Shuzluva: I’m in the same boat as Janine; I was *trying* to read two other books (one successfully, the other? Not so much) and when I got this ARC I took a deep breath and plunged right in. I’m excited to discuss the book with Janine since we share the same love of the series but have definitely disagreed about certain books and characters.

Janine: But first, a plot summary. Kiss of Snow begins with Hawke, the alpha of the SnowDancer wolf changeling pack chastising two of his young soldiers for getting into a fight while on duty. Maria is contrite but Sienna challenges Hawke’s authority. Hawke disciplines both girls but simmering under the surface is the unwanted sexual tension between Sienna and Hawke.

Longtime readers of Singh’s Psy/Changeling series know that Sienna is a member of the Psy, a race of psychics linked through a neural network called the PsyNet. Through a protocol called Silence, the Psy repress all emotions, but Sienna’s family, the Laurens, defected from the PsyNet when Sienna was deemed by the one of the leaders on the Psy Council to be too powerful.

Rather than watch Sienna and her younger brother Toby and cousin Marlee die, Sienna’s two uncles, Walker and Judd, risked their lives and disengaged from the net, and the family survived by forming its own psychic network and finding asylum with Hawke’s wolf pack.

All that happened when Sienna was sixteen. Now she is nineteen, nearly twenty, and in love with Hawke, a man who once mistrusted all Psy because of the damage they inflicted on his loved ones years before. But Sienna’s fascination with Hawke only hurts her, because Hawke, although powerfully attracted to her, resists his feelings with all his strength.

Between Hawke and Sienna stands more than one conflict. Most prominent is the difference in their ages — Hawke’s age isn’t given in this book, but I believe he is in his thirties, while Sienna is nineteen.

In addition, there is the fact that when Hawke was just ten years old, he suffered an almost unbearable loss — Rissa, the girl who would have become his mate had she lived to adulthood, died. The wolf changelings only mate once in a lifetime, and Hawke knows he cannot mate again.

Finally, Sienna is a cardinal X-Psy, which means she possesses lethal and limitless power. But that very power threatens to consume her and perhaps even those in whose vicinity she lives, including her family and Hawke’s wolf pack. No X-Psy is known to have lived as long as Sienna, and although she herself remains in denial, Judd fears she does not have much time left.

For all those reasons, especially the age difference, Hawke is wary of Sienna’s appeal to him. He tries to tell himself that she is off-limits, but her friendship with the leopard changeling Kit gets under his skin. When Hawke’s sexual hunger begins to affect the teens in his pack, he knows he must sleep with someone, but he does not intend that it be Sienna.

Sienna, angry and hurt after realizing this, decides to move on and goes clubbing with friends. After her dancing nearly incites a fight at the club, Hawke collects her and dances with her in the moonlight. Because he can’t stand to free her to be with someone else, but knows that he cannot give her all she deserves — the profound connection of the mating bond – Hawke sends Sienna mixed signals.

Sienna is torn and confused, but eventually she understands that she needs to fight for Hawke, as she’s seen her packmates do for their mates.

Meanwhile, things are heating up in the war between the members of Pure Psy and the changelings, and the coming battle threatens not just Hawke and Sienna, but all they hold dear.

Interspersed between Sienna and Hawke’s romance is a quieter romantic relationship that unfolds between Sienna’s uncle, Walker Lauren, and Lara, the wolf changelings’ healer. Lara and Walker were close friends until one night a kiss changed that. Walker drew away from Lara and his rejection hurt her, but six months later, the two still miss each other.

Also woven in is a thread about Alice Eldridge, a scientist who wrote a dissertation on the X-Psy over a century earlier, before the implementation of Silence. Alice’s emails to her father appear at the end of some of the chapters, as Alice gets closer and closer to uncovering what may or may not be the solution that could save Sienna’s life.

I’m anxious to hear what you thought of Kiss of Snow, Shuzluva. This book grabbed me by the throat and I spent every free minute reading it, even skipping dinner for hours because the story was so gripping.

Hawke and Sienna’s relationship has been building over the course of the series and this was the culmination not only of their unrequited feelings, but also of the first arc of the Psy/Changeling series itself, with hostilities between the series’ protagonists and the villains finally breaking out into war.

We were also treated to the birth of Luke and Sascha’s baby – and no, I’m not revealing the gender or name of the child in this review! Judd and the mysterious Ghost’s alliance took a very compelling turn, too, with the Ghost conflicted over whether to help Judd save Sienna when she could present a threat to his own plans.

For all those reasons I could hardly put this book down, and I was left reflecting on how well Nalini Singh builds her plot arcs and sets up her emotional payoffs. I think she is one of the genre’s best when it comes to plotting. This book was also, as you mentioned to me in an email, tightly written, and all of that made it a very satisfying read. I think it might be my new favorite in this series.

Shuzluva: First, thank you for the fantastic plot summary, Janine. I know I would have probably given something away that shouldn’t be discussed in a review, but my tendency is to overshare when I’m trying to make a point.

Janine: Thanks, but I’ve been known to give away spoilers too. I hope I haven’t done so in this instance.

Shuzluva: Regarding my immediate reaction to Kiss of Snow, I am in the same boat as you. I managed to read this book during every free minute I had and absolutely blew through it. That’s not to say this book is a light read. Things get hot and heavy in a number of ways and the reading is intense on both an intellectual and psychological level.

I actually found myself going back to re-read certain passages that had less to do with the emotional arc of the story and more to do with the nuts-and-bolts of Sienna’s designation, the movement towards open hostilities between the Psy and the Changelings (and humans), and certain tactical interactions between characters just to make sure I didn’t miss anything critical.

As I noted to you, the book is incredibly tight, with the primary story strongly interwoven with the secondary and tertiary plot lines so much so that no event or action seems extraneous or gratuitous.

Janine: Great point about the weaving of the plot lines. I loved the ways they impacted on one another.

Shuzluva: I have been fascinated by the progression of Hawke and Sienna’s relationship from the moment the two of them appeared on the page together way back when. While I don’t think of dogs as sensual creatures the same way as cats (and I’m a dog person, trust me), Hawke always appealed to me on a physical level, and from the very first, his antagonistic relationship with Sienna was a recipe for serious combustion. Their interactions are so hot that there were times I was sure my eyeballs were going to catch fire.

I have been driving myself crazy in terms of trying to figure out who the Ghost is. I have a pretty good idea, but I’m still not convinced. Judd Lauren’s alliance with him and their scenes are totally compelling. This will probably be one of my classic overshares: I cannot wait to see what happens next with the Psy Council and the repercussions it will have on the PsyNet.

One of the reasons this series works so well for me, and this book especially, is that the different characters appear without a hiccup in personality or voice. That is highlighted with the birth of Lucas and Sasha’s baby. The interactions between the SnowDancer and DarkRiver packs (and the reminders that they were once not allied with each other) were superbly done, and the focus shifted smoothly from one character to another and one situation to another. I know I’ve mentioned this before in my reviews of the Psy/Changeling series, but the characters are so well written that they each retain their individual personalities without becoming background wallpaper. With a cast that is now well over 50 characters, of which over half have been written about in significant detail, the ability to continue making all of them integral to the story is an accomplishment in and of itself.

Janine: Agreed, it is very impressive.

Shuzluva: Your use of “emotional payoff” hit the nail on the head. Kiss of Snow is a gripping read due to both the emotional and intellectual payoffs. For me, it’s definitely in the top three of the series.

Janine: It is easily up there for me as well. With regard to criticisms, I can find very few things to complain about. Singh has a tendency to use certain words and phrases a lot, but this is one of the things that give her writing style its vivid and distinctive quality which has grown on me over the course of the series.

Gender roles are a bit on the traditional side in certain regards in these books, too. The male protagonists are almost always dominant and lethal, while the women, though emotionally strong, shy away from killing. We hear about the maternal contributions of submissive females, but the submissive males don’t get much positive attention.

Some of the Psy/Changeling books I’ve liked best have been those where that hero/heroine dynamic is a little less conservative, such as Branded by Fire, with its sexually experienced heroine, or Play of Passion with its older heroine/younger hero matchup. But even though this book doesn’t fit that description, I enjoyed it so tremendously that I was only very slightly bothered by the fact that Hawke outmatched Sienna in many ways. More on the reasons why in a minute.

What about you, Shuzluva? Did this book have any drawbacks for you?

Shuzluva: I agree with you about the traditional gender roles in this series. The lack of a positive submissive male model was highlighted in Play of Passion, and I was definitely bothered by it as well as another plot point that had to do with gender roles in the same book. I know we discussed it in an email exchange, and while I loved Play of Passion, that particular point still sticks in my craw. If anyone would like to discuss it with me (I know I’m being somewhat vague here, but I don’t want to give away plot points that are well into a book) feel free to mention it in the comments.

In this particular book, the gender roles were in no way reversed, but perhaps better balanced due to Sienna’s abilities. You mentioned the males of the series being lethal, but Hawke admits he takes no pleasure in killing, which made that particular aspect of their relationship an easy read for me. I did have a bit of a struggle with the age gap between Hawke and Sienna (even though it’s unclear as to exactly what their age difference is), and frankly I wish that Sienna had just a couple more years on her. I’ll discuss that below.

Janine: Yes, let’s discuss the way Singh handled the age difference. As I read this book I compared it to Julie Anne Long’s What I Did for a Duke, where there was a similar age difference between the characters. The Long book had a more realistic treatment of that type of conflict, with the heroine at first dismissing the hero as much older, and only coming of age during the course of that story. Genevieve’s immaturity was an integral obstacle to the romance in that book.

By contrast, Singh chose to present Sienna very differently. Despite her youth and her sexual inexperience, Sienna lived through some horrors in childhood, and those things forced her to grow up early so that she is in some ways as strong and emotionally mature as Hawke.

I think it is perhaps a less true-to-life depiction because I believe that in real life someone who lived through the kind of abuse Sienna endured as a child would come out more damaged, and not necessarily strong enough to handle Hawke with all his possessiveness, dominant instincts.

But putting aside that caveat, I have to say that I really enjoyed the relationship between the two of them and didn’t care much that it wasn’t entirely realistic.

I loved that Sienna was vulnerable, but not as much as she was when she first arrived on SnowDancer land. I loved that she was mature enough to understand what was driving Hawke, while still being young enough to go clubbing in sexy jeans and dance on top of the bar when she thought he’d be sleeping with someone else.

And I loved that Hawke was so thrown by his feelings for her, so conflicted as to acting on them. I know that there are many readers who dislike big age differences, and often I do too. I also feel Singh walked a tightrope here, because Hawke would probably be too much for most thirty year old women, let alone a nineteen year old.

But ultimately this aspect of the book worked for me because Hawke wasn’t waiting for Sienna to grow up so he could jump her bones – he struggled as hard as he could to stay away from her, and only gave in when he realized how impossible that was for both of them.

Hawke’s internal struggle made it clear that his control over the situation had shattered, and in a strange way that shifted the balance of power between him and Sienna, so that despite the age and rank difference, to say nothing of his dominant alpha personality and greater sexual experience, there was a feeling of the two of them being on equal ground. He was in some ways just as powerless in the face of his need for Sienna as she felt with him early on in the book.

Shuzluva: You laid out Sienna and Hawke’s issues beautifully here. I think my greatest struggle was reconciling the Sienna I was reading on the page with her chronological age. On an emotional level she didn’t read like a 19 year old, especially a 19 year old that had been Silent for the majority of her life. I definitely had some trouble with this, and I realize that some of it has to do with my own view of age differences and maturity. And it bothered me as well that we don’t know how old Hawke is. I think it’s another indication of “it shouldn’t matter”, but it must for me because I’m thinking about it.

Janine: We agree on both these points. I wished Hawke’s age had been given in the book because I wanted to know exactly how many years separated him from Sienna’s, and I also felt that Sienna’s maturity wasn’t entirely realistic. But despite these issues, I enjoyed the conflicted, combustive chemistry between the main characters so much that I was willing to throw my reservations to the wind and fly with the story.

Shuzluva: What saved this for me was Sienna’s very age-appropriate reactions to Hawke (read: going clubbing in sexy gear to get him jealous) and her ability to slice down to the heart of the matter whether it was dealing with her own fears and feelings or Hawke’s. Sienna’s direct approach to the deepest emotional conflict was refreshing and her down and dirty confrontation with Hawke rang so true that I could almost hear the bells going off.

Janine: Terrific points about Sienna. How did you feel about Lara and Walker? That subplot didn’t grab my attention right away because at first their dynamic seemed a bit too similar to Hawke and Sienna’s, with Walker sending Lara push-pull signals and Lara being hurt by them, but once Walker started to open up to Lara, that relationship developed in a different direction from the Hawke and Sienna storyline and I started caring about them too.

Shuzluva: From Walker and Lara’s first interaction I knew we were going to be treated to a secondary romantic subplot. I admit that I mentally groaned when Walker began with the hot/cold crap and Lara acted wounded by his withdrawal. But I was curious about the one Lauren family member that seemed to be the least well drawn. I am thankful that Walker and Lara’s relationship went very differently than I had assumed (damn assumptions) and am now a huge Walker fan.

Janine: On another note, I really enjoyed the interactions between Judd and the Ghost. The Ghost remains as enigmatic as ever, and his actions in this book have made me even more interested in him than I was before. I hope he gets his own book eventually, and the same goes for Vasic and Aden from Judd’s Arrow squad.

Shuzluva: I mentioned my fascination with the Ghost above, and the confusion behind his loyalties and actions. With Hawke finishing his romantic arc, I find that I’m hopeful we will get another Psy-driven book (*cough* Kaleb *cough*) versus another SnowDancer / DarkRiver one.

Janine: Sounds good to me. There are some falcon changelings waiting for their turn, too.

It’s time to grade Kiss of Snow. I very rarely give A range grades to books unless I love the prose as much as I do the characters, and while I care about plot, which is one of Singh’s greatest strengths as a writer, it isn’t usually my highest priority as a reader or a reviewer.

Still, this book was such a roller coaster ride — with great pacing, emotional scenes that made me cry, happy moments that brought a goofy smile to my face, and scorching hot love scenes — that I can’t give it less than an A-.

Shuzluva: I am on the opposite end of the spectrum. If a book has an amazing plot and characters that are only likeable, I’m likely to give it a higher grade than if the reverse were true.

Beyond plot, I feel that a lot of components seamlessly came together in Kiss of Snow and the book provides emotional as well as intellectual rewards that are not solely dependent upon the main characters. And all the sexin’ didn’t suck either. Kiss of Snow gets an A from me.

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Related posts:

1. JOINT REVIEW: Kiss of Snow by Nalini Singh (and Giveaway)
2. REVIEW: Branded by Fire by Nalini Singh
3. REVIEW: Archangel’s Kiss by Nalini Singh

UPDATE: We’ve decouple the review from the giveaway because this is a book so many want to talk about. The review will be reposted on Monday in a new and separate post.

The winners have all been emailed.

1) Andy Swanson
2) Cath
3) Adrianne Robinson
4) Jenny
5) Sera
6) Nicola
7) sequoia
8) Erika

NOTE FROM JANE: We have 8 copies of the hardcover debut from a Dear Author favorite, Nalini Singh. These 8 copies we will give away on Sunday to a random commenter to this post. This book engendered such a strong response that Janine and Shuzluva decided to do a joint review. There may be some spoilers in this review and if you don’t want to be spoiled, just skip to the comments section and leave a comment as to why you want to read Kiss of Snow. I’ll tell you my reason. Because Singh delivered everything she promised when Hawke and Sienna were first introduced in the first book in this series, Slave to Sensation. I’ve told anyone who asked that yes, this book is worth the hardcover price.

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Related posts:

1. REVIEW: Archangel’s Kiss by Nalini Singh
2. Wanna Win an ARC from Nalini Singh?
3. REVIEW: Branded by Fire by Nalini Singh

Other than Magic Mourns, the short story that was included in the Must Love Hellhounds anthology, I haven’t read any of your Kate Daniels series. I’m not sure why Kate Daniels unfortunately flew completely under my radar, but due to my giant, listing TBR stack, I doubt I’ll end up getting to it before I retire from my day job and my children are in college (read: not happening). While I may be late on The Edge bandwagon, I am happy that I jumped on with the second book.

I freely admit that what drew me to Bayou Moon was something in a blurb about William Sandine being a killer who plays with toys and action figures. Being a complete nerd and vinyl aficionado myself, there was no way I was going to pass up a book that feature a hero unafraid to show his less mature self. WHOOO! How little did I realize I hit the nail on the head with that thought.

William lives in the woods between the Weird (a magical world) and the Broken (mundane backwater South). An easy way to describe the Weird is it is a parallel world to our mundane one, but operates completely with magic and the fantastical, paranormal, what have you. Territory and power in the Weird are being fought for by nobles in the Kingdom of Andrianglia and the Dukedom of Louisiana. People like William live between the two worlds in the Edge. Those that are Edgers either don’t have enough magic to be welcomed into the Weird or they are outcasts from the Weird. Take a wild guess at which category William falls into.

William is a changeling, and all changelings in Adrianglia are separated from their families and bred as soldiers. After failing to follow orders, William is cast out into the Edge. I don’t want to ruin anything for those who haven’t read the first book here (and I haven’t but I picked up everything I needed to know from this book), so I’m not going to delve into William’s history too far. His lifetime of being trained as a tracker and killer precluded any sort of romantic or social interaction (along with being told that his attentions would be unwelcome by any female), so he is very much alone in the Edge in the beginning of Bayou Moon. William is approached by the Adrianglian Secret Service to go on a dangerous mission into the Mire, the swamps of the Edge that is between the Dukedom of Louisiana, the Broken and the State of Louisiana. He takes on the mission to try and get revenge against Spider, an agent from the Kingdom of Louisiana that kills changeling children.

Cerise Mar’s family were nobles, but they’ve been cast out to the Mire, and have claimed a huge portion of it for themselves. They may be poor, but the Mar family is large and they rely on each other. When her parents disappear, Cerise takes charge of the family and has to make some tough decisions. The family suspects that their rivals, the Sheeriles, are responsible for her parent’s sudden disappearance. Cerise is forced to travel to the Edge, and on her return, she and William’s paths intersect.

The book borders on epic in its scope; the worldbuilding is completely new and slightly complicated, and the characters don’t stay in one spot for long. However, Bayou Moon doesn’t slack on the development of characters or the story between Cerise and William. William may be a prime fighting machine, but his upbringing has stunted him emotionally and socially, and it’s both entertaining and painful to read as he works out what social nuance means and whether he reacts correctly or incorrectly in certain situations. His growth into a well-rounded person (character? changeling?) takes time and is believable. Cerise’s struggle to take up the family reins and effort to retain the control and respect of her unruly clan is well portrayed. Cerise is sure of herself but knows that she must prove that she can hold the family together. It was refreshing to have a heroine that could hold her own throughout the book and didn’t have quite as much growing to do as the hero. Cerise and William together…sometimes was explosive, but there were a few moments I felt like I was watching some really awkward interaction, and it felt slightly disjointed.

There were a couple of scenes toward the end of the book that frustrated me, but didn’t preclude me from enjoying the final chapters of the book, or the book as a whole. The secondary characters are superb and the tension (both romantic and action-filled) is strong throughout without having to be artificially manufactured. I’m going to pick up the first in the series and I hope that there’s another in the works. B+

~Shuzluva

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Related posts:

1. REVIEW: Bayou Moon by Ilona Andrews
2. REVIEW: On the Edge by Ilona Andrews
3. REVIEW: Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews

The changeling William Wolf was introduced to readers in your earlier book, On the Edge. On your website, Mr. Andrews states in that book, William "lost Rose to Declan and did not save the day. This book [Bayou Moon] was his chance to be a hero, to get the girl. A damaged hero and a very odd girl, but still."

I enjoyed Bayou Moon, which takes place in the Edge, a strip of land between two dimensions, the Weird and the Broken. The Broken is our world, where there is no magic. The Weird is a magical realm, a mirror of the Broken in which two New World countries, Adrianglia and the Dukedom of Louisiana, are engaged in a cold war.

Bayou Moon begins when Nancy Virai, an Adrianglian spymaster, and her assistant/thug Erwin, arrive in the Edge to recruit William for a mission. William used to be a member of the Red Legion, an Adrianglian black ops army unit. But he was expelled from the Red Legion and adopted by the evil Lord Casshorn Sandine, who met his death in On the Edge. Since the events of that book, William, Lord Sandine, has been employed as a construction worker in the Broken and moping in his spare time.

Back in his Red Legion days, William had two encounters with a twisted, magically enhanced Dukedom of Lousiana spy named Spider. That William survived those encounters means he is the Adrianglians' best hope of defeating Spider and his covert organization of magically enhanced spies, the Hand. Spider and the other members of the Hand have infiltrated a part of the Edge which borders the Dukedom of Louisiana and is known as the Mire. Virai believes that they are searching for a magical item that could tip the balance of power between Adrianglia and the Dukedom of Lousiana, and mean all-out war.

William loathes Spider with his whole heart, since Spider is responsible for the murders of several Adrianglian changeling children (In Louisana, changelings are reviled so much that they are killed at birth, while in Adrianglia, many are abandoned by their parents and given over to the care of Hawk's Academy, the brutal orphanage where William grew up). Because he hates Spider so much, William agrees to infiltrate the Mire, learn what Spider and the Hand are seeking, capture that item, and if at all possible, kill Spider.

Meanwhile, in the Mire, Cerise Mar discovers that her parents have not returned from a ride to Sene Manor, an empty house that once belonged to Cerise's grandparents. When Cerise and two of her cousins ride to Sene, they discover that the house has been confiscated by the Sheeriles, a family with whom the Mars have a longstanding feud. The Sheeriles inform Cerise that the Hand has taken her parents, and they claim not to know the reason why.

Now Cerise and her family will have to fight the Sheeriles for Sene Manor, where there might be clues to explain the Hand's interest in Cerise's parents. But to prove that the Mars have the right to Sene, Cerise must travel to the Broken to retrieve a copy of the deed from her uncle.

Sneaking into the Mire from the Broken, William pays a man named Vern to guide him down a river to the town of Sicktree. Also on the same boat is a girl who looks like a hobo, and smells, to William's discerning nose, like a jar of moldy spaghetti sauce.

Partway through the journey, William and the girl lose Vern to a shark attack. Now the “hobo queen” is William's guide to Sicktree, and he does not trust her as far as he can throw a necromancer-controlled giant eel. But when he realizes the Hand's agents are after the girl, and that after washing off the spaghetti sauce, she smells delicious, William realizes that he has to stick close to her, and that that is exactly what he most wants to do.

For her part, Cerise, too, catches on to the fact that William is more than the spoiled blueblood he first appears to be. Unexpectedly attractive and proficient with a crossbow, William may be dangerous to Cerise's family. Can she trust him, and even if she can, should she risk her heart at a time when the lives of her family members are threatened?

Bayou Moon is darker in tone than On the Edge (One scene in particular is quite violent and not for the faint of heart) but it is still greatly entertaining.

William and Cerise seem right for each other. It was immensely enjoyable to see them begin to perceive they had met their match in the one they first dismissed as “Hobo Queen” and “Lord Bill.” As their strengths become apparent, they grow to admire each other more and more. Both are great with weapons and really respect each other's abilities in this arena. She has a huge family and he longs for family, a sense of belonging and being wanted and accepted, more than anything.

There is some delightful, laugh out loud humor in this book. I caught myself giggling and smiling several times. The novel had a terrific sense of adventure, particularly in the section of the book when William and Cerise were trying to reach Sicktree together, that reminded me of movies like “Romancing the Stone” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

The worldbuilding is superb; the Mire comes alive and I felt as though I could feel the humid air and murky water, and see the creatures that inhabited this world, from the Loch Ness monster-like rolpies to the legged eels.

I did catch one major inconsistency, though. Earlier in the book, it was stated and shown that exposure to the Hand's magic makes people sick at first, but later in the story, when many characters encountered the Hand for the first time, this was not the case.

If the world was believable for the most part, so was Spider. I especially liked it when he stated that he became a monster so his fellow countrymen would not have to. It's a rationale that many have used on a slippery slope to evil.

Most of the secondary villains among the members of the Hand reminded me of the supervillains in the comic books I read as a child. On their own they were menacing, but when they gathered together for a big showdown near the end of the book, it was too much to be wholly convincing. The Sheeriles were more interesting villains and I particularly appreciated the multidimensional Lagar, who had a humanity that he denied.

The Mars (Cerise's family) were colorful and lively. They were distinct from one another and I had no trouble telling them apart and remembering who each of them was, which is impressive since there were so many of them.

William's desperate need to be loved and accepted was so intense that at times it seemed a little over-the-top, but it was understandable given how barren his childhood had been, and it made me feel for him. Cerise was so attracted to William that I wondered why the women if the Broken and the other part of the Edge hadn't been, or if they had been but William simply didn't notice because he didn't believe anyone could want him.

Cerise was a wonderful heroine, strong, intelligent and responsible. I loved that she could still be smart alecky with Williams despite all the pressure she was under, and I especially loved the way she struggled with the difficulties of leading her family. Even when she fell apart on the inside, she knew she couldn't show it on the outside, lest her authority be challenged at a crucial time.

The attraction between Cerise and William was potent and the fact that their lives were in danger made me root for them as a couple even more. I wanted them to find some happiness in the midst of all the danger, and I was glad for them when they did.

In the last third of the book, a lot of attention is given to the magical item Spider is bent on acquiring, and to the history of this thing. This came up just as things were heating up between Cerise and William, and romance-lover that I am, I wanted more focus on their relationship and less on the history of this magical item.

[[Visit blog to check out this spoiler]]

The final chapter and the epilogue have a very different feel from the rest of the story, and as a result, this book isn't as cohesive as On the Edge. The last conflict that came between William and Cerise near the very end of the book felt contrived to me. There is also a plot thread that is left unresolved. To me this was on the one hand this was somewhat dissatisfying, but on the other, encouraging, since I'm hoping for more books in this series.

Though it wasn't a perfect book, Bayou Moon was highly entertaining. I look forward to the next Edge-set book, and my grade for this one is a B+.

Sincerely,

Janine Ballard

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Related posts:

1. REVIEW: On the Edge by Ilona Andrews
2. REVIEW: Magic Burns by Ilona Andrews
3. REVIEW: Magic Bleeds by Ilona Andrews

Burning Up is a new anthology of steamy paranormal novellas from Berkely. I almost never read or review entire anthologies, mainly because it takes me a long, long time to craft four mini-reviews, but in this case I was motivated to do so by my desire to try these stories, all of which sounded like they had potential. Here are my reviews of the four stories:

“Blood and Roses” by Angela Knight

“Blood and Roses” is set on a medieval-feeling world where women called Blood Roses were created to satisfy vampires and keep them content, so they would not rebel against the king. As the story begins, a vampire named Raniero is traveling with a small group of fighting men on a mission for the king. Amaris, a Blood Rose, watches the group while cloaked by an invisibility spell.

She is accompanied by her evil father, the vampire Tannaz, and two Varil, reptilian creatures who love nothing more than to feast on humans. Although she despises Tannaz and the Varil, Amaris has no choice but to help them attack Raniero and his fellow riders. If she refuses, her three year old half-sister, Marin, will be killed by the evil Lord Korban, a wizard whom Tannaz and the Varil are serving.

Amaris uses her magic to cause Raniero to pass out, and he is brought to Lord Korban's castle. There, Amaris discovers that Korban will not keep his promise and release Marin. He uses Amaris's fear for the child's life to blackmail Amaris into seducing a chained Raniero, so that Raniero will send the king a message attesting to Korban's loyalty, and thus delay the king's next attack on Korban.

Of course, Raniero's loyalty to the king is not easily swayed. Amaris does not want to seduce him, but she attempts to do so anyhow. Raniero blames Amaris for her role in his capture. Amaris also has the power free Raniero – if he drinks from her blood he will be able to break his chains. But she is afraid to take such a risk with her sister's life. Will these two trust each other enough to take on the evil Korban and his minions together?

This was my first experience of reading Angela Knight and I was not sure what to expect. While this novella had some detailed worldbuilding and interesting descriptions, it turned out to be problematic for me on several levels.

First, I think it's debatable whether or not the first sex scene was consensual, and while I'm not categorically opposed to all rape in romance (My favorite romance is Patricia Gaffney's To Have and to Hold), I do feel that if that if rape takes place, it should create problems between the hero and heroine. In this case, it's not entirely clear to me to what degree Amaris and Raniero were forced, but since he was chained and she was blackmailed into what happened there, it didn't ring true to me that the sex they were at least partially forced to have did not haunt them later on.

Second, even leaving aside the not-entirely-consensual sex, Amaris and Raniero both had major trust issues. Raniero had been betrayed by other Blood Roses, including his mother who tried to convince his father to kill him. Amaris had been betrayed by other vampires, including her evil father as well as a lover who raped her. Raniero was therefore inclined to distrust all Blood Roses, and Amaris all vampires. I'm not crazy about this type of prejudice but I think I could have gotten over that had I seen the characters gradually, slowly learning to trust one another. But instead these issues too were glossed over and the way the characters overcame their prejudices felt rushed and unconvincing.

Third, there was a lot of darkness in the setup. Raniero loses his men, including a teenaged boy, to the villains' attack. The life of Amaris's three year old sister is threatened more than once. There's loads of violence, and an insane villain whose quest for power would get thousands annihilated, to say nothing of the aforementioned traumas. Entertaining though it was to read about, it also felt like overkill to me — and I'm a fan of darker stories.

The novella did keep me turning the pages to see what would happen next, the writing was smooth and the last scene even gave me a heartwarming feeling, but ultimately, that was not enough. For those reasons, I give “Blood and Roses” a D+/C-.

“Whisper of Sin” by Nalini Singh

This novella, a prequel to the books in Singh's Psy/Changeling series, begins with a prologue in the form of an article in the San Francisco Gazette, which describes a crime wave in Chinatown rumored to be the work of a new organized crime family.

In chapter one, we are introduced to Ria, a 22 year old human woman who lives in Chinatown (her grandmother is Chinese) with her family. Ria has just been attacked and has fought off the attacker with her purse. Before the man could rape her, two changelings from the DarkRiver leopard pack, Dorian and Emmett, appeared and fought him off.

In the paramedic van, Emmett coaxes Ria into speaking and describing the assault. He is furious that a woman was attacked on his watch, and determined to “sniff out the nest this little viper came from.”

An attraction blooms between Ria and Emmett, and Emmett begins to feel protective of Ria almost immediately. Since she is still a target of the crime family, Ria must be protected constantly, and Emmett sees that as an opportunity to court her. But Ria's family members have other ideas. Ria is expected to marry Tom, the son of family friends.

I really liked “Whisper of Sin.” After two books focusing on humans and Psy, it was nice to read about the changeling characters again. I also enjoyed visiting the DarkRiver pack at a time before the events that begin with Slave to Sensation. The worldbuilding was compelling and clear to me as a follower of this series, but it's hard for me to judge whether or not someone who has not read the other Psy/Changeling books would be confused.

The main characters and most of the side characters are appealing. Ria is part of a loving family of strong minded people who think they know what is best for her, and she must learn to stand up to them. I really liked her and I also liked Emmett, who is sexy, strong and affectionate. Emmett knows very quickly that Ria is the one for him, but he has to learn to curb his overprotective tendencies.

The biggest obstacles to the happy ending are Tom and a misunderstanding on Ria's part – she believes that a changeling could not be interested in a long-term, serious relationship with a human. In that sense, the latter is not that suspenseful a conflict because it's evident that this is only a misapprehension that will be cleared up. Still, I was thoroughly entertained by both the romance and the changelings’ pursuit of the mobsters who wanted Ria dead, as well as charmed by the characters. B+ for “Whisper of Sin.”

“Shifting Sea” by Virginia Kantra

This story opens in Scotland in 1813. Major John “Jack” Harris, a survivor of the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo, has recently come into the unexpected inheritance of Arden Hall and its lands. He is riding along the Scottish shore that is part of his property when he hears a woman singing. As he approaches the woman, he is struck by her beauty.

The woman, Morwenna, invites Jack into her cottage on the shore, and then into her bed, making it clear to him that she is freely choosing to please herself with his company. The sex is intense and unforgettable to Jack. To Morewenna, who is not what she appears to be, the experience is unsettling. Although Jack's first thought is that Morewenna must be a prostitute, he still invites her to Arden Hall. She refuses to come, but grants him permission to come to her cottage again.

Morwenna is in fact an elemental of the sea, one who can take the form of any of the ocean's creatures, as well as human form. She has decided to try to live on land for a while, although her twin brother disapproves.

The next day, Jack comes across Morwenna at the market, trying to purchase food with a pearl and then with a gold doubloon, when Jack's steward assumes she stole the old coin and accuses her of thievery. Jack comes to Morwenna's aid, which leads to a horseback ride together and then to another sexual encounter. Jack grows more and more fascinated with Morwenna, and Morwenna begins to return this interest. But will she sacrifice her immortality to be with Jack?

This was my first time reading something by Virginia Kantra and I was very impressed both with the author's writing style, as well as with her ability to marry the paranormal and historical elements. I felt that these two aspects blended seamlessly, so much so that I was reminded of Shana Abe's drakon series, where the paranormal and historical are also very well integrated.

There was a magical feel to the story which, along with the inventive use of the seashore setting, also put in mind of the selkie movie “The Secret of Roan Inish,” which I enjoyed many years ago.

My chief complaint with regard to “Shifting Sea” is that I felt that the romance was rushed, especially on Jack's part. He seemed to fall in love with Morwenna very, very quickly, before he really knew her– after a couple of bouts of sex but not much conversation. Morwenna's more gradual evolution toward love and commitment was executed better, though I would have liked to have seen the prospect of sacrificing immortality explored more.

The characters were absolutely delightful – Jack so clearly honorable and caring, and Morwenna independent and unashamed of her sexuality. Since the language and atmosphere were both appealing as well, I look forward to reading more of this author in the future. “Shifting Sea” gets a B+ too.

“Here There Be Monsters” by Meljean Brook (There may be some spoilers in the following review).

“Here There Be Monsters,” Meljean Brook's contribution to the anthology, is also the first story in her new steampunk series, the Iron Seas. This novella, which is a bit longer than the other three and will require a longer review, begins in London, and Ivy, the heroine, is running for her life.

Ivy was born during a time when the Horde (as best I can tell, this is a nation originating in Asia) had infected London's denizens with nanoagents (also called "bugs") that controlled them. Seven years before beginning of the story, Ivy and London's other residents were freed from enslavement when the control tower that signaled the nanoagents was destroyed.

But on the night the story opens, Ivy awoke to find herself unable to move, her body frozen by the nanoagents, while she and the people with whom she rooms were examined against their will. The rest were taken, presumably for enslavement, and Ivy was left behind, but now she's determined to hightail it out of London as soon as possible rather than wait around and become enslaved once more.

To that end, Ivy goes to an inn by the docks. She is searching for Mad Machen, a feared pirate. Ivy thinks Mad Machen might facilitate her escape in exchange for her labor. Ivy worked for a man known as the Blacksmith and as she says “can repair engines, prosthetics…or windups, if you have any automata.” It was in the Blacksmith's employ that Ivy met Mad Machen, who sat with his friend Barker while she worked on Barker's prosthetic leg. Ivy saw Mad Machen show his friend kindness and support, and now, that has given her hope that Mad Machen will help her.

But Mad Machen refuses to transport her, saying that his ship already has a blacksmith. It is at this point that Ivy offers her virginity instead, and when Mad Machen doesn't reply, the fierce expression on his face terrifies Ivy. She begins to back out, but Mad Machen insists that she'll sleep in his bed for the entire journey. Ivy asks him to promise not to hurt her, but Mad Machen merely says they will sail in the morning. Later, he promises to come after her if she runs away.

Mad Machen, or Eben as his friends know him, is furious at Ivy's desperation and at her fear of him. He would never rape her, and in fact had planned to return to the smithy to court her. But now he is faced with a bad situation – he must sail into very dangerous waters, and he doesn't want to put Ivy at risk. Leaving her in London, though, might mean never seeing her again, since she is so desperate to escape the city.

Before Eben can decide what to do, Ivy disappears. Lady Corsair, a female pirate who captains an airship, offers her transport, in exchange for a debt to be repaid later. Ivy jumps at this offer, and two years later, she is living in Fool's Cove, when Lady Corsair and Mad Machen reappear in her life.

Fool's Cove is nearly unreachable by ship, so Ivy thought she was safe from Mad Machen's pursuit there. But she knew he was still searching for her, because of some terrifying stories she'd heard about him. Now Lady Corsair insists that Ivy repay her debt to Mad Machen, and sleep in his bed in the time it takes them to reach Wales, where a work project is waiting for Ivy. Ivy isn't given much choice in the matter – Lady Corsair threatens to loose her aviators on Fool's Cove if Ivy refuses.

Bitterly, Ivy agrees and is taken to Mad Machen's ship. But once there, her fear turns to defiance. She does not know that Eben has a reputation to maintain, and cannot afford to have his crew and other sailors believe he has gone soft. Every time Ivy challenges his authority in public, Eben must come down hard, for to do otherwise would be to put his crew's lives at risk. In private, he accepts Ivy's coin in exchange for a promise not to touch her sexually. But Ivy has only eight coins, and the journey will last more than eight days. What will happen when her money runs out?

I've been waiting a long time to read this story, and it does not disappoint. One of the best things about "Here There Be Monsters" is the worldbuilding, which is intricate and complex, but for the most part, understandable and clear, too. The world of the story feels whole and complete, and it is a blend of historical setting details and contemporary and futuristic technologies. Some of the details are surprising, and all of them are woven together into a fascinating steampunk setting.

The writing made me feel that I was truly there, inhabiting that world. I found the story absorbing and difficult to put down, and Eben and Ivy were both endearing. Ivy had a lot of fear to overcome, but her background made it easy to understand why. Eben was both strong and caring, for all that he had to show the outside world his rough edges. The sexual tension was drawn out in a natural way. I never felt that the sex was being postponed to tease the reader, as I sometimes do with other books. Instead, the characters' choices felt natural and organic.

I have just a couple of quibbles – Ivy's terror of Eben turns into defiance a bit too abruptly, and there were a couple of times when I wasn't sure what something meant (for example I didn't understand who or what the Horde were until halfway through the novella, and I would have liked to know sooner). These things are minor enough though, that “Here There Be Monsters” gets an A- from me.

I'm the kind of reader who is willing to purchase an anthology for one great novella. In the case of Burning Up, three of the four stories delighted me. My overall grade for the anthology is a B.

Sincerely,

Janine Ballard

Book Link | Kindle | Amazon | nook | BN | Borders
| Sony| BooksonBoard

Related posts:

1. REVIEW: Branded by Fire by Nalini Singh
2. REVIEW: Sea Witch by Virginia Kantra
3. REVIEW: Sea Fever by Virginia Kantra

Your Psy/Changeling series has me hooked. Set in a future and alternate Earth peopled by three races, humans, Psy, and changelings, the books feature dynamic characters, suspenseful plots and subplots, intricate world-building, and a lot of sexual and romantic tension. Though the world is dominated by the Psy, who are connected through a telepathic net, the changelings, who can shift form from animal to human, have slowly been gaining power, and it is they who are the focus of Branded by Fire, the sixth book in the series.

The story begins with a hot encounter between two changelings. Mercy, a sentinel for the DarkRiver leopard changeling pack, walks through the forest feeling the effects of eight months of abstinence. She is now the only one of the sentinels who is still unmated, and she worries she’ll remain that way. Mercy is dominant in her personality, and while she doesn’t want to walk all over a submissive man, she will also never allow someone else to boss her around. It’s a problem that other dominant females have sometimes been unable to resolve, and Mercy fears that even if she finds the right partner, she will resist the mating bond and roam away from him instead of accepting his love.

Just as Mercy is musing out loud that she would settle for a temporary lover to satisfy her physically, Mercy’s nemesis, Riley Kincaid, walks out of the woods. Riley is a wolf changeling whose rank in the wolves’ SnowDancer pack, lieutenant, is equal to Mercy’s leopard sentinel rank. Ever since Mercy’s DarkRiver leopard pack formed an alliance with Riley’s SnowDancer wolf pack, Mercy and Riley have been irritating one another, and now, Riley does not pass up the opportunity to taunt Mercy with his awareness of her physical needs.

A furious, frustrated Mercy attacks Riley and after he tries to subdue her without hurting her, things get sexual. Did I say this scene was hot? Scorching is more accurate. Even in bed (or rather, on the ground) Mercy and Riley vie for the upper hand, and the struggle for power turns them on more than they can stand to admit.

The next day they wake up feeling both satisfied and confused by the events of the previous night. After all, wolf and leopard are different animals. There may now be a truce between their packs, but cats and dogs are each other’s natural enemies. Not only that, Riley has always wanted a mate he could protect and keep safe, as he could not do for his mother or his sister Brenna, and Mercy will never allow any man to turn her into a submissive little wife. So why are they constantly thinking about each other, even on the trail of a rogue lynx changeling and on the search for the lynx’s brother, who has been kidnapped?

Branded by Fire may well be my favorite book in this series, and considering how much I enjoyed Caressed by Ice, that is saying something. I closed Branded by Fire at 11 PM, having skipped making or eating dinner until then so I could finish reading Mercy and Riley’s story. Sexy, intense and riveting, this book was also deeply satisfying. I couldn’t put it down.

I absolutely adore Mercy, who is not only strong and courageous but also loyal and generous. There is a scene in which Riley, after reliving his sister’s kidnapping in a nightmare, turns up outside Mercy’s house in the middle of the night, and she invites him to her bed, not for sex, but so that he can have the comfort of her company, without prying into his pain. The scene spoke volumes about the size of Mercy’s heart. For all that she knows that her toughness is her strength, Mercy also knows how to compromise without losing any of her self-esteem.

The latter is also true of Riley. Because of the hard time he gave Judd in Caressed by Ice, Riley started out with two strikes against him (in my book, anyway). I couldn’t blame Mercy for being annoyed with his taunts, either. But he won me over by making real sacrifices for Mercy, such as restraining his protective and possessive instincts so as not to lose her. By the end of this book, I also felt I understood his actions in Caressed by Ice better. I had forgotten, or maybe not known, that he raised his brother and sister from childhood, so it’s no wonder that what happened to Brenna in Slave to Sensation continued to haunt him even long after it was over.

In addition to Mercy and Riley’s romance, Branded by Fire also contains several intriguing subplots about the Human Alliance, the Psy Council, PsyNet, Lucas and Sascha, and Hawke and Sienna. The deeper into the series I’ve gotten, the more fascinated I’ve become with the complex tapestry you are crafting from these various, interwoven threads. I cannot wait for Hawke and Sienna’s book. I am so hoping these two will end up together. Please don’t make us wait too long to learn how things will turn out for them.

I do have a few minor criticisms. Besides the fact that it took me a little while to warm to Riley, I also felt that the writing wasn’t always smooth. There were POV shifts within scenes, and while I don’t always mind these, a couple of times I was confused as to whose thoughts I was reading. Additionally, toward the end of the book, I was so absorbed in the various plots that I felt somewhat impatient during the last couple of sex scenes, which did not hold my attention as strongly as the earlier ones.

But on the balance, I thought Branded by Fire was a deeply rewarding book. I don’t know you, but while reading Branded by Fire, I had the feeling that you weren’t holding anything back. There is a passion to your writing, and I don’t mean just the sex scenes — the whole book feels like it is written from a place of deep investment. I am now looking forward to November’s Blaze of Memory. B+/A- for Branded by Fire.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased at Amazon on July 3, 2009, or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers on that same date (will update when link is available).

Related posts:

1. REVIEW: Hostage to Pleasure by Nalini Singh
2. REVIEW: Caressed by Ice by Nalini Singh
3. REVIEW: Slave to Sensation by Nalini Singh

Ironically, Sybil blogged about her frustration with MySpace last week and authors’ seeming devotion to it. It seemed to me that authors spent way too much time on MySpace and not enough time optimizing their websites for readers who want to buy their books.

Marianne Mancusi, author of the upcoming book Moongazer (Shomi) (which I’ve not read, but I have read Liz Maverick’s Wired (Shomi) in that line which was good), gave a spirited defense of MySpace arguing that she has gained readers and sales from MySpace.

But one thing that Sybil said made alot of sense to me and that is the following:

5) You can find readers yourself by doing searches and adding friends instead of waiting for them to find you. (Mancusi’s reasoning)

I don't see how this is any different than blogs, live journal or whatever. And again, if you have that kind of time you aren't updating your website or blog enough. That makes readers cry. The ones that don't have to ask their mom's for money to buy your books. (Sybil’s response).

Very few author blogs or websites are designed for ease of use with a smartphone, particularly the ones relying heavily on graphics or other multimedia. If you have a dark background, it is especially hard to read on the smartphone or cellphone device. It seems to me that an author’s goal is to sell books and if the reader can’t access a booklist from her smartphone at the bookstore, then the author might be missing out on potential sales and that might be a much more important marketing tool than MySpace.

But for Sybil and my blog, it really makes no difference. Or does it? Say the reader is out running an errand but can’t quite remember the name of the or the author she read about on Sybil’s blog yesterday. She can easily load Syb’s page on her smartphone (Dear Author too) and read the posts and the comments.

For wordpress, it couldn’t be easier to add mobile functionality. Drop this plugin into your plugin folder and you are set.

For everyone else, it isn’t really that hard. All you are doing is stripping off all the fancy graphics and providing just the meat. White background, black lettering. Link to your booklist. Ask your web gal for some help. If you want to see what your site looks like in a mobile browser, head over to the Opera site and paste your web address in the demo form. It can give you an idea of what your cellphone users see with those slimmed down browsers.

Do it for us reader’s sake and you might just make another sale.

Edited to add:
I did modify the index.php file a bit. I added a “comment” link at the top of a post so that you can quickly jump to the comments. It involves adding two small lines of code to the index.php and comment.php file. I would type it in but for some reason, it doesn’t show up here so if you want, you just email me and I’ll send you my modified files. :)

Related posts:

1. Anonymous Bitchery: Get Your Engines Started
2. REVIEW: Threesomes (Menage a Trois) or how to increase traffic to your new blog
3. If you can’t make money as an author, sell book reviews

Sascha Duncan is a member of the Psy race. Years ago, in an effort to reduce the level of violence in the Psy community, the Council decided to begin a program to eliminate emotions. After several generations, the conditioning is complete. Psy operate on logic and practicality. They feel nothing. They feel that this makes them superior to humans and changelings who are ruled by emotions. Changelings, of course, feel differently.

Lucas Hunter is the alpha of the DarkRiver leopard pack. Shrewd, powerful and cunning, he intends to use the joint real estate development project he and the Duncan family are working on to further a secret aim. There is a serial killer on the loose who is preying on changeling women and Lucas needs an “in” into the Psy community to hunt him. He’s hoping to use Sascha to learn anything he can to nail the killer. After a few meetings with her, he’s convinced she’s not a usual Psy.

Sascha also realizes she’s not normal. For years she’s tried to develop her mental abilities to rise in the rigid Psy hierarchy. Now she just wants to fly below the radar, so to speak, and avoid revealing that she’s feeling emotions. Any Psy caught doing that is sentenced to a brainwashing session that leaves them mindless husks left with only enough mental ability to sweep floors and wipe away the drool. But with Lucas pushing her and her ruthless mother and other council members watching her closely, it’s getting harder by the day to conceal the cracks in her mental facade. Time is also running out for Lucas. A werewolf changeling woman has been abducted and if the killer isn’t found for the wolves to wreck vengeance on, widespread civil war could erupt, destroying civilization.

I was impressed with the Psy world building. It’s new and interesting and you’ve obviously put a lot of thought into it. Sascha’s trip into the PsyNet (a kind of mental Internet) was amazing. What I didn’t need was to have many aspects of the world and the Psy community repeated ad nauseam. I understand Sascha can’t reveal emotion, I know the council is ruthless, I know what awaits Sascha if she’s found out. And while you thoroughly explain the DarkRiver leopard pack, there’s really nothing new here as far as pack structure or dynamics. And I certainly didn’t need elements of it (Lucas’s tragic childhood and early rise to pack leader) repeated as well. I know this is your book and your reality but do leopards even have pack structures? I will give you major bonus points for avoiding a lot of mental lusting and for slowly developing the heat between Lucas and Sascha. Talk about wet dreams! But then Lucas has to go all dominant on Sascha and turns a tad overbearing.

Balancing what I liked and didn’t like I’d give “Slave to Sensation” a B-

~Jayne

Related posts:

1. REVIEW: Slave to Sensation by Nalini Singh
2. Slave to Sensation by Nalini Singh, a blogging experiment
3. REVIEW: Intent to Seduce by Cara Summers (Blaze 38)