After years of living in the shadows, being glorified as sparkly lovers and dangerous enemies and on TV, vampires have revealed themselves to humans. After a nasty outbreak of vampirism, thanks to a misplaced act of mercy, the world cannot ignore the lore. Infected cities are walled off from the public, called Coldtowns, these places are exquisite prisons for vampires. Humans, enthralled with the beauty and horror of vampires flock to the Coldtowns to offer their sweet red blood for the chance of being turned.
The aliens have unleashed 4 waves of death upon humanity. The first, an electronic pulse to render all machines useless. The second, tsunamis to destroy coastal cities. The third, an avian plague called The Red Death. The fourth, Silencers, a race of humans implanted with alien intelligences as fetuses, an enemy we didn’t see coming. The 5th is upon us. Cassie, a 16 year old surviving on her own is one of the few left alive on earth. Armed with an M-16 and a teddy bear, she searches for her little brother with the hunky and mysterious Evan.
When seventeen-year-old Tana wakes up hungover from a wild party at a remote farmhouse, surrounded by dead classmates, she thinks things can't get any worse...until she discovers a mysterious vampire named Gavriel chained up in the same room as her bitten ex-boyfriend Aiden, who is about to turn into a full-fledged bloodsucker at any moment.
Altered picks up immediately where Crewel left off. Adelice, Jost and Erik are on Earth and searching for a way to get back to Arras to save the ones they left behind and overthrow the Guild. They find themselves in the middle of a rebellion they never knew existed nor truly wanted to join. All three characters have their own motivations and secrets that they are hiding from each other, and very quickly the reader realizes that this will not be a smooth or safe journey.
Soren Bearskin has grown up in a United States colonized by the Vikings rather than the Puritans, a country where trolls hide in the mountains and Norse gods walk the land, where children learn how to sword-fight in school and every year the land is renewed by the god of light, Baldur, as he is resurrected from his winter death. Except this year, Baldur fails to appear. A search is begun, a boon is offered by Odin to whomever can return his missing sun, and Astrid Glyn, the daughter of the most famous seer in New Asgard, convinces Soren that it is their fate to find Baldur. 
This was a very engaging, interesting read. I especially appreciated the unusual point of view; this story was narrated by the disease itself. At first, the narrator was mildly suggestive: eat this, not that; run just a little further. As the anorexia began taking over, it became more and more demanding and controlling until it directed every aspect of 15 year old Mike's life. When he tried to make a decision that did not further the purposes of the disease, the anorexia talked to him, tricked him into believing that another choice was better.
The time is now, but the world is more than a little different. The United States were settled and established by Scandinavians who worshipped the Norse gods--who are very real and very active in the world. And so you get Tessa Gratton's new series, The United States of Asgard, and the first book, The Lost Sun.
I have recently had two very drastically different experiences with audiobooks. The first was Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver, about a popular girl at school who dies in a car crash and relives the last day of her life over and over, trying to fix what she has broken.
Robert is the last man in New York City after a massive epidemic that turned everyone into vampires. By day he sharpens stakes, makes runs to the abandoned grocery stores for dry goods, and maintains his generator and the protections around his house. By night they come. Crowding around the doors and windows they call to him, begging him to come outside. The loneliness is enough to drive a man insane, but to have to listen to them every night is almost too much for Robert.
Everyone has felt the pressure around standardized tests. The thought, real or imagined, that how you perform in this one moment will decide the rest of your life. While we may be lending a dramatic flair to our own examinations, that fear is real for Cia. She has been chosen along with 3 other classmates from the 5 Lakes Colony to participate in The Testing. Every year, the best and brightest high school graduates are brought to Tosu City to undergo a series of exams that will decide who goes on to University.
