Blog Tour: Soul Crossed (Of Demons and Angels #1) by Lisa Gail Green

Soul Crossed (Of Demons and Angels #1)
by Lisa Gail Green
Publisher: Full Fathom Five Digital
Release Date: February 25th 2015

Rate: Average (3 stars)

Synopsis:

"A wickedly romantic story that will have you cheering for Lisa Gail Green’s addictive storytelling. SOUL CROSSED is devilishly delicious!" — Martina Boone, author of COMPULSION and the Heirs of Watson Island trilogy

"Soul Crossed blurs the lines between good and evil with addictive characters and plot that will have you eagerly turning the pages." ~Kelly Hashway, author of the Touch of Death series.

One Demon.

One Angel.

One Soul.

Josh lived a reckless, selfish life, so upon his death, escaping the eternal torments of Hell by assuming the role of a powerful, soul-corrupting demon is an easy choice. His first soul assignment doesn’t seem too hard: the mortal Camden is already obsessed with weapons, pain, and torture. If only Josh wasn’t distracted by Cam's beautiful friend, Grace.

Grace never expected to die violently at age sixteen, but now she’s an Angel, responsible for saving a soul. She can already see past Camden’s earthly flaws, so the job should be be easy. If only that handsome, playboy Josh would stop getting in the way.

It’s forbidden for an Angel to be with a Demon, so if Josh and Grace stop resisting each other, the results would be disastrous. 

And only one can claim Cam’s soul.

Soul Crossed is a nice YA read with a love story similar to Romeo and Juliet's but with demons, angels and a possible apocalypse coming. 

The story is pretty much what the synopsis describes. Josh and Grace died. They didn't know each other, but somehow their deaths are related and in their afterlife will get them the chance they didn't have when they were alive. However, their love is a forbidden one since Grace is an angel and Josh is a demon. And that just simply can't happen.

The character's in this book were good, but kind of predictable. Grace is everything's expected for someone who lands in heaven: good, kind and someone who'll never do anything wrong. Josh, on the contrary, is pictured as the bad guy, the one who got drunk underage and end up killing himself. They both were kind of naive. One to expect that everything on heaven should be made of feathers and good intentions and the other from expect a good trait from Satan and that everything would be a bed of roses. I mean, we are talking about the king of hell, Josh. What were you expecting?

The only character that shocked me a lot was Cam. He had the lonely and nerdy style going until we saw his true nature and it was beyond creepy. I was truly impressed by this character, because I didn't see the change coming. Not at all.

The plot was a good one. Maybe not an original one, but definitely a juicy one. I really knew that everything will be amazing, but the story was kind of low until the very ending when all the good stuff happened at all once. Don't get me wrong, I liked the story, but like I said I was expecting much more. 

Like I said, every good stuff happened at the very end. I saw true love, sacrifice and real action at the very end. I was like: "Man, that's what I'm talking about." I just wish that all the story was as good as the ending. 

I also felt a bit confused with the time in between chapters. Sometimes I felt a bit lost and uninterested by the first chapters (probably what I ended up thinking that all the good stuff was at the end). 

This story is a good one if you like the stories where demons and angels fight against each other for souls and end up falling in love instead. If you're into these type of stories, give it a try. You might end up liking it.

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Lisa Gail Green lives with her husband the rocket scientist and their three junior mad scientists in Southern California. She writes books so she can have an excuse to live in the fantasy world in her head. She likes to share these with readers so she's represented by the lovely Melissa Nasson of Rubin Pfeffer Content. She has a parrot but would most definitely get a werewolf for a pet if she weren't allergic. 

Lisa loves YA. She believes with all her heart that teen readers are ready and willing to experience things that some adults have closed their minds to, that books are the safest way to explore, learn, and escape, and that imagination is the key to just about everything.

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Sweet Evil (The Sweet Trilogy #1) by Wendy Higgins

Sweet Evil (The Sweet Trilogy #1)
by Wendy Higgins
453 pages
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: May 1st 2012
Rate: Enjoyed it (4 stars)

Synopsis:

Embrace the Forbidden

What if there were teens whose lives literally depended on being bad influences?

This is the reality for sons and daughters of fallen angels.

Tenderhearted Southern girl Anna Whitt was born with the sixth sense to see and feel emotions of other people. She's aware of a struggle within herself, an inexplicable pull toward danger, but it isn't until she turns sixteen and meets the alluring Kaidan Rowe that she discovers her terrifying heritage and her willpower is put to the test. He's the boy your daddy warned you about. If only someone had warned Anna.

Forced to face her destiny, will Anna embrace her halo or her horns?

Sweet Evil's the perfect first book for the Sweet Trilogy. It's a refreshing story about angels and demons and nephilim worth reading.

The story starts with sweet, innocent Anna whose life is as normal as any teenage life can be. That's until she meets hot, sexy and dangerous Kaidan Rowe. That's when she learns about the Nephilims, children of angels that were cast out of heaven. Each Nephilim has a urge that can be easily confused as a curse, they inherit their fathers sins and they have to work with them, corrupting people or they die by the hands of their own fathers.
Anna's been always a good girl, but meeting Kaidan might chance that. Because, after all, he's the guy that make good girls go bad.

I loved this story. Wendy Higgins story's not like any other angel story that you might say: "oh, another one." Not at all. I think that I have been waiting so long to read this series 'cause I thought it would be that: just another angel story. But I'm glad I was wrong.

The relationship between the two main characters, Kai and Anna is simply hilarious and filled with a lot of sexual tension that can reach even the reader. In this story, Anna's the perfect representation of sweet, pure and naïve and that brings a lot of funny situations and scenes into the story. I like how Kai tries to control himself without losing his very own essence. And I loved picturing Kaidan with british accent *sigh*.

I have a hard time relating to Anna in this book 'cause she's so good that makes the reader feel bad. I mean she's never tell a lie. NEVER. Can you tell me you have never ever ever ever told a lie? I can't. And that's why I felt like such a bad person. And I can't blame Kaidan for feeling what he feels about Anna's purity. I mean, I was feeling that I was unworthy of reading her point of view and being "inside her head", imagine falling for her!

As I said, this first book is all about Anna finding herself and trying to understand what's her place in all of this world. I definitely recommend to all potential fans to not give up on this book and to keep reading until the second book to have a general opinion. I've read all three books and I have a very different perspective than from the first book alone. And if I had to give stars to the whole Trilogy, it would definitely and without a doubt would be a five stars; you-have-to-read-it-now stars.

Olivia Holt as Anna

Wade Poezyn as Kaidan

Thomas McDonell as Blake

Lily James as Ginger

Robbie Amell as Jay

Bella Heathcote as Marna

Eli Goree as Kopano

Freida Pinto as Zaina

After earning a bachelors in Creative Writing from George Mason University and a masters in Curriculum and Instruction from Radford, Wendy taught high school English until becoming a mommy. Writing Young Adult (YA) stories gives her the opportunity to delve into the ambiguities of those pivotal, daunting, and exciting years before adulthood.

She lives in Northern Virginia with her husband, daughter, and son. Sweet Evil is her debut novel.

The Beautiful and the Damned by Jessica Verday

The Beautiful and the Damned
by Jessica Verday
272 pages
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Release Date: October 1st 2013
Rate: Average+

Synopsis:

Cyn’s blackouts have deadly consequences in this sexy, suspenseful spinoff to the New York Times bestselling Hollow series.Cyn and Avian are far from a perfect match. She’s a witch who casts spells on men so she can steal their cars. He spends his time being judge, jury, and executioner to the truly evil in the supernatural realm.

When the blackouts Cyn’s been having ever since her time in Sleepy Hollow start escalating, she finds herself unable to remember where she’s been or what she’s been doing. Frightened, she seeks guidance at a local church, and it’s there she meets Avian.

The unlikely pair soon discovers that her blackouts are a side effect of what she truly is—an Echo—a conduit for souls of the dead. The only way to prevent Cyn from losing complete control is to return to Sleepy Hollow and vanquish the source of her power—but she may not survive the process. And if she does? She won’t ever be the same...

The Beautiful and the Damned completely confused me. At first, without reading the synopsis, I was a little lost and didn't understand what was Avian or if there were more like Avian and Cyn and how many types of demons were in this story. 

I kept reading it because Cyn's story was pretty intense and interesting. I felt sorry for her for finding her boyfriend brutally murdered to her side, and living with the fear of thinking about the possibility of her being the murderer. I seriously wanted to know what happened to Hunter and if it was really Cyn who murdered him. 

She's an Echo. She has the ability to cast spells on me so she can compel them to do whatever she wants. But she's a different Echo, she's not selfish as the others, and only uses her ability to steal cars, and then return them, to feel the adrenaline rush and when its only necessary. But being an Echo also mean being a conduit for souls of the dead. And that means that from time to time, a soul that is not Cyn's soul takes control of her body.

In this story, you also read Avian's point of view. He's half demon, half angel and a revenant. I'm still kind of processing this. He could be categorized as the bad boy in the story and although he's an asshole to Cyn, you know these two have to end up together. 

I liked how the author uses the story to "free" Avian. He was tormented by the death of another Echo he fell in love with, and he's described with black winds. But after saving Cyn he's described with white wings. I think those last chapters were my favorite from the book.

And my favorite character in the story? The hellhound. I know. But from what I read, he was in the "good" side, in Cyn and Avian's side, so he earned points and it's described as a dog. I love dogs. I couldn't help but like him. And he also "saves the day". If you read the book, you'll understand why I just say that.

The plot was pretty interesting and had a lot of potential, but as I said at the beginning of the review, I felt a little bit lost during the story and when they explained Cyn and Avian's "world" I still felt like something was missing or that it was not accurate enough. It's not a problem of not understanding what Cyn is or what Avian is (although Avian was difficult to understand what he was), but their surroundings and the other creatures. Because there're more.

The ending was a almost perfect ending. I liked the ending, but I was heart-broken. I am one of those readers who need a happy ending to love the story and even sigh after reading it. Ms. Verday wrote a realistic and almost happy ending, but I was hoping for more conclusion since it's not a series. At least not now. I hope we have more stories about Cyn and Avian. I would definitely read them all!

The Beautiful and the Damned has the perfect title for Cyn and Avian's story. This dark paranormal romance is one of those stories that you enjoy reading if you are a Young Adult addict. I recommend you to enter Ms. Verday's world and read this book. 

Jessica Verday is the New York Times bestselling author of The Hollow Trilogy, published by Simon & Schuster/Simon Pulse. She wrote the first draft of THE HOLLOW by hand, using thirteen spiral-bound notebooks and fifteen black pens. The first draft of THE HAUNTED took fifteen spiral-bound notebooks and twenty black pens. THE HIDDEN took too many notebooks and too many pens to count. Find out more at jessicaverday.com.