Blog Tour ~ "Canvas Bound" by Laura M. Kolar + giveaway

Canvas Bound by Laura M. Kolar
My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars
Source: Received to Review
Genre: YA Fiction

Book Description:  Sixteen-year-old Libby Tanner’s art comes to life. Her painted skies turn from day to night, leaves rustle on trees, and sometimes, a mystery boy appears.

While attending England’s Aldridge Art Academy, Libby meets charming Brent Henderson, a performing arts student who showers her with attention. But his rival, gorgeous Dean James, is the one who occupies her mind, even though he’s very much attached to his current girlfriend.

Libby soon learns there’s more to both Brent and Dean than she ever imagined. In order to save her future and the boy who’s captured her heart, she must unlock the secrets behind her art by entering the most dangerous place of all… the world within her paintings.

But once she steps into the canvas, she risks being trapped forever.

My thoughts: Libby is sixteen and attending an Arts school in England. She misses her parents, but is engrossed in her painting. She would love to be left alone with a canvas and paint. Her drive to paint comes from the boy that she has been seeing in her paintings for several years. She wants to capture the right picture so that he will visit. He never stays, just pops in and out.

Fortunately for her, she has a great friend at the school who makes her have a social life and cheers her up when she needs him. He is her protector and fashion coordinator. He was assigned to help her out at the school and since has become her best friend.

There are other students who play a vital role in the story. Dean and Brent hold vital positions as well as a Neeley. All of them hold keys to unlocking the secret of the missing boy, Ryan. There are secrets that need to be unlocked to figure out how to help Ryan.

I enjoyed the originality of the story. It is well written and is paced well. The author is good are revealing a little bit at a time. The full impact of the secrets is not revealed until the end. It left me surprised. There are twists and turns that keep the story interesting.

I would suggest this book to readers 17+. There are sexual situations and swearing. The 'F' bomb is used a couple of times.

Read an Excerpt!

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I paced my studio floor as evening descended on the field in my painting. The sparse oak trees cast lengthening shadows on the acorn-littered ground, where the grass was more golden brown than green. The sunny sky became a star-filled night, and the field turned murky as the shadows faded into the black oblivion… just like my mystery boy.

He’d vanished.

Again.

So did the rush of him appearing in my finished work, my joy squelched by the expression on his face. Usually he wore a smile—a sad one, but still a smile. That night, he’d just looked miserable.

I stopped pacing and stared at the canvas, reaching out to the spot where I’d last seen him. Maybe if I could touch him or knew where he went when he disappeared, I wouldn’t feel so hollow from his absence.

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About Laura Kolar : Laura M. Kolar lives with her husband and daughter in a one-stop-light town in northern-lower Michigan. Though she didn’t discover her love of books until she turned thirty, as a self-declared hopeless romantic, she has spent the past few years reading and writing stories with mostly happy endings.

If she’s not at her day-job or with her family, you will find her sipping a cup of chai latte while sitting in her favorite rocking chair, hunched over her laptop writing or spending entirely too much time on Twitter.

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Red Adept is having a giveaway with this blog tour.  Enter using the rafflecopter form below.  They will be notifying the winner and getting out the prize.

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