Fancy is Wicked in SLICE OF CHERRY by Dia Reeves

Hello! So, a few weeks ago Blogger was doing funny things and ate my post on Divergent by Veronica Roth.  But I've been too lazy  incredibly busy to rewrite it.  So, I'll sum up. You should read it. Divergent crawled inside my head and stayed there for days.  Fans of The Hunger Games will love it.

OK then, onward and upward!

I loved Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves and I was excited about Slice of Cherry.  I'd heard it was darker, bloodier, and even better than Bleeding Violet.  And guess what?  They were right!  These people who say these things: so smart!

It's not a sequel, but Slice of Cherry takes place in Portrero, the same town as Bleeding Violet, and Hanna and Wyatt make a cameo.  Slice of Cherry is about Kit and Fancy, daughters of an incarcerated serial-killer known as the Bone-Saw Killer.  And the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.  The girls can't fight the desire to cut and kill (well, it's not like they try hard).

All Fancy wants is for her and her sister to be together and be allowed to be themselves, even if that means an occasional homicide.  Reeves has this way of combining blood, murder, sex, and a light-hearted playfulness into a book that is difficult to put down but creates this uncomfortable squishy spot inside you.

I'd find myself rooting for Fancy and her murderous desires, only to be disgusted with myself for doing so.  Through their special abilities in the dangerously magical world of Portrero, Kit and Fancy turn murder into a game.  Although it made me squeamish at times, I loved how remorseless Fanny is.  She doesn't apologize for who she is.  Ultimately this is a book about being true to yourself, sticking by your family, and searching for what it means to be "good."

There are some books where you love the world and the characters so much, you want to dive into the book and live the characters' lives.  This is not one of those books.  Reeves does an excellent job of making Portrero and the girls' world feel disturbingly real, but I'm really glad it's not.

If you want to read a book you can feel in your gut, I highly recommend Slice of Cherry.

Hanna is crazy beautiful in BLEEDING VIOLET by Dia Reeves

This book is weird.
Don't get me wrong, I love weird.  Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves is a welcome relief from the swooning damsels, vampires, and werewolves plaguing the paranormal YA world.

Hanna talks to her dad everyday, even though he's been dead a year.  Hanna is bi-polar and has the stash of pharmaceuticals to prove it.  When threatened with hospitalization, Hanna beats her Aunt over the head with a rolling pin and flees to find her long lost mother.

When Hanna shows up on her mom's door step in Portrero, Texas, Rosalee is anything but happy to see her.  Hanna is determined to stay in Rosalee's house and make Portrero her home, no matter how many times Rosalee say she doesn't want her.

They strike a deal.  If Hanna can survive two weeks in Portrero--a town stranger and more dangerous than any of Hanna's hallucinations--then Hanna can stay.

Hanna encounters monsters lurking in the windows of her school, flying leeches on a walk home, and a man possessed by a serial-killing ghost while on a date.  Instead of running and screaming, Hanna decides she needs to hunt down a monster to prove her worth to Rosalee.  Hanna enlists the help of Wyatt, the cute boy sworn to protect the town and who is even freakier than Hanna.

I love Hanna's character in this book.  Her wild mood swings are fun and she's not easily rejected, no matter how many times her mother tells her she doesn't love her.

Hanna narrates the story through her girlish voice and overly simple view of the world.  And that's where it got weird.  These characters curse, have sex, and rip people's arms off, and it's all narrated in this childish tone.

The amount of blood in this book became so surreal that I stopped being concerned each time a character opened a vein.

But that didn't stop this from being a really fun read.  I whipped through the pages.  I enjoyed losing myself in Hanna's warped head and I stopped guessing what would come next.

Bleeding Violet is a great summer read.