Reads things. Writes things. Fluent in sarcasm. Willful optimist. Cat companion, chocolate connoisseur, coffee drinker. There are some who call me Mom.
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In a world divided by power and greed, seventeen-year-old Lilika harbors an intense desire to return to Winter in the Soul, the place her family left to escape the darkness that was manifesting from a coldness of the soul.
When she meets Talon, their connection is evident right from the start, and together they travel through the Black Kingdom to recover Lilika’s stolen locket. And in search of an answer to the mystery behind Winter in the Soul.
Lilika holds the key to stopping the darkness from spreading. The fate of their world lies in her hands. Will she stop the Black Kingdom before its darkness overtakes them all, or will they succumb to the darkness that is spreading across the land?
Winter in the Soul will release July 15, 2014 and is Novotney’s debut novel.
About Jennifer Novotney
Jennifer Novotney was born in Burbank, California and lived in Los Angeles for most of her life until settling in North Eastern Pennsylvania with her husband and daughter. She attended California State University, earning a bachelors degree in journalism, and Northern Arizona University, earning a masters degree in English. After college, she spent several years writing and teaching, including at Pennsylvania State University.
Seventeen year-old Amy and her parents join a team of scientists and military personnel who will endure 300 years of cryogenically induced sleep as they travel across space to form a colony on a new planet. Fifty years before the ship’s scheduled arrival at Centauri-Earth, Amy awakens, trapped and suffocating in her cryo-chamber. She cannot wake her parents without risking sabotage to their mission, so she is left to find a place within the strange society of passengers who make their lives aboard the ship Godspeed.
An unpredictable, manipulative man called Eldest rules the populace, and he immediately threatens to cast Amy off the ship to her death if she disturbs the other passengers in any way. Eldest’s protégé, Elder, finds himself drawn to Amy’s exotic beauty and inner fire. Her stories of life on earth and her insistence that something aboard the Godspeed is very wrong send Elder spinning into doubt and confusion. What if Eldest is wrong? What if the way he governs the people is wrong? When another cryo-chamber is disturbed and the person within dies, the crew aboard the Godspeed must face the possibility that someone is deliberately sabotaging their mission. To stop the killer, they must uncover the truth about Godspeed, its mission, and its leaders.
Amy finds herself trapped in a ship filled with people for whom earth remains only stories and legends. Over hundreds of years, the people of the Godspeed have evolved into a society regulated by artificial hormones and genetic engineering. Does this manipulation reduce the elusive qualities that separate man from animal? Revis expertly explores the morality of such a world in her cleverly constructed sci-fi arena. I loved the exploration of this idea, and thought the story did a great job of showing some ideas about it without ever getting preachy.
The serial murderer on the loose on board a space ship within a pretty constricting dystopian-like society plus a budding romance makes this an intense read and kind of a genre-bending story, which I loved as well. This is a book that has a lot to offer a lot of different readers.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
No straight up profanity. Instead, characters use faux/made up swear words, like “frexing” and “shite.”
Sexual Content Passengers aboard the Godspeed are hormonally manipulated into having a mating season, just as animals do. During this “season,” the passengers engage in sex out in the open. Descriptions are brief and spark conversations about the importance of love in relationships and the difference between humans and animals. Several men surround Amy, intending to rape her. The men pin her down and partially expose her, but a friend rescues her before the men fully assault her. The scene is intense.
Spiritual Content None.
Violence One resident aboard the ship removes passengers from cryo-sleep one by one, allowing them to thaw and die by drowning in the cryo-fluid. Amy wakes in her cryo-chamber. Someone rescues her, though the experience traumatizes her.
Drug Content
Hormones and medical supplements/drugs control the ship’s populace. Eldest, the group leader, is drinks liquor in a couple of instances.
Violet returns to Winterhaven for her senior year, convinced that with her awesome friends and fabulous boyfriend, this year is going to be the best yet. She’s paired with the famed Dr. ‘Hottie’ as her mentor, Aiden is closer than ever to finding a cure for his vampirism, and she’s still on top in the fencing team. Then a mysterious serial killer leaves a trail of blood-drained women in his wake, and violent visions of death for those closest to her terrorize Violet. With her mentor’s help, she hopes to discover enough clues about the visions to stop them from becoming reality before it’s too late.
Though it begins at a slow pace, delving into details like who’s taking calculus or has which lunch period, Mirage quickly ramps up the tension via Violet’s mysterious visions and Aiden’s distant behavior. Few of the characters really shine with complexity, but Violet and Aiden can be listed among them.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
Extreme but infrequent.
Sexual Content Violet laments the fact that she and Aiden won’t be able to have satisfying sex because for a vampire, part of the satisfaction comes from biting his partner. Dressed in an inviting outfit, she meets Aiden in the loft of the barn for some alone time. The couple engage in some heavy making out, but stop before clothes come off.
Spiritual Content In the story, Violet and her friends each share certain super-human gifts. These are thought to be a leap forward in human evolution rather than any source of spiritual power.
Violence A rogue vampire leaves a trail of victims. No descriptions of the attacks.
Drug Content
Aiden and his friends work together to create a serum that will cure his vampirism.
After enduring long hours of torture, Verity, a prisoner in an abandoned hotel in Nazi-occupied France, promises to tell her German captors everything she knows. She begins with recollections of her best friend and pilot, Maddy. As Verity writes Maddy’s story, she recounts the early days of friendship and recruitment as a wireless operator in England. Life for Maddy, a simple country girl with a gift for mechanical engineering, drastically changes on the day she meets a bold woman pilot whose plane needs repair. For Maddy’s friend, a lost German pilot becomes the catalyst that sets in motion her own transformation.
While some of the content definitely places this novel in a category for older teens, it is a powerful story brilliantly told. Author Elizabeth Wein brings to life the story (inspired by history) of two courageous women who served England during World War II. Wein captures not only an intricate physical description of the places in the story, but the desperate, patriotic feel of war-time existence.
On a Personal Note
My grandfather served the US as a flight navigator during World War II. Though he rarely spoke of this period in his life, I was always proud to know that he served. Additionally, I’ve always treasured the story of a dear family friend. She lived in France, and during the war she helped a young Jewish girl escape the country with her. Reading about Verity and Maddy brought those stories along with the love and pride I feel for my family members back fresh and new. As time marches forward, and the veterans and survivors of World War II reach the end of their lives, it is so important for us to remember the sacrifices they made and the reasons they made them. Reading historical accounts and novels is one way to bring this period in history to life for our children.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
Extreme with moderate frequency.
Sexual Content Rumors and brief comments suggest that Verity seduces war prisoners and guards in order to gain favors or information from them. As a prisoner, she allows a man to fondle her breasts in exchange for supplies for which she is desperate.
Spiritual Content Early in their friendship, Verity and Maddy discuss assisted suicide and whether it’s selfish or noble to refuse to aid someone in ending his or her life.
Violence As a war prisoner, Verity receives brutal treatment. Most of the torture is not described in the story. In a frantic attempt to rescue prisoners en route to Nazi concentration camps, soldiers and Resistance members face off, and several are killed.
Drug Content
References to alcohol (though all characters may be of legal drinking age) and cigarettes.
After rescuing many of the women from their village and hiding them within the Safe Lands, Levi, Mason and Omar formulate a plan to rescue the children and return them to their families. As the plan begins to take shape, the boys learn that one of their allies may have an agenda all his own.
Mason still pursues research to develop a cure to the deadly disease plaguing residents of the Safe Lands. His relationship with his beautiful supervisor deepens, and Mason longs to ask her for help. But Ciddah keeps her own secrets, some of which may directly threaten Mason and his people.
Omar longs to make up for the betrayal which left many of his people dead and its survivors as captives in the Safe Lands. He’s got a plan, and it’s big enough to unravel the entire leadership of the Safe Lands and bring freedom to everyone. Or it might just get his family executed.
Outcasts brings all the excitement and intensity introduced by the first in this series. While the characters in the first book were intriguing, they emerge in a sharper, even more engaging way in this novel. Mason’s geeky struggles to pursue romance and Omar’s desperation for approval and retribution are fun and endearing. The web of political intrigue spins far and fast, pulling the reader deeper into the story page by page. The unexpected ending will leave readers panting for the next installment. This is a great series for boys or girls, and one that explores deep issues of addiction and forgiveness.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
None
Sexual Content Omar realizes that when he feels bad, he seeks sexual encounters as a means to thwart loneliness and guilt. The encounters are implied, not explicitly shown. Mason wrestles with his feelings of affection for his supervisor. She invites him to sleep with her, but he refuses.
Spiritual Content Shaylinn wants to participate in opposing the Safe Lands rule, but as a pregnant fugitive, her options for how to do so are limited. She begins sending encouraging notes to people. The notes contain uplifting Bible verses and exhortations to stand fast and have faith. She prays over each note as she writes it.
Violence More than one character is shot during a risky rescue attempt. Others are beaten by Safe Lands Enforcers. Violence is brief and descriptions are not graphic.
Drug Content
Omar depends on regular drug use to manage his emotions. He realizes this is a problem and wants to change, but feels powerless to break the habit.
Note: I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.
After Mary Shelley’s father’s arrest as a traitor, Mary Shelley flees to her aunt’s home in southern California. There she hopes to find safety from the ugliness of war and the Spanish Influenza epidemic. When Mary Shelley arrives, she learns the flu epidemic is as alive and dangerous as it was in her Oregon hometown. She also discovers her childhood sweetheart, now a US soldier, apparently missing.
With so many families grieving loved ones lost to war or disease, many people turn to Spiritualism, seeking help from famed photographer who claims to capture spirits of dearly departed in his portraits of the living. Mary Shelley’s aunt presses her into sitting for a portrait. The foggy image of Stephen, her love and missing soldier appears with her in the photograph, shocking Mary Shelley. Soon after, Stephen’s ghost visits her, clearly frightened and disturbed. Refusing to accept the public story of his death, Mary Shelley vows to uncover the truth about Stephen’s death and find some way to help him rest in peace.
While the story brings to life an important period in American history, capturing the desperation of World War I and the fear of the flu epidemic, some of the other elements seems almost at war with themselves. Mary Shelley feels devoted to science and scientific understanding. She staunchly believes that the spiritualism craze is bogus and full of dishonest vendors taking advantage of families of war and flu victims.
She decries both the séance and the photographs of her with spirits, yet firmly believes in the encounters she has with Stephen’s ghost, and never really explores why she believes one and not the others, or whether other people may be able to contact spirits. Some of the scenes in which Stephen’s ghost visits Mary Shelley leave her longing for him and yet I found them creepy. I found it difficult to understand her fascination and longing for him, though her desire to see him at peace seemed noble.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild and infrequent.
Sexual Content Mary Shelley experiences a visit from her lost love at night. The two grieve that they never had the opportunity to consummate their affection for one another, and begin to make out. No clothes are removed, but it’s a pretty intense scene.
Spiritual Content During the early 1900s, many people were fascinated with contacting spirits of the dead. Mary Shelley participates in a séance, which she believes a hoax, until the ghost of her former lover contacts her. She sits for a photographer who claims to reveal spirits in his photographs. She does not believe in the authenticity of his practice. Still, she remains convinced that the ghost of Stephen will not be at rest until she understands how he died.
Violence Brief references to a young man beating his brother. Many references to flu victims and their symptoms. Mary Shelley visits a veterans’ hospital and speaks with soldiers there. Various injuries are briefly described.
Drug Content
Mary Shelley hears rumors that Stephen’s brother is an opium addict.
Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.
