EyeLeash by Jess C. Scott

Jade Ashton is a sassy virgin. In her private blog, she vents about "fitting in" a world where superficiality reigns supreme. Suddenly all logic flies out the window when she meets Novan: the former geek, who's morphed into a delicious songwriter-musician. They decide to be "friends-with-benefits". But it's Novan, with his poems and riddling passages on his own blog--which *isn't private*--that backs out. EyeLeash captures self-discovery in the 2000s, and showcases the colorful, intricate drama in two youths' relentless search for themselves--and what's really in their hearts.

My thoughts: I really enjoyed this book. I haven’t read a blog style book before, so that was interesting.

I could totally relate to Jade and I could really understand her dilemma about Novan, I loved the on-off nature of their almost relationship. Jade blogs a lot of her private thoughts and she also blogs MSN conversations and copies down Novan's blog posts too. In fact, when it comes to Novan I'd say her behaviour is verging on stalkerish.

My one negative comment is that there was a huge amount of sex talk in this book. I mean Jade totally obsessed over it, which I guess is the whole point of the novel. I could just about put up with her blog posts about masturbation (would someone seriously blog about that, even in private?), but the thing that I really didn’t get was the talk of orgies and stuff. Where does this girl live? It sounds like a pretty perverted town lol.

Overall, this was a fun read. Like I said, there is a LOT of sex talk, but no 'actual' sex (unless you count masturbation...), but it is a little bit awkward to read about in places. However, if you can get past that, then it's a fun and cute love story.

I read this book online for free at completelynovel.com which is an awesome website that I just found out about yesterday.

Hamlet by William Shakespeare

 The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, or more simply Hamlet, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601. The play, set in Denmark, recounts how Prince Hamlet exacts revenge on his uncle Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet's father, the King, and then taken the throne and married Gertrude, Hamlet's mother. The play vividly charts the course of real and feigned madness—from overwhelming grief to seething rage—and explores themes of treachery, revenge, incest, and moral corruption.

My thoughts: This was the first time that I've read Hamlet, I've heard it quoted so many times and I thought it was about time I read it.

Hamlet's mother is married to her dead husband's brother. And after seeing his father's ghost Hamlet decides to take revenge on his uncle/step-dad who apparently murdered his father. It's a kind of crazy story with lots of death, and there were some places where I didn't really understand what was going on, but I still got the overall jist of the story.

I enjoyed reading this but when reading a play as a book I find it a bit hard to keep track of the characters and the settings, I think I would like to see it performed so that I can really get a feel for the story.

DEAD(ish) by Naomi Kramer

Synopsis: Linda’s had a bad day. First her boyfriend killed her. Then she woke up, still on this boring plane of existence, and with an odd obsession about her missing body. Mike won’t tell her what he did with her body, and she can’t find the stupid thing herself. There’s only one thing she can do - torment the b*****d until he coughs up the information.

My thoughts: This was a quick story to read. The point-of-view jumps between the different characters, which can be confusing in places.

The story is quite shallow, we don't really learn much about the characters, only about their relationships with each other.

This book made me laugh, but to be honest, it's a bit silly (in a good way).

Illusion by Edmond Cheng

Synopsis from back cover: A haunting, a vision, a nasty headache, and a murder… What’s next? Illusion will distort and re-shape your view.

My thoughts: The first chapter begins with us seeing an unknown couple dumping an unconscious man into the sea.

In the second chapter we meet Thomas, and his wife Karen. Everything seems quite normal at this stage in the story. As yet, it is unclear how the first chapter will relate to the rest of the story. But after Thomas is paid a visit by his old friend’s mother, Wai Ha, things start to get weird for Thomas. When he gets home he finds out that Wai Ha has been dead for weeks, and there is no way that it was her that visited him.

Thomas begins to try and solve the mystery of Wai Ha’s visit. Did he imagine it? Is someone playing tricks on him? He doesn’t know. He starts having more visions, and the story takes lots of twists and turns. Thomas finds himself in the frame for murder and his wife is kidnapped. He gets some unexpected help from a mystery man, but is he an illusion too?

I really enjoyed this story. I couldn’t stop reading it! The twists and turns in the plot kept me guessing to the end. Every time I thought I knew what was going to happen, something unexpected would happen instead. Even on the last page there was still one last mystery.

The Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker

Synopsis: At last he had solved the puzzle of Lemarchand's box. He was standing on the threshold of a world of heightened sensations. In moments the Cenobites - who had dedicated an eternity to the pursuit of sensuality - would be here. They would reveal dark secrets that would transform him forever.
A story of the human heart and all the great terrors and ecstasies within.

My Thoughts: This book was the inspiration for the film 'Hellraiser', so if you've seen the film this book would make an interesting read. I read this as an ebook and I finished it very quickly as it was very fast paced. There is a lot of action and quite a few gory scenes in the story. But because the book is short I didn't get to learn much about the characters, which meant that I didn't really care whether they lived or died.
As the story neared its end I guessed what was going to happen, which was a shame because I like surprises. Other than the ending, the plot of the story is very imaginative, I just wish there had been a bit more background about the Cenobites and their world.
This is the second Clive Barker book I've read and personally I much preferred Coldheart Canyon to this.