My June Reads

Okay as you can see i have a serious reading slump. I can't even say what happened. Not that all the books were bad but I kind of have to force myself to read at the moment. Bummer. I loved some of these books but still they didn't save me from this. I don't even want to think about next month and my exams. O_o
But I will stop to complain now and here is my short June Read list:

1. Edge of Moonlight (Lucani Lovers, #3) by Stephanie Julian 

This book was wonderful. A thrilling plot with a spicy romance. Kaine and John are my favorite couple in this series now but I'm open to change my mind when the next book comes out. Highly recommended read. (You can read my full review here) 
 

2. Magic on the Storm (Allie Beckstrom, #4) by Devon Monk 

This one started exactly the way I wanted it. I loved to see Alli and Zay interact but it kind of got all UF on me. I know this series is urban fantasy but man I didn't like the end at all. In the middle I wasn't really gripped by the action and the plot. Perhaps it is cuz of my reading slump.  Still want book 5 really bad though.
 

3. Shades of Midnight (Midnight Breed, #7) by Lara Adrian 

I had this book at home since January but never found the time to start it. When I got the news of meeting Lara I knew I had to read the book before so I finally started it. I enjoyed the book. I really like the hero and the heroine but something was missing. Perhaps I compared it too much to Rio's book. I still really like this series and I can't wait for the next one.
 

4. Exit Light by Megan Hart

I so adore this book. It again broke my heart but I loved every second of it. A wonderful book about dreams, reality and how to see the difference, if there is one in this world. I can't wait to get my hands on the sequel. (You can read my whole rave here)
 

5. Reason Enough by Megan Hart 

To buy this book was a huge fiasco. I bought it at booksamillion (don't ask me why- probably cuz there were like 3 stores listed on Megan Harts blog and I just clicked on one). BIG mistake. It took them over 48 hours to get the book to me. In that time I already bought it a second time somewhere else. Huge FAIL. 

But the book was worth the hassel. It's a sequel to Dirty and I enjoyed to see Dan and Elle again. It was wonderful to see them together and how life treated them. Wonderful. And you know how much I usually love novellas. *LOVES* 
 

6. White Wedding by Megan Hart 4

I bought this one ages ago and discovered it while I wanted a Megan Hart fix and didn't get Reason enough. I enjoyed Josie's and Jack's story. Sweet, hot and entertaining. The overall plot was a bit predictable but enjoyed the book nonetheless.
 

7. Damned and Desired by Kathy Kulig (DNF)

I really tried to like this book but I just couldn't read more than the first half. It had too much smex and not enough story for me. I felt lost between all the characters and the world in general was kind of weird, too. Perhaps I will try again later cuz I read in another review that second half is really good but this month I just couldn't take any more.

So that's what I read. What did you read in June? Any books I should check out to get my reading mojo back?

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And the winners are...

What a day I had. Stress I tell you. I had to finish a project for today and I did that till 1 AM this morning. I read a bit than to cool down and had to get up again at 5:30 AM this morning. I gave the Professor my project and got the last one back (I passed *yay*). I also had an awful test today. That one went so wrong. I hope the Prof is nice and I will pass it nonetheless. But luckily is over and I finally found a minute to make someone, or better said 2 someones happy.

The lucky Winner of a signed copy of Gezeichnete des Schicksals by Lara Adrian is....

~*~*~drumroll~*~*~

Ina

And our international winner of a bunch of Midnight Breed swag is....

~*~*~drumroll~*~*~

Patti

Congrats ladies. I will Email you now to get your mailing addy.

Hope everyone else is as happy as me that it is nearly Friday.

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Sharing the Lara Adrian Love Giveaway

Okay so now you all know how great my day with Lara Adrian was (if not look here).I thoiught perhaps I should give a bit of the love back to you. I have a few things I will giveaway. I will split this giveaway in 2 parts: a German and one for everyone else.

Für Deutschsprachige:

Ich hab ein signiertes Exemplar von Gezeichnete des Schicksals von Lara Adrian für einen glücklichen Gewinner. Es ist Buch 7 in Lara's Midnight Breed Serie.

Hier um was es in dem Buch geht:
Eine übermenschliche Kreatur richtet in der Wildnis von Alaska ein grauenhaftes Blutbad an. Bei der Pilotin Alexandra, die die Toten findet, ruft die Tat schreckliche Erinnerungen an ihre Kindheit wach. Bei der Untersuchung der Morde trifft sie auf den geheimnisvollen Vampirkrieger Kade, der eine ungeahnte Leidenschaft in ihr weckt. Gemeinsam machen sie sich auf die Suche nach dem Mörder. Doch um zu überleben, müssen sich beide den Geistern ihrer Vergangenheit stellen ...

"Erotisch und hochspannend … von Lara Adrians Vampiren kann man nicht genug bekommen." Romance Junkies

"Tauchen Sie ein in Lara Adrians Welt und lassen Sie sich verzaubern!" J. R. Ward

Um an der Verlosung teilzunehmen musst du einfach dieses Online Formular ausfüllen.

Ende der Verlosung ist Donnerstag, der 1. Juli den Gewinner werde ich am Freitag darauf bekannt geben.

For the Rest:
Unfortunately I don't have another signed book to spare so I will give you the chance to win a bunch of swag. I have Midnight Breed bookmarks, postcards and some other goodies. *mysterious smile*
Just a small price but I wanted to share the love.

Just leave a comment on this post to get entered for the swag!

For each meaningful comment on the round-up post you will get an extra entry.

Both Giveaways end on Wednesday, July 1st and I will announce the winner on Friday.

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How I met your moth...ahem...Lara Adrian

Okay so here I am now trying to think of how to start. *ponders* Perhaps the beginning would be best?
I was born 25 years...sorry just kidding. Man I need more coffee. LOL

So on Monday was the BIG day for me. I was so nervous on Sunday and I tell you sleep was  nothing that came easily to me. I lay awake in bed with BF and we told us "important" things about vuvuzelas just so I could pretend that I'm not unable to sleep cuz of meeting an author the next day. But after hours of senseless discussions I found a bit of sleep that night but I was wide awake at 7AM or perhaps a bit earlier. I tried to be cool and took everything real slow but all in all I was late when I had to leave the apartment just to be too early at the train station. Don't ask me how that works but it does with me- go figure. I met another of the lucky winners there and together we took the 2 hour long train ride to Berlin.

We planned to read and listen to music the whole time but in real we sat there and talked about books and books and surprisingly more books. It was so good to finally find someone who shares my love for these novels in real life and luckily our humor fit so no one started to cry.

After the 2 hour book talk we finally arrived in Berlin and met with the third girl in our small fangirl group. We all clicked really fast and I'm so happy I met these 2 girls on twitter. We tried to find the meeting point for the boat trip and started walking. You could see and hear the group we were looking for really fast and everyone was really nice from the start. We got a pretty bag full of goodies with an audiobook(I got Jäger der Nacht (Visions of Heat) by Nalini Singh), the new book Gezeichnete des Schicksals (Shades of Midnight), a pen and the LoveLetter Magazine.

First thing we did was a group picture with Lara Adrian and all the winners from the audible.de giveaway. So that was my fist contact with an author and she knew who i was. *fangirl scream* I said:" Hi, I'm Susi. Nice to meet you." and she asked "Susi_Sunshine from twitter?" Isn't that awesome? I think I love Lara just for that alone. LOL So the photographer (later referred to as the Stalker) made a  million more pictures and the first hors d'oeuvre were served. We made a big picture of all the 20 winners and the team who organized it and directly went to our small little boat to start our 2,5 hours trip on the Spree.

We had a, lets call it enthusiastic tour guide and we could ask Lara everything we want. So as you can imagine that went rather slow at the beginning. Everyone was a bit awed and not many dared to do it. I think most of them didn''t speak much English which made the whole thing more complicated for them. But we tried to ask as much as we could think of. Although you couldn't ask much about the story cuz not many read the new book already cuz it was released in Germany on Monday and went directly to place 3 on the Spiegel Bestseller list. *woot* Congrats for that Lara!!!

Lara's husband John was there too and he was such a sweetheart. He asked which hero we liked most and he nearly made no mistake with naming them all. *g*
Okay here a few things I learned on the boat trip:

- Lara told us that she will write a total of 10 books in the Midnight Breed series and it will end with a big change in her world. After that she plans to write some spin-off books set in this "new" world and her old characters might get a reappearance in those.

- I thought it was really interesting to find out what a plotter Lara is. She spends most of her time plotting the whole book through- she knows what will happen in each chapter and when she is finished with that she starts to write like a maniac. Sometimes more than 16 hours a day. O_o My hands would fall of.

- Lara Adrian is not her real name but Tina St. John isn't either.

- Lara is half German and the last time she was in Berlin she was 7 years old.

- She's been happily married to John for 24 years now and says it feel more like 1 year.

- John helps her plot her books from time to time and there are times when they talk about it at the breakfast table.

So we had a nice chat, drank coffee, tried to ignore the Stalker snapping pictures the whole time and listened to what Lara had to say.

Surely the time was over fast and we drove to the next part of the day- BBQ on a roof-deck of audible.de. That was so awesome. We were welcomed with a bit of sparkling wine and yummy food and got the time to chat a bit more. We also took a tour through the building and it was so interesting to see how they make the audio-books. Fascinating how much work that is and to hear how many ppl are actually involved in this process. I also saw a German actor, Helmut Kraus, who you won't know but everyone here does. He was recording an audio-book at the moment and I was thrilled to see him. He's the neighbor of Peter Lustig in a German tv show for kids and it was a childhood dream come true, kind of. LOL

So after everyone was done with eating Irina von Bentheim, the German voice of Carrie Bradshaw, started a short Q&A with Lara and Simon Jäger who's reading her books in the German Audiobooks. He's also the voice of Josh Hartnett and Heath Ledger. *swoon* I have to say he is rather funny and I had to laugh out loud more than ones. Especially when he was asked how it is to read the more erotic parts of Lara's books. And I swear you could see a small blush. I thought that Mrs. von Bentheim wasn't the best choice to translate what Lara said but luckily I understood everything in English and  I didn't need her translations.

Around 8 PM we started to go to the Quatsch Comedy Club where the actual reading took place. We all took a  seat in this nice little theatre and listened to Lara and Simon reading from Shades of Midnight. Lara's voice was a bit strained but I loved every second of it. Simon is soooo good I tell you. I think I need the German audiobooks just to listen to his voice. Very HOT!! We had to leave relative quick after to get the last train but I will never forget this day.

I wanted to thank audible.de, Egmont-Lyx, LoveLetter Magazin and LovelyBooks who made this day possible. You are the bestest ever.

And tomorrow I will have a small surprise I brought home from the signing so stay tuned. =)

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Wahooooooooo I won!!!

Okay not sure if I told everyone already but  I won something wonderful this week. The fantastic Lara Adrian will be in Germany next week and I was one of lucky gals who won a Fan Ticket to meet her before her signing in Berlin on Monday.

Woot woot woot!

*jumps through the room and screams like a crazy*

Okay cooling down now. We will meet with everyone at 1PM on Monday and make a boat trip on the Spree and after that there will be a BBQ before the actual signing. All with LARA ADRIAN! I'm so thrilled and can't say often enough how happy I am about this.

BUT I already imagined all the ways I can embarrass myself and I really hope I won't. Reading and writing in English is something totally different. What if I always pronounced the words wrong in my head and no one understands me. I hope I won't sound like a complete dork. And me being shy and all I'm also so grateful that I found a girl on twitter who will go to the event with me. She lives here too and we will share a train ticket and hopefully sooth the nerves of each other. I will make a full report about everything here or perhaps not if I died of embarrassment. LOL

In other news I just came back from the wedding of my baby cousin. She now is officially married and it was a wonderful ceremony. The weather was gorgeous and the party was perfect. We had so much fun. The only thing my gran didn't find good was me failing in catching the bridal bouquet. The brides sister caught it and the groan my aunt and uncle made was deafening. LOL These 2 girls will ruin them financially.

I also set a new record: I killed my shoes after 45 minutes but luckily I had "dancing shoes" in our bag so could wear something on my feet. And yep the sole is broken and I nearly lost it while leaving the city hall after the ceremony.

Book and blogging-wise this week was a complete fail. Didn't read much and didn't blog much either.

How was your week? Any great news you can share with us?

Hope you all have a great weekend.

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