Every Day Books of Gems: Chicago

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Thursday, August 29, 2013

Review of Roaring Midnight by Colleen Gleason

Disclaimer: I bought this book to read for myself and to give it an honest opinion.

Roaring Midnight
(Macey #1: The Gardella Vampire Chronicles)

Author: Colleen Gleason
Paperback
240 Pages
June 7, 2013
Avid Press

Overview
Macey Gardella is a typical young woman of the Roaring Twenties: she works a job, has her own flat, and loves to dance the Charleston. But when a mysterious man named Sebastian Vioget informs her she belongs to a family of vampire hunters, Macey is stunned and disbelieving.

Yet, strange and frightening things begin to happen, and when Macey comes face-to-face with one of the fanged creatures, she has no choice but to believe Sebastian. And when she learns his own soul depends on her willingness to carry forth the family legacy and hunt the undead, Macey capitulates and joins the fight.

As she begins to learn about her new life, Macey meets the handsome newspaper reporter known as Grady--who seems to know more about vampires than he should. When he begins to ask too many questions, she has to juggle her strong attraction to him with the need for secrecy.

Slipping into speakeasies and sampling bootlegged whiskeys, dodging gangster gunfire and trying to keep her nosy landlady from finding the stakes in her flat, Macey Gardella must navigate through a world of stunning violence, passionate romance, and dark betrayal.

My Take
Oh my gosh! I read this amazing line that I found in the book ~ "I'm not making any promises," she said blithely, trying to regain her senses. She'd kissed boys before, but Grady was definitely not a boy and this was definitely not the same. page 81

Does that catch your attention? When Colleen Gleason announced she was writing another series of the Vampire Gardella, I had to get it, no matter what. I'm a huge fan of hers. I have read the first five books of the Vampire Gardella series which I absolutely adore! You do not need to read the first five to be knowledgeable for Roaring Midnight. It gives you a feel for a spin off from the first five books by Colleen Gleason. It's almost like a mini series. For some reason, the entire Vampire Gardella series fascinate me due to the fact I'm a fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So I get a image of a woman who can kick butt and still be beautiful in her own right. Onwards to the review...

Macey is the main character who has had some knowledge of who her parents were. Although she did not know everything! She knew they died but how remained a question for her. When she finds out how they died, she was shocked! It took her time to realize her true heritage of being a vampire slayer. I felt Macey had the right reaction of shock in learning everything but at the same time I somewhat had a hunch she knew a little bit about this. After all she was having dreams of being a vampire hunter! She takes her time on deciding whether or not to accept her fate as a vampire hunter. Macey is a strong female character in this book with a stubborn mind. I loved, loved, loved that Macey works in a library. (I love libraries!!!) Her goal is to become a head librarian which I hope she succeeds down the road.

Colleen hits the spot with the terminology and feel for the 1920s in Roaring Midnight. You will not be able to put it down. It also takes place in Chicago which is a favorite city of mine. Al Capone is mentioned in the book which was quite interesting and caught my attention. I wonder what made Colleen to include Al Capone. I look forward to the next book on him and Macey's adventure!

Sebastian is mentioned! He is a character from the previous Gardella books which I enjoyed. It was nice to see him pop up in this series. I always thought Sebastian was mysterious and still is to me. Other than Sebasation, we also have a character named Chas. Chas seems to have his own baggage which makes me wonder of him. Hopefully I will find out more about him! All the characters have a role to play in this story and you will see Macey trying to figure out who to trust.

The cover is awesome! I have always loved Colleen Gleason's covers of her books. This cover fits right in with the Vampire Gardella series of 1920s! I want more soon. I look forward from seeing more from Colleen Gleason in these series. If you have read her previous Gardella series, then you need to add these to your collection! If you like vampires, then you need to read this as well. So go find your copy today.

Cover: A
Story: B

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Wednesday, July 3, 2013

ALA 2013 Adventure

I decided to head to ALA 2013 because it was in Chicago! Of course I live in Illinois and I took the train downtown. I attended ALA 2013 on Saturday and Sunday just for the exhibits only. I hopped the train as it stopped at every stop. Then of course my brother lives downtown so he picked me up and went to his place for some breakfast. It was fun. After we ate, he dropped me off at McCormick Plaza which is not far from his place at all. I did have a list this time to be prepared. Sadly I did miss a few books I wanted but got that made up later from walking around. I saw many lovely publishers such as Penguin, Little Brow, Flux, Hyperion (Disney), Sourcebooks, Macmillan, Spencer Hill Press, Zondervan, HarperCollins, Harlequin, Bloomsbury, and so on. The place was huge. Of course there were artists and business companies for the library field was so neat to see! I loved seeing the shelving units and tables and chairs and even book drops were there. There were business companies such as 3M, Family Research, Baker & Taylor and so on.

After getting some books here and there and meeting with some people from the publishing company, I had to get lunch. The food was pricey! I spent 20 bucks on lunch there..the sandwich alone was $17.00. The joys of going into the city! After I ate, I headed back out. It does help to have a list. The one thing that was different was that ALA had their numbers on the floor, where BEA had their numbers up on top. Plus I didn't see a map in the ALA handbook that they gave us. So I basically went around in circles quite a bit! Oh my feet were fine but my shoulders ached so from carrying those books. It's quite a work, good for the soul! I saw so many different people there and met some great librarians! It was packed.

I also learned that 'Teardrop' by Lauren Kate would be handed out on Sunday morning so that was a new thing to add to my list! Plus I got an extra copy of 'Teardrop' for another book blogger named @heatherkkilpatri who did not know if she could go or not. I believe you can go. I saw children there which made me smile! Then I saw a tweet from another book blogger named @Sash_and_Em who had to leave early and wanted to get Shannon Messenger book signing as I did get a copy for her. I just like to help others out. Plus I also got some books for my two teacher friends as well. I came back with tons of books!

I did get to meet Colleen Gleason who I have been a fan of since 2007! There's another blog posting about that. Then I also met Shannon Delaney where I got a copy of Weather Witch, then some other authors I met were Julie Berry, Simone Elkeles, S.J. Adams, Geoff Herbach, Amanda Sun, C.Y. Lyons, Marissa Moss, and a few others. It was exciting and fun.

One thing I did get to have was dinner with my brother and his girlfriend at Hugo Frog Bar which was amazing. If you like seafood, then you need to go to this place! It was amazing!!! We shared an appetizer of Mussels! I had a bowl of clam chowder soup and then some shrimp for dinner. I was full afterwards. We did eat outside and it felt great. There was a heater outside too. It was fun to watch people go by. Later that night we headed back to my brother's place since I was crashing the night there (nice brother to help his older sister out)! We watched the movie 'Gangster Squad' - it was a good movie but a little violent. I did sleep pretty damn well since the train does go by his place.

Sunday came and my poor shoulders were already sore from Saturday. Sunday I ended up with more books. Holy cow! At the end, I went to Flux publishers to see what they had and the one lady there was so nice, she gave me a copy of this one book that I wanted to read since I would not be there on Monday. Thank you soooo much to Flux Publishing!!

Now I have all these books to read...I'm pretty much set for a while! Heading home..I had to walk from State Street to Michigan Ave to get a taxi cab to get to the train station to get home! I barely made it. Once I got on the train, it was packed. There was no place to sit! I ended up standing the entire time until about the 3 or 4 stop before I got off the train. The Metra train runs every two hours on Sunday. My kids were happy to see me when I arrived and so was my husband! I have the best family. A wonderful husband who lets me geek out at books.

If you are thinking of going to ALA, do it! It's worth the fun. Just like BEA..it's fun. A great way to see the whole world of books and people! I believe 2014 ALA is in Las Vegas and BEA 2014 is in NYC again. If you got any questions for me, ask away. :)

Photos below to check out: