Birthday and Christmas Book Haul

I have the lovely experience of having my birthday and Christmas fall within three days of each other and what that means is LOTS of bookish presents!! I know, normal people who get a book for Christmas are probably like, "Ick, a book? Really?" but not me! I love getting books as gifts. So today, I'll be listing out all the books I received this past holiday season - all of which I've really been wanting to read - and some of which have been sitting on my to-read list for quite a while. Let's start with the two awesome box sets I got:

The Legend Trilogy box set (with the novella Life before Legend) by Marie Lu - Legend has been a book I've been wanting to read since I heard about it. Honestly, I didn't know much about it except that it was a trilogy set in a dystopian post-apocalyptic America. I've really begun to love the action and quick pace of dystopian (YA only - I haven't yet read any adult dystopians) novels ever since I read The Hunger Games. I was hoping that this series would be just as fun and exciting. I'm halfway through Prodigy now and so far it's pretty good but I'll do a full series review when I'm done with Champion.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series box set by Rick Riordan - These books have been on my reading list for so incredibly long - basically ever since I first saw the first movie. (I've yet to see Sea of Monsters). However, from what I've read from reviews, the books are completely different from the movie. I enjoyed the movie for what it was but I'm really excited to see how much more exciting the books are because of course, the books are always  better. Plus, it involves Greek mythology - that's practically a guarantee right there that I'll love them.

Now for the non-box set books I received:

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld - I first heard about this book a really, really long time ago. I've never read anything by Scott Westerfeld before, but after reading a non-spoiler review of this book, I really wanted to start this series. It's set in alternate-history World War I where the opposing sides are the Clankers versus the Darwinists. The Clankers use technological warfare while the Darwinists' weapon of choice is of a biological nature. When I first heard about this book, I had just finished reading The Infernal Devices Trilogy by Cassandra Clare so I had been eager to get my hands on another steampunk-ish type of book. This one seems really good and hopefully, once I read it, I'll be picking up the rest of the trilogy.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein - Honestly, I have no idea what this book is about. My interest in it came from a high recommendation from a co-worker. I know it's set in World War II but I'm not too clear on the plot exactly. All I know is my co-worker liked it and Rick Riordan gave it five stars on Goodreads - therefore, it has to be good.

Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi - This is another post-apocalyptic book that I've been hoping to read for a while now. It's set in a world where you're either a Dweller living in government controlled cities or an Outsider living in the Wastelands. The main character, Aria, is a Dweller who becomes exiled and meets Perry, an Outsider. I was initially curious about this book for a couple of reasons excluding the hype of it actually being pretty good considering it's a debut novel. First, it's in third person, which is different from the trend of first person POV books that has been dominating the YA shelves recently. Second, from what I've heard, the love interest in this story isn't instantaneous like most YA books. I'm interested to read about how this develops because insta-love has become a really big pet peeve of mine.

Seeing Redd and Archenemy by Frank Beddor - I read The Looking Glass Wars in the middle of last December and I absolutely loved it. I loved the way the author twisted the classic Alice story, embedded it into history, and completely made it his own. I loved Wonderland as Frank Beddor created it, especially the way he used the imagination and gave it tangible (that's not quite the word I'm going for) rather than just hypothetical or metaphoric power. It's definitely not a  sequel to Carrol's Alice stories in any way but it was never intended to be that. I can't wait to read further about Alyss, Dodge, Hatter Madigan, and General Doppelgänger. And, for next Christmas, I want Hatter's hat.

So there they are, the last thirteen books I received in 2013! Here's to hoping they live up to my expectations! Cheers!

- Jazzie Kings aka The Book Dancer

Currently reading: Prodigy by Marie Lu
Progress: page 291
Thoughts so far: So far, I'm really enjoying this series. There's a few points that I think could have been developed further to be more believable including the Day and June's relationship (again, the whole insta-love thing doesn't work quite right) and the public's decision that Day is their hero. Putting those aside, however, it's definitely been a fun reading experience so far.