With the buzz over The Hunger Games trilogy, YA dystopian novels are hotter than ever right now – even an infrequent YA reader like myself knows that. I’ll admit to being party to the general enthusiasm. I like dystopian novels in general (at least in theory; in practice I’m careful about which ones I [...]]]> Dear Ms. Baggott,

With the buzz over The Hunger Games trilogy, YA dystopian novels are hotter than ever right now – even an infrequent YA reader like myself knows that. I’ll admit to being party to the general enthusiasm. I like dystopian novels in general (at least in theory; in practice I’m careful about which ones I read, because some of them are just too grim for me). But YA seems particularly suited to dystopian themes, perhaps because depressing subjects can be a little less so when seen through the eyes of the young, who may have more resiliency and less to lose than older protagonists. I also think that even at my age I retain a certain visceral thrill at the idea of being young and suddenly unconstrained by the rules that govern society (of course, the characters in these novels often face other, more difficult challenges). In addition to really liking The Hunger Games trilogy, several years ago I read and loved How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff, which was a rather low-tech and straight-forward story with dystopian themes. So I’m always on the lookout for similar books.

 Pure definitely had some similarity to The Hunger Games; less so to How I Live Now, in that the post-apocalyptic world of Pure is definitely more science-fictiony than those two books. Some of the creatures created by the apocalyptic event (called “the Detonations” in Pure) almost seem supernatural to me, though there’s no suggestion that they are not the natural result of what happened. It’s just that they seemed so fantastical to me and the science behind them is never explained, which leaves me wondering how they came to be. (The author’s note at the end suggests that she did do some research with nanotechnology experts, but since I didn’t read that until I was done with the book, it didn’t really help me.)

Anyway…Pure begins by introducing the reader to Pressia Belze, a 15-going-on-16-year-old (more on this in a moment). She lives with her grandfather in the burned-out husk of former barbershop. Some time (perhaps a decade) before, the Detonations occurred; the Detonations appear to have been some sort of bomb or bombs, as the name would suggest. Apparently similar in scale to an atomic bomb, the Detonations cause a specific and horrifying sort of damage. Many are killed, and the survivors exist in poverty and misery. Well, some of the survivors. An unspecified number had escaped before the Detonations to a planned artificial community called the Dome. Those within the Dome are safe from the Detonations and continue their lives in a rigidly controlled and sterile environment, waiting for the day that the Earth will be renewed and they can rejoin their brethren outside in the real world.

Pressia’s age is an issue because 16 year olds are compelled to report to the OSR, a sort of militia that controls what’s left of society. Children taken by the OSR are forced to either become OSR killers or used as target practice for other OSR recruits. Pressia and her grandfather must make a decision about whether to try to evade the OSR (which would mean certain death if she were caught) or not.

Meanwhile, within the Dome, a teenage boy named Partridge is beginning to awaken to some truths about his past. His father, Willux, is a high muckity-muck in Dome society, a scientist who was one of the chief architects of the Dome. Partridge’s mother supposedly died in the Detonations, and his older brother, the golden boy Sedge, committed suicide. Partridge is a disappointment to his father in part because he is resistant to “coding”, the genetic manipulation that the scientists within the Dome use to create super-soldiers.

The world of Pure feels artificial, or at least incomplete. It’s unclear what happened to the rest of the world, and it’s hard to get a sense of exactly how big the world the characters inhabit is. How big is the Dome – the size of a small city? A large city? Bigger? Smaller? I had no idea, and that bothered me. The scale of the world outside the Dome is similarly vague, and there is no mention of what happened to the rest of the world. (Come to think of it, was that ever addressed in The Hunger Games? Now that’s bothering me….)

The inauthenticity problem kept cropping up for me. One of the central conceits of Pure is that those left outside the Dome during the Detonations were altered by them in strange ways, usually involving having inanimate or animate objects fused to their bodies. In Pressia’s case, it’s a doll’s head in place of (or over? I was never clear on this) one of her hands. Her grandfather has a fan lodged in his throat. Another teen, Bradwell, has birds fused into his back, birds that somehow remain alive enough to occasionally flutter their wings, though they don’t seem to eat or poop or caw or do anything else that birds do. A third character has his younger brother fused to his back; in that case, the brother does eat, and talk, though he appears to be mentally retarded or brain-damaged.

The concept was intriguing, but it didn’t hold up to scrutiny much. I don’t know if my problem was that I’m too scientifically minded or not scientifically minded enough. I kept wondering, in the case of fusing with non-sentient objects, how the objects didn’t end up causing infections. In the case of, say, the birds on Bradwell’s back, I was even more confused. Were they somehow parasitically living off Bradwell? How would that work? Wouldn’t their life span be different from his, and if so, would their deaths effect his health? There is a suggestion at one point that the detonations were of some sort of weapon that changed the people and objects outside on a molecular level – at least that was how I understood it. But it was so beyond my understanding of the way things work that it almost seemed to be more magic than science involved. I couldn’t help but feel that the author was more moved by a cool-sounding concept – a doll head for a hand! birds that flutter their wings imbedded in one’s back! – than that she was really working from a well-thought out theory about the world she was creating. Again, maybe this is all explained by nanotechnology; I really wouldn’t know (that’s putting it mildly; my knowledge of nanotechnology begins and ends with my ability to spell the word). But I wished there was more detail – I even would’ve accepted an info dump – that put the strange mutations caused by the Detonations in some sort of context I could begin to understand.

As I mentioned, the Detonations happened about a decade before the book begins, but in some ways the time feels shorter than that. I would have expected that more of a civilization would have emerged; things on the outside are pretty chaotic, and everyone just seems to accept that. Now, it may be that there is manipulation from inside the Dome to keep things that way (I hope I’m not giving too much away by suggesting that the architects of the Dome aren’t exactly benevolent), but that’s just a guess; it’s not something that’s suggested in the text. There is a market of sorts that Pressia barters at, proving I guess that commerce is the hardest thing to kill, but no schools or organized workforce (beyond the OSR) seemed to exist. I can’t say I know how people would react after an apocalyptic event that destroyed society, but I feel like there would be some effort to approximate normalcy, even if it was a harrowing and miserable facsimile of it.

Pure definitely contains some not-so-subtle political messages – not ones I disagreed with, but they may bug some readers. Society was obviously somewhat troubled before the Detonations – there are mentions of the asylums and prisons being full, for one thing. The prevailing thought within in the Dome seems to be that a lack of “civility” and “purity” were the main problems that plagued society, but their definitions of such concepts are a little twisted. There’s a heavy dose of eugenics in the notion of being “pure”, though the term is also used by those on the outside to denote those within the Dome, who avoided being physically marred by the Detonations as apparently everyone outside was. Also, Dome society is depicted as pretty rigidly old-fashioned in regards to gender roles: the boys train to be soldiers and the girls are expected to see their highest calling as mothers.

In addition to being somewhat flummoxed by the scale of the society depicted in Pure, I was confused by the idea that those within the Dome would anxiously anticipate the day that they could rejoin the outside world – a world that supposedly would be reborn and renewed at some future point. Again, only going by my own hazy scientific understanding of the weapons used in the Detonations, and using the still-present manifestations of the damage they wrought – omnipresent ash and mutations – as a reference point, I wouldn’t think that rebirth and renewal would be happening in anyone’s lifetime, or their children’s, or their children’s children’s children’s, if you get my drift.  What I’m saying is, I don’t really understand anyone within the Dome being emotionally invested in the day that Dome folk would once again walk in the sunshine, since it seemed like it could be hundreds and hundreds of years off.

That’s before you even get to the “meltlands” of destroyed neighborhoods, the periodic “death sprees”, and the dust monsters – terrifying (though again somewhat biologically improbable) creatures that rise up and devour unwary humans. Granted, those within the Dome don’t necessarily know the reality of life on the outside, though they know it’s not good (presumably, they are told just enough horror stories to discourage them from thinking of trying to get out and see for themselves). But still, it feels like this idea – that the Detonations were done to scrub the Earth of all its unsavory elements, allowing for a fresh start at some point in the future – is an interesting one that is just not that well thought out.

There’s a lot going on in Pure – a lot of the stuff that happens later in the book is probably too spoilery to even allude to. There are several significant characters besides Pressia and Partridge: Bradwell, a young man who has escaped the OSR’s notice and lives outside even the marginal society that exists outside; Lyda, a Dome girl whose involvement with Partridge ends up costing her a lot, but which also opens her eyes to the reality of life both in and outside; and El Capitan, an OSR commander who comes to have divided loyalties as the story progresses.

Pressia and Partridge, for all that they are the leads, aren’t really the characters who interested me the most in the story. For all the strangeness of the world, they feel like fairly conventional characters. So too was Bradwell. I actually found Lyda and El Capitan the most interesting. Lyda really has her world turned upside in Pure - actually, all the main characters do, with the possible exception of Bradwell. I’m not sure why I found her more interesting that Pressia – maybe because, having more, she gave up much more when she accepted that everything she knew was a lie. El Capitan is in some way’s Lyda’s opposite, though he also has been led to believe things about life in and outside the Dome that aren’t true. But rather than being kept in innocence, he’s been fashioned into something hard and cold – which makes the strong spark of humanity beneath the tough surface all the more appealing.

Something I should probably note:  the story is told in first person present tense.  I found this distracting at first but quickly got used to it. I do know that some readers are picky about such things, though.

Ultimately, Pure was a bit of a mish-mash for me: a lot of good ideas that felt like they were better in concept than execution, some characters that didn’t interest me very much and some that interested me a lot, and a plot that was crammed full. The last half or third (with all the spoilery developments) was fast-paced and kept me absorbed, and I’m interested enough to want to check out the next book in the series. My grade: B-.

Best regards,

Jennie

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I’ll confess that I had become disenchanted with your work. The grown up hookers with a heart of gold series followed by two dark and somewhat unromantic stories made me gun shy. But a free book of an author I’ve liked in the past? I can’t resist at least giving it a [...]]]> Dear Ms. Haynes:

I’ll confess that I had become disenchanted with your work. The grown up hookers with a heart of gold series followed by two dark and somewhat unromantic stories made me gun shy. But a free book of an author I’ve liked in the past? I can’t resist at least giving it a try and I am glad that I did.

Rachel Delaney is a newly divorced single mom sharing custody of two teen boys with her ex husband. Before her divorce, she was a homemaker. Now she is working at a receptionist for a local company but her small salary doesn’t allow her for many extras even with her ex picking up the tab for the mortgage. Her eldest, Nathan, is playing Rachel against his father like a pro, starting to hang out with a bad crowd, and acting perpetually angry. Rachel would like something just for herself and while a lover would be nice, she’d settled for a vibrator.

Rand Torvik is a believer in the law of attraction or perhaps the universe reshaping things that were meant to be. He sees Rachel three random times – at a grocery store, outside a sex store where Rachel bought her vibrator, and in a local coffee shop – before approaching her with his interest. Rachel isn’t looking for a relationship but she wouldn’t mind calling on Rand for a little adult time. This suits Rand just fine.

In some ways, Rand and Rachel’s sexual interaction is much like a courtship. Even in this erotic book, their first encounter is relatively chaste, at least between the two. Rand’s neighbors are exhibitionists and Rand essentially sets up a first date atmosphere with wine on his upper balcony and a cinematic view of the neighbor’s hot tub antics. Every encounter that Rand and Rachel experience explore a few more fantasies from video taping themselves to participating in some exhibitionism themselves. Inevitably their physical connection brings them emotionally close. Rachel and Rand’s relationship is put on hold when she discovers that Rand is her son’s new principal, a man that her son hates.

As Rachel becomes more sexually adventurous with the encouragement of Rand, she gains confidence at work with the encouragement of a co worker. I felt that Rachel was blossoming into the person she could have been, not because she had a job and a lover, but because she began to identify herself as an individual and it was through those two vehicles that this came about. I enjoyed her recognizing that her skills as a mother translated into managing fractious co workers.

The one weakness in the story was Rand. The story could have been written in the first person because despite scenes from Rand’s point of view, he remained much of a mystery. He had little character movement and everything he did was exactly right. He knew exactly how to nudge Rachel into loosening her inhibitions, guessing exactly what would turn her on. He was able to turn her son around with exactly the right methods. I found him too good to be true and in many ways a flat character. I was also puzzled by his mantra that the laws of attraction bound his actions. The way he conducted his life didn’t seem as metaphysical as his philosophies would indicate.

The ex husband storyline was fairly predictable and while it was used to propel Rachel’s storyline and exhibit her newfound personal strength, I didn’t find the ex husband’s actions particularly believable which worked to lessen the tension that I believe it was supposed to present.

I did love the subtle sex positive, pro woman message in the story. A repeated mantra is that Rachel deserves to have it all. She deserves to be viewed as a good mother, an upstanding member of her community, and most of all, she deserves to have great sex. Rand is happy to stand by her side to make sure all of those things come to fruition, particularly the great sex part. It seems that full length erotic romances are a wasteland of late so The Principal’s Office, even at the trade paperback price, might be worth it. B-

Best regards,

Jane

This book was not what I expected when I picked it up. In fact, I’d even venture so far as to offer a caption.

Heat is probably the best independently published book I have read, and one of the best books I have read in a long while. It is also [...]]]> Dear Ms. Smith,

This book was not what I expected when I picked it up. In fact, I’d even venture so far as to offer a caption.

Heat is probably the best independently published book I have read, and one of the best books I have read in a long while. It is also one of the most graphic, and most disturbing books I have read in a long while. When I finished this book, I told a friend about it and she said it sounded awful. On paper, it does sound awful, but it was a truly compelling read and I could not put it down. I mainlined this book as if I were a junkie and this was my fix. I debated about reviewing it, since it is not the standard Dear Author sort of book. But the bottom line is that I want to talk about this book with other people, so here’s the review.

Warning – if you are easily triggered, this is most definitely not the book for you. Move along.

I stumbled upon this book on Amazon, but I’m not sure how. Perhaps someone mentioned it on a villainous hero thread. Someone said it was the most unique and different romance they had read in a very long time, and that was all it took for me to purchase despite the hefty cover price. This review will probably end up rather long, so fair warning.

Heat does not fall into my regular reading category. It’s about two sets of alien men. One is an escaped drug dealer and criminal who is hiding out on earth. The other is the stiff and proper interplanetary cop who is chasing him. They are both the heroes, and over the course of this very long book, they both fall in love with their respective females. This is definitely a romance. A bizarre one, but ultimately with a happy ending for both parties.

The book starts out with Kanetus, aka Kane. Kane is a Jotan interplanetary pirate who has been sentenced to life in prison for any number of crimes. He escapes and heads to earth. Earth is full of humans, and the Jotan treat them like pets, sex toys, and slaves. Sometimes all of the above. Another interesting thing about humans is that they produce a chemical called dopamine that can be harvested from their brains. From this chemical, an illegal drug called Vahst can be made. Vahst is in high demand and Kane is broke, so he has a plan. Go to earth, harvest humans to make Vahst, and return to his life of space piracy a rich man. When Kane gets to earth, his plans are quickly turned upside down. It is summer on earth, and heat makes Jotans go into heat – they must have sex on a regular basis or else they are in intense pain and become ill. Kane doesn’t have time for this, so he decides he will steal himself a human. After grabbing and raping the first woman he runs across, he is perplexed when she runs away and kills herself. So he gets another human, and this time reminds himself to be more careful.

The new human female is named Raven, and she’s an eighteen year old street prostitute who loves drugs and living wild. She’s terrified of Kane and how brutally he treats her, as any woman in her right mind would be. What Raven wants isn’t a factor in the first half of the story. She is Kane’s to use as he wishes, and gradually she begins to help him with his harvesting of other humans for the Vahst, which is just as graphic and awful as it sounds.

Tagen is the interplanetary cop who has come to earth to find Kane and bring him back to justice. He’s afflicted by the same situation as Kane – the heat of summer makes him need sex intensely, but he refuses to give in to it. Tagen accidentally kills a human with his blaster and he is horrified that he is so careless with human life. Suffering from the elements, Tagen collapses on the doorstep of Daria, a human woman who is a recluse. Daria takes him in despite his fearsome appearance and his strangeness, and she helps him recover and later assists him in his hunt for Kane.

The story is a very interesting dichotomy about two men who could not be more different, but are both influenced by their late fathers, and you layer this in beautifully. Kane remembers his dead father with fondness, for all that his father was a murderer and pirate who taught Kane to be just like him. Tagen was adopted by a man that served as his father, but he never felt affection or love, merely duty, and this influences the man he has become. It’s a very interesting nuance to a story that on the surface sounds coarse, violent, and a little weird.

Though we are given dueling storylines, the ‘romance’ between Kane and Raven is the more compelling of the two storylines. It’s interesting to note that Kane is a villain, but over the course of the story, he is not reformed from his wicked ways in the slightest. He remains a rebellious killer on the first page and the last. Nor does Raven, his love interest, change from her hedonist ways. Rather, the characters change by being together, and change in how they perceive each other. Raven begins to assist Kane with his Vahst collecting, and Kane begins to appreciate how smart and clever and cautious she is. Raven, for her part, begins to understand Kane’s cues and how he functions, and learns how to show him that she is a worthwhile partner. While their story starts out with a very Stockholm-Syndrome vibe to it, it progresses to something else, and by the end of the book, Raven is very much an equal partner to Kane, and the last scene of the book had me thrilled to my bones at how far Raven had come.

Tagen and Daria have a much sweeter, more traditional romance. Tagen is worried about hurting Daria, who has clearly been damaged in the past. In addition, Jotan women are the ones that are aggressors in the relationship, and since Daria does not make a move on him, he simply waits for her to indicate that she wants him. This takes a very, very long time since Daria has been hurt in the past. Tagen is obsessed with his police-work, and he appreciates Daria’s clever mind as she begins to help him track down Kane. In turn, Daria is attracted to Tagen, but she is afraid of letting someone into her safe, protected life and being hurt all over again. Their relationship is much slower to develop, but is a nice counterpoint to the violence of Kane and Raven’s relationship, and when they finally get together, the reader knows it is because they have come to a genuine understanding and mutual desire.

This is dubbed as ‘erotic horror’ by the author, and while I don’t think it’s really a horror novel, the erotic tag is very key. Kane rapes multiple people throughout the book, including the heroine. Raven herself is passed around and forced to service other men and sometimes other women, all upon Kane’s whim. There is lots of extreme violence and Raven is manhandled for the first section of the book to the point that I was very uncomfortable with some of the scenarios. I’m not a fan of rape in novels. Usually that is the first thing that will make a book hit the wall. Yet I kept reading this, and I found myself still hoping that Kane and Raven would have a happy ending by the end of the book. I’m not sure what that says about me.

Despite the violent storyline, there are some genuinely touching moments between each couple, and some very funny ones. The conclusions that Tagen comes to as he tries to figure out earth culture by watching TV are quite funny, as well as the scene in the sex shop.

I would be remiss without pointing out that this book is very long.  The page count is not listed on the Amazon page, but clicking over to the paper copy shows that it’s over 600 pages long, which sounds about right. Yet the book does not feel dragged out or change plots halfway through (unlike your other book, Olivia, which I bailed out on at 40%) and the story never loses its momentum. I was actually sad to see the book end and immediately looked for other reads similar to Heat, because I wanted to return to that enjoyable intensity your writing brings.

Overall, Heat was an uncomfortable read at times but a riveting one the entire story. I am struggling with the grade to give this book. The writing and intensity that I felt while reading it mark this into A+ territory, and I am stingy with my grades. I haven’t felt quite so caught up in a book in a very long time. Yet if I were taking off marks for awful things depicted in the story, I’d have to mark it right back down to an F grade, because there are a lot of reprehensible things done and committed by one of the heroes. Kane is not nice. He does not become nice. He is not reformed into a kinder, gentler Kane by the end of the story. If you are interested in villain heroes, this is definitely a book to get. If not, you should pass this one on by because you will regret every dollar you spend.

I do feel as if this sort of book was the reason I read indie books. I’m constantly hoping for that one read that will probably never be published by a mainstream publisher, yet is intense and consuming and surpasses all my skeptical misgivings. The happy ending for both couples cinched this for me, since I was worried that it could not possibly end well. And yet, you pulled it off.  I have to give this a very enthusiastic B+/A- and hope that others pick it up so they can tell me if I have lost my mind with my affection for this book.

All best,

January

PS – Your website is awful and your book covers almost as bad.

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I’ve been remiss in not reviewing these books. I recommended them in November, but then the end of the semester and the holidays and then the beginning of the semester and and and…caught up with me. But I’ve been dipping into them again and again through the last few months when I needed [...]]]> Dear Ms. Haimowitz.

I’ve been remiss in not reviewing these books. I recommended them in November, but then the end of the semester and the holidays and then the beginning of the semester and and and…caught up with me. But I’ve been dipping into them again and again through the last few months when I needed to cleanse my palate from other books.

Nicky Avery is a TV star who is rehearsing for a Broadway show. He meets Devon Turner, film star and all around amazing actor. They connect instantly, Nicky feeling Devon’s dominance, Devon reacting to Nicky’s submissiveness. But this isn’t a touchy-feely story. This is pure D/s with intense sadomasochistic overtones. Devon doesn’t let Nicky get away with anything, either physically or emotionally. The first book, Master Class, shows Nicky and Devon’s meeting and the start of their relationship. SUBlime (really on that title?! Please trust your readers to Get It without the hokey capitals!) is a serious of short vignettes, mostly (really great) wank material more than anything else, that reveals scenes in their daily life, but that doesn’t really forward their relationship.

Devon and Nicky meet at a dinner with friends. I love this. I love that they don’t meet at a Kinky Klub of Kinkiness. They meet like other normal people do. And they’re drawn to each other through mutual attraction rather than some ridiculous set up. The book definitely has a lot of “All-Knowing All-Seeing Dom Who Knows What’s Right for the Misguided Little Submissive”-itis to go around. Devon recognizes that Nicky’s submissive, that he’s deeply masochistic, that he’s utterly fucked up. And he knows just what Nicky needs. Of course. (Honestly, just once, I’d like to read a book with a fucked up Dom and a has-it-together sub who saves him/her.) But if that’s going to be the point of the book, it’s very well done. Brilliantly done, even.

Devon takes care of Nicky. He knows what Nicky needs and he gives it to him. And as physically excruciating as their play can be, both for them and for the reader, depending on the reader’s squick levels, it’s possible to see Devon’s care for Nicky all the way through the book.

As an example of the physical and emotional intensity of the book:

Devon retrieved his crop. He wasn’t usually such a one-toy man, but he needed precision tonight without too much bite. He thwapped it lightly against Nicky’s testicles. Stretched and weighted as they were, even a light touch was painful; Nicky grunted, stumbled, fell. The rigging caught him, and he scrambled back to his feet and forced his limbs back to their straining stance. Devon rewarded this by striking Nicky’s nuts again, upping the force a bit. Perhaps expecting it this time, Nicky kept his feet.

“Now, I do believe we were having a conversation. Tell me what I’m doing.”

Another strike. Nicky gasped.

“You’re cropping my nuts, sir.” Again, and Nicky lifted one foot but quickly put it back, gasping out, “Fuck, it hurts.”

Devon knelt down to add a second weight to the leather cord, stretching Nicky’s sack a little more. He let it go carefully, stroking one sweat-damp thigh as he released the weight. Nicky’s whimper went straight to Devon’s cock, but he ignored it. Right now, his boy demanded all his focus.

Devon picked up the crop again and rubbed it against the stretched skin of Nicky’s scrotum, then slapped it lightly, several times in succession, until Nicky danced away. “Hold still,” Devon warned, grabbing him by the rigging to keep him in place and resuming his tapping with the crop.

It was impressive that Nicky remembered to speak through this treatment. He gritted out, “Tapping my balls, sir,” through increasingly heavy breaths that became grunts, then cries: Devon’s cue to stop. Devon smoothed over the hot skin with his thumb, gave Nicky’s half-hard cock a few quick pumps.

“And I suppose you know what my next question’s going to be.”

Chest heaving, limbs quaking, Nicky said nothing as Devon worked his erection. Finally, he shook his head, looking contrite and a little frightened. A drop of sweat flew from his chin and plopped to the floor.

Good. Nicky was moving beyond the ability to parse every little thing, moving beyond control and into true subspace. Devon added another weight, and another.

“How do you feel, Nicky?”

“Hurts,” he panted.

“How you feel, Nicky, not how it feels. That’s five.”

This book is not for the faint of heart. It shows an intensely physical and deeply emotional relationship between a sadist and a masochist, between a Dom and a sub, that has some necessary suspension of disbelief (do people REALLY play that hard — especially emotionally — with each other right away?), but is otherwise beautiful, brilliant, and if you like that sort of this, deeply arousing.

Grade: B+

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SUBlime, on the other hand, is a series of vignettes that seems to lose sight of the fact that Devon and Nicky are people. In these stories, ever-in-control Dom and bratty sub are thrown in with various kinks (medical play, knives, cross-dressing, isolation, mummification). And while the individual stories stay true to Devon and Nicky’s personalities, and while the stories are arousing if it hits the reader’s kink buttons, and while they’re very well-written, Devon and Nicky are no longer actors with real lives. They’re just posable kink dolls you brought out whenever some nifty new kink caught your fancy.

Which is not to say they’re not fun, but I doubt very much that an A-list film actor can bring his A-list stage and TV actor boyfriend to a huge party, no matter how “private,” and parade him around in pony-play gear without having to worry about it getting out to the press. No matter how much you trust other people in the lifestyle, stardom is still fraught with blackmailers and paparazzi, and I just missed the real lives of Devon and Nicky amidst the kinkiness.

I feel like I’m hammering these stories for not being something they never tried to be, and I REALLY hate it when people do that. I *think* they were written first, precisely AS wankable shorts, and Master Class was written to show how Devon and Nicky got together. But however they were written, they were published as a stand-alone story and some sequel shorts, so that’s how I read them. And with that in mind, the posable kink doll thing bothered me, as much as I enjoyed the individual stories themselves. They were more erotica than romance. Brilliantly GOOD erotica, with each short having an emotional arc of its own, which is SO important, but erotica, not romance, nonetheless. As erotica, I’d give it another B+. But as romance:

Grade: C+

Best regards,
-Sarah

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I first encountered your debut novel on NetGalley. I admit I’ve always been fond of historical YA, especially if there’s a paranormal flavor. Your book sounded like the ticket. It was a nice change of pace from the urban fantasies and dystopians overwhelming the genre right now. The unique setting was just [...]]]> Dear Ms. Bridges,

I first encountered your debut novel on NetGalley. I admit I’ve always been fond of historical YA, especially if there’s a paranormal flavor. Your book sounded like the ticket. It was a nice change of pace from the urban fantasies and dystopians overwhelming the genre right now. The unique setting was just icing on the cake.

Katerina Alexandrovna is a young aristocrat in late 19th century Russia. She’s expected to marry rich and marry well and thus, is attending finishing school. The very idea is sheer torture to her. She hates the balls, which she considers to be meat markets. In fact, she’d much rather spend her time studying medical textbooks. Katerina dreams of becoming a doctor even though the profession is considered absolutely out of the question for a woman. Especially a noble one, because what suitable husband would allow his bride to do something so pedestrian as treat the sick and poor?

But Katerina has one little secret: she can raise the dead. Some people would consider it a gift. She thinks it’s a curse and has kept her ability hidden from everyone. After all, it’s abnormal and she doesn’t want to be viewed as a monster. Unfortunately, her gift is discovered and soon Katerina finds herself embroiled in a political conflict between the supernatural forces that rule Russia.

I really enjoyed Katerina as a protagonist, but I admit I have a weakness for heroines who love science. I thought it was a good choice, however, given that this time period in Russia is one characterized by superstition and folk belief. Katerina’s mother depends on her tarot cards and routinely holds séances. In fact, it was at one of these séances that Katerina accidentally discovered that she was a necromancer. But she loves science and the advances in modern medicine. There’s already conflict between her career aspirations and her class. To toss in her ability, which drags her back into old world beliefs is great.

One thing I did have a little trouble following was how the supernatural world overlapped with the Russian court. In this world, the Light and Dark faerie courts battle it out in a political dance of power. Some families are aligned with the Light Court (like the tsar) and others are aligned with the Dark Court. Katerina is, I believe, aligned with the Dark Court due to her family’s social circles. It’d make sense considering the fact that she is a necromancer. But on top of that, there are werewolves (I thought it fairly obvious who the werewolves were) and vampires. So many different kinds of vampires, I lost track of who was important, how, and why. At times, it was a little tough to figure out which characters were allies based on their family ties and which were enemies based on their supernatural ones.

I thought the plotline involving Katerina trying to find a way out of the Montenegro family’s schemes was interesting. After all, who wants to become the sacrifice to make a new living vampire? Certainly not me. On the other hand, I thought the romantic subplot was poorly executed. It was fairly obvious who Katerina would ultimately fall in love with, given the fact that one of the potential suitors is Evil with a capital E. But even though I knew and expected it, I needed something more to go on. It seemed like Katerina went from arguing with and disliking him to realizing she was madly in love in a snap. That transition phase between the two states didn’t entirely come through, in my opinion.

While the ending was a little too heavy-handed in setting up the sequel, I really enjoyed Katerina as a heroine. I’m a big fan of characters that love their family and do everything to protect them, even if it’s a mistake by our standards. I’m interested to see how future books balance her career aspirations, burgeoning powers, and new obligations so I’m definitely on-board for the continuation. B-

My regards,

Jia

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I loved your 2009 book, Scandal, and very much enjoyed Indiscreet, which came out later the same year. So when I learned that you were publishing a new historical called Not Wicked Enough I got excited, and asked Jane if she could send me the ARC. Having now read it, I have [...]]]> Dear Ms. Jewel,

I loved your 2009 book, Scandal, and very much enjoyed Indiscreet, which came out later the same year. So when I learned that you were publishing a new historical called Not Wicked Enough I got excited, and asked Jane if she could send me the ARC. Having now read it, I have mixed feelings about Not Wicked Enough. The novel has quite a bit of elegance and charm, but it’s in a lighter vein than Scandal and Indiscreet and was not quite as satisfying to me.

Lily Wellstone arrives in Bitterward, the home of her widowed friend Ginny, at night and in the middle of a downpour. Occupying the entrance hall is an unsmiling gentleman in rough clothes. Yet despite his ill-fitting attire, Lily correctly identifies him as Ginny’s older brother, the Duke of Mountjoy. Lily and Mountjoy converse and when Lily mentions that she is rarely tired enough to sleep before four in the morning, Mountjoy shows her to the library.

Once there, Mountjoy learns from Lily that she is a wealthy heiress, the owner of Syton House, a very prosperous property, and that she was once disowned by her father for her wild nature. Lily offers to leave Bitterward before Ginny learns of her arrival, but Mountjoy, who finds her uncommonly attractive, welcomes her into his home despite the misgiving that Lily may “disrupt his peaceful country existence.”

Mountjoy is not wrong about that, since Lily proves to be a “managing” kind of woman, a bit like Sophy in Heyer’s The Grand Sophy, but more whimsical and less madcap. Lily likes to take others in hand and assist them in finding happiness by enticing them to have fun.

Lily’s first and foremost project is Ginny, who has been mourning her late husband too long, to a point of isolating herself and not allowing herself to enjoy life. Under Lily’s encouragement, Ginny begins to blossom once more, to wear colors and smile again.

But Lily does not confine herself to amusing Ginny alone, she also engages Mountjoy’s near-fiancée Miss Jane Kirk, and his brother Nigel, in such experiments as writing with glowing (and flammable) phosphorous ink. Which would be bad enough, to Mountjoy’s thinking, even without Jane’s suggestion that she write “Mountjoy has not smiled these seven years.”

Although Mountjoy and Jane are not betrothed, the entire neighborhood, Mountjoy included, expects they eventually will be. That Jane is shy and even fearful in his presence is disconcerting to Mountjoy.

Mountjoy and Lily encounter each other at night, when Lily wanders the house or the gardens because she has difficulty sleeping. The first time they meet in the garden, they kiss and then restrain themselves from succumbing to their mutual attraction.

That same night, Lily shows Mountjoy the medallion she says she received from a gypsy king in thanks for rescuing his dog. The gypsy king promised the medallion would unite its wearer with the person with whom he or she “is happiest in love.” But Lily does not expect that will happen for her, since she has already met that man.

Lily loved and still loves Greer, a soldier she meant to marry who died in the war before their union could come to pass. It’s been five years since Greer’s death, but Lily does not believe she will ever love again. Nonetheless, she still has an appreciation for a man’s body and has not forgotten carnal pleasure.

Thus it happens that Lily and Mountjoy become lovers, although neither of them admits that is what they are. During their nighttime encounters, one thing leads to another, and another, and another. Eventually they become what today would be termed “friends with benefits,” neither intending to fall in love with the other, although they like each other very much.

Lily will never love again. Mountjoy will someday marry Jane. Yes, he should stay away from a gentlewoman who is also his sister’s friend. Yes, she shouldn’t touch her friend’s brother. But when there is so much pleasure to be had, how can they keep their hands to themselves?

Not Wicked Enough has considerable strengths to recommend it. First, the characters are delightful. Lily, for all she takes charge of others’ happiness, is endearing because of her generosity of spirit. Her desire to bring joy to her friends makes her appealing, as well as charismatic and outgoing.

Although she had a lonely childhood, Lily looks forward rather than back, and displays a great deal of strength of character regardless of the occasional moment of vulnerability. Her love of color, clothing, and other beautiful things, her sense of whimsy and adventure make her stand out in Mountjoy’s eyes like a bright, exotic flower.

Mountjoy is just as appealing, though in a subtler way. He was a gentleman farmer who came to prominence when it was discovered he was the heir to a dukedom, but he continues to dress like a gentleman farmer in an attempt to prove something to people who are superficial enough to dismiss him on the basis of his garments.

And that is not the only difference between him and Lily. Whereas she is extroverted, he is shy of crowds and social occasions. While she looks for ways to enjoy life, he is dedicated to hard work. And when she takes risks, he feels protective of her. (I especially appreciated that despite those protective feelings, Mountjoy does not attempt to control Lily but gives her the freedom to be herself. He also acknowledges at times that she is in the right and he is in the wrong.)

The affection between these characters is palpable, for all that it grows out of a physical relationship. Their energetic lovemaking sessions are filled with humor and teasing, and I could see them bonding with each other in a way that reminded me of some of Susan Johnson’s earlier erotic romances.

To add to the novel’s strong points, your writing style has a beautiful clarity that I love. There is smoothness to the writing that made me want to savor the words.

Still, while I liked Not Wicked Enough I found myself reading a few chapters and then putting the book down for the day. The reason, as best as I can articulate it, has to do with the relative absence of either external or internal conflict.

While Mountjoy was almost engaged, his near-betrothal never felt like a real obstacle to me. Although he kept thinking that he ought to propose to Jane, his heart was never in it, and it was also evident that Jane’s affections had settled on someone else.

Yes, Lily believed her own heart belonged with Greer and she could never love another, but since she rarely thought of Greer except to repeat this mantra, it was hard to feel that her disloyalty to Greer ever truly upset her. I also didn’t get much indication of what Greer had been like as a man, so I did not feel that Lily was haunted by her past love.

Additionally, the subplots didn’t have much forward momentum except near the very end of the book. Lily’s cousin the Marquess of Fenris skulks around Bitterward’s neighborhood for much of the story, but doesn’t really reveal his motives until close to the end. Nor do we find out the reasons behind Nigel’s odd behavior any sooner, although I guessed what was going on there early on.

Because of the above, and because Mountjoy and Lily were such good friends and lovers, and clearly got on like a house on fire, I didn’t feel their relationship faced real obstacles. The stakes felt relatively low, and consequently I wasn’t deeply driven to find out what would happen next. I also don’t know how much this book will stick with me. Still, while I read about them, the characters charmed and entertained me, and I enjoyed their sexy relationship and the hours I spent in their company. B-.

Sincerely,

Janine

I was interested to read your debut novel for two reasons. First, I love the title. I’ve always thought being a husband’s harlot is one of the best parts of marriage. (Plus, it reminds me of a classic song, the number one single from 1973, Charlie Rich’s Behind Closed Doors. I’m humming [...]]]> Dear Ms. Callaway,

I was interested to read your debut novel for two reasons. First, I love the title. I’ve always thought being a husband’s harlot is one of the best parts of marriage. (Plus, it reminds me of a classic song, the number one single from 1973, Charlie Rich’s Behind Closed Doors. I’m humming it as I write.) Second, I think it’s impressive you’ve taken your 2010 winning manuscript, (Her Husband’s Harlot was a 2010 Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Finalist) and turned it into a successfully selling novel: It’s currently the 36th most popular Regency romance at Amazon.com and has a five star reader rating.

I enjoyed your book. You utilize a typical regency plot—virginal girl marries sensually experienced and sexually voracious man whose heart she longs to win—and give it an innovative rendering.  I loved the opening scene in which your heroine, the well-bred Lady Helena is wandering the halls of the Nunnery, a high-end London brothel, determined to track down her husband Nicholas and beg him not to consort with whores but to consort with her instead. The two have been married just a month and, after a truly awful experience for both on their wedding night—she practiced “ladylike forbearance” until the moment she screamed in startled pain; he jumped off her, ran out of the room, horrified he’d hurt her—the two barely speak. Helena, though, longs for another chance and so, upon learning Nicholas will be at the bordello this evening, she slips on the clothes of a tart, paints her face, dons a wig and a feathered mask, and goes husband hunting.

She finds him, hidden behind a curtain, watching an exceedingly bawdy threesome. Nicholas has been in sexual hell since his wedding night. He is consumed with lust for his wife, but sees her as too genteel and pure for him. He thinks, after their wedding night, she wants nothing to do with him. But he’s a guy with big needs and even beating off three times a day, while fantasizing about fucking the hell out of Helena, is neither slaking his lust nor assuaging his loneliness. He came to the Nunnery thinking he’d find relief in another woman’s quim, but found, much to his despair, he only wants his wife.

Usually, in romance novels, the hero doesn’t ever have sex with another woman—many romance readers have zero tolerance for unfaithful husbands. In your book, you take a different path and I liked that. When Helena literally bumps into Nicholas, he doesn’t know her. The light is dim—they are swathed in heavy velvet drapes–, she’s wearing a mask and, most importantly, in Nicholas’s mind, Helena is a paragon of virtue; there’s not a chance in hell his highborn, pristine wife would ever be rubbing up against him in a den of vice.

The minute the room is emptied of the threesome, Nicholas jerks Helena into his arms, lays her flat on the nearest table, yanks down her bodice and unbuttons his trousers. He is aflame with desire for this woman who is not his wife. Helena, who got quite an education from watching the ménage a trois, is just as desirous of him. She realizes, though, he doesn’t recognize her, and, afraid he’d condemn her for her wantonness—she speaks to him in French in an altered voice. The two have explosive sex—I love the bawdy language of your sex scenes—after which Nicholas drops a fifty pound note on the table and abruptly leaves.

Nicholas, of course, feels worse than ever after this event. He’s already believes he’s not a worthy spouse for Helena and now he’s gone and fucked a whore while imagining he was defiling his wife. Helena, now that she knows how great marital bliss can be, is more determined than ever to woo her husband. Here again, you don’t take their story down the expected path.

Helena does everything right and Nicholas behaves like an ass to her. She tries to talk with him, works on de-dowding herself, and—I really liked this—gets angry at him when he doesn’t respond pleasantly to her. The nicer she is to him, the nastier he is to her. Normally this dynamic would irritate me, but you make it work. You do a wonderful job of showing why Nicholas thinks he’s so unworthy of Helena.  Nicholas is not from the privileged class. He grew up alone and wretchedly poor in the slums of St. Giles.  He was well on his way to death by noose or starvation when he was given a chance by the owner of a shipping company. Nicholas worked his way up, ethically, to managing the company and when the owner died, he left it to Nicholas to run. Nicholas now has money and a title, but he still sees himself as the abused boy he once was. He’s consumed with shame for things done to him and the things he did in his vile past.  You write Nicholas’s shame so believably—he may be crippled by it, but you give him just enough emotional flexibility for the reader to believe it’s possible for him to change.

You also do a nice job of making Helena a credible character. She may be from the ton with snotty parents, but she really doesn’t care that Nicholas isn’t from her class. She was thrilled when he courted her and has always found him incredibly attractive. She really doesn’t understand why he doesn’t seem to want her anymore—she knew nothing about sex and thought what happened on their wedding night portended permanent problems. Once she goes to the Nunnery, and experiences successful coitus, she sees sex as a way to connect with her husband. It’s not, however, the only way she tries to forge a bond between them. She asks him about his work, invites herself to meet the Fines (they are the family of the shipping company owner and are as close to family as Nicholas has), and pleads with him to socialize with her. She sees what works, what doesn’t, and adjusts her behavior accordingly. I liked that she works so hard to get her husband to be with her but she never acts in any way that is debasing or untrue to whom she is.

I appreciated the emotional relationship between Nicholas and Helena. I liked the way it evolved and how, over time, both Nicholas and Helena began to trust and rely on one another. I also really liked their sex life. Your sex scenes are incredibly graphic and your characters use fairly blunt, even brutal language, as they couple.  Nicholas is such a sexual person—the way he speaks in bed is the way he thinks out of bed. And Helena has, from the beginning of the book, wanted to become her husband’s harlot. For her, listening to Nicholas ask her if she wants his cock and being able to say yes is an affirmation that all she’s worked for is hers.

I did feel that Nicholas’s self-loathing went on longer than it needed to, but this is a small quibble. In general, I loved the romance in your romance.

I wasn’t as engaged in the suspense plot that comprises a great deal of your book. You have Nicholas being anonymously threatened by some unknown villain. Nicholas keeps getting notes that threaten to tell the truth about his past. This extra level of threat seemed overkill to me. Nicholas is already consumed with fear that if Helena knew what he’d been, she’d be disgusted and repulsed. When he uses the possible blackmail to distance himself further from Helena, it felt heavy handed to me. I also had a hard time caring who was behind the notes and, as the book progresses, the criminal activity at Nicholas’s shipping company. For me, the relationship between Nicholas and Helena was so interesting, I was somewhat resentful when you took the focus off of the two of them and put it on bad guys at the docks.

All in all, though, this is a good book. It’s the kind of debut novel that gives me faith your next book will be even better.  It seems possible the next book will be about Helena’s friend Marianne. (She helps Helena get into the Nunnery in the first place.) She was a great secondary character and I hope to read more about her.

So, again, congratulations. Her Husband’s Harlot is a pleasing, out of the ordinary read.  I enjoyed finding out what went on behind closed doors in your book—it was nice to watch Helena become her husband’s harlot!

Thanks,

Dabney

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I liked the poetic nature of the title given that this book kind of closes the door on the Black Ops, Inc., or BOIs, crew. Joe Green is indeed the last man standing of the group. The other living members have all fallen in love and had a happy ending. Joe’s done [...]]]> Dear Ms. Gerard:

I liked the poetic nature of the title given that this book kind of closes the door on the Black Ops, Inc., or BOIs, crew. Joe Green is indeed the last man standing of the group. The other living members have all fallen in love and had a happy ending. Joe’s done the falling in love part. He can’t stay away from Stephanie Tompkins. But the happy ever after ending is eluding them, primarily because Joe is driven to seek justice for the death of his best friend, Bryan Tompkins, Stephanie’s older brother.

This leads him to Sierra Leone, a cell, and certain death. Stephanie, a code breaker at the NSA, sees a picture of Joe, beaten. Under the photo is a notation that he was arrested for the slaying of a Sacred Heart priest. Stephanie calls on the BOIs to get Joe out but the team is deployed on a deep undercover mission with no communication. Rafe is manning the home base but is recovering from a severe bout of malaria. He tells Stephanie to wait until the team comes back, a week, maybe ten days. Stephanie believes that Joe will not make it ten days and flies to Sierra Leone. Help comes in the form of a teenage boy who Joe saved. Together they work to get Joe and Stephanie out of Sierra Leone to safety.

The setup worked for me. Stephanie is out of her mind in love with Joe and she wasn’t going to leave him in a Sierra Leone prison to die alone. While a number of coincidences, or conveniences may be the better word for it, occur to aid Stephanie in freeing Joe and escaping with him, Stephanie never acted TSTL. In fact, she demonstrated for Joe a certain type of strength he hadn’t seen in her before.

I’ve really enjoyed this series and reading Last Man Standing was bittersweet for me and maybe it was for you as the author. The tone of the book seemed regretful. Joe wanted Stephanie, loved her, but he didn’t love her enough to be with her. Instead, he had to seek out the truth behind Bryan’s death, a truth he believes implicates someone wealthy and powerful. Stephanie loved Joe more than anything. She’d do anything for him, including following him to a hellhole in Sierra Leone.

Joe says to Stephanie when he leaves her that he doesn’t love her, not enough. And frankly there is a ring of truth to that even though Joe would deny it. He characterizes his departure as being weak, succumbing to the pleasures of Stephanie’s flesh where the better man would have resisted and broken it off with her long ago, knowing that he could never commit. But I did view Joe as not loving Stephanie enough or maybe he was scared of loving her.

Even though I admired Joe and his dedication, there were several points where I wanted to tell Stephanie that she was just too good for him. But her dogged pursuit of Joe and her refusal to accept him pushing her aside won her the man she wanted in the end and that is kind of kick ass all on its own.

What does happen is that Joe begins to see that Stephanie isn’t the frail, weak kneed girl he must have thought her to be. She blows his mind (and well she should). I never could figure out if Joe was falling in love with a new Stephanie, whether Stephanie blossomed under dire circumstances, or whether Joe was simply blind to the kind of person that Stephanie always was. I think it was the last one. Joe was so caught up in his own mission that he couldn’t see the gentle but determined woman that Stephanie was.

Even though this was the last in a long line of books, I definitely think that a reader could pick this up and not be lost. There aren’t many appearances of the other BOIs until late in the book. The focus is primarily on Stephanie and Joe. B-

Best regards,

Jane

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Which shattered Lauren Russell’s perfectly ordered life. Lauren’s new neighbors were about to see the Southern lifestyle columnist’s temper! Then she met Cole Donovan, the sexy single dad. He was not the man from her husband list; he was too tall, too sexy—and definitely had too many kids! But somehow, [...]]]>

“It started with a baseball…

Which shattered Lauren Russell’s perfectly ordered life. Lauren’s new neighbors were about to see the Southern lifestyle columnist’s temper! Then she met Cole Donovan, the sexy single dad. He was not the man from her husband list; he was too tall, too sexy—and definitely had too many kids! But somehow, looking into his blue, blue eyes, she forgot all that….

Lauren was too elegant, too prim and didn’t understand that his three rambunctious kids were the focus of his life. But his tempting neighbor smelled delicious, looked luscious and cooked like a dream. Cole wasn’t looking for a wife, but he couldn’t stay away from Lauren. Was it a recipe for disaster—or marriage?”

Dear Ms. Winstead Jones,

There still sure are a lot of Harlequin authors who I haven’t tried yet and it just happened to be your newest book which caught my eye next. My own house is a disaster and my cooking – though I love to do it – often depends on how many pots and pans I’m willing to get dirty at a time. I envy people who can look into their pantries and whip up something scrumptious from what’s there so Lauren’s profession called to me. Then it’s also kind of fun to watch an ordered person’s world upended and it appeared that these three children would accomplish that. And who isn’t interested in sexy? So, selection made I got to reading.

Cole and Lauren begin to interact almost cautiously. Neither had counted on meeting the other, both have lives and plans and they take things fairly slowly, get to know each other and establish a foundation before jumping into bed. They get to like each other before they start to love each other. They’ve also dated in the past and are open to possible relationships. This is important to me because I don’t like characters who fixate on one past love to the exclusion of all others. I’ve just read that trope too often. Here, Cole and Lauren seem like fairly normal, well adjusted adults.

The three children also come across as such. They’re definitely not plot moppets and are neither perfect, lisping angels nor spawn from out of a nightmare. They run around, they play, they like to eat fish sticks and don’t want to brush their teeth. The’re also intelligent and view their dad’s relationships in the way young children would – how the dates would affect them. I especially think Meredith’s character is well drawn as a young woman on the verge of growing up but who’s still got a bit of maturing left.

A major thing I like about the book is that both Cole and Lauren don’t immediately dissolve in a puddle of lust. In fact, despite noticing each other’s better physical qualities, they remain relatively in control until after quite a few meetings. When things do heat up, they sizzle yet at the same time there’s a degree of humor that had me laughing such as the first time Cole arrives at Lauren’s house and sex is on the agenda.

“Reality intruded like a splash of ice water. “Oh, tell me you came prepared.” When she’d thought about not overthinking, that hadn’t meant they shouldn’t think at all.
His voice was raspy as he responded, “Do I not look prepared?”
She smiled, touched him, leaned in so her breasts rested against him. He was so warm. Almost hot. “A condom, Cole. Please tell me…”
He squatted and reached into the back pocket of his jeans, pulling out three wrapped condoms. A baby monitor and a three-pack. He was most certainly prepared.”

I do like some humor with my sex. Some smiles along with the sparks. And things were going well until the last minute additions of Complications to the mix combined with the panic button pushing done by both Cole and Lauren. One person sounding the “I’m not sure I’m ready for this” alarm is understandable but when they both did it, it was too much. This followed by the quick realization by both of them that they’d messed up all seemed too much like plot manipulations and running out of space rather than the natural flow of a relationship.

This slight hiccup is somewhat redeemed by a good, solid ending. Both Cole and Lauren have come to their senses, they talk and it doesn’t appear that Lauren is ready to throw over her career to be a baby maker. The children and adults are all on the same page about the relationship and things look good without an immediate frog march down the aisle to show how deliriously in love everyone is. Overall, I’m impressed with “The Husband Recipe” and have added you to my list of watched authors. B-

~Jayne

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At first impression, your debut novel is a YA paranormal. It has a lot of the trappings. After a life-changing event, a girl develops unusual abilities. She has to choose between a couple guys. But I think applying that label and reducing it to those tropes does it an injustice. This is [...]]]> Dear Ms. Miranda,

At first impression, your debut novel is a YA paranormal. It has a lot of the trappings. After a life-changing event, a girl develops unusual abilities. She has to choose between a couple guys. But I think applying that label and reducing it to those tropes does it an injustice. This is one of those cases where the whole is more than the sum of its parts.

Delaney Maxwell is just a regular high school student. She’s the top of her class and aims to be valedictorian. She’s not athletic and dare I say it, is a bit clumsy. She’s best friends with her next-door neighbor and childhood friend, Decker, but their relationship has been tense since he caught her making out with his guy friend. All in all, it’s an ordinary life.

Then one day, she falls through the ice covering a frozen lake. Delaney’s rescued but she was under for 11 minutes. In fact, she was clinically dead. Nearly a week later, she wakes up from a coma to find her life changed. Her brain is so damaged, she shouldn’t even be functional. And yet she walks and talks with no difficulties at all.

But despite surviving her brush with death, Delaney’s life starts to fall apart. The accident reveals the faults in her relationship with her mother. The tensions with Decker come to a head. And inexplicably, she’s drawn to death. And I don’t mean figuratively. She gains the ability to tell when someone is about to die. This dawning realization misleads her parents into thinking their daughter is going crazy.

Then Delaney meets Troy, an older guy who also had a brush with death and spent some time in a coma. He shares her ability to sense death. Desperate for someone to understand what she’s going through, Delaney begins to spend more time with him. But the more she gets to know him, the more she realizes that shared experiences don’t always mean same perspectives and Troy’s outlook on life may be a bit darker.

I was surprised by this book. In an extremely good way. I went in expecting a pleasant read and instead got a thought-provoking story about life, death, and all that comes with it. The novel has a very powerful message, one that I both appreciate and find beautiful.

Delaney is a great protagonist. She’s very real and very flawed. I liked how driven she was to excel academically and how her confusing relationship with Decker showed all the insecurities a teenage girl may have. I found her voice very engrossing:

There are certain things kids must know depending on where they grow up. When my parents took me to Manhattan last summer, I saw kids half my age navigating the subway while Dad squinted at the map on the wall, tracing the colored lines with his finger. Maybe kids in the desert can drain the water from a cactus. I don’t know. But here in northern Maine, we know how to treat hypothermia, we know how t o prevent frostbite, and we know how to rescue someone who has fallen through the ice.

The description of how Delaney was rescued from the ice was very visceral, even secondhand as Fracture is told in first person POV and other people told her what happened. I could easily imagine Decker’s panic. I could see the other kids calling the police and running for help.

I loved the relationship between Delaney and Decker. They’ve known each other since they were kids when Decker declared that he would make her smile. Even her mother used to babysit him. There’s a familiarity in their exchanges that only comes with time.

“Let’s go out for lunch,” he said.

“Can’t. I’m studying French.”

“Seriously? French over food?” Decker didn’t take French (Spanish was more useful, he said). I held the receiver between my shoulder and chin and didn’t stop writing.

“Call Monday after the precalc final.”

“You can’t take a thirty-minute break?”

“I have three words for you, Decker: four point oh.”

“Yeah, well, I have three letters for you: C. P. R. “

Delaney and Decker are stuck in relationship limbo. Until the couch incident with Decker’s friend, she’s never had any real attention from other guys. She knows Decker is more important to her than that of merely a friend but she’s afraid of taking the next step. When you’ve known someone for so long, all the little incidents and minor occurrences that happen over the course of that relationship can add up and do a number on your confidence. I can definitely sympathize with Delaney here.

Similarly, you can tell Decker has feelings for Delaney, even from her point of view, but he doesn’t seem to know how to climb over that “Just a friend” wall. To say that Delaney’s near-death experience shakes him up is an understatement. He didn’t know how to handle the possibility that Delaney might never have woken up from her coma, and he’s frustrated that there are so many things he now doesn’t understand about his best friend.

I thought the depiction of Delaney’s family was really well done. Her accident revealed a lot of family secrets about her mother’s background and parents. Prior to the accident, Delaney never would have thought to question or wonder about these things because she’d never had a hint of their existence. We’re clearly shown how her mother’s past and relationship with her parents affect her relationship with Delaney. And even though it’s told through Delaney’s eyes, we see her mother’s panic over the possibility of losing her daughter in more ways than one.

Above all, though, I liked how this novel explores death and reinforces the idea that you must seize life because you never know which day will be your last. Accidents happen all the time and you can’t control them, no matter how much you may try. Life is both random and cruel. Someone who should die doesn’t, and someone who shouldn’t die does. Delaney tries to come to peace with this fact. Troy, on the other hand, has let it poison him:

“This, this” — he waved his arms around his body, trying to capture the entirety of Earth in his gesture– “is a punishment.”

“For what?”

“For me, for driving that goddamn car off the road.” My stomach clenched. That hadn’t been in the article. “For getting stuck. For killing my entire family. For not being able to help them. God wouldn’t let me die. So, you tell me, what did you do? Why didn’t you get to die?”

Decker didn’t let me die, only he didn’t do it out of hate. But I didn’t tell Troy that. I let him keep his grief. It was all he had left of them.”

Fracture is less paranormal and more medical mystery. We don’t know why Delaney appears normal despite the amount of brain damage she received. And truthfully, we never learn why because the human body is more complicated than that. Yes, she gains the ability to predict death but that’s not really the point. Society in general fears death but if you’ve lived a long, fruitful life, what is there to be afraid of exactly? I really enjoyed this story of how one life-changing accident reveals all the fault lines in our relationships and in our life, and I’m looking forward to your next novel, whatever it may be. B+

My regards,
Jia

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I always seem to be behind in keeping up with this series but I think it’s because I want to be sure I have a Pink Carnation book on hand. And in this instance it worked beautifully for me. You see, I’ve been in a reading slump for it seems like ages [...]]]> Dear Ms Willig,

I always seem to be behind in keeping up with this series but I think it’s because I want to be sure I have a Pink Carnation book on hand. And in this instance it worked beautifully for me. You see, I’ve been in a reading slump for it seems like ages (actually about 3 months) and “The Orchid Affair” is what I needed to finally pull out of it. So thank you for doing me such a service. Now, on to our regularly scheduled review:

Miss Laura Gray has been a governess for sixteen years and is convinced that if she doesn’t do something different now, that this is all she will ever be. Her chance arrives when she is recruited by the Pink Carnation. After a short stint at the Selwick spy school, she leaves on her first assignment. Her job is to take a position in the household of Andre Jaouen who is the right hand man of Bonaparte’s minister of police. True she’s pretending to be a governess for his two young children, but if she does well perhaps her next assignment will be something a tad more exciting.

However, she has to survive this job first and things begin to get dicey after she’s recognized by an old friend of her deceased parents. Is Antoine Daubier merely a friend of her employer or is there something else going on here? Should Laura be worried that Gaston Delaroche, Andre’s sinister colleague, knows not only the names of Andre’s children but hers as well? And who is behind the Royalist plot to remove the First Consul and restore the monarchy? Laura wanted exciting but maybe merely interesting would have been a better wish.

I’ll start by saying that there are some details about the book and its setup that don’t make a great deal of sense and are perhaps best skimmed over. How was Laura discovered and recruited? Why was Andre willing to bring someone new into his household given what was going on? And though I know that the Treaty of Amiens was still in effect during the timeframe of this novel, how are two so obviously English people as Miss Wooliston and Mr. Whittlesby so accepted in the circle of the First Consul’s family? After pondering these questions a bit, I realized that to continue was to not only invite a headache but to also ruin the story for me.

Laura Gray – or Laure Griscogne since she decides to use her real French name while on the assignment – is a great heroine. She’s intelligent, she’s resourceful, she thinks quickly and acts decisively yet she’s not a typical “kick ass” woman. She has been trained – a little – in self defense and how to use weapons but she rarely relies on this. Instead, she acts like the best spies do and that’s to blend in and not attract attention. Sixteen years of blending and being “gray” for lack of a better word serve her well. She’s also not all angsty. Life hasn’t treated her spectacularly well – she lost her parents at age sixteen and has fended for and survived on her own since then – but she doesn’t weep and wail about it and, when the opportunity appears, she takes a chance to change things.

Andre is more complicated than he might initially appear. Laura’s first impression is of a cold, matter-of-fact man who doesn’t suffer fools gladly. As her time in the household passes, she sees a man who loves his children even if he might not think he knows how to show that. She also discovers that he isn’t at all what she or her superiors believe him to be. She – and I too – wonder how can this be? Here is a man who has been dedicated to the changes that have taken place in France over the past fourteen years. A man who worked to bring about those changes. So, why is he doing what he’s doing? The way you have him explain it to Laura makes sense. He is a man who wants a better future for his country and, especially, for his children. But he also wants a stable world for them. Since he isn’t a swashbuckling man-of-action, he works for this end in his own way.

I like their relationship. They aren’t flamboyant people and the way they fall in love is slowly and gently. When the misunderstanding arrives, it’s not really a Big Mis and it doesn’t derail their feelings. Instead of a “you betrayed me you beyotch!” scene, there is initial astonishment followed by thought and a reconciliation.

The tension and atmosphere of the novel is excellent. I can feel the cold, wet damp of Paris in the winter. Likewise, the ravaged Hotel de Bac echoes its past glory and sulks in its present gloom. The feeling of political change is in the air as the fervor of the Revolution has almost died down and the status quo is shifting. But there are still throwbacks to recent past methods of dealing with dissension. Andre might not enjoy putting suspects to The Question as much as does Delaroche but he still gets results for his superiors. He is, after all, a practical man who does what is needed to try and bring about the changes he wishes to see take place. It all makes sense given the way you’ve developed the plot and the characters.

The modern portion of the book doesn’t interest me or hold my attention as much as you’d probably like it to. This relationship and Eloise’s research is moving so slowly – glaciers move more quickly – that when it pops up, I feel more impatient to get back to the main action than any burning desire to know about what is going on with her and Colin.

A heroine who is strong in a “period” way, a beta hero who comes to love and admire her for who she is as well as being strong in his own non-flashy way, two children who I haven’t really discussed much but who don’t annoy me – and that’s saying a lot from me, the slow building to a bang up finish and a wrap up that doesn’t require a gooey sweet epilogue means I like this book a lot. Good job and I’m looking forward to the next installment which hopefully I’ll get to sooner than I did for this one. B

~Jayne

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Players’ Club: Scott

The Players’ Club is an urban legend of men jetting around [...]]]> This post reviews all three Players’ Club books, two of which are available now and one which is set to be released digitally on February 1, 2012. I will say that if you read one, you’ll have to read them all.

Players’ Club: Scott

The Players’ Club is an urban legend of men jetting around the world, throwing amazing parties, playing huge pranks, or so Scott Ferrell  thinks, but when he stumbles upon the monthly meeting he refuses to leave until they reveal the truth to him.  The Player’s Club was formed by two friends named Lincoln and Finn and they ask one question: “When was the last time you did something that made you feel as though your life was worth getting out of bed for? ”

Scott can’t recall. His life is okay but he’s never really asserted himself.   His co workers think he’s dull.  His last girlfriend dumped him for being too nice.  The Player’s Club offers Scott an opportunity to push his boundaries.  The problem is that his cute neighbor, Amanda,  was on the fire escape watching the same shenanigans as he was and when pressed, Scott admits to the existence of the Player’s Club to impress her.  And it does.  Amanda is a planner.  She is never without a list and a clear idea of where she wants to be tomorrow but ristk taker she is not.  Scott and his introduction into the Player’s Club gives her a chance to experience some risk, within boundaries.

The two get swept up in the Player’s Club until they aren’t sure whether their emotion for each other is from this emotional high of risk taking or something deeper.  There was something charming about the lack of smoothness in Scott and Amanda’s interactions.  They both are nice people but their niceness has been perceived as a weakness.  In trying to remake himself, Scott becomes something else: “He’d been so worried about not being a ‘nice guy’—so intent on being the badass he thought Amanda wanted—that he’d become the opposite. Selfish, insensitive. Cruel. ”

Amanda had to find a backbone and Scott had to discover how you could be a nice guy and still get the girl.  It was a fun and sweet story, albeit driven by a hokey concept of a rich man’s frat club.  B-

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Players’ Club: Lincoln

This story read to me about the redemption of socialite, Juliana Mayfield, whose entire worth is wrapped up in being famous. She learns to let go of fame, to be a person of worth based upon her own actions (and not the measurement of others).   Talking with Sarah Wendell about this book in our podcast leads me to believe that how much a reader likes this book depends a lot upon how they view Juliana. I liked Juliana’s redemptive path but Sarah did not. The unhappy socialite is no different to me that the world weary billionaire which is a standard staple of romance.  Juliana decides that she’ll infiltrate The Player’s Club and try to sell the reality tv version of it because Juliana has no money and this is her last ploy to stay relevant.

Part of why I liked this story is because Juliana knows that her search for fame is empty but she doesn’t feel like she has any other options. Of course she does, but at the beginning of the book she can’t see those options.  That’s not the worldview everyone around her, including her dilettante parents, holds.  Over the course of getting to know The Players’ Club, particularly Lincoln and another new initiate, Juliana begins to see how truly empty her quest to remain with the “in” crowd is.

Lincoln I liked less.  Lincoln was wealthy and viewed Juliana with contempt.  He treated her as if she wasn’t worth being the gum under his shoe, yet he couldn’t wait to take her to bed.  I have little appreciation for men like that.  At some point, the tables turn. Juliana becomes sympathetic and Lincoln begins to realize his assumptions about Juliana might be incorrect.  C+

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Players’ Club: Finn

This was my least favorite but mostly because I felt like Finn was a rich guy without a clue. I didn’t understand his unhappiness.  He had it all.  A ton of money.  Great friends. As many women as he could want.  Yet, he was disenchanted with life and began taking increasing risks in his adventures.  His father sends in the family lawyer to rescue Finn from himself.  Diana has spent her adult life trying to repay Finn’s father for the chance that he gave her.  She’s the fixer for the family and this time it is Finn that needs fixing.  Diana is portrayed as the Hard Ass Asian, kind of Tiger Mom wannabe, which I loved.  What I was frustrated by was that the HA Asian portrayal wasn’t internally consistent (maybe this is because Diana is only half Chinese?)  When Diana was having all these soft moments in the middle of the book, I might have yelled, err, raised my voice at the portrayal.  HA Asian wouldn’t be crying all the time. HA Asian’s don’t cry!!

Diana’s early breakdowns diminished the tension and build up that could have been.  If she had held on to her emotions until the penultimate scene (before the denouement) when she would realize that her course of action would lead to loneliness and that her obligation had been fulfilled, then the outpouring would have been so much more powerful.  Instead, I felt that it was a cop out, as if a heroine can’t be hard, cold, and resisting whereas a hero can.  My dislike for this story may be more about how I wanted the story to read rather than a failure of the story to deliver but in the end, I have to give it a C.

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Samuel [...]]]>

“There was a time when Julia Stanton’s fondest wish was to be Samuel Ward’s wife. But that was before the war. As pro-Confederacy sentiments clash with the Union troops occupying Baltimore, fear and suspicion turn friends to foes. Julia chooses the Confederacy…Samuel does not. And his decision is one she’s sure she’ll never forgive.

Samuel would gladly give his life for Julia. Still, he cannot go against the certainty he feels that slavery is wrong—even after his beliefs cost him Julia’s love. Yet as they work to comfort a city in turmoil, Samuel prays God’s guidance will lead them to common ground. For where there is courage and faith, two divided hearts may come together once more….”

Dear Ms. Farrington,

Since this is the beginning of the sesquicentennial of the US Civil War, I’ve been meaning to read more books which use it as a theme. Yours caught my attention since it’s set at the very start of the conflict and shows a side of the War that I’ve not read about in romance novels yet – that of neutral Maryland which was caught between North and South with Washington, DC on her border. It also shows people forced to decide on their convictions in the conflict as it came home to everyone – not just those in the deep South and slave holders. Even people who didn’t think they had a dog in the race found out that they had to choose on whether they supported ALL states rights or not. At this early point in the war, it’s strange to see Federal troops still enforcing laws about slaves held in Baltimore. I also liked the glimpse of how little the Union troops wanted to be there and that they weren’t the monsters which Julia and the other Baltimore citizens expected.

Most people in Baltimore were more concerned that their city was being invaded and taken over and threatened by Union troops than about slavery. They felt city was under siege. Sam is right in protesting the actions of men in city to tear up railroad lines and impede the travel of troops to the South as the North would never have permitted it. I’d heard of the suspension of habeas corpus but this is a great depiction of how shocked people were when the reality of the suspension was experienced. Life in wartime came to roost here long before many other places.

The book has a good period feel what with the heat they endure and Julia’s bonnets and hooped dresses. The descriptions of Fort McHenry make me want to check out some photos and learn more about it. And I’m so glad I don’t have to worry about chopping wood – though that’s a nice way to show the “guy” way Sam deals with his concern for Julia – he does something for her which he knows needs doing – like a modern hero changing his heroine’s snow tires. The men are so protective of their women though it doesn’t feel as if it’s a smothering concern or condescending one. Since Sam and Julia are already in love, you center the conflict between them on what was going on in their city and throughout the country.

Kudoes for Sam accepting Julia’s initial decision to break off their engagement and for him not to try and strong arm her back into it. He respects her, her opinion and knows that she must make up her own mind. Of course he’s not above using some powerful persuasion in the form of Frederick Douglass’s book and her own experiences with the two young slave boys they encounter, or the plight of the runaway young woman. These are worth years of trying to persuade her on his own. Though they might start out by not liking Federal troops in Baltimore or arbitrary justice, after Sally and Julia read the book their eyes are finally opened to the fact that slavery is wrong and can’t be allowed to continue.

I’d say the story is a 7/10 on the religion scale but that’s to be expected for that day and age when religion and church going were more a part of daily life, there was a war looming and the fact that Federal soldiers were in Baltimore and young men had chosen to join sides in the conflict – religious people would turn more to prayer.

You scattered a few other unresolved relationships throughout the book so I hope that you’ll return to this setting to finish those up. I enjoyed my time with Sam and Julia and of this glimpse of a different angle on the beginning of a war that altered the US forever and for the better. B+

~Jayne

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I love your books. Whether it’s under this pseudonym or Michelle Sagara, I make sure to read them all. It’s true that I find some more satisfying than others but I’ve never actually regretted picking any of them up. Given my growing disenchantment with the fantasy genre as a whole, this is [...]]]> Dear Ms. West,

I love your books. Whether it’s under this pseudonym or Michelle Sagara, I make sure to read them all. It’s true that I find some more satisfying than others but I’ve never actually regretted picking any of them up. Given my growing disenchantment with the fantasy genre as a whole, this is a major point in your favor. So thank you for offering an early look at your latest fantasy novel. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to get to it sooner and it in no way reflects upon the book or your writing. It’s all on me.

Skirmish is the fourth novel in the House War series, which follows the adventures of Jewel Markess ATerafin, a young woman who spent her early years living in the poorest slums of the capital before being adopted into the most powerful noble house of the empire. You see, Jewel is a seer and at the age of fifteen, she helped avert a demonic invasion. Her ability makes her very valuable.

The first three novels of this series cover Jewel’s life before she was adopted into House Terafin. This novel jumps forward in time to when Jewel is an adult and is a member of the House Council. She has just returned from the Southern kingdom of Annagar and the war that is reaching its climax there. (That story is covered in a previous 6-book series, The Sun Sword, which I highly recommend.) The Terafin’s leader has just been assassinated by demons, casting the house into chaos. In this world, house leadership is not hereditary. The leader earns it — by political savvy, by forming allies, and yes, by murder.

The Terafin was one of the most important people in Jewel’s life. But she also knows what her dead mentor wanted: for Jewel take up the title of Terafin and become the next leader of the House. The only reason why no one else knows this is because the last heir the Terafin chose was assassinated and Jewel is far too valuable to be put in danger like that.

But Jewel doesn’t want to think about games of power and the responsibility of leadership. She just wants three days to bury and mourn for the woman she respected most. Unfortunately, that luxury may not exist. If demons were responsible for the Terafin’s death, then that means others must be around. More importantly, Jewel’s power and abilities have begun to awaken, affecting the lands within Terafin property and beyond.

Given that not only is this the fourth book of a series, which in turn is connected to other series, this is absolutely not the best place to start for a new reader. I wish I could say otherwise, considering how weary of series people can be but I would hate for a reader to pick this up and think it’d work well without any context. It won’t. Along those lines, I’m also not completely sure someone who hasn’t read the Sun Sword series will pick up some of the nuances in this one. So this is a major caveat for new and unfamiliar readers.

All that said, however, I really enjoyed this book. I’ve been waiting a long time to see what happens after the events covered by The Sun Sword and finally, we have it. This is a very political book. While there are clashes with demons, longtime readers know that knock ‘em and drag ‘em out fights never figure prominently in your books. But even though I love fight scenes, I also love political intrigue. I can see readers who don’t care for that subgenre not being so thrilled with it, but it was very satisfying for me. I especially liked learning more about Haval and his past with Duvari. It makes me even more curious about Jarven. I found all those interactions extremely interesting.

A good chunk of the book is spent exploring the limits of Jewel’s abilities which, as we discover, extend far beyond precognition. It was very fantastical and as a reader who’s getting a little bored with the GRRM brand of gritty, “realistic” fantasy, I enjoyed it quite a bit. I do like a little — or a lot — of magic in my fantasy from time to time and I thought this filled a lack I hadn’t realized I’d been feeling. In addition, the talking cats (a staple of science fiction and fantasy) were hilarious.

I know the book covers a relatively short time period so there probably wasn’t room for it, but I would have liked to see Jewel interact more with the people who had officially declared for the seat. She interacts with Marrick at the end but not so much with the others. This goes back to what I was saying earlier: longtime readers will be familiar with the pre-existing relationships but new readers, or even readers who’ve only read this series and not Sun Sword, will not fully grasp the bad blood involving Rymark and Harraed.

A surprising thing I liked was the relationship between Jewel and Angel. I’d never really gotten a handle on Angel in previous novels and only began to understand him in this series. In Skirmish, we really see his devotion to Jewel and his utter disregard for anything not related to her.

In many ways, this is a book about grief. In the end, the dead don’t care about the actions of the living. They’re dead. How can they care? It’s a loss of innocence for Jewel in many ways but it’s also an important lesson for her to learn, especially if she’s to succeed in gaining control of the House.

I feel like this review is short for a book in which I thought a quite a bit happened, but on the other hand, there’s a lot of spoilers involved too and those events should be uncovered on their own. I admit that after the last book, I was growing impatient for us to move along already and I think many other readers felt the same way. I like to think they’ll be as pleased with this installment as I am. I’m glad we’re back in the present, no longer expanding on the past, and I hope we get to see serious struggles for House control in the next book. B+

My regards,
Jia

Previous books in this series: The Hidden City, City of Night, House Name (review)

Kushiel’s Dart, your fantasy novel, is the story of Phedre, who begins life in the Night Court of Terre D’Ange. The Night Court is peopled by prostitutes, known in this world as Servants of Naamah, the goddess of such things.

Terre D’Ange is modeled on Renaissance France, but with some substantial differences, [...]]]> Dear Ms. Carey,

Kushiel’s Dart, your fantasy novel, is the story of Phedre, who begins life in the Night Court of Terre D’Ange. The Night Court is peopled by prostitutes, known in this world as Servants of Naamah, the goddess of such things.

Terre D’Ange is modeled on Renaissance France, but with some substantial differences, including a religion worshipping an angel/god named Blessed Elua, believed to be a child of the messiah’s blood and the Magdelene’s tears, and Elua’s companions, angels who left Heaven to accompany Elua in his journey and peopled Terre D’Ange along the way.

Young Phedre is “a whore’s unwanted get” and at a very young age, she is sold to Cereus House, one of the Night Court Houses. Although she is brought up and trained there in her early years, the Dowayne who runs Ceresus House does not intend that Phedre remain there. Phedre has a blemish, a red mote in one of her eyes, which makes her flawed, and therefore she is not considered perfect enough for Cereus House.

The Dowayne plans to sell Phedre’s “marque” – her worth, which Phedre will eventually have to earn back and spend on having a design tattooed on her back. When the design (the physical marque) is complete, Phedre will be free, belonging only to herself, but until then she’ll have to work for the house or person to whom the Dowayne sells her marque.

Phedre slips away from Cereus House briefly and meets with a boy named Hyacinthe, whose mother is a fortune telling member of the Tsingani, a nation of travelers. Hyacinthe becomes Phedre’s only friend.

One day Phedre is called before a man named Anafiel Delaunay, who identifies the red mote in her eye as something other than a flaw. It is “Kushiel’s dart” the mark of Elua’s companion Kushiel, and it identifies Phedre as an anguissette, someone who experiences pain – not just sexual pain, but any kind of physical or emotional pain — as pleasure.

Delaunay purchases Phedre’s marque and when she is ten years old, she leaves Cereus House and comes to live with Delaunay as his pupil. Delaunay has another pupil, a beautiful boy named Alcuin. At Delaunay’s house, Phedre and Alcuin learn how to carefully observe, how to think, and also study languages and geography. They have a tutor who trains them in sexual arts as well and in their teens they become prostitute-spies for Delaunay.

Phedre does not know why Delaunay needs the information she learns from her patrons, but she strives to get it for him and sometimes succeeds. Although her patrons know she is Delaunay’s spy, they succumb to her sexual wiles to such a degree that they occasionally forget themselves.

The only one who does not is Melisande Sharizai, a peer of the realm and acquaintance of Delaunay’s whose purposes are different from his. Melisande is clever and seductive, always three steps ahead of Phedre, and Phedre can’t help but love her.

Throughout the early part of the book, a tragedy is foreshadowed, and when it finally comes, the course of Phedre’s life changes. Now Phedre must find a way not only to triumph over what has befallen her, but to save Terre D’Ange as well.

I started out Kushiel’s Dart having several issues with the first hundred or so pages of this long book. The prose, on the flowery side, took a lot of getting used to. My husband and I read the book aloud to each other and for a long while we stumbled over some of the phrasing, and weren’t sure how to pronounce many of the characters’ names.

In addition, the use of Hebrew names and phrases sounded odd and jarring to me as a native speaker of that language. For example at one point the opening phrase of Jewish prayers is used as a greeting by a Yeshuite (Christ-worshipping) character to another person. This phrase is (A) traditionally addressed to God, and I have never heard it used to address another person or spoken outside of prayers, and (B) is used in Jewish, not Christian prayers. So I was pulled out of the story by this usage, and by the part-Hebrew names.

Some aspects of the religion took getting used to, but I did very much appreciate that there was a religion, since it is something that lends depth to the worldbuilding.

Speaking of worldbuilding, I was confused about how the marque system worked. Phedre’s marque was purchased by Delaunay from Cereus House, and she had to earn the money to buy it back from him by paying to have it tattooed on her back. But Alcuin also had to buy his marque back and have it tattooed, yet Delaunay had never purchased Alcuin’s marque to begin with. Alcuin had been given into his care.

The first hundred or so pages also made for frustrating reading because Phedre was studying sex and spying but not actually engaging in these activities. Once Phedre began sleeping with her patrons, the story improved because she was finally spying, and because I appreciated that unlike in many other fantasy novels, where bedroom doors remain closed, here we got actual sex scenes.

A few of my problems with the book were more significant. I was unsure whether the anguissette premise made sense because wouldn’t an anguissette, as a young child, seek ways to inflict pain on herself that would be dangerous and threaten her survival? The first time she burned herself, would she know to cry out or move away from a flame? It wasn’t clear in the beginning of the book that she would.

I also felt that Alcuin and Phedre’s spying for Delaunay on patrons who knew them to be spies was a contrivance, because if such a scenario happened in real life, I would think that some of Delaunay’s enemies, knowing that Phedre and Alcuin were there to glean information from them, would be smart enough to use Alcuin and Phedre to feed false information back to Delaunay, and Delaunay would never know which information was false and which was true.

An additional issue for me was that Delaunay is portrayed as someone without moral blemishes, but when I looked at his actions in whoring Alcuin, I found that suspect. Phedre would have been a prostitute one way or the other, but Alcuin hated that work and it seemed highly unlikely to me that someone as perceptive and observant as Delaunay would not have figured it out.

Moreover, Delaunay had raised Alucin from early childhood, yet they end up becoming lovers, which struck me as more than a touch incestuous. For both these reasons I found Delaunay’s characterization inconsistent.

Finally, another thing that took away from my enjoyment of the first third or so of the book was the foreshadowing. The beginning of the book is chock full of phrases along the lines of (paraphrasing from memory) “If only I had known what was to come, but I did not.” After a while it felt repetitive and heavy-handed.

But by the one third point, the foreshadowed event took place, and something very bad happened, both to Phedre and to Terre D’Ange. This ended most of the foreshadowing and dissipated many of my other concerns as well.

Even better, at this point Phedre’s fate was intertwined with that of Terre D’Ange, and Phedre and the reader were no longer ignorant of the impact the knowledge in Phedre’s possession could have on the kingdom. The stakes rose as a result, and the book became far more compelling.

Kushiel’s Dart became a story filled with dark deeds, hatred, friendship, romantic love, adventure, battles, and more. The latter two thirds of the book were much, much better than the beginning and I was glad I had stuck with the book.

The worldbuilding was detailed and huge in scope, and Phedre, once her mettle was tested, grew into a heroine well worth rooting for – smart, sympathetic, determined and yet compassionate. There was also a romantic triangle with two men, both brave and loyal in their way, and obstacles facing both relationships. I wasn’t sure who to ship for, so I just rooted for Phedre.

I wish I could go into the later part of the book in more detail, since describing the thing I liked about it would balance out my criticisms, but I try to make it a policy not to discuss later sections so as not to spoil books for readers who have not read them.

Suffice to say instead that Kushiel’s Dart becomes a very exciting and moving novel, and one which, despite its shaky beginning, was well worth reading. B-.

Sincerely,

Janine

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Blake Maddock spent his life [...]]]>

The last person Mardie Rainey expects to see on her doorstep is her childhood sweetheart, Blake Maddock. Fifteen years ago, Blake Maddock had walked away, leaving her teenage heart sore and broken. But now—with a thunderstorm raging overhead—she can’t turn him away, nor the injured border collie in his arms….

Blake Maddock spent his life running from one tragic mistake… Now the frightened boy has become a formidable man—and he’s coming back for the woman he has never forgotten….

Dear Ms. Lennox,

Recently I met fellow DA reviewer Sunita, which was a blast, and as book lovers do, of course we talked about books. We agree that one of our least favorite tropes is the “I kissed you once 10 years (or more) ago and have never forgotten it nor moved on with my life.” Argh, I hate this. So imagine my happiness when you made it very plain that Mardie hadn’t waited and faded away, she hadn’t lived in stasis since Blake left. She’d loved another man, married him, had a good and satisfying life before losing him. She still loved him in a way that was all his though there was room in her heart for another. Yeah, that’s another trope I dislike: the “I’ve loved and lost and will never love again!” Hate that too. Thank you for this.

I seriously enjoyed the sections about the dogs. They are such a part of these peoples’ lives that a story without them would feel incomplete. The parts with Charlie and Bessie working again and later at the funeral had me almost bawling. Would have had I been home but I had to hold it together at work. Still these are lovely scenes of how much dogs love and are loved and love to be useful.

Another wonderful thing about the story is that when Blake returns fifteen years after he left and shows up at Mardie’s door, she doesn’t turn into mush – well, perhaps for a minute in surprise but then she gets over it. And lets Blake know that she hasn’t wrapped herself up and mourned his loss all this time. He left, she was sad but then she got over it. She moved on. She’s lived a successful life and hasn’t thought about him or wondered about him. She took her passion for art and has made a name for herself as well as finding happiness teaching arts courses. I was bouncing in happiness through all this. Oh, and I loved it when she called him on how he viewed her life since she hadn’t gone overseas and saved children’s lives. And even after Blake makes a half hearted and emotionally induced proposal, she is wise enough to turn him down because she knows it’s still all wrong. Yeah, Mardie!

It’s wrong and Mardie insists that it be right. She probes Blakes’ reasons for not wanting to stay in Banskia Bay, she offers encouragement and mentions the therapy that helped her past the loss of her husband but she doesn’t push it or make ultimatums. She – and Blake – realize that neither will be happy trying to make a marriage work at their present stage. Yes, this takes the story down to the wire but I needed for them to work all this out to their satisfaction before I’d believe in their HEA.

And Blake does have some serious issues in his past. Some screwed up parents and a guardian aunt who wasn’t much better. Again I appreciate that this isn’t just a pity party on his part but some deep seated emotional mess that goes back a ways and must be dealt with. The way you described why he had to leave Banksia Bay and why he never contacted Mardie makes sense. He needed to leave this place that he saw as an exile where his parents sent him and if he’d talked to or written to Mardie, he wouldn’t have been strong enough not to crumble. When Mardie is finally given a window into what has driven Blake all these years and what still continues to haunt him, she knows these are things she might be able to help with – a little – but she can’t solve them for him. Nothing gets papered over or shoved under a rug with these two. They hurt each other somethimes with what they say but no punches get pulled and I like that.

Blake’s reasoning about why he needs to leave Banksia Bay and Mardie now also makes guy sense – he’s afraid he’ll hurt her by getting involved while he’s there – and planning to leave. It’s here that I can sort of see the start of his change of heart. Before, he’s wanted to leave to escape bad memories or to in some way make up for his twin’s death but now, emotion for Mardie is starting to seep through. I like that the time frame of the story allows for these slower shifts in emotion since there’s a lot to be dealt with and sorted out. Over the course of fixing Bessie’s eyes and the fund raising dinner and the month long recovery needed for the dog, Blake gets time to think and time to slowly see Mardie and Banksia Bay not as escapes anymore but as a person and a place that are home to him. There’s also the fact that they still have that connection they had years ago of being able to tease each other and almost know what the other is thinking that they’ve never lost.

Their ultimate realization that they’re both ready, willing and in an emotional place to finally get together for good is sweet and gentle and plays out in a way true to the setting of the story. Thanks for another enjoyable excursion with these salt of the earth people – and their dogs! B

~Jayne

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I saw this book on NetGalley and requested it immediately. I started laughing about about 5 paragraphs in and didn’t stop. Johnny Smith is a guy’s guy. He loves sports. He belches at the table. He wears his baseball cap backward. He hosts a weekly poker game and has been the best [...]]]> Dear Ms. Baratz-Logsted:

I saw this book on NetGalley and requested it immediately. I started laughing about about 5 paragraphs in and didn’t stop. Johnny Smith is a guy’s guy. He loves sports. He belches at the table. He wears his baseball cap backward. He hosts a weekly poker game and has been the best man 8 times. He’s like the Pied Piper of men. Yet this has not translated into many women for him. Instead he is 33 years old, single and with no female opportunities. He was interested in law at one time, but did not pursue a degree because his father fell ill and Johnny came back to take over his father’s painting business.  (Reading Johnny’s thoughts about color on the walls was a hilarity all on its own).  His oldest friend, Billy, has just married Johnny’s next door neighbor Alice, who in another book would be Johnny’s love interest. I admit wondering whether Billy and Alice would be getting a divorce. Alas no.

Johnny is in a rut. He wants to find a nice girl, settle down and get married but being a guy’s guy hasn’t worked out for him.  Everywhere Johnny goes, guys fall in best friend love with him and Johnny goes through a litany of things to show how men think he is awesome whereas women just view him as an asshole.

Exhibit 1: The One with All the Cars: Between the ages of sixteen and twenty-two, I owned a total of twenty-five cars. Not all at once and sometimes not even all by myself; a few of those cars I owned jointly with Billy Keller. See, the thing is, I couldn’t see the point in driving anything new or even remotely new. I excel at understanding what’s going on under the hood and I loved the challenge of finding the clunkiest clunker I could find – more than one of those cars was discovered in The Penny-Saver – and then doing the necessary work to get that baby on the road. Put in a little more work, and not only were those cars drivable but also profitable when I’d turn around and resell them. My proudest acquisition? A VW that Billy and I purchased jointly for twenty-five dollars. It’s amazing what a little duct tape and a few strategically placed rubber bands can do for a car!

The thing those twenty-five cars all had in common was that no matter how much work I put in, no matter how good a mechanic I was and still am, they all each would break down at least once, often at inopportune times, like say on dates.
Guys’ Verdict: “How cool! You get to tool around town in a different car every few months. You avoid the high costs of buying new or good used, thereby having more money to spend on partying or prime tickets to ballgames. You beat the system by never having to pay high insurance or taxes on your vehicles. Coolest. Guy. Ever.”

Women’s Verdict: “Asshole.”

Apparently, women prefer reliable transportation over variety and savings.

I’m not convinced that Johnny is an accurate rendition of any one guy.  He is likely a caricature of some sort but he’s a consistent one.  Johnny recognizes that neither himself nor his BFF Sam are going to get Johnny a girl so he turns to the wives of his buddies and through them, he changes his name (no girl wants to date a guy whose name ends in the long e sound); buys new clothes (He’s surprised at how well the J Crew attire actually looks on him); redecorates his house (the throw pillow scene at the home store made me laugh out loud); and gets a cat (the cat procurement scene is possibly the best in the book).  Morever, Johnny, err, John must suppress all affection for sports.  Johnny also asks advice from the elderly owner of the coffee shop; the guy who fits his rental tux; and just about any one else who will give an opinion on what makes relationships work.

He meets and dates Helen, an assistant district attorney.  What is obvious to readers is that Helen is not the type of girl that probably expects a guy to have throw pillows, enjoy opera, and have a cat but Johnny is too busy transforming the exterior of his person and suppressing his supposedly baser character traits to notice.  What leaks through, however, is what a genuine guy Johnny is.  He really wants to change. He really wants to settle down.  He works had at making sure that Helen is having fun and is happy.  What makes guys love Johnny made me love him too. To wit, he was a self deprecating guy who didn’t take himself too seriously but really enjoyed people.  The truth is that Helen and John are single not because they are misfits but because they haven’t met the right person and, well, both are really bad at dating.

This is Johnny’s transformation, though, and Helen remains somewhat of a mystery.  I thought the story did a good job of showing the mystery of both the man and the woman. It represented how everyone is different and that everyone’s match is different.  John would never have been happy with Alice. Sports was a big part of his life.  Wearing J Crew plaid shirts and removing his ball cap and tossing some throw pillows on the sofa were cosmetic and something fairly easy to adopt but Johnny cannot change what is essentially him. The good thing is that he doesn’t have to.  B

Best regards

Jane

PS. The title and cover  are off-putting.

PPS.  I have to include the pet store scene:

The guy brings down the item and places it on the counter next to the rest of my stuff. “So you’re getting a cat and a dog?” he says.

“No, just the cat.”

“Then what do you want a leash for?”

“The cat. So I can take it for walks.”

“People don’t usually – ”

“Don’t even bother,” Sam cuts him off. “He’s probably got this whole thing pictured in his head: him walking down the street, his cool new sleek black cat on the leash strutting by his side, maybe the two of them popping into the neighborhood bar for an ice cold beer for him and a saucer of milk for his furry little friend.”

Really? Am I that transparent?

The guy breaks out in a wide smile. “Man, that’s the coolest thing I’ve ever heard. I never thought to do that with a cat before. Maybe I should get one.”

“The Home Goods guy’s going to get throw pillows because of you,” Sam says, “now this guy’s going to get a cat so he can take it to the bar because of you. You’re like the Pied Piper of weirdness. Just what is it with you and guys?”

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Your Georgia Nicholson series is one of my go-to YA recommendations for a read that makes me chuckle.  I’ve read maybe half of them, but each one was a treat that made me laugh out loud – and though I can appreciate a lot of humor in books – it’s rare to [...]]]> Dear Ms. Rennison,

Your Georgia Nicholson series is one of my go-to YA recommendations for a read that makes me chuckle.  I’ve read maybe half of them, but each one was a treat that made me laugh out loud – and though I can appreciate a lot of humor in books – it’s rare to have me actually laughing due to the hilarity of the joke.

Withering Tights is your answer to finishing your Georgia Nicholson series – a spin-off involving her cousin, Tallulah.  It nods to the Emily Bronte book, too, but it serves more as a humorous new start to a series that will most likely have several more books to come.  It didn’t have the strength of the first Georgia book, but it provides a great dose of your signature writing style.

Tallulah is spending time away from home to attend a series of workshops at a college nestled in moors.  Being away from home would stress most people out, but Tallulah comes in determined to succeed and potentially meet some cute boys.  She’s placed with a host family that’s more than a little eccentric and has to make due with a bedroom decked out in squirrels.

Dother Hall makes a very strong favorable first impression on Tallulah.  The Hall promises to be the perfect place for Tallulah and her wackiness.  She quickly makes friends with several girls, catches the attention of a few boys (including one very bad one), and impresses everyone with her Irish Dancing…or something like Irish Dancing, but much less good.

A teacher from Withering Tights describes the heroine, Tallulah, best in this passage:

“Watching you is like watching someone whose pants are on fire.  Strangely fascinating, keep it up.”

Tallulah’s crazy antics and speech patterns quickly capture the hearts of her friends.  Whether it’s lamenting her knobbly knees or making unintentional jokes, Tallulah is the life of the party.  Her boy-troubles (which are not helped by her cousin Georgia’s friendly parting advice) and antics make for a summer that she – and her classmates – will not forget any time soon.

There are two things that make your books recommendable to me, and your main character is always the first thing.  Whether it’s Georgia or her cousin Talluluah, you make a main character that’s filled with humor and just enough ignorance to make for some hilarious situations.  Tallulah is similar to her cousin Georgia, and the familiarity will put Georgia readers at ease, though it doesn’t provide anything new in terms of the rest of your work.

Unlike Georgia, Tallulah was more focused on her purpose than boys at Dother.  Boys are present, but the romantic life of Tallulah is more of a side story than Georgia’s romantic life, which was the main focus of the Georgia Nicholson books that I read.  That provided a new outlet for character growth, and I felt like Tallulah really gained a better sense of appearance and her own personality.  She learns to use her humor to better herself and perform, even though she can’t necessarily act…or sing…or dance (aside from a hilarious faux-Irish jig, of course.)

The likability of Tallulah is what allows this story to be so humor-focused.  Her friends and love interests are all well and good, but they are limited in scope and development due to the story’s focus.  I don’t often read YA that doesn’t focus on characters, but your writing voice is what allows me to make an exception and enjoy books such as Withering Tights just as much.  Your writing is primarily humor focused – situational humor, puns, ect – and it’s akin to listening to a story told by a very funny friend. 

Humor, however, is specific from reader to reader, and that will ultimately determine whether or not someone will like Withering Tights.  Your humor is basically what mine is.  There are a lot of extremely amusing things said and word usages that would come from a teenager with a penchant for humor.  It’s all over the top and lacking in serious flair, and you make growing with Tallulah an experience that is memorable in laughs if not depth.

Readers who find amusement in words like squirrel-y and humor like that in the following passage will connect to the book best, and this passage in particular shows your signature humor.  The situation involves Tallulah and her friends doing a type of improvisational acting game, and Tallulah gets the bright idea to make herself an owl.

No one came near, although Flossie did offer me a mime cheesy wotsit (I think). Then she and Vaisey went back to pretend conversation and mime snack-eating.  Eventually I started waving my pretend wing.  Flossie came up, dabbing at the floor like  I spilled my pretend drink.  This was hopeless.  I caught Vaisey’s eyes and raised my lower eyelids slowly.  Surely, that would do it.  It didn’t.  So then I laid an egg.  People can be very thick even when offered the best of mimes.  Flossie said, “Are you having a poo?”

That kind of situation makes up a lot of Tallulah’s story.  Events like making an entire ballet out of riding bicycles are commonplace, but they never seem to lose their humor or charm.

Reads will find some of the purposely over-the-top accents to be problematic in the beginning.  Most of the characters do not have heavy accents, but there are one or two side characters that can be challenging to read, especially if you’re not familiar with the particular accent being portrayed.  A glossary of British slang is provided in the back by Tallulah herself, but I didn’t feel the urge to look at it throughout the reading experience.  Most of the slang (which is used frequently) is accessible via context clues, and the humor itself is only fully appreciated when added into the British-isms.

Returning readers will end up comparing this to your previous series, and the sad thing is that it is much of the same.  Your books are extremely quick reads that have people laughing, but Withering Tights is a lot of the same that the Georgia Nicholson books were – just with newer characters, joke types, and settings.   You do progress as a writer here in regards to how you develop those similar characters, settings, and the like.  Your humor is still focused, but you make a point to make Tallulah’s unintentional comedy a part of the plot.  In discovering that her skills in drama are best suited for comedy, there is more of a narrative purpose to all of the jokes and situations.  You also bring more non-romantic interests into the mix.  The Georgia Nicholson series is highly memorable, but Georgia’s humor was purely just voice, and I liked that Tallulah had that intent behind her.

That being said, I would have liked more distinction.  Withering Tights is a solid follow-up with all things considered, but pulling away from more of the Georgia similarities would benefit the story and the reading experience.

I give this book a solid B-

John

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This book got my attention due to the lovely cover. Larkstorm has one of the more striking covers I’ve seen lately, especially in a world of self-publishing that is dominated by stock photography. The sample was intriguing, and I was sold, even though I’m rather tired of dystopians. Larkstorm started out strong, [...]]]> Dear Ms. Miller,

This book got my attention due to the lovely cover. Larkstorm has one of the more striking covers I’ve seen lately, especially in a world of self-publishing that is dominated by stock photography. The sample was intriguing, and I was sold, even though I’m rather tired of dystopians. Larkstorm started out strong, but by the end, I felt like the story had begun to fray at the seams a bit.

Larkstorm is the story of Lark, a girl who is months away from graduation. Lark lives in a rigidly structured dormitory with other students and they are waiting for graduation so they will be assigned mates (as breeding is rigidly controlled) and assigned jobs with the State. Lark has things pretty good, though. She is the daughter of the equivalent of the Vice-President, and she knows who her mate is going to be -  sweet, funny, charming Beck. Beck is also her roommate at the school, and he has been in love with Lark forever. She is not sure how she feels about him until the day that Beck is taken away from her, accused of being a Sensitive (a person with powers). Sensitives are evil and untrustworthy and removed from society. Lark is shocked and horrified that Beck could be Sensitive and she doesn’t believe it. She goes on a journey to find him, and her entire world changes.

This book starts out with the focus of Lark and Beck. They are the YA equivalent of a friends-to-lovers storyline in that they’ve grown up together and care for each other, but they’re just now beginning to explore more and realize that how they feel about each other is greater than friendship. I thought their relationship was very sweet and was the glue holding the storyline together. The best scenes were the two of them together, and I liked that Beck is clearly beta to Lark’s alpha. She is running the relationship, and Beck is more than happy for her to be the one to decide things.

Unfortunately for me, Larkstorm does a 180 about halfway through the book, when the truth of Lark’s sheltered reality is revealed to the reader.

[[Visit blog to check out this spoiler]]

This had me scratching my head, as I felt that the entire story changed. It was as if I’d gone to a restaurant, ordered a sandwich, and someone brought me a pizza. Pizza is great, but I asked for a sandwich.

This change in the story also added to my confusion about the setting, even more now that new layers had been added. Is this story dystopian or unreliable narrator, or both? I feel as if it’s both, but the trouble is that the dystopian setting at the beginning was so lightly sketched (Why are they in a structured dorm? Why are Sensitives evil? What is the city like that Lark isn’t familiar with money? Why are they so rigidly controlled yet she is saving money for a vacation? What was the Long Winter and why did the world change the way it did? Why did Canadian cities survive if the world was locked in winter and not warmer climate cities?) that when the entire storyline changed halfway through, I struggled to follow it. Lark has been lied to for her entire life, and the story is told through her eyes. I understand that the reader is supposed to be confused right along with Lark, but we also need to know the ground rules so we can tell what is a correct assumption and what is not. I felt that in Larkstorm, the ground rules were never clearly established.

I think you played with some great concepts in this story – the truth of who Lark is

[[Visit blog to check out this spoiler]]

I thought this was a really intriguing concept that, done right, could have been a fascinating, very different sort of story. As it was, however, I felt that it just made Lark erratic. Her personality seemed to shift abruptly with the true knowledge of who she was. This could have been well done to carefully show the reader the changes in her over time, but I felt it was hammered into the story in a very obvious manner.

Overall, the romance in Larkstorm is well-done and heartbreaking, but the story and world left me with too many questions to wholeheartedly recommend. It was entertaining reading, though, and I couldn’t put it down once I picked it up. There are some typos and grammatical goofs that probably need an editor’s eye, but not enough to marr the enjoyment of the story.

I’m more than a bit irritated at the cliffhanger ending, however. Does everything in Young Adult require three books? I would have been thrilled if this was a standalone. My grade started as a very warm B+ but as the story moved on and got murkier, I found it sliding down the scale. I do feel it’s a very strong B- read. Good for a rainy day and a sweet romance full of longing, but lacking in the setting. I’m not sure that I’ll pick up book two when it hits, but I’ll at least skim book 3 to see how the romance ends up.

All best,

January

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I am pretty sure I bought that at the recommendation of has_bookpushers on September 6, 2011, (according to my Kindle records).  But like many a book, it languished (or was lost) in my to be read pile.  Internet chatter about this book rose up and I pulled it out to read.  Okay, [...]]]> Dear Ms. Ee:

I am pretty sure I bought that at the recommendation of has_bookpushers on September 6, 2011, (according to my Kindle records).  But like many a book, it languished (or was lost) in my to be read pile.  Internet chatter about this book rose up and I pulled it out to read.  Okay, I actually went to buy it at $.99 but I was told by Amazon I had already purchased it.  I started and read non stop until the last page.

Penryn lives in a post apocalyptic world brought on by the Angel Gabriel bringing war to the humans. Gabriel was destroyed in a flurry of return gunfire by the heavenly hosts are too much for the humans.  His body wasn’t recovered but the televised fight played all over the world as evidence that angels were not invincible. Humans have turned into refugees and lawless gangs rule the cities while everyone afraid of the dark.  In the dark, the angels come out or even worse – unknown terrors.

Penryn has made the decision that her insane mother and crippled little sister must move out of their condo because it has been marked for gang infiltration. They move out at night even though the night is so dangerous that even the gangs stay inside.  It is their only chance, or so Pen believes.  Pen makes a number of these decisions throughout the book. Some work out and some do not but each decision is backed by some thought so she never appears foolish, only not completely in possession of all of the facts.

In the midst of their escape. Pen sees a glorious angel with white wings attacked by other angels.  The white winged angel’s wings are cut off but he still fights on.  Spurred by some crazy compulsion, perhaps due to her own instinctive penchant for underdogs, Pen picks up his discarded sword and throws it at him.  In the ensuing confusion, one of the angels takes Pen’s sister from the wheelchair Pen is pushing her in.  Pen’s insane mother runs off.

Pen picks up the wings and demands the wounded Angel tell her where she can find her sister.  The Angel, Raffe, tells her that this is basically a suicide mission but what does Pen have to live for in this wasteland if she doesn’t even try.  Another calculated risk.  They don’t always turn out in her favor, but I admired her courage and her swift decision making. Pen is not a ditherer.

There are some worldbuilding flaws. Only six weeks have passed since the Angel Gabriel’s attack and death.  The post war seemed to be far too settled with its gangs and the established Angel aeries.  Technology has been totally destroyed to the point that some are using computers to form a brick like wall.  The complete hopelessness that seemed to have swept the land along with the abandonment of existing structures and technology came upon too quickly. I felt like the time that had passed from apocalyptic event to collapse was too quick but then again, how would Pen and Raffe be able forage for supplies in abandoned houses.

There is a mystery surrounding Pen’s mother that seems to be trotted out at only convenient times, providing strained coincidences. Raffe explains that the children of the angels and humans were unmentionable horrors yet there is not one nephilium that appears in the book.  Why was Raffe even on the Earth?  How did he get separated from the other Angels?  Why wasn’t he leading his men?  Some of those questions may be answered in a sequel, but I felt that they made the world building seem a little thin in areas.

Yet, these things are minor irritants in the larger captivating story.  Pen reminded me of Katniss, only more determined, less reluctant.  As for the romance, Raffie and Pen develop feelings for each other but it is low key and expressed in smart aleck exchanges.

We walk for about an hour before Raffe whispers, “Does moping actually help humans feel better?” We’ve been whispering since we saw the victims on the road.

“I’m not moping,” I whisper back.

“Of course you’re not. A girl like you, spending time with a warrior demigod like me. What’s to mope about? Leaving a wheelchair behind couldn’t possibly show up on the radar compared to that.”

I nearly stumble over a fallen branch. “You have got to be kidding me.”

“I never kid about my warrior demigod status.”

“Oh. My. God.” I lower my voice, having forgotten to whisper. “You are nothing but a bird with an attitude. Okay, so you have a few muscles, I’ll grant you that. But you know, a bird is nothing but a barely evolved lizard. That’s what you are.”

He chuckles. “Evolution.” He leans over as if telling me a secret. “I’ll have you know that I’ve been this perfect since the beginning of time.” He is so close that his breath caresses my ear.

Pen is represented as a teen but she could have easily been early 20s. She was an old soul, having been forced into responsibility early as the result of the death of her father and her mother’s insanity. I will provide this warning. The ending is a cliffhanger that takes a shocking turn. Ordinarily, I hate cliffhangers, but with this? All I can say is when does book 2 come out?  B+

Best regards,

Jane

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