Friday 22 February 2013

Recalled Blog Tour: Review + Guest Post + Giveaway


Welcome to my stop of the Recalled Blog Tour! I'll be doing a review of the book here, as well as a generous giveaway from the author Cambria Hebert. Most excitingly, Cambria will also be doing a guest post at my stop called "Who would you like to meet"! If you want to follow the rest to the rest of the tour, you can find the tour schedule here. Enjoy!




Recalled by Cambria Hebert (Death Escorts, #1)
Publication date: February 15th, 2013
Genre: New Adult Romance with paranormal, thriller and mystery elementsLove or Death? A simple question really. The choice seems obvious. But. What if you never knew love, what if your life was spent just trying to survive? What if you knew your fate before you were fully grown?

And then you died.

And you were given another chance. A better chance.

This new life depended upon one thing: your job. And so you agreed. You thought it would be simple. You thought it would be cut and dry.

It never is.

And now you are left holding the fate of someone else in the palm of your hand and you have to make the ultimate choice.

Love or Death?


Book Trailer:





Purchase:

AUTHOR BIO
Cambria Hebert
Author. Blogger. Latte Sipper.

Cambria Hebert is an author who wrote her first book at the age of fifteen. It was terrible. But the passion for writing never went away so years later when she opened her laptop and started typing she worked until she wrote a book that she hopes everyone will be as excited about as she is.

Cambria is obsessed with werewolves and is terrified of chickens (they are creepy!)She is an animal lover that would choose coffee over food and her favorite TV show is the Vampire Diaries (Hell-O Damon!)

Author Links:
   -Website: http://cambriahebert.com/

My Review:

Rating: 3 stars

I usually don't review ebooks for tours, I'm really more of the hardcopy kind of girl. But after reading the blurb for this book, I was thoroughly intrigued and immediately signed up for this awesome blog tour. Thank you to Cambria for this e-ARC of the book and to Giselle at Xpresso Blog Tours for organising it.

The idea of Death escorts is very original. What would you do if you were given a second chance to live? Would you use it solely to enjoy the pleasure no matter the cost, or would you choose to help someone you love? This is an interesting concept. When one's own future depended on one way or another, then throw in emotions and love into the mix too, it can be very hard to keep a leve head. That's what exactly Dex, the main guy character, had to deal with. He hasn't lived a previliged life and getting inside his head is very different from any other characters I have ever read about. He isn't one of you normal charming bad boys; he has his faults yet as a reader, I can't hate him. He is a very confusing character and changes his mind a lot. I didn't love him as a charactet either because at times he seemed to be petty and cowardy, but some of this changes throughout the course of the book. 

Piper, the main girl character in comparison, is must more likable and easier to understand. I can relate to her well. However, she is supposed to be bright and inquisitive. I didn't find her bright at all when it comes to finding out truths about Dex. She seems to be stringed along for things without second-guessing whether or not it was a trap. Sometimes I just want to have a good shake at both Dex and her too! 


The writing of this book is alright, but some description can be more detailed and the author could use the creative writing technique "show not tell" more. At a lot of places, there would be quite a bland description or abrupt action. Using more descriptions can smooth those a little. However, I enjoyed the style of this book, and it is one of the dual-perspective books that I thought was quite well done. Both Dex and Piper have their chance to tell the story from there angle (first-person narrative) and it gives insight to their thoughts and intentions. Recalled is a very enjoyable and light read. 


Guest Post by Cambria Hebert

Who would you like to meet?

Do you ever get asked this question: If there was one person you could meet who would it be?
I mean of course there are a lot of people that I think it would be cool to meet but no one that I am like “Oh my gosh!!” To be honest, I don’t get caught up in the whole celebrity thing… I mean, I like celebrities, I read People magazine because I’m nosy and I love to watch TV and movies. But really, aren’t celebs just like you and me? Except for them having a ton more money and cool jobs (course I think my job is pretty cool, too. LOL) So would I freak out if I saw a celebrity on the street? Probably not. I might stare a little (if it was someone like Ian Somerhalder, lol) but then I would move on. If given the chance to talk with someone famous I probably would take the chance but really what would I say? How’s the weather?? Ha ha ha ha.
I’m not into politics and if I met a politician I’d probably ask them why they couldn’t take a cut in their own salary to help out the rest of the struggling Americans… but I am not here to talk about that.
So… I guess that is why I think this question is hard.
But there is one person I really think would be cool to meet. I guess she is kind of a celebrity but that isn’t why I would want to meet her.
The person I would like to meet is Ina Garten AKA the Barefoot Contessa. She has a cooking show on Food Network and she has a million cookbooks.
So why would I want to meet her?
I watch her show, Barefoot Contessa, on TV whenever I can and the show films at her home in East Hampton, NY. It’s a beautiful home with gorgeous gardens and sprawling green grass. Her kitchen is calm and homey and she seems so happy there that it makes me want to sit there with a cup of coffee and watch her cook.
I am they type of person that is kind of high strung – I don’t relax easily at all – and I can honestly say that her show relaxes me. The sound of her voice is always calm she just appears to be a genuinely calm and happy person. She loves to entertain and if forever having people by on the show to cook for and they always show her at the table with her guests and its always casual and relaxed feeling and they are always laughing.
Plus, the food she makes always looks so mouth watering and simple. And who doesn’t like to eat? I do.
So, I guess the real question is why wouldn’t I want to meet her?
In case you aren’t familiar with Ina Garten AKA Barefoot Contessa here is some brief info about her AND following that is a recipe of hers for brownies!!!

Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten) Bio:
In 1978, Ina Garten found herself working in the White House on nuclear energy policy and thinking, “There’s got to be more to life than this!” She saw an ad for a small food store for sale in a place she’d never been: the Hamptons at the end of Long Island. She and her husband drove up to investigate and made the owner an offer on the spot. Two months later she found herself the owner of Barefoot Contessa, a 400-sq. ft. specialty food store.
Twenty years later, Barefoot Contessa grew to a 3,000-square-foot food emporium where twenty cooks and bakers prepared the food. Twenty-five more employees worked in the store helping thousands of customers to choose breads, salads, dinners and baked goods to take home. In 1996, Ina sold the store to her employees. In 2003, the new owners of Barefoot Contessa decided to close their doors and go on to new adventures.

Ina’s recipe for Outrageous Brownies
Ingredients   
                                                                                                                             
  • 1 pound unsalted butter
  • 1 pound plus 12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
  • 6 ounces unsweetened chocolate
  • 6 extra-large eggs
  • 3 tablespoons instant coffee granules
  • 2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
  • 2 1/4 cups sugar
  • 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 tablespoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 3 cups chopped walnuts
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Butter and flour a 12 x 18 x 1-inch baking sheet.
Melt together the butter, 1 pound of chocolate chips, and the unsweetened chocolate in a medium bowl over simmering water. Allow to cool slightly. In a large bowl, stir (do not beat) together the eggs, coffee granules, vanilla, and sugar. Stir the warm chocolate mixture into the egg mixture and allow to cool to room temperature.
In a medium bowl, sift together 1 cup of flour, the baking powder, and salt. Add to the cooled chocolate mixture. Toss the walnuts and 12 ounces of chocolate chips in a medium bowl with 1/4 cup of flour, then add them to the chocolate batter. Pour into the baking sheet.
Bake for 20 minutes, then rap the baking sheet against the oven shelf to force the air to escape from between the pan and the brownie dough. Bake for about 15 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Do not overbake! Allow to cool thoroughly, refrigerate, and cut into 20 large squares.

DELISH!!! So that is who I want to meet. How about you – who would you like to meet??



Last but not least, it's giveaway time! It's open for US followers only, sorry!

4 comments:

  1. Woo hoo! Hi! Thank you for having me here as part of the Recalled tour. I appreciate all the time and effort you put into the post and your review.

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    1. No problem Cambria! Thanks for having me on the tour and for the ARC copy :) The chocolate Brownies recipe looks soooo nice! I will go make some soon!

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  2. Great review and guest post! I love the brownie recipe! <3

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  3. Lovely review! This sounds like a unique paranormal:)Love boys' POV and likable characters:)

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