Book Review: School Spirits by Rachel Hawkins

Hello All! Today I am going to share my review for School Spirits by Rachel Hawkins. This is the spin off book to the Hex Hall series. After I read Hex Hall it became one of my favorite series so I definitely had to pick up the spin off book. I will post the summary from below and then share my thoughts on this book.

Summary from Goodreads:

Fifteen-year-old Izzy Brannick was trained to fight monsters. For centuries, her family has hunted magical creatures. But when Izzy’s older sister vanishes without a trace while on a job, Izzy's mom decides they need to take a break.

Izzy and her mom move to a new town, but they soon discover it’s not as normal as it appears. A series of hauntings has been plaguing the local high school, and Izzy is determined to prove her worth and investigate. But assuming the guise of an average teenager is easier said than done. For a tough girl who's always been on her own, it’s strange to suddenly make friends and maybe even have a crush.

Can Izzy trust her new friends to help find the secret behind the hauntings before more people get hurt? 






So in this spin off book to Hex Hall, the main character is Izzy Brannick. We learned in Hex Hall, that Izzy is Sophie's cousin and Sophie's mom is sister to Aislinn Brannick (Izzy's mom). The Brannicks are descended from powerful white witches, but they have no magic left and they are also Prodigium hunters. Since meeting Sophie and since there are very few Brannicks left, they don't hunt prodigium anymore but rather help keep them in control and send them to the council for punishment. In this book, Izzy's older sister Finley goes missing, and Izzy's mom moves them to a new town so Izzy can do smaller assignments and go to high school to have a somewhat normal life.

So first I want to say that this book was nowhere near as good as the Hex Hall series was. Not even close. I had a really hard time getting into this one, where the hex hall books have you hooked right away. I tried really hard not to compare everything in this book to the things in Hex Hall, but I really couldn't stop myself. When a series is really great, I think the spin offs have a lot to live up to and this book just didn't do it for me. Overall I was really disappointed it in.

While I loved all of the characters in the Hex Hall series, I did not love any in this book. Most of them were bland and boring, even all of the love interests. I liked Izzy okay, but she wasn't as fun to read from as Sophie was. However, I do think there was a little bit of good character development with Izzy, and if there is more books in the series I can see that there will be more progression with her.

The plot for this book was really boring to me. It took the whole book for things to happen and to get to the point of everything. And then when you finally do get to that point, it wasn't even exciting. Reading Hex Hall, there was always so much excitement and action going on. There were a lot of twists and turns, and I couldn't put it down. This book I kind of dreaded reading because it was that boring. I think this book could have had a lot of potential and could have been a lot better than it was. I'm not sure if there is going to be more books in the series, but if there is I will probably pick them up and hope they are better than this one was. I had really high hopes for this book and it was kind of a let down because I loved Hex Hall so much!

This is all for my review, I ended up giving it a 3/5 stars on goodreads because it wasn't horrible, it was just okay. Thank you all for reading and I hope you enjoyed!

Upcoming Book Releases for 2013!

Today I am going to share some up coming YA book releases for 2013 that I am excited about! I found quite a few books while I was browsing Barnes and Noble's website in their coming soon section. All of these books are coming out this winter and early spring for 2013. A few of the books are parts of series that I love and have been waiting (impatiently) for the new book to come out! I hope you all enjoy reading this list of books that I am excited for!

-Splintered by A.G Howard coming out on January 1st.

This is a book retelling/based off of Alice in Wonderland. It sounds so good and this is probably one of the books that I am most excited about. This is A.G Howard's debut novel and I can't wait to read it!









-Empty by K.M Walton coming out on January 1st.
This book seems like a good, real life contemporary novel about "A girl tumbles into a downward spiral when a romantic encounter turns violent" (from barnes and noble's description).






-Teeth by Hannah Moskowitz coming out of January 1st.
This is another contemporary novel about a boy named Rudy who moves away to a remote island to help save his younger brother who is sick. He meets a girl named Teeth who has terrible and violent secrets of her own and they form a connection that he has never had with anyone before. This book sounds so good and I can't wait to read it! I'm a sucker for any contemporary novel that sounds as good as this one does!






-Crash by Lisa McMann coming out on January 8th.
I am super excited about this one because I absolutely loved Lisa McMann's Wake Trilogy and this book sounds really good! About a girl who has recurring visions that haunt her!







-The Archived By Victoria Schwab coming out on January 22nd.
This is a supernatural fantasy/thriller book that sounds super good and original. It doesn't sound like any book that I have ever read before and that is why I'm excited to read it.  "Imagine a place where the dead rest on shelves like books.Each body has a story to tell, a life seen in pictures that only Librarians can read. The dead are called Histories, and the vast realm in which they rest is the Archive."  (from barnes and noble's summary).

-The Indigo Spell by Richelle Mead coming out on February 12th. 
This is the 3rd book in the Bloodlines series which is the spin off series to the author's Vampire Academy series. I can't wait for this book to come out! The ending to the Golden Lily was so amazing and I wish I could have read this book right when I was finished! 

-Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare coming out on March 19th.
This is the third book in the Infernal Devices series which is the prequel series to The Mortal Instruments series. I absolutely love this series and the whole world that Cassandra Clare has created and I can't wait to read this one! The cover to this book is just so beautiful as well!










-Chosen at Nightfall by C.C. Hunter coming out on April 30th.
This is the 5th and final book in the Shadow Falls series. This is a series that I really enjoy reading and each book in the series keeps getting better and better. I can't wait to find out what happens, but I'm sad that this will be the last book in the series! 






I hope you all enjoyed this post and happy reading! 

7 Deadly Sins of Reading

Hello Everyone! Today I'm going to do a blog post on the 7 Deadly Sins of reading. This is a book tag that I saw going around the book community on Youtube. I thought it was fun, and even though I wasn't tagged, I still wanted to participate in this book surgery!

Greed- What is your most inexpensive and expensive book? 
My most inexpensive book that I have purchased is The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I bought this at a used book sale for $1 last summer. My most expensive book is probably the 7th Harry Potter book, which on the inside flap has a price for $34.99

Wrath- what author do you have a love hate relationship with? 
I'm going to say Nicholas Sparks. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Nicholas Sparks and I love all of his book as well. However I find some of his books to just be okay and not amazing like some of his others. So I picked him for a love hate relationship because I always have really high expectations when he writes new book and I don't like being slightly disappointed when one of his books aren't as good as the others!

Gluttony- What book have you deliciously devoured over and over with no shame at all? 
Definitely every single book in the Harry Potter series. I've read the books so many times and I just love them and want to read them again!

Sloth- What book have you neglected reading due to laziness?
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R Tolkien. I've read half of the first book, some of the second book and none at all of the third. I've also neglected reading The Hobbit, which is on my fall TBR list because the movie is coming out in a few months!

Pride- Which book do you often talk about to sound like an intellectual reader? 
I don't really talk about books to make myself intelligent, I mostly read YA novels and I have no shame in that!

Lust- What qualities do you find attractive in male and female characters?
I like characters who are humorous, witty, and who can make me laugh. I also like really strong characters who you can see progress through out the novel/series. I love characters who have really strong and real emotion to them as well. This goes for both male and female characters.

Envy- What books would you most like to receive as a gift? 
Any book! Books are my favorite gifts and I love it when people give me a book to read, even if I'm just borrowing them! :)

I hope you enjoyed this post and anyone can feel free to join in on this book tag!

On a side note- I just finished reading Tilt by Ellen Hopkins. I'm still not sure if I am going to do a review on this book or not. I sometimes find Ellen Hopkins books hard to review for some reason. If anyone reading this wants me to do a review on this book then I will, just comment and let me know.I'm about 300 pages into A Game of Thrones. This book is taking forever to read. I took a break so I could read Tilt, but I hope to finish reading this book by the end of this month. I'm currently reading Venomous by Christopher Krovatin on my Kindle and I'm really enjoying it so far.

Thank you for reading! Find me here on goodreads!