4.5 STARS | Bad Taste in Boys by Carrie Harris

Title: Bad Taste in Boys
Series: Kate Grable #1
Author: Carrie Harris
Age Group: Young Adult
Genres: Horror, Paranormal, Fantasy, Romance, Urban Fantasy, Humor
Elements: Zombies
Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Format: Hardcover
ISBN-13: 978-0385739689
Published: July 12th, 2011
Source: Library
Rating: ★★★★.5

Someone's been a very bad zombie.

Super-smartie Kate Grable gets to play doctor, helping out her high school football team. Not only will the experience look good on her college apps, she gets to be this close to her quarterback crush, Aaron. Then something disturbing happens. Kate finds out that the coach has given the team steroids. Except...the vials she finds don't exactly contain steroids. Whatever's in them is turning hot gridiron hunks into mindless, flesh-eating...zombies.

Unless she finds an antidote, no one is safe. Not Aaron, not Kate's brother, not her best friend...not even Kate.

In Bad Taste in Boys, Kate Grable is faced with curing a zombie virus outbreak. All it takes is one bite or exposure to any bodily fluids and you're infected. With those more suited to deal with the outbreak unbelieving that an entire school's student body is turning into zombies, the only one who can save the day is Kate, but what could possibly cure a zombie?

(there may be spoilers in this review after this point)

Bad Taste in Boys is such a fun read! Kate is such a funny and awesome heroine. She's really smart, but can also kick zombie butt. And she has so much courage--I don't know what I'd do if zombies were chomping on me.

And what a coincidence that the one person who has the ability to find a cure is epileptic. Who would have thought that the cure to zombie-ism would be epilepsy medication? Seriously, epilepsy medication! Some thing that Kate takes everyday and therefore makes her immune to the virus.

You know how most of the time the guy gets the girl in the end? Well, in Bad Taste in Boys, it's the girl who gets the guy. Kate has had a crush on the hot quarterback of the football team, Aaron. AND he likes her back! I tell you, things just seem to fall in place for Kate--even with flesh-eating zombies running around.

I had so much fun reading this book and I can't wait to see what Kate's next adventure will be.

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Carrie Harris is a geek-of-all-trades and proud of it. Brains are her specialty; she used to work at a lab where they were delivered daily via FedEx. After that, it seemed only natural to write a zombie book. Now she lives in Michigan with her ninja-doctor husband and three zombie-obsessed children.


Disclaimer: This review was originally posted in 2012 to my book blogs, Zodiac Book Reviews and A Bibliophiles Thoughts on Books.

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4 STARS | Drink, Slay, Love by Sarah Beth Durst

Title: Drink, Slay, Love
Author: Sarah Beth Durst
Age Group: Young Adult
Genres: Paranormal, Fantasy, Romance, Urban Fantasy, Humor
Elements: Vampires, Unicorns
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Format: Hardcover
ISBN-13: 978-1442423732
Published: September 13th, 2011
Source: Library
Rating: ★★★★

Pearl is a sixteen-year-old vampire, fond of blood, allergic to sunlight, and mostly evil...until the night a sparkly unicorn stabs her through the heart with his horn. Oops.

Her Family think she was attacked by a vampire hunter (because, obviously, unicorns don't exist) and they're shocked she survived. They're even more shocked when Pearl discovers she can now withstand the sun. But they quickly find a way to make use of her new talent. The vampire king of New England has chosen Pearl's Family to host his feast. If Pearl enrolls in high school, she can make lots of human friends and lure then to the king's feast--as the entrees.

The only problem? Pearl's starting to feel the twinges of a conscience. How can she serve up her new friends--especially the cute guy who makes her fangs ache--to be slaughtered? Then again, she's definitely dead if she lets down her Family. What's a sunlight-loving vampire to do?

Pearl is a vampire who sees humans as only a food source to be tapped then forgotten until she's hungry again. All that changes one night when Pearl takes her dinner out back of the Dairy Hut and ends up being staked by a unicorn instead. Yes, a unicorn. Pearl can't believe it, either. She also didn't expect to still be alive and resistant to the sun.

What's worse is she's having the beginnings of a conscience. When Pearl's parents insist she go to high school to find a food source for the vampire king of New England's Fealty Ceremony, she never thought she'd start caring for the humans. Especially the luminous-eyed Evan and "Miss Perky" Bethany. When you're a vampire and your "food" becomes your "friend," disaster is just after sunset.

Pearl Sange is a sixteen-year-old vampire who likes her blood sweet, so she visits Brad at the Dairy Hut every once in a while for some ice cream and a quick sip. But everything changes when Mr. Sparkly-and-Pointy stakes her with his horn. She's not only still alive, but resistant to the sun. She's awestruck the first time she sees the sun and how it shines and reflects. Though she loves being able to go out in the sun during the day, she absolutely hates the inconvenient feelings she's having as a result of her impalement. As Pearl changes (in many different ways) she's torn between loyalty to her Family and her new friends.

I didn't know what to expect when I first started reading Drink, Slay, Love. I thought the story would be a lot darker than it turned out to be. There are the cruel, evil vampires and their macabre world, but on the other side there's the unicorns and their world of light and love. And Pearl has one foot on each side, straddling both worlds.

The story is a lot more humorous that I expected, too. I love how sarcastic and witty Pearl is, as well as her I'm-not-a-damsel-in-distress, I-can-take-care-of-myself attitude. And let's not forget the rest of the cast of characters. There's the dangerously hot Jadrien, sparkly luminous-eyed Evan, "Miss Perky" Bethany, the bumbling idiots Matt and Zeke, and a whole assortment of other characters that make this book work.

Everything from the unique vampire society and culture, unicorn mythology, literary quotations, and multi-dimensional characters, combine to make a humorous vampire story that's not afraid to show its dark side.

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Sarah Beth Durst is the author of Drink, Slay, Love (coming Sept 2011), Enchanted Ivy, and Ice from Simon & Schuster, as well as Into the Wild and its sequel Out of the Wild from Penguin Young Readers. She has been writing fantasy stories since she was ten years old and holds an English degree from Princeton University, where she spent four years studying English, writing about dragons, and wondering what the campus gargoyles would say if they could talk. Sarah lives in Stony Brook, New York, with her husband and children. For more information, visit her at www.sarahbethdurst.com.


Disclaimer: This review was originally posted in 2012 to my book blogs, Zodiac Book Reviews and A Bibliophiles Thoughts on Books.

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