forward to any of these?

(Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Jill of Breaking the Spine)