In My Mailbox (11)

I love IMM! I love seeing what everyone else got and adding new books to my ever-growing TBR pile. I also love sharing what I found and received with all of you. For all of that, I thank Kristi AKA The Story Siren for bringing IMM to all of us. You rock!!!

Okay, here's what I got in the mail...good week!!

The Strain by Guillermo Del Toro


Here's the description:

The Strain

They have always been here. Vampires. In secret and in darkness. Waiting. Now their time has come.

In one week, Manhattan will be gone. In one month, the country.

In two months—the world.

A Boeing 777 arrives at JFK and is on its way across the tarmac, when it suddenly stops dead. All window shades are pulled down. All lights are out. All communication channels have gone quiet. Crews on the ground are lost for answers, but an alert goes out to the CDC. Dr. Eph Goodweather, head of their Canary project, a rapid-response team that investigates biological threats, gets the call and boards the plane. What he finds makes his blood run cold.

In a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem, a former professor and survivor of the Holocaust named Abraham Setrakian knows something is happening. And he knows the time has come, that a war is brewing . . .

So begins a battle of mammoth proportions as the vampiric virus that has infected New York begins to spill out into the streets. Eph, who is joined by Setrakian and a motley crew of fighters, must now find a way to stop the contagion and save his city—a city that includes his wife and son—before it is too late.

Not YA, but vampires + Del Toro(director of Hellboy and Pan's Labyrinth)=awesome!! Woo Hoo!!

Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev


All her world’s a stage.

Bertie Shakespeare Smith is not an actress, yet she lives in a theater.

She’s not an orphan, but she has no parents.

She knows every part, but she has no lines of her own.

That is, until now.

Enter Stage Right

NATE. Dashing pirate. Will do anything to protect Bertie.

COBWEB, MOTH, MUSTARD SEED, and PEASEBLOSSOM. Four tiny and incredibly annoying fairies. BERTIE’S sidekicks.

ARIEL. Seductive air spirit and Bertie’s weakness. The symbol of impending doom.

BERTIE. Our heroine.

Welcome to the Théâtre Illuminata, where the actors of every play ever written can be found behind the curtain. They were born to play their parts, and are bound to the Théâtre by The Book—an ancient and magical tome of scripts. Bertie is not one of them, but they are her family—and she is about to lose them all and the only home she has ever known.

I was very excited to receive this one. Thanks Lisa!! Can't wait to read it.

Ash by Malinda Lo


Pushed into indentured servitude in her stepmother's household, Ash is consumed with grief after the death of her father and mother. Her only joy comes from the brief, stolen walks she takes in the nearby woods with the dark and dangerous fairy Sidhean. Ash's single, unspoken hope is that someday he might steal her away, as fairies are said to do.

But when she meets Kaisa, the King's Huntress, her heart begins to change. Kaisa teaches Ash to ride and track, and as their friendship grows, Ash's desire for life and for love is reawakened.

Ash is an empowering retelling of Cinderella, in which life and love triumph over death and grief.

This one was a complete surprise when it showed up on my front porch, but it was on my wish list, so I did a little dance of joy. Can't wait to read it!!

Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl



There were no surprises in Gatlin County.
We were pretty much the epicenter of the middle of nowhere.
At least, that's what I thought.
Turns out, I couldn't have been more wrong.
There was a curse.
There was a girl.
And in the end, there was a grave.

Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she's struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.

I did a major happy dance for this one. I was soooo excited to get it. Thanks to Kami for sending me in the right direction. By the way, the cover is beautiful and shiny...woo hoo!

So that's it for the received. Remember last week when I said I wasn't going to buy as many books this week. Well....that didn't work out so well for me, so here's a list of what I bought. This is also a perfect example of my lack of willpower.

The Awakening by Kelley Armstrong
Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr (I had a pb copy, but I wanted a HC, because I love it so much)
Faeries of Dreamdark: BlackBringer by Laini Taylor
Willow by Julia Hoban
Jars of Glass by Brad Barkley & Heather Hepler
Dead is a State of Mind by Marlene Perez
Dead is So Last Year by Marlene Perez
Atherton: The Dark Planet by Patrick Carman
Beige by Cecil Castellucci

See...no willpower. Oh well, I'll do better next week. Maybe.

So what did you guys get?