Blog Tour – Deadly Sweet by Lola Dodge

Hello Lovelies and welcome to my Blog Tour Stop for Deadly Sweet by Lola Dodge. Be warned — This book will have you ridiculously craving magical pastries and desserts. Don’t forget to stay until the end for the giveaway!

 

Deadly Sweet
Lola Dodge
(Spellwork Syndicate #1)
Published by: Ink Monster LLC
Publication date: January 16th 2018
Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal, Young Adult

For fans of Hex Hall, The Magicians, Practical Magic, and Food Wars!

Anise Wise loves three things: baking, potion making, and reading her spellbooks in blissful silence. She might not be the most powerful witch, but enchantment is a rare skill, and her ability to bake with magic is even rarer. Too bad one wants witchcraft on their campus. Anise’s dream of attending pastry school crumbles with rejection letter after rejection letter.

Desperate to escape her dead-end future, Anise contacts the long-lost relative she’s not supposed to know about. Great Aunt Agatha owns the only magic bakery in the US, and she suddenly needs a new apprentice. Anise is so excited she books it to New Mexico without thinking to ask what happened to the last girl.

The Spellwork Syndicate rules the local witches in Taos, but as “accidents” turn into full-out attacks on Anise’s life, their promises to keep her safe are less and less reassuring. Her cranky bodyguard is doing his best, but it’s hard to fight back when she has no idea who’s the enemy. Or why she became their target.

If Anise can’t find and stop whoever wants her dead, she’ll be more toasted than a crème brûlée.

Who knew baking cakes could be so life or death?

Goodreads / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / iBooks


Review 

4 ★ – Magically delicious and Scrumptiously Entertaining

I had such a wonderful time reading this book. Deadly Sweet by Lola Dodge is magically delicious and scrumptiously entertaining.

This book was a light and fun read. The plot was entertaining, delightful, and made me laugh. There’s magic, baking, mystery, and plenty of delectable baked pastries. It was definitely really amusing to read about baking with magic — being able to mix in a little love, confidence, or happiness so that when someone takes a bite, that’s exactly how they’ll feel. I thought that part was really fun. Oh and be warned… you will have a never ending craving for all the different scrumptious pastries and sweets described in this book, so be sure you have something to munch on while you read. 

I loved how this book had strong female characters. Anise was a fantastic and such an adorable lead. She made some mistakes along the way, but that made her incredibly relatable and so easy to root for. I also loved how passionate she was about baking. Even when things didn’t go her way, Anise remained determined to improve her skills.  I thought Great Aunt Agatha was just the best. She seemed strict and tough, but underneath she was this sweet, loving, and really kickass grandmother. I liked the supporting characters too. They were quirky and charming in their own ways, so I can’t wait to get to know them more in the next installment. 

While some parts were a bit predictable, there was never a dull moment in this book. With plenty of magic, adventure, and spell-binding baked treats, Deadly Sweet is satisfyingly entertaining and deliciously fun. l’m absolutely excited to find out what happens next in this wicked series. 


Author Bio:

Lola Dodge is a compulsive traveler, baker, and procrastinator. She earned her BA in English from Stonehill College and MFA in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University–and hasn’t stopped moving since. When she’s not on the road, Lola spends her time indoors where the sunlight can’t melt her, writing or bingeing on anime and cherry soda. She can be summoned in a ritual involving curry, Hello Kitty idols, and a solid chocolate pentagram.

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Twitter

Giveaway
Deadly Sweet Prize Pack
Treat House 12 Pack

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Follow the Tour Here

January 15th
Kindle and Me >> Guest post
It’s a Book Life >> Review
Belle’s Book Blog >> Excerpt
Stuffed Shelves >> Review

January 16th
Butterfly-o-Meter Books >> Guest post
Book Reviews Express >> Review
Novels & Necklaces >> Review

January 17th
Girls With Books >> Excerpt
Movies, Shows, & Books >> Review
Adventures in Writing >> Review
Novelties >> Review
Smada’s Book Smack >> Review
Sincerely Karen Jo >> Review

January 18th
Booker T’s Farm: Books & Nails & Puppy Dog Tales >> Review
Whatever You Can Still Betray >> Excerpt
Bibliobibuli YA >> Guest post
Rabid Reads >> Interview
Touch My Spine Book Reviews >> Review

January 19th
The Avid Reader >> Review
A British Bookworm’s Blog >> Review
Desert Rose Reviews >> Review
Dani Reviews Things >> Interview
The Genre Minx Book Reviews >> Review

 

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Thanks for stopping by and reading my review. Have you read this book? What did you think? Don’t forget to leave your comments down below!

Sincerely Karen Jo

Review – No Plain Rebel

No Plain Rebel

(No Ordinary Star #2)

M.C. Frank

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5 ★ – INCREDIBLY FASCINATING AND BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN
PUBLISHED BY CREATESPACE INDEPENDENT PUBLISHING PLATFORM DECEMBER 2, 2015
GENRE(S): YOUNG ADULT, SCI-FI, FANTASY, DYSTOPIA, ROMANCE
PAGES: PAPERBACK 212
BUY AMAZON

Add of Goodreads

Synopsis

A soldier is summoned to the North Pole, days before the year changes, told to fix a the great Clock for a celebration. He has no idea what to do.
A girl, hunted for the crime of being born, almost dies out on the ice. She is rescued by the last polar bear left alive.
A library waits for them both, a library built over a span of a hundred years, forgotten in the basement of an ice shack.
The world hasn’t known hunger or sickness in hundreds of years. It has also forgotten love and beauty.
The year is 2525.

Inspired by the short stories of Ray Bradbury, this futuristic novel is set in a world where Christmas -among other things- is obsolete and a Clock is what keeps the fragile balance of peace.

Written in three installments, this is the breathtaking and sensual story of how two unlikely people change the world, and each other, one book at a time.

Immerse yourself into the icy cold world of this scorching hot new novel.

In No Plain Rebel, Felix finds out the truth. Or so he thinks. He’s trying to come to terms with that, as well as with the fact that the Clockmaster’s shack has been discovered by his fellow-soldiers, but he can’t exactly concentrate.

The match girl’s fiery curls appear before his eyes every ten seconds, distracting him, and then he starts talking to her in his head.
Because she’s no longer there.
The Stadium is looming in the distance.
It’s ten heartbeats to midnight.

Review

No Plain Rebel is just as gorgeous and enthralling as No Ordinary Star (Review). M.C. Frank has created such a unique, thrilling, and heart achingly memorable story about loss, forgiveness and hope. I’m positively in love with this breathtaking series and honestly can’t recommend it enough.

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I loved being back with Felix and Astra as they continued to uncover more truths about themselves and the world that had forgotten kindness, faith and love. Some were quite pleasant, others were just sad, while many were absolutely atrocious. Through it all, the plot was fast-paced, insanely intriguing, and amazingly suspenseful. There were plenty of nail-biting twist and turns, fun surprises, and tender moments that kept the story moving. I felt so many emotions with this book that I thought my heart would burst into a million pieces. When Frank writes… she writes with so much passion and purpose. Every single page had meaning, beauty, and most of all – a tremendous heart! Trust me, you will be obsessed with this series so much that you won’t want it to end.

My admiration for Felix and Astra has no bounds. They’re strong, complex, beautifully flawed, and lovable in every way. They both have been through so much pain and loss that it was so wonderful to see them become the amazing heroes you’ll root for all the way to the end. Together, Felix and Astra rebelled against everything they knew and worked together to change the world. Along the way, they also found friendship and love in each other. A love so real and sweet and just beautiful. Tin Soldier and Match Girl have a piece of my heart now and forevermore.

With a powerfully evocative writing style, fascinating storyline, gorgeous world building, and great character development, No Plain Rebel is 200 pages of pure beauty. It’s wonderfully poignant, incredibly engrossing, and so utterly sincere.

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It’s ten heartbeats to midnight. Ten heartbeats to the unknown future of humanity and I cannot wait to see what happens next.

As a member of the NOS Street Team, I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest and fair review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.


Other Books in the Series

ADD NO ORDINARY STAR ON GOODREADS

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ADD NO VAIN LOSS ON GOODREADS  
(Releasing December 5, 2017)

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About the Author

(Taken from M.C. Frank’s Website)

mcfrankI am M.C. Frank: writer, reader, designer, editor, physicist and teacher. (To mention a few.)

I have been living in a world of stories ever since I can remember (that’s before I knew how to write). I started writing them down when I could no longer stand the characters in my head screaming at me to give them life and while those first scribblings weren’t exactly good (nor were they books, although I insisted on calling them that), they were enough for me to discover my passion in life.

I started writing seriously a few years back, pursuing my dream of a writing career. I started small, in a magazine, but ever since I’ve been dreaming of doing what I absolutely love for a living, and finally I am getting there! I feel so blessed and happy.

I got my university degree in physics a few years ago. People look at me weirdly when I tell them I’m a physicist, so I say, I know what you’re thinking, and yes, I’m like Sheldon, only a bit crazier! I am now free to pursue my love of reading and writing, as well as my free-lance job of editor-in-chief. I live with my husband in a home filled with candles, laptops and notebooks, where I rearranges my overflowing bookshelves every time I feel stressed.

Which is often, since (as you might have noticed) I don’t pick the easiest subjects for my novels. I put my characters in icy-cold dystopian worlds where kissing is forbidden (among other things), or place them in green forests ruled by evil Sheriffs. If they’re in Jane Austen’s London, they have to be running away from a traumatic childhood, or if they are in our current, contemporary world, they’re scared they’ll die before they have finished high school. That sort of thing.

Don’t worry, though, I know we all are in need of a little hope and joy in our lives, so there’s a good dose of those as well in everything I write.

Follow and Connect with M.C. Frank 
 WebsiteInstagram / Twitter / Facebook

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Thanks for reading my review. I hope you get a chance to meet Felix and Astra and discover the beauty in this breathtaking series. I promise you will fall absolutely in love.

Don’t forget to leave your comments down below. I’d love to hear what you think.

Sincerely Karen Jo