My Book Haul / Showcase Sunday

This is Books, Biscuits and Tea's Showcase Sunday where I share my lovely book hauls each week. Have a look back at Vicki's link up to see what everyone is up too!

I started to get back into my reading groove this week as I finished Queen of the World by Ben Hennessy - intriguing but realistic fantasy, Spartan Frost by Jennifer Estep - too short but nice to visit the Mythos Academy world again. I also raced through A Cursed Embrace by Cecy Robson - so, soooo good! And makes me doubly excited to be taking part in the blog tour later this month!

A couple of review books this week, two competition wins and a couple of shop purchases came into the flat this week so I was a happy little bunny!

For Review

Mistress of the Sea - Jenny Barden

Publisher: EBury (Published 20th June 2013)

Mistress Cooksley may be a wealthy merchant's daughter, but she blushes at my words and meets my eyes look for look. Yet I cannot hope to court her without fortune, and a dalliance with a pretty maid will not hinder me from my path.  
Captain Drake's endeavour might bring me gold, but I, Will Doonan, will have my revenge. 
The Spaniards captured my brother and have likely tortured and killed him. For God and St George, we'll strike at the dogs and see justice done. 
I thought I'd left Mistress Cooksley behind to gamble everything and follow Drake, and here she is playing the boy at the ends of the world. She's a fool with a heart as brave as any man's. Yet her presence here could be the ruin of us all...

This turned up unexpectedly on Monday but sounds like a nice historical read - it will be nice to read a historical book away from the royal court for a change!

Crown of Midnight (Throne of Glass #2) - Sarah J Maas

Publisher: Bloomsbury (Published August 2013)

Eighteen-year-old Celaena Sardothien is bold, daring and beautiful – the perfect seductress and the greatest assassin her world has ever known. But though she won the King’s contest and became his champion, Celaena has been granted neither her liberty nor the freedom to follow her heart. The slavery of the suffocating salt mines of Endovier that scarred her past is nothing compared to a life bound to her darkest enemy, a king whose rule is so dark and evil it is near impossible to defy. Celaena faces a choice that is tearing her heart to pieces: kill in cold blood for a man she hates, or risk sentencing those she loves to death. Celaena must decide what she will fight for: survival, love or the future of a kingdom. Because an assassin cannot have it all . . . And trying to may just destroy her.

Throne of Glass was a great read last year so when this came up on Netgalley I didn't hesitate to request it and was accepted! So happy!

Won

I won a facebook competition over at Tor UK and a little bundle of alternative books arrived this week!

London Falling - Paul Carnell
Publisher: Tor

Detective Inspector James Quill is about to complete the drugs bust of his career. Then his prize suspect Rob Toshack is murdered in custody. Furious, Quill pursues the investigation, co-opting intelligence analyst Lisa Ross and undercover cops Costain and Sefton. But nothing about Toshack’s murder is normal. Toshack had struck a bargain with a vindictive entity, whose occult powers kept Toshack one step ahead of the law – until his luck ran out. Now, the team must find a 'suspect' who can bend space and time and alter memory itself. And they will kill again. As the group starts to see London’s sinister magic for themselves, they have two choices: panic or use their new abilities. Then they must hunt a terrifying supernatural force the only way they know how: using police methods, equipment and tactics. But they must all learn the rules of this new game - and quickly. More than their lives will depend on it.

Great North Road - Peter Hamilton
Publisher: Pan McMillian

In Newcastle-upon-Tyne, AD 2142, Detective Sidney Hurst attends a brutal murder scene. The victim is one of the wealthy North family clones – but none have been reported missing. And the crime’s most disturbing aspect is how the victim was killed. Twenty years ago, a North clone billionaire and his household were horrifically murdered in exactly the same manner, on the tropical planet of St Libra. But if the murderer is still at large, was Angela Tramelo wrongly convicted? Tough and confident, she never waivered under interrogation – claiming she alone survived an alien attack. But there is no animal life on St Libra. Investigating this alien threat becomes the Human Defence Agency’s top priority. The bio-fuel flowing from St Libra is the lifeblood of Earth’s economy and must be secured. So a vast expedition is mounted via the Newcastle gateway, and teams of engineers, support personnel and xenobiologists are dispatched to the planet. Along with their technical advisor, grudgingly released from prison, Angela Tramelo. But the expedition is cut off, deep within St Libra’s rainforests. Then the murders begin. Someone or something is picking off the team one by one. Angela insists it’s the alien, but her new colleagues aren’t so sure. Maybe she did see an alien, or maybe she has other reasons for being on St Libra ... 

Un Lun Dun - China Mieville
Publisher: Pan McMillian

Tumbling through a secret entrance, Zanna and Deeba emerge in the strange wonderland of UnLondon. Here all the lost and broken things of London end up, and some of its people, too – including Brokkenbroll, boss of the broken umbrellas and Hemi the half-ghost boy. UnLondon is a place where Routemaster buses have legs, where Librarians are ‘bookaneers’, intrepid adventurers dedicated to hunting down lost books, and postmen spend years tracking the mobile addresses of the ever changing Puzzleborough. But the girls have arrived at a dangerous time – UnLondon is under siege by the sinister Smog; it’s a city awaiting its hero.

The String Diaries - Stephen Lloyd Jones
Publisher: Headline

A jumble of entries, written in different hands, different languages, and different times. They tell of a rumour. A shadow. A killer. 
The only interest that Oxford Professor Charles Meredith has in the diaries is as a record of Hungarian folklore ... until he comes face to face with a myth.For Hannah Wilde, the diaries are a survival guide that taught her the three rules she lives by: verify everyone, trust no one, and if in any doubt, run.
But Hannah knows that if her daughter is ever going to be safe, she will have to stop running and face the terror that has hunted her family for five generations.
And nothing in the diaries can prepare her for that.

I won this from the girls over at Book Chick City and it looks so creepy. My copy is an arc which came tied up in string and I think this will float to the top of my TBR pile in short order!

Bought

The Trouble With Fate - Leigh Evans

Publisher: Tor

WHAT SHE DOESN'T KNOW MIGHT KILL HER: Hedi looks normal. Yet that's taken effort. Her fellow Starbucks baristas don't see her pointed ears, fae amulet or her dark past, and normal is hard for a half-fae, half-werewolf on the run. Hedi's life changed ten years ago, when her parents were murdered by unknown assassins. She's been in hiding with her loopy aunt Lou since, as whatever they wanted she's determined they won't get it. Things change when wolves capture Lou, forcing Hedi to steal to free her -- for if she can offer up a fae amulet like her own they may trade. But it belongs to a rogue werewolf named Robson Trowbridge, who betrayed Hedi on the night of her greatest need. Over forty-eight hours, Hedi will face the weres of Creemore, discover the extent of her fae powers and possibly break her own heart in the process...

This has been on my wishlist for ages and this weekend I gave in and just bought a copy. I love the cover - it's so pretty and the new UF series I've tried this year have all been very good.

Copycat Killing (Magical Cats #3) - Sofie Kelly

Publisher: Signet

 Everyone thinks their cats are special—but Owen and Hercules have powers that go far beyond an adorable look or an irresistible purr. Along with their owner, librarian Kathleen Paulson, they have an uncanny instinct for solving crimes...

It's been raining cats and dogs in Mayville Heights. The small town's been deluged, and now the local artists' co-op is on the verge of flooding. Kathleen has been up all night helping her friends move their creations to the safety of the upstairs studio.

The artwork survives, but when controversial mask maker Jaeger Merrill is found drowned in the co-op basement, Kathleen questions whether the death was accidental. After she discovers the artist was using an assumed name, she realizes she can't actually assume anything about him. With the help of handsome detective Marcus Gordon—and her cats' extraordinary powers of detection—it's up to Kathleen to unmask a killer.

I have the first book in this series on my TBR pile and I spotted this third book in a second hand bookshop and thought I would pick it up!

So what have you picked up this week?