Life Eternal

Aargh!!!!!!!<br />A Cliffhanger!!!!!!!<br />It ended with a cliffhanger!<br /><br />If you can't remember book 1 (Dead Beautiful), please read it before you start this.<br /><br />This book started off weak.<br />It was spooky at first, soon turned to boring but the story picked up soon enough and it engaged us into the suspense, mystery and romance.<br />It left me with goosebumps throughout till the very end.<br />This is indeed a very beautiful story.<br /><br /><i> "Just one kiss will take your breath away.." - Dead Beautiful </i><br /><br />Renée Winters is a Monitor* and she has changed.<br />Everyone is speculating her as the "immortal". <br />In Dead Beautiful, she died last May, and was brought back to life by the kiss of her Undead* soul mate, Dante Berlin. No one knows the secret except them.<br /><i>*Monitor - a person who can sense the Undead and put them to "rest".<br />*Undead - a person who'd died before the age of twenty-one without a burial or cremation, and had thus reanimated. (In other words, <b>zombified</b>). Doom to wander the earth in search of the person his soul had been reincarnated into, and take it back through a kiss before their bodies decay. </i><br /><br />What sucks? They are soul-mates and the star-crossed lovers are finding ways to be together again before Dante run out of time.<br /><br />After the death of a teacher at Gottfried Academy. Renée is sent to Montreal to attend a school for the Monitors.<br />If being apart from Dante isn't enough, she is now sent away from Dante with no means of telling him so.<br /> <br />Sent to a foreign place, separated from family and friends, Renée has to start afresh and try to find a solution to being with Dante.<br /><br />Renée is now caught in dreams/visions triggered by some subjects or places.<br />It seems to be a solution for her situation.<br />A mystery about Les Neuf Soeurs, or the Nine Sisters.<br />About <i> IMMORTALITY.</i> <br /><br />There weren't much scenes of Dante with Renée but it never fails to give us a heart stopping/fluttering feeling even if it is just a secret message left by Dante to Renée.<br />Dante has a mission of his own. Trying to find the solution as well.<br />All Dante want is to be with Renée, keep her safe and her to trust him. <br /><br />In the new school, Renée met Anya and Noah.<br />A very unique friendship between Anya and Renée.<br />And an uneasy, confusing yet sweet friendship with Noah.<br />Together, they tried to help Renée to uncover the mystery.<br /><br />Mystery, confusion, loneliness, doubts, feeling of betrayal, love.<br />This book really does weird things to me.<br />It pulled me in, creeped me out, left me breathless and broke my heart.<br /><br /><i> "I don't believe you." I breathed.<br />Dante blinked, his chest collapsing as if there were nothing left inside him."</i><br /><b>THAT</b> stopped my heart. I thought it had collapsed too.<br /> <br />The ending killed me. <br />This is just simply amazing.<br />I am really looking forward to book 3 and I hope to read about Noah and Anya again.<br />Please. I really like Noah and I don't mean it to break up Dante and Renée.<br />No. It is purely platonic.

<i>I don’t want to be with someone who completes my soul; I want someone who will open it. I want to be able to choose.</i><br /><br />This book was a pleasant surprise. I enjoyed the first book in the series enough, but felt it was simplistic overall. Everything in the first book felt...lacking in complexity; things were smooth, almost too smooth. She had pretty much one love interest, spent time daydreaming about Dante, her ONE TWOO WUV, she had good friends, and the Monitors were fairly antagonistic but by means was her life difficult.<br /><br />It's not that I like things challenging for my main characters. I want to like my main characters; I don't want the queen bitch in the school making life a miserable, living hell for them every minute of every second of every day, but I'd like my protagonist to face a little bit of a challenge. It gives them character, it builds up their personality, their strength, and in this book, we see Renée grow a backbone. She stops swooning over the perfect Dante, she realizes that it's ok to be attracted to someone else, she feels guilt, she learns to defend herself against attacks from the odious Clementine.<br /><br />Renée even learns to question Dante. She does not blindly accept that because she loves him, that he can do no wrong, that he may be someone different than whom she had believed him to be. She is not so blind to love that she does not see his faults or question his actions when things doesn't feel right. In the first book, she is blindly infatuated with Dante, in this one, she learns that love doesn't mean you need to blindly trust someone. Good for her.<br /><br />I felt the mystery was well done here, too. The new Canadian setting is interesting, as was the flashbacks that gave us more insight into the background of the Monitors and the history of the schools. I wish that there were more details about the classes at the new school, and I wish that things weren't left on a cliffhanger at the end of the book. (It would also have been nice to get a nice confrontation with Clementine, too, but if wishes were horses, I'd have a ranch).

Ok not a great book to read super late at night, in a silent house, when you have a strange amount in common with the main character, and the entire time you are expecting some undead to crawl out of your closet and suck your soul out of your mouth. All things said read this book in the DAYLIGHT with alive humans around. At least that is what I reccommend because in doing that first part I may just not sleep all that well tonight. But to the actual review part. This book like the first started out slow but once more information started to flow and you were able to start piecing parts of the mystery yourself, I personally could not put this down. I love this book because it combines historical myths with present-day settings but not in an overdone way as a lot of myths these days have just been exploited to death. I like to see an author keep with what is mainstream but make it in her own way. I loved Life Eternal because Renée does not react in the classical way a heroine usually does by tripping her way stupidly through a novel somehow not getting herself killed along the way. No this author gives Renée some brains and the emotions of what a person would actually be experiencing if their life were to play out like Renée's does. Life Eternal may be spooky as all get out but it is a great modern book, with heart-pounding cliffhanger ending that will make you want to go find this author and beg her to write the third book. Which she better or I'll do it myself because a story like this cannot simply end this way.

Ok so I've literally just finished reading the second installement of the Dead Beautiful books... my opinion? I was extremely sad to put it down... I didn't even know if they would continue the story so after the last page I was like... HUH! NOOOOO! I demanded more in my head! <br />Yvonne Woon rocks! Her descriptions again left me in awe... EVERYTHING in this book screamed out epic to me. I found myself being drawn into her world yet again. The story continues to spin in my head. Renee and Dante are awesome characters and I REALLY want a movie! Come on!! I often thought to myself that one of the new characters would have an evil side. I turned the page slowly, my eyes worried with how disheartened I would feel. I especially liked Noah's character but thought he would have something to hide, I am so glad he was a genuinely nice guy. I felt so sorry for Renee... she came across so many hurdles but never gave up!<br />I just want to say to all the cynical people out there, it's a made up story, get over it! I haven't in all my life read a book that stayed with me as long as these have, except the Twilight novels. Who else found flaws with the characters? I did... Renee had flaws... her temperament for one. I honestly don't care what bad reviews this gets, I found it incredible and can't wait for the third novel, the conclusion to their hard work! It's something to look forward to. I would recommend this series to those who love this sort of thing... I adore it! And it will continue to live in my heart forever!

SEEEEEEQQQQUUUUUEELLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I loved Dead Beautiful!!!! It was one of my favorites from last year! I CANNOT WAIT!!!

<blockquote> <i>Last year Renee's life turned upside down.<br />First her parents were killed and she was the one to find them. Then her estranged grandfather came back into her life and moved her all across country to a boarding school she never even heard of. There's where she found out that there are undead children roaming the earth, trying to find their lost souls that now belong to another person and the only ones that can kill them, are montiors. Monitors of which Renee is one of.<br />And when she thought that her life couldn't become more twisted, she found out that her boyfriend is one of the Undead and that his soul is inside her now.<br />After all that, she sacrificed herself to save Dante's life only for him to transfere their soul back to her, with the result that now both of them are alife but neither of them is really human and they're both connected in a strange way.<br /><br />So when Renee finds out that there is a secret that will help Dante become immortal forever, she is determined to find it at all costs.</i> </blockquote><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />The second books begins with a few months passing since the last book has left off. It doesn't pick of straight away and it takes it's time to explain some of the events that followed after Berlin gave Renee her soul back, mainly that the Academy thought that Dante killed the Head Mistress and Gideon and now is in hiding.<br />Renee herself only states that there are a few changes in her appearance and that she has trouble sleeping.<br />Later we find out that miss LaBarge has been killed and that the Academy will be closed now to all students except the Undead, so Renee will have to attened another Boarding School in Canada that is just for monitors. There's where she finds out about the nine sisters and their secret of eternal life.<br /><br /><br /><br />I felt a disconnection from this book with the first one. The characters that were important to Renee in the first book, got left behind and swapped with new ones and it was if they never even existed to begin with. The main characteristics of the first book were there but the characters were completely different.<br />This just didn't really feel like a continuation of the story from the first book for me.

<a target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow" href="http://themoonlitbookshelf.blogspot.de/2013/06/review-life-eternal-by-yvonne-woon.html">http://themoonlitbookshelf.blogspot.d...</a><br /><br />Renée's and Dante's love story continues with this stunning sequel to Dead Beautiful (click here to read my review)!<br /><br />Summary:<br /><br />Renée Winters is not the same girl that she was a year ago. A lot has happened since then - she lost her parents and she found out that she is a Monitor whose job is to bury the harmful Undead. But she has also found unexpected and dangerous love - a love that brought her death and life.<br /><br />Renée died last May, but she was brought back to life by her Undead soul mate, Dante. Now Dante is on the run and the Gottfried Academy has closed its gates to everyone except for the Undead. Renée, along with other Monitors, has to attend a new school, Lycée St. Clément, in Montreal.<br /><br />There, she feels like an outsider and without Dante, her life is pretty lonely. But when she learns about the Nine Sisters, she begins to have hope again. The Nine Sisters seem to have found a way to live forever, at least, according to legend. Renée desperately wants to find out more about these Sisters and with the help of her strange visions she is hot on the scent. But she must take heed, because there are others out there who are looking for the secret to immortality as well, and they will murder anyone just to achieve their goal.<br /><br />Will Renée be able to learn the secret to eternal life, a secret that could be the answer to all of her problems? Unless Renée finds answers soon, her time with Dante will come to an end, because he only has a few more years to live until he is dead for good.<br /><br />My thoughts:<br /><br />Life Eternal is an exciting sequel and definitely worth reading because it will surprise you and sweep you off your feet. While reading this book I didn't know what will come next and it kept me guessing until the end. Yvonne Woon has again managed to create a fantastic read full of mysteries and intrigue. I felt like I was there, along with Renée, searching for the secret that could save Dante. And I really wanted her to find a way to be with him because I really like him as a character. But I could also relate to Renée when she started doubting Dante because it was very clear that her boyfriend was hiding something.<br /><br />I liked that the sequel took place in Montreal because the reader learns interesting things about this city, including its importance regarding Monitors. I also liked the fact that we get to know new characters, like for example Renée's new friend, Anya, a Monitor at her new school. And then there's Noah, a boy that seems very interested in Renée. Together, they try to find out more about the Nine Sisters and Noah likes to be part of this thrilling and dangerous adventure, but he doesn't really know that for Renée, it means more than that. As Dante becomes more and more secretive and she begins to doubt him, Renée feels more and more drawn to Noah.<br /><br />If you're not a fan of love triangles, then you won't probably like this sequel, but I didn't really mind much. As I said before, I could understand Renée since she didn't know if she could trust Dante anymore and she began to feel drawn to Noah because he could offer her 'normality' (at least if you overlook the fact that they're both Monitors who bury the dangerous Undead). I liked Noah and I loved reading about the two of them trying to find out the secret to eternal life.<br /><br />Conclusion:<br /><br />All in all, Life Eternal was a fascinating sequel full of suspense, gothic elements and creepy scenes. If you liked Dead Beautiful then you definitely have to read this one!<br /><br />Rating:<br /><br />4.5 out of 5 stars<br />

I was so excited to get a copy of Life Eternal from NetGalley to review, just after I finished Dead Beautiful as well, talk about perfect timing!<br />I was really excited to read this one as it's not out till February next year in the US and it doesn't have a UK release date yet!<br /><br />Life Eternal pretty much picks up right where we left Renee in Dead Beautiful, after all the tragic events that happened at Gotfried, the school is now closed to everyone except the Undead.<br />Renee is shipped off to Lycée St Clement's in Montreal, which is a school solely for Monitors. Although ever since Dante gave Renee her soul back, something just hasn't been feeling right to Renee. She still has no appetite, no sense of smell and she looks much older almost overnight.<br /><br />At Lycée St Clement's Renee faces some new problems, not only does she have to face a new school full of people who think she is immortal and somehow survived death, but she also has to find away to sneak in some Dante time. Which is almost impossible with a town full of Monitors! She is also having some strange visions, that seemed to be triggered by her new surroundings.<br />And as if that wasn't enough to deal with, Renee is still searching for a way of helping Dante prolong what is left of his life.<br /><br />While searching she comes across the legend of the nine sisters, who apparently found a way to cheat death and vowed to take the secret to their graves with them.<br />Eight of the sisters were all murdered, presumably by the Undead. The ninth sister was never named in any documents or ever found. It is this sister Renee decides to try to track down.<br /><br />Firstly, let me just say I loved all the French bits in this book. I really used to love French, but it took a bit of a back seat to Spanish while I was a university. So reading all the French names and streets in this book really started to bring everything back to me!<br />I loved the fact that this book was set in an entirely different place from Gotfried. To me Dead Beautiful taught me all about the Undead, and Life Eternal taught me all about the Monitors.<br /><br />The story itself is full of twists and turns that kept me gripped to the edge of my seat! I had no clue what was going to happen in this book, every page just seemed full of more and more mystery. I actually read this book in one day, I was completely hooked on it from page one!<br /><br />There are a few new characters in this book, some of them I grew to love as I got to the end of the book. <br />I really liked Noah, he seemed like a really nice boy and if Dante wasn't in the picture I could really picture him and Renee together.<br /><br />The legend of the nine sisters was well planned out, looking back, as the story unfolds you can see that the reader is given a small hint here and there. At the time you are too wrapped up in the Renee and Dante story that you don't even realise it's a clue until you reach the end of the book!<br />The plot itself is amazing, although very different to that in Dead Beautiful I think that it works well with this new setting.<br /><br />Ugh the ending. All I can say is I hope the actual book has an ending, because this ARC didn't.<br />I had to go back and read the last few paragraphs three times before I realised there is actually no ending. The book just stops! I really don't even understand what happened in the last paragraph, it just stopped! Big disappointment to me, but at least I'm pretty sure now that there will be a third book, Yvonne Woon can't just leave it like that. Although I'll probably have to wait till 2013 for it :(

<br />KEY POINTS: Romance, Love Triangle, Mystery, Detective, Suspense <br /><br />IN SHORT: This book was a great read; it combined a great 3D mystery with in depth characters and heart stopping action.<br /><br />Life eternal is the second book in the beautiful dead series by Yvonne Woon, In this instalment we are thrown straight into where we were left off with the main character Renee still unsure where she fits in her world and is unmoveable in her affections for Dante, although at the beginning the action is set at slow burn I feel this helps build the characters depth and helps the audience get a better feel of Renee and her personality, along with helping to understand and feel the interactions with some of the more minor characters such as her granddad.<br /><br />As we move through the book a subtle but page turning mystery starts to take wing that allows the audience to discover the clues right along with the main character Renee, we also get a deeper view of her and Dante relationship where the audience are turned to root for the couple as the author explores the issues within the pairing.<br /><br />At this point in the book we are introduced into some past characters and new characters which will play key roles later on, one particularly interesting character is Noah, although I liked this character very much I was never quite sure what his agenda was, whether he was truly just an enthusiastic friend was up for fun or if he truly loved Renee and was a big rival for Dante, this created excitement and an audience involvement as the reader will inevitable choose to root for certain parings. The reader is also left feeling worried and curious about weather this character will appear in the third book due to his role in the twist in the last chapter.<br /><br />There is also the classic girl rival in the character clementine who tries to beat Renee in Academics, status and Affection for Noah. Even though I found her abrasive at first as the author delved into the past of this new character I found myself actually like her more and hoping we might see her again in the third book.<br /><br />The end of this book left me breathless as the action and the mystery build up to it final stages, at this point the reader has followed ever clue along with characters and are desperate to find out the treasure that is buried underneath that will either save the characters or kill them. Here the author creates one last twist that the audience will not expect leaving them breathless and wanting more.<br />

I read Dead Beautiful few years ago, and i remember how much i enjoyed reading it. Second book in the series Life Eternal did not disappoint me either. Story is well written, its neither stretched nor plain, kind where you don't wish for 2 more chapters or less. <br /> Renée and Dante are one of my fav couples. They love each other unconditionally but also see each others flaws. They have their unique supernatural dating problems but also every day couple issues. <br /> Reason i gave this book 4 star and not 5 is that when a writer is introducing new characters (which were completely missing in the first one) they rush things a little bit, number of coincidences increases. Two people come face to face again and again when least expected. These encounters gives reader a reality check, that what they are reading is a Fiction after all. I for one don't like these reminders. Chemistry of Noah and Renee was difficult to connect with, their story grows but you don't connect with their emotions.<br />Overall, it was a good read for me. If you enjoyed Beautiful Creatures and Raven Boys then i hope you will enjoy this one as well.