Review will be on my blog in January/Feb 2018

I was a little unsure of this book at first. Three teenage guys and one girl going on a mountain hiking trip alone. I knew it wasn't going to end well, but I was not expecting it to go as bad as it did.

Three friends Ceo, Graham, and Collin from an elite school that are all in the tennis program one night while playing poker decide to go hike a mountain. With another friend backing out the day of Ceo decided to invite someone else along with them, and that someone is Ellie who is not his usual type of girl, but one that he has befriended anyway. (trust me it all gets cleared up in the end and it makes sense why in his mind he does this.)

We get to see this story from two pov's Collin and Ellie. Collin is a scholarship kid who is pretty poor compared to most of his classmates and especially compared to Ceo and Graham. I'm mentioning this because Collin doesn't have the proper clothes for this trip.
Ellie has lied to her parents telling them that she is going to a college campus for the weekend after having been invited and has her best friend posting photos for her to try and keep up the charade.

Ellie hears warning bells the minute this whole group sets off, but she decides to try and stick it out anyway, after all the plans she had made to make sure that her parents didn't know where she really was. The group also has two other problems one Graham and Ceo constantly argue, and problem two there is a fire on most of the mountain meaning they have to do a trail that they knew nothing about.

Now from the cover you know that an Ax is apart of this story, and let me tell you it is a big question mark from the beginning and things just get worse and worse with it throughout the book. So many arguments and scary moments happen with it that you just wish they had left it behind after having trouble hooking it to their packs.

Overall this story had me from the first page, and I needed to know what happened, and why it happened. If you start a book with someone covered in blood and a person missing, you gotta keep going to know what happens next. This book did not disappoint and we even got to know what lead to some hard feelings between the guys and what exactly made them agree to this crazy trip in the first place. I also liked how the characters worked as hard as they could to survive and mostly worked together as a team even if they were annoyed with each other.

As for who gets hurt, I could see why it finally happened, but I wasn't expecting it to happen like that. I think this is a really good book for older YA and even though it has slow parts, you want to know who got hurt that it's easy to work through.

Thank you to Disney Hyperion and NetGalley for an e-arc of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This book was an easy, fast-paced read. The climax was the type where you kind of see what’s coming, but there are still details that shock you! The characters weren’t the most developed but seeing as the book takes place over the course of 3 days, I’m still pleased with them. I recommend this book if you’re a fan of survival novels or thrillers, which I’m a fan of both of.

*I received this copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*

“Bad Call” is a great novel for anyone who is a fan of both survival stories and a good murder mystery.

Told in varying point of views and with flashbacks to provide a more in depth background for the characters to set up the climax while providing different layers of perception as both the friend and the outsider so the reader has room to decide who they want to trust before the big reveal.

This book is very well done and keeps the suspense up while also raising the stakes and creating a desperate atmosphere where the truth and your judgements have to be set aside in order to survive, and the devil you know might be someone you need to trust in order to make it out alive.

**thank you to netgalley for providing an arc in exchange for a fair and honest review**

I thoroughly enjoyed this quick read about a group of friends who go camping in the wilderness of Yosemite Park, when things go terribly wrong. I was hooked from the first couple of pages. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes survival stories and suspense.

Bad Call follows the lives of four teenagers as they set off on an unsanctioned and semi-unprepared camping trip to Yosemite. A complicated friendship between the three young men increases everyone second guessing the real role of the fourth person in their party, Ellie.

Bad Call has plenty of drama, tension and twists and turns. You think you know what’s going to happen just to find out you don’t know anything at all. Each person has their own motives and secrets. When a freak winter snow storm erupts, the four have to try to survive the weather, bears, an axe and each other. One of them doesn’t make it.

Excellent reading! This is no typical “the-teenagers-went-into-the-woods-and-don’t-come-out” story. Excellent writing, excellent characterizations and excellent plot line.

Note to sensitive readers, while the book is intended for children nine and older, use of the F-bomb and other expletives and occurrences of drug use may require personal reevaluation.

This book was devious, twisted, and a good warning against marching off into the California wilderness unprepared and with a bunch of narcissists. Not that I would, anyway, but it's generally good life advice. Pair with Stephanie Kuehn's WHEN I AM THROUGH WITH YOU.

Review: BAD CALL

I started this book with a sense of foreboding. Beginning with the first page (what a reader's hook!), my intuition just "knew" something was going to go very badly wrong. Some one or more of the characters would suffer, and so would I, vicariously. Some of them I distrusted from the beginning; plus I knew that the deception from the very beginning would prove disastrous, bringing on trouble, and more lies, and quite possibly betrayal. As the story continues, the suspense ratchets higher and the tension tautens. As everything seems to conspire against this disparate conglomeration, tricking and blocking their attempts at progress, true character rises to the forefront, both strong integrity and vicious cruelty. When Nature itself leaps in to confuse and destroy, and more than one of this mismatched group of four adolescents makes their own "bad call" (and making wrong or misguided decisions is a consistent theme in this novel), nothing can result but tragedy. The result for the reader: constant breathtaking suspense.

If only plans went as planned...

This wilderness/psychological suspense is quick read about how the reaction of one person to one moment in time sets off a chain of events that forever alters the lives of four teenagers, CEO (Cee-o), Colin, Grahame and Ellie.

Four fourth-year boys from a Prep school decide to take an unapproved long-weekend trip exploring and hiking some nearby mountains. When confronted by a school official about leaving school, they lie about going to a tennis tournament which has been approved (not!) by their coach. The man doesn't buy their story and is ready to call and verify it with the tennis coach until CEO says "he's at a family wedding and he'll really be upset about being bothered, especially with the time difference and all." After bribing the school official, they are all set and raring to go. Except one unexpectedly drops out before they even start. Then there were three with two worried about how they will bear the additional cost of the trip now that expenses are divided only three ways instead of four. CEO surprises both Ellie, and Colin & Grahame alike when he invites Ellie along. She agrees, and the foursome head off for their adventure.

Parking their car, they start their hike up the mountain without telling anyone where they are going or when they expect to return (OMG - such stupid kids)! Hikers coming down the mountain advise the teens that the path they were planning to take is in for bad weather and to head in another direction. Weather fails, nighttime descends, mountain animals come out, egos emerge, and conditions get worse in every possible way.

I liked the interplay between all of the characters; the jockeying for position, the tension, the surprising reveals, the sexual tension and competition that Ellie's presence kicks off (not of her own doing, but simply because she is a female traveling with 3 young men.) The author subtly distracts us with the drama of the characters until we are as surprised as they are to discover how bad the weather has gotten and how few choices are left at that point. What starts out as an adventure turns into wilderness survival with psychological suspense as well.

Though the book may be called Bad Call (and the characters each made several!), I doubt you'll be disappointed by picking up this book. A fine read!

Many thanks to NetGalley, BookishFirst and Disney Hyperion for allowing me the privilege of reading and reviewing an advance copy of this book.

Friends, Ceo, Grahame, Rhody and Collin all attend a yuppity boarding school. Ceo, who is the king manipulator (primarily to get anything he wants from women of all ages) sets in place a plan for the 4 of them to go camping in Yosemite for the weekend. He creates an elaborate plan manipulating many entities to get them off campus unauthorized. At the last minute, Rhody backs out of the deal. Little to the other’s knowledge, he has also invited along a girl, Ellie, to join them.
It is clear, from the beginning that distrust deeply rooted in these boys friendship. There are occasional flashbacks to when Ceo and Collin were competing for placement in the school’s tennis team. Ceo comes from money but Collin is a scholarship athlete. His scholarship is dependent upon him remaining in the top two places on the tennis team. Ceo, as he so often does, conned his way into winning that match.
This book starts with a girl (Ellie) and one of the guys lost in the woods in a snow storm. When finally the reach camp, they see one other member of their group (the two guys remain nameless at this point) pacing back at camp. They can see that something is wrong and that his jacket has a “black stain on it”. From this prologue you know throughout the first half of the book that something goes terribly wrong – that their hiking/ camping through Yosemite is bound to end in tragedy. The author doesn’t reveal exactly WHAT the tragedy is or TO WHOM it occurs, though you know to be awaiting a snow storm and likely some tragic end. I enjoyed this quick, easy read from NetGalley and BookishFirst. To be published in February 2018.

First, I just want to say a giant thank you to NetGalley, Disney-Hyperion, and Stephen Wallenfels for providing me with and ARC of this awesome book! This is my first ARC ever and I'm beyond thankful for the opportunity and excited to see what else NetGalley can offer me!

I went into this book thinking it would just be about a camping trip between friends where some drama is revealed and someone disappears only to be found later. Boy, was I wrong. Don't let the description fool you; this book is deep. Being fresh out of my teen years myself (I'm 20, so this was me only two years ago) I found the writing and characters very realistic. I mean, it really reminded me of hanging out with my friends back in high school. The writing style and the characters' personalities reminded me of a John Green book. It was awesome and I felt instantly connected and comfortable with the characters, so bravo to the author for creating such realistic, complex, and interesting characters.

This book did really confuse me at first for this simple reason; all the stuff  happens in the last like 40% of the book. So the first 60% or so is all lead up to the action in the back half and while I did think the book was a really slow-building type of book it didn't bother me because I was enjoying it so much. If the characters and drama and setting weren't so amazing I probably wouldn't have liked it as much as I did, but all the build up and back story is so needed to really drive this book home. And boy, was that last 40% crazy.

The conclusion of this book was chilling, and I'm not just talking about the snow storm. I genuinely had goose-bumps during the last chapter or so. Stuff wasn't adding up, things kept getting creepier and more dangerous, and the stakes were getting as high as the snow levels. I just wanted to keep reading and reading and get some answers, and while the ending isn't 'happy', it is definitely satisfying.

I would recommend this book to high school aged young adults because of the language and some of the sex and drug references, but I would definitely be on the look out for this book next year if you're interested in young adult thrillers. The writing was phenomenal, the plot was great, and the characters were intriguing. Triple B approved!

I was very surprised by this book. On page 2, I thought I was going to hate it but then it got better the more I read. The depth of the characters was very beautiful and I could even liked the romance that was built on only knowing each for two days. Towards the end I had to keep on reading because I had to know what was going to happen.

To be truthful I did not like this book at first. I am a mature librarian. I asked myself why would a young girl go camping with three boys. I kept reading this story and could not stop. The storyline was really interiging. The characters were well developed. Characters I did not like at first became indering. Again, being an older reader I thought that I could not recommend this book to a middle school student, but I was wrong. The language was a little crude, but not offensive. Great adventure and realistic mix. I will recommend this this book to people looking for a adventure and thought provoking story.