Bleeding Violet

By: Dia Reeves
http://www.diareeves.com/

Love can be a dangerous thing….

Hanna simply wants to be loved. With a head plagued by hallucinations, a medicine cabinet full of pills, and a closet stuffed with frilly, violet dresses, Hanna’s tired of being the outcast, the weird girl, the freak. So she runs away to Portero, Texas in search of a new home.

But Portero is a stranger town than Hanna expects. As she tries to make a place for herself, she discovers dark secrets that would terrify any normal soul. Good thing for Hanna, she’s far from normal. As this crazy girl meets an even crazier town, only two things are certain: Anything can happen and no one is safe.
(from diareeves.com)

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This was an interesting read for me- I didn't love it, but I also didn't hate it. I hate to give a bad review, beacuse there was alot about this book that I really liked and I really loved some of the charecters, but overall I was kind of left just feeling so-so about it. I loved how imagination and reality swirled together, but at some points I was even confused about what was real and what wasn't, especially since you know that Hanna has suffered from halluciantions in the past. I also really loved Wyatt, who is an initiate in the Mortmaine, aka the protectors of Portero. I thought he was a great charecter, trying to figure out how to do his duty to the town and still retain his own idividuality.

One thing that I will admit that really irked me was that alot of the charecters randomly slipped in and out of accents. Saying things like "You gone go get that"- it struck me as less of a regional accent and more like an uneducated accent, which I don't think was the point. Everytime I got to a sentance like that I kind of got a sour taste in my mouth. I would have prefered that if she were going to pull dialect like that out that is be consistant through the entire book and not rendomly dispersed throughout. I thought that the characters and premis were great, but that I needed more on alot of fronts. More info as to why Portero was the way it was, why Hanna's mother was the way she was, and especially how much of what we get through Hanna's point of view was the reality of living in Portero and how much was her own mental illness.

Overall, I'd call this a decent book, I don't regret I read it, it was a fun, quick, easy read, but I'm not sure I would go pick it up again.

The Alchemist

By: Paulo Coelho
http://www.paulocoelho.com/engl/

This story, dazzling in its simplicity and wisdom, is about an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of treasure buried in the Pyramids. Along the way he meets a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an Alchemist, all of whom point Santiago in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago will be able to surmount the obstacles along the way But what starts out as a journey to find worldly goods turns into a meditation on the treasures found within. Lush, evocative, and deeply humane, the story of Santiago is art eternal testament to the transforming power of our dreams and the importance of listening to our hearts. (from Goodreads.com)
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When you want something, the whole Universe conspires to help you realize your dream.

Santiago, the hero of the novel, already forms part of a select gallery of illustrious characters and leads us through his story to experience a remarkable adventure.

“When I wrote The Alchemist, I was trying to understand the reason for the existence of life. Instead of writing a philosophical treatise, I decided to converse with the child inside my soul.

To my surprise, this child was living inside millions of people around the world. With this book I wanted to share with my readers the questions which, precisely because they don't have an answer, make life a great adventure”. - Paulo Coelho (from Paulocoelho.com)
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I loved this book and I can't believe I didn't pick it up sooner. This is one of those great coming of age, personal journal, hero quest kind of books that kind of sucks you in and leaves you wishing you had a quest to go on too. Really enjoyed the main charecter, Santiago, and the way he chooses to follow a dream (literally) in the hopes of finding a treasure. I loved the message that you can succeed at being anything, so long as you are willing to work at it and even when things do not seem to be going your way, they may be working to get you to that end goal, to that destiny. There are religious tones to the story, but it's done in a way that makes you want to believe that there is something bigger out there and not in "preachy" manner. Coelho really takes you on the journey with Santiago and you want him to succeed in finding his treasure.

I think anyone who hasn't read this book should go grab it. It's well worth the read and has a great message.

Far From You

By Lisa Schroeder
http://www.lisaschroederbooks.com/

Lost and alone...down the rabbit hole.

Alice thought she knew
what solitude was:
Her mother—gone.
Her father—remarried with a newborn
daughter.
Now
trapped
in the icy embrace
of a deadly snowstorm
Alice faces the true meaning of loneliness.
But hope
may not be as far away
as she thinks.
(from Lisaschroederbooks.com)

This is yet another great book by Lisa Schroeder- sticking to the same format (prose) as her other two books, Far From You again deals with a young girl coping with death and finding her way in the world after a loss. In this book our main character is Alice, who has lost her mother to cancer, and who is now dealing with her father's remarraige and newborn daughter. A crisis throws Alice together with her "evil-stepmother" and they must learn to communicate and trust eachother in order to survive. This book also has a romantic storyline, with Alice's boyfriend a constant presence, but it isn't the focus here. This is a book about family and how you have to stick together even when things are bad.

Like Schroeder's other books, I loved Far From You, it deals with death with grace and shows you how to learn to move forward and love the people who become your new family, while never forgetting the ones who have gone.