Dreaming Anastasia by Joy Preble

Dreaming Anastasia
Joy Preble

Genre: YA Paranormal Fiction
Pages: Paperback, 310 pages
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky

What really happened to Anastasia Romanov?
Anastasia Romanov thought she would never feel more alone than when the gunfire started and her family began to fall around her. Surely the bullets would come for her next. But they didn't. Instead, two gnarled old hands reached for her. When she wakes up she discovers that she is in the ancient hut of the witch Baba Yaga, and that some things are worse than being dead.
In modern-day Chicago, Anne doesn't know much about Russian history. She is more concerned about getting into a good college—until the dreams start. She is somewhere else. She is someone else. And she is sharing a small room with a very old woman. The vivid dreams startle her, but not until a handsome stranger offers to explain them does she realize her life is going to change forever. She is the only one who can save Anastasia. But, Anastasia is having her own dreams…
When I was younger I had a mild obsession with Anastasia and the Romanov’s. Disney helped my parents out when they released their version of the story (and gave me songs to sing and a floppy eared dog to love). History has always been something that fascinates me and I honestly believe it is because there are often so many gaps in history that I am able to make up my own stories to fill in those gaps with. There are many stories out there about what truly happened to Anastasia when her family was murdered and I don’t know if I truly believe that she died with the family myself.

Joy Preble has given us another great play on what happened to Anastasia with her debut novel. Weaving in the supernatural with history makes the reader question what we really know about the Romanov family like only a few authors have done (Dan Brown made many question their beliefs with The Da Vinci Code, remember?). Baba Yaga still creeps me out and she was so well written in this story that she has a whole new face in my head now... and it might not even be such a bad one now! Preble has done an amazing job with recreating this story and Anne’s links to Anastasia and her involvement in saving her are uncanny. I loved every second of this book and was lucky enough to meet Joy at NCTE this year and scored the sequel Haunted which I am reading now. Don’t you just love it when you don’t have to wait on a sequel?! Keep on the lookout for Haunted in February!

Visit Joy HERE and follow her on twitter (@joypreble) for more info on her and her upcoming novels!

The Hollow by Jessica Verday

Genre: YA Paranormal Romance

Age Level: 7^th grade and up

Hardback: 544 pages

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Other Info: This is author Jessica Verday’s debut novel and is the first in a trilogy of novels featuring Abbey and Caspian and the haunting intertwining of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

There is so much to say about this amazing novel that I don’t know where to start!! Abbey is a typical teenager except for the fact that her best friend, Kristen, recently vanished from the bridge near the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery and everyone thinks that she is dead. Abbey doesn’t want to believe them because they haven’t found Kristen’s body. While seeming to fool everyone into believing that she is indeed mourning the death of her best friend, Abbey meets a series of people who begin to play more important roles in her life as she spends more and more time in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Caspian, a gorgeous and mysterious boy, shows up seemingly out of nowhere at Kristen’s funeral and continues to show up and allows Abbey to explore emotions and feelings that she finds both exciting and frightening. While her relationship with Caspian blooms Abbey discovers that her best friend had been keeping major secrets from her, ones that could have changed both of their lives forever. Abbey feels betrayed by Kristen’s secrets and turns to Caspian who clearly has secrets that he is not willing to share with Abbey. She begins to feel that maybe she can come to some sort of understanding she discovers something that could easily break her façade and presents a major test when it comes to her love for Caspian and even her own well being. Abbey has to decide whether her new found love or her well being are more important in the grand scheme of things and realizes that her decision could change her life in more ways than one.

Seriously… I cannot wait for you all to get your hands on this book!! It is amazing and will have you hooked from the very beginning. I love it when an author reels you in and you become completely invested in a book so much so that you don’t realize that you are 400 pages into a book and dreading it coming to an end. I also love that it is going to be a trilogy because there were so many little things that were touched on in this novel that have me still reeling and wondering but I am going to have to wait to find out the answers until later. AHHH! That drives me nuts and makes me want to harass Jessica Verday (but I promise I won’t)!! I love, also, that she WROTE this entire book in notebooks originally… most of us are so stuck in the technology world that we forget the magic of pen and paper. Oh and another thing I love is that she is bringing back one of my favorite legends and putting a new spin on it! I am dying for the next book and hope that I get it early too!! I may have to get on my knees and beg… and believe me, with this book, I am NOT past that!!

The Hollow hits a bookshelf near you on September 1, 2009! Mark your calendars and GO GET IT!!! While you are waiting you can go to Jessica’s site and check out all the cool things she has going on and even read Chapter 1 of The Hollow!!

Happy reading all!!

(originally posted 8/5/2009)