Dear Author » Seattle

REVIEW: Shaedes of Gray by Amanda Bonilla

Jia — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 10:00:29 +0000

Dear Ms. Bonilla,

If there’s one character type I love seeing, it’s assassins. Especially female assassins. I could probably stand to see less redheaded assassins though. Seriously, what is it with fantasy and redheaded assassins and/or redheaded women? Still, the promise of a female assassin was enough to lure me into picking up your debut. I tried to read another debut earlier this year featuring a female assassin, but that quickly became a DNF. So I hoped for something better with your book. But while I did finish your novel, it was with very mixed feelings.

Darian is an assassin. She makes it a point to only kill people who deserve it but there’s no getting around what she does for a living. She kills people and she does so well. Until now.

Darian is also a Shaede. Shaedes are supernatural beings that can turn into shadow at night. Very effective ability for an assassin. People are usually born Shaedes but a select few — the powerful ones — can turn others. The process to become one isn’t very clear — no exchange of blood likes vampires, no bites like werewolves — so I’m guessing it was something mystical.

Darian was made into a Shaede. The man who turned her into one vanished many years prior and is assumed dead, so she assumed she was the only one of her kind. After all, that’s what her maker told her so why should she have any reason to doubt him?

It turns out he lied. Darian is not the only one of her kind. In fact, she’s been recruited back into the fold for specific particular mission. And to succeed at this mission, she’s got to train for it because while she was good against humans, it turns out her current skill level is nothing at all compared to other Shaedes and the man she now has to kill.

I really wanted to love this book. It had promise. Finally, a female assassin who’s hard and not depicted to be incompetent in the opening pages! But as the book progressed, I realized that while I like my female assassins to be hard, I also prefer for them not to be complete and utter sociopaths dissociated from their emotions. Now I assume that to be a good assassin, you need to be able to dissociate to a certain extent, but there’s compartmentalizing and then there’s being emotionless. It makes it hard for me to like Darian.

For example, Darian’s backstory is that she was an abused wife. Yes, I’m sure everyone is surprised that the tough as nails heroine had a tragic backstory in which she was beaten by her husband. At least she wasn’t raped. On the other hand, the reason the husband beat her was because he was closeted gay and resented it. Talk about cliches and stereotypes! A woman can’t become strong unless she was abused? The gay man is evil? Really?

But that’s not even the point I was trying to make. You see, when the abusive husband gets what’s coming to him, Darian watches the scene unfold with no reaction at all. I would have taken anything. Hysteria. Cheerfully jumping in to help. Screaming and running away when she realizes that the man they invited into their house is in fact a murderer! Her dropping to the floor and saying, “Okay, kill me next.” Anything! Instead, I got nothing. She just stood by and watched.

Now you could say her lack of reaction was a sign that the abuse had affected her. That she could no longer feel. But based on the rest of the book, I don’t think that was what was intended at all.

I also found her to be willfully ignorant. It’s not just her actually believing they were the only ones of their kind. It’s the fact that she didn’t stop to think that there were other supernatural things walking around. And to tell the truth, I can’t help but think badly of a supernatural character who has no idea what a Jinn is. When she was human, sure. I can buy that lack of knowledge. But Darian’s been alive for a long time. She lives in modern-day Seattle. She doesn’t know that jinn=genie? Let’s not even get started on the fact that while Darian insists on only killing evil people, she doesn’t actually confirm that the people she’s killing are evil! She trusts her handler, Tyler, to vet everything. I know it’s just a personal preference but I really want my protagonists to be smart and clever!

There’s a romantic subplot but it feel really flat for me. I had no idea why Tyler was so in love with Darian. Was it a genuine emotional connection? Some sort of supernatural soulbonding? Both? Who knows? And I personally found the insistence that Xander was a rival for Darian’s affections to be laughable. I found the scenes where Darian interacted with Xander to be lacking in romantic or sexual chemistry at all. Trying to see Darian as being torn between Tyler and Xander was impossible despite the book telling me that Darian was attracted to Xander. I didn’t see that at all and every time the book told me that, I made a face.

Which brings us to the final point. This book is a lot of telling. It’s also a lot of withholding information for the sake of withholding information. I really dislike this. I knew who it was Darian had to kill the minute they mentioned it. It was so obvious there might as well have been neon orange flags around it. The fact that it took so long for them to reveal the identity in the book was annoying.

While I liked that the novel took the idea of a shadow assassin and showed how nasty the applications of that can be, I really could not get behind Darian. Her backstory was so cliche and she followed the path of many an urban fantasy heroine and started developing unique and random superpowers no one has ever seen before when times got tough. The romantic subplot was poorly done in my opinion, and the plot lacked any twists at all. I don’t regret reading the book but it does remind me of why the urban fantasy genre frustrates me so much. C-

My regards,
Jia

REVIEW: Hellbent by Cherie Priest

Jia — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 19:00:08 +0000

Dear Ms. Priest,

I was first introduced to your work with Four and Twenty Blackbirds, your Southern gothic debut. I remember liking it but for some reason, I never picked up another book by you again. It happens. So when I saw this book pop up on NetGalley, I glanced at your backlist and was shocked to discover how extensive it was! Time passes fast. Upon realizing that Hellbent was the second book in a series, I tracked down the first book Bloodshot (which I talked about briefly here) and liked it enough to give this one a go.

Raylene Pendle is a vampire who makes a living as the thief known as Cheshire Red. She’s lived a long time and is good at what she does — so good that many people think Cheshire Red is actually a man. After the events of Bloodshot, the normally solitary Raylene has picked up some friends: the blind vampire Ian Stott and the ex-Navy SEAL turned drag queen Adrian deJesus.

In Hellbent, Raylene is recruited to steal a very strange set of magical artifacts. Unfortunately, a brilliant but mentally unstable sorceress also wants them for her own purposes. And when she gets them first, Raylene will have to contend with the woman’s greatly amplified powers to get them back.

At the same time, Ian has a political problem on his hands. Vampires normally belong to Houses. Raylene left hers decades ago after a falling out with the head of the Chicago house. (The head wanted Raylene to die for her, and Raylene disagreed.) Ian, however, never actually left. He went into hiding after losing his sight because as one of the potential heirs, such a perceived weakness would put him at a disadvantage and make him a walking target. But now the San Francisco head has died and people are looking for Ian. And because of her feelings for him, Raylene will do anything to dissuade him from leaving, even if that means dealing with the San Francisco vampire house instead.

I’ll be the first person to say that urban fantasy is a crowded subgenre. Adult, young adult, blending with paranormal romance, traditional fantasy with urban fantasy trappings, it’s everywhere despite the fact that I think the subgenre’s heyday is behind us. But despite all that, I found Raylene’s voice very refreshing. Anyone who’s read urban fantasy is used to the tough loner heroine with attitude and a chip on her shoulder.

And while Raylene started out a loner in the previous book, Bloodshot, she’s a different take on that archetype. She’s a loner because of necessity. While she can be tough, it has more to do with living a long time on her own without a vampire house to back her up and being competent at what she does. It’s not a front. In fact, the only lies she tells involve her valuing her solitary life and disliking all these people barging in on it. That’s obviously not true since she collects people and takes them in, just like the valuables and artifacts she steals.

The biggest thing that sets her apart, however, is her personality. Raylene is neurotic and has OCD. I liked that this played on the traditional folklore about vampires where to distract them, you throw rice at them because that makes them stop and have to count each individual grain. (Like how The Count on Sesame Street teaches counting?) It makes for an interesting character because Raylene is simultaneously overprepared and reckless. She likes planning for contingencies but ends up taking risks when faced with the actual situation.

I think it’s this trait of Raylene’s that made her interactions with the sorceress Elizabeth interesting. Once she realized Elizabeth had schizophrenia, she stopped being the rival Raylene needed to eliminate. Instead she became someone Raylene wanted to help. And if there’s something Raylene suffers from, it’s this unacknowledged desire to help.

For me, though, the main flaw of Hellbent is that the plot is divided between the stolen artifact storyline and Ian’s vampire house storyline. A part of me originally thought they would converge and I read on, interested in seeing how they would. Because that didn’t happen, I was left with a scattered impression. I liked the vampire house storyline because plots involving political intrigue are a favorite of mine. But Raylene jumping back and forth between that and the stolen artifact storyline weakened it for me.

I was surprised by the conclusion to the subplot involving Adrian’s missing sister. Maybe neverending series have conditioned me to expect mysteries to be drawn out for several books. That the question was answered in this installment was refreshing. Unfortunately, it also struck me as a little too convenient.

As for the relationship between Raylene and Ian, I still have problems wrapping my mind around it. I think I just never bought it in Bloodshot, so while I can see Raylene doing all this because he’s a friend, I have a harder time thinking of them in a romantic way. I don’t know if that’s intentional but I admit I find their interactions to be emotionally unsatisfying.

Adrian, on the other hand, I can’t get enough of. I don’t care what he does. I just want more of him. I am interested in seeing how his new connection to Raylene will impact their relationship in the future.

Overall, I do think Hellbent was a worthwhile read. Maybe not so much about the events that take up the majority of the book but rather the fallout and what it means for the future. I am curious to see how Raylene proceeds from here. C+

My regards,
Jia

Previous book in this series: Bloodshot

REVIEW: The Curtis Reincarnation by Zathyn Priest

REVIEW: Nothing But Trouble by Rachel Gibson

Jayne — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 09:00:09 +0000

Dear Ms. Gibson,

I am a slut for your hockey theme books. You can give me improbable plots and unlikeable characters but it you throw hockey into the mix, I will give up for your stories. Why? I like to watch big, strong macho guys fall for women who initially drive them nuts and I like to see woman who are horrified at the thought of falling for hockey players fall anyway.

Six months ago, hockey superstar Mark Bressler’s life was turned upside down by a horrific car accident. Now forced into early retirement and struggling with his new physical reality, he’s made a new career out of getting rid of the nurses and “minders” that the Seattle Chinooks team keeps trying to foist on him.

Chelsea Ross is to be his latest victim but she’s got an incentive he doesn’t know about: the $10,000 bonus promised to her if she can stick out three months with him. Chelsea might be little but she’s tough, having lived in the dog-eat-dog world of aspiring LA actors for almost 10 years as well as being the personal assistant to innumerable Hollywood assholes along the way. Bressler and his insults are nothing new to her.

But the passion they find together after finally giving into their attraction to each other is. The sex is great – no, better than great – but the emotional feelings that begin to develop just might be even better. If they can trust this potential love.

Long time fans of the Chinooks books will be happy to see a few familiar faces throughout the story but the book focuses mainly on Mark and Chelsea with a subplot for Chelsea’s twin sister, known to, and feared by, the team as the Mini Pit.

Even though Chelsea is short and Mark is brawny, I like the way that their relationship is balanced. I never got the feeling that he is overpowering her either physical or verbally. Chelsea more than holds her own here and proves her background of dealing with demanding people. And Mark, insulting as he can be, never slips over the edge into jerkwad territory. He does criticize Chelsea’s driving but then after surviving the kind of car accident he did, that’s reasonable. He comments on her fashion style but not on her body, despite what he thinks are her surgically enhanced breasts. Plus he makes sure that his former teammates behave themselves around her.

The physical attraction isn’t immediate, even though both admire each other’s bodies and they each manage to restrain themselves once desire starts kicking in. Chelsea is determined not to give into Mark sexually during work hours since this is something she’s never done. Even though it drives him nuts, Mark respects her boundaries. I appreciate that both can act professionally and not be reduced to puddles of drool.

Mark’s life was hockey and now that’s gone. There will be no coming back from these injuries and it does affect him. He does feel resentment at not being able to play for the Cup, he hates that his body won’t always obey him now and there is a dark pool of anger in him that takes a while to dissipate. All this felt natural and to be expected. His transition from player to “life after hockey” takes time and I’m glad you allowed us to see that time elapse.

Chelsea’s got a plan for life post-Mark and, just as she falls for him because he supports her, so did I. Hey, he doesn’t see anything wrong with her but he’s not her and if she wants this, then he’s onboard with it. The fact that Chelsea is able to reveal her secrets to Mark, and vice-versa, shows me how they are coming together.

Which makes the Big Misunderstanding all the harder to take. The only thing about it that keeps me from completely losing it is that Mark does have experience with woman who just want him for money. But, I still think his reaction is overreaction and it’s not like the money is coming from him, after all. Then the reconciliation happens on his sudden about-face which is fast enough to cause whiplash.

Up until the end, this book was cruising for me. And I still think that readers will enjoy most, if not all, of it. I love the hockey, I love most of the relationship, I love the big honkin’ ring Mark gives Chelsea but oh, that Big Mis. B

~Jayne

This is a trade paperback published by NAL but pre-Agency pricing.

REVIEW: Hunting Ground by Patricia Briggs

Janine — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 18:00:43 +0000

Dear Ms. Briggs,

Even though I adored “Alpha and Omega” in the anthology On the Prowl, the story which introduced readers to the werewolves Charles and Anna, and also loved the first novel in the series which follows these characters, Cry Wolf, I’m not sure I’m the best person to review Hunting Ground, the latest entry in the Alpha and Omega series. That’s because I have a pattern of tending to lose interest in the second or third book of series which follow the same protagonists, and for this reason, I only rarely read them, and review them even more rarely.

I made an exception for Hunting Ground because when I first read “Alpha and Omega,” I fell in love with Charles and Anna. I felt that I could read about these characters forever and not tire of them. In fact by now I’ve read “Alpha and Omega” around seven times, and Cry Wolf around three.

For readers who are not familiar with them, let me introduce this endearing couple:

Charles is an over two hundred year old, half Native American werewolf. He is dominant enough to be an alpha, but his pack has one werewolf who is even more dominant — Bran, Charles’ father, an alpha of alphas, also known as the Marrok, or leader of all of North America’s werewolves. Because Bran is more dominant than he is, Charles must do as he says. He is his father’s right hand man as well as his executioner. The last is a role he dislikes, one that isolates him from the many who fear him.

Anna, Charles’ mate, is an omega werewolf, which means that she is outside the pack structure. She cannot be commanded by anyone, but she also lacks the alphas’ aggressive tendencies. Instead, her presence has a calming influence on dominant wolves. Anna is a relatively young werewolf, only in her twenties. The pack Anna originally belonged to abused her and assaulted her sexually, and Anna’s recovery from those attacks is an ongoing process.

Anna and Charles’ wolf halves chose them as mates for one another before Charles and Anna had a chance to get to know each other well, and now, a month into their relationship, Charles and Anna are still learning to deal with the new emotions and abilities their bond has given them. Just as Anna struggles to overcome her fear of dominant werewolves other than Charles, Charles must battle his protective and possessive instincts toward her.

Hunting Ground opens at a time when Charles and Bran, his father, are at odds. Bran intends to make the werewolves’ existence public, and before he does so, he wants to meet with all the European alphas and their seconds. But Charles, who possesses some magical abilities due to his mother’s having been a shaman’s daughter, feels intuitively that something very bad will happen if Bran attends the meeting he has scheduled.

With Anna’s help, the conflict between Charles and Bran is defused, and Bran resolves to send Charles and Anna to the werewolf gathering in his place. Charles and Anna arrive at the meeting place, Seattle, even though Charles’ instincts to protect Anna are screaming in protest.

Once in Seattle, Anna and Charles face difficulties and dangers that come from several sources. First, there is Jean Chastel, also known as “The Beast,” a mad, carnivorous werewolf who leads the French contingent. Then there is Dana, a fae and Gray Lord who is a former lover of Charles’, and who will act as moderator of the meeting. Charles likes Dana, but Brother Wolf, his other half, distrusts her, and Anna feels uneasy in her presence. Lastly, there is a group of rogue vampires on a killing spree, bent on capturing Anna.

If that weren’t enough there are also the aforementioned personal issues in Anna and Charles’ relationship. Charles is closing Anna out of their bond much of the time, because he is afraid that as Bran’s killer, he is not someone Anna can truly love if she ever knows all of him. Anna, meanwhile, still finds sex scary when her wolf half isn’t present.

I enjoyed Hunting Ground a lot, but not as much as “Alpha and Omega” or Cry Wolf. I’m not sure how much of that is due to my having already spent a lot of time with these characters before reading this book, when I usually prefer to read about characters I don’t know this well, and how much of it is due to the (mostly minor) problems I had with Hunting Ground.

The first of these is that the first half or so of the book felt episodic to me. Each of the conflicts I described seemed to crop up and then fade away, when I would have preferred for the story to feel more cohesive.

Secondly, it’s my opinion that ongoing series about the same couple face special challenges. If the conflict between the pair is too pronounced in second books, it may seem like the relationship is in a holding pattern, or the couple is lacking in the maturity necessary to surmount their problems. But if the pair resolves all their problems quickly, then the suspense an internal conflict brings to a book can dissipate, and readers’ interest in the couple may also wane.

Hunting Ground shows astute navigation of these waters. Charles and Anna’s relationship has clearly progressed, and they both show maturity, but at the same time, they are both wounded individuals and their scars don’t heal overnight just because they have married. I feel that you struck a great balance between avoiding repetitiveness and not resolving things too fast.

Perhaps it is the romance reader in me, but, even though I recognized how deftly you handled that, I still found myself wanting more focus on Charles and Anna’s personal relationship, especially in the middle portion of the book. I would have loved more in the way of exploring their physical intimacy with one another, too.

Anna and Charles are still wonderful characters, though, and I still cared about them greatly. They are both vulnerable, flawed, but fundamentally good people, inhabiting a dangerous world where only the strong survive.

Eventually, too, my concerns were allayed in what was a fabulous build up to a terrific ending. The various plot lines came together into a cohesive and very satisfying whole. There was a subtle and moving exploration of Anna and Charles’s issues with sex. The ending, in which both Anna and Charles must come to the other’s aid, was as gripping as it was romantic. And I love the way Anna finds her strength growing from book to book.

Although I won’t reread it immediately and obsessively as I did the first two installments in Charles and Anna’s story, I closed the book feeling thoroughly rewarded and looking forward to more of Charles and Anna in the future. B+ for Hunting Ground.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers. This book goes on sale on August 25. I hope that the Sony ebook will show up but it’s in the Kindle format for sure.

REVIEW: Lady’s Choice by Jayne Ann Krentz

Jane — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:00:21 +0000

Dear Ms. Krentz:

This book was published in 1989 but I don’t think I read it until the early 1990s. My copy was used and I recall that I had purchased it used in its original Harlequin Temptation iteration. Since that time, it has been re-released by Harlequin at least twice more. I anxiously await for it to come out in ebook format. (Hint. Hint.) The thing that I remember most about this book is that it was the first one that started out with the hero and heroine in bed together.

Juliana Grant is a tall, confident, passionate business woman. When Travis Sawyer first met her, a relationship is that last thing on his mind but she embodied everything he had ever wanted in a woman. Travis, a business consultant, had sought out Juliana because she was the only member of the Grant he had not yet met. He begins to woo her under the guise of offering his consulting services for her burgeoning coffee shop empire. Travis plans to crush the Grant family because they promised him a part of the business when he saved their bacon but reneged when his engagement to Juliana’s cousin fell through.

Juliana was unaware of the debt her family owes Travis or that Travis is still seeking his pound of flesh. The problem is that Travis is too good by half in his revenge plans. He finds himself helplessly ensnared by Juliana and when he finds that his plans for revenge imperil her business prospects, he works feverishly to prevent the impending disaster he set in motion.

This book was unconventional in many aspects, not the least of which was Juliana’s absolutely wonderful fierceness. She was a very good businesswoman even if she secretly wanted to a tea empire and not a coffee shop empire. She wasn’t shy about taking her passion, telling everyone that she loved Travis, assuming that he loved her back and proceeding to plan their life together. She was an unstoppable force. I loved that both believed that they had found the one true mate for themselves and in a genre filled with the possessive being tossed about by the heroes, it was especially piquant to have the heroine be espousing it:

Because she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this particular man-’this hard, lean, sexy man named Travis Sawyer-’was the man. The right man. The one she’d been waiting for all her life.

She savored the delicious secret and held herself very still so as not to awaken the exotic creature lying next to her. She wanted a moment to luxuriate in the thrilling certainty that she had finally encountered her true mate.

He was not exactly as she had fondly imagined over the years when she had indulged in a little harmless fantasizing.

The scene goes on with Juliana comparing Travis’ appearance to that of her dream man from his height (only a bit over 6 feet) to his eyes (gray and not her preferred hazel) to his hair (severely cut black versus blond) to his lack of interest in clothes.

There were a few other minor discrepancies between the real Travis Sawyer and Juliana’s fantasy version of her true mate. If she were inclined to be picky, for example, she
could have carped about the undeniable fact that his rough, grim looks would probably forever keep him from gracing the cover of Gentlemen’s Quarterly magazine. Ah, well, it was GQ’s loss, she told herself. He looked perfect here in her bed.

Juliana’s unabashed embrace of her own sexuality, her own self worth and of Travis always makes me smile.

The revenge plot is also a bit unique because from the very first pages Travis already has regrets over his plans now that he has met Juliana, someone he never thought he would find in all of his life. He wants to capture her passion and loyalty and hold it fast to him. He’s never had someone like Juliana fight for him, over him or even with him and he wants it even more than he thought he wanted revenge. The true irony is that his plans for destroying the Grants might spell his own demise.

There is a great scene in which Travis thinks he has lost Juliana and he prepares to leave in his very staid automobile when Juliana comes storming out of the country club after him like a Valkryie. She throws herself on the hood of the auto:

“You’re engaged to me, you bastard,” she yelled back through the windshield. “You can’t walk out on me like this. I deserve an explanation and I’m warning you right now, whatever that explanation is, it won’t be good enough. Because we aren’t just engaged, we’re partners, remember? You might be able to end an engagement like this, but you can’t end a business relationship so easily.”

Travis response is the only he can give:

The only thing that made it possible for Travis to hang on to his self-control was the sure and certain knowledge that if he lost it now, he would never be able to regain it. He looked up at the magnificent creature standing on the hood of his car and felt the blood pounding through his veins. Her hair was a wild, crazy shade of orange in the glare of the parking lot lights. Her shoes sparkled garishly as if they’d been coated with some sort of cheap glitter dust, and the huge satin bow at the back of her green dress had come undone.

Travis knew he had never in his life wanted a woman as badly as he wanted this one.

The one draw back to this story is that Juliana’s cousin and her family are really bastards and they never really get the comeuppance they deserve.

I see so few truly assertive heroines in romance that Lady’s Choice is one I’ve savored since the first that I read it so many years ago. Travis was a great match for her and in the end, no reader ever doubted the depth of their love for each other or the likelihood of that ever after happiness.

Best regards,

Jane

This book can be purchased at Amazon. No ebook format.

REVIEW: Sweet Talk by Susan Mallery

Jane — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:00:20 +0000

Dear Ms. Mallery:

July, August, and September sees the release of your Keys’ Bakery sisters series. The series begins with Claire, a piano virtuoso. Claire has been estranged from her family since, well, almost forever. When she was 3 years old, she walked up to a piano and started playing and her life changed forever. She began lessons and practicing and at age 6 left the home with her grandmother to start her career as a classical pianist. When she was older, her mother left her family to be with Claire. Nicole and Jesse were left behind and Nicole, at age 12, had to be mother, daughter, and bakery worker. Jesse was the irresponsible one. They both blamed Claire for the failure of their family and want nothing to do with her.

But then Jesse calls and tells Claire that Nicole is going to have surgery and that Nicole wants Claire to come and help. Claire thinks this is a chance, an opportunity to reconnect with the only family she has. She’s also got some performance issues so running off to help her sister is a two fold blessing.

Claire is a very nice woman whose life might be one of riches and fame but because of being a child prodigy, she’s had very few ordinary experiences, like driving a car, cooking, or being with a man. (Yes, my readers, she’s a virgin).

Wyatt Knight is Nicole’s best friend and he’s spent years learning what a delinquent, unfeeling sister Claire really is which is why he can’t really figure out what game she is playing when she shows up to "take care" of Nicole during her convalescence. He’s determined not to let her bother Nicole but the minute that he even shakes Claire’s hand, he recognizes that there is a powerful physical attraction between the two of them. One that he does not want.

Goddamn sonofabitch, he thought grimly, jerking back his hand and stuffing it in his jacket pocket. No way. Not her. Dear God, anyone but her.

Claire was babbling on, probably thanking him. He wasn’t listening. Instead he was wondering why, of all the women in all the world, he’d had to feel that hot, bright, sexual heat with her.

As for Claire, first she doesn’t recognize what she’s feeling is lust and then when she does recognize it, she’s excited about it and Wyatt. It doesn’t really matter to her that he doesn’t want to feel it back or even that he’s a bit of a jerk to her. Like a new born puppy trying to experience everything from rabbits to mailmen, Claire is delighted. She wants to have sex and is willing to use the physical attraction between the two of them to get what she wants.

Claire’s good humor in the face of really gut wrenchingly poor treatment from her sisters, Nicole and Jesse, and some from Wyatt, is nothing short of a miracle. Nicole, at some point, mentions that Claire is the strongest emotional person she knows. It’s the truth. You’d have to be an emotional warrior to withstand the crap that Nicole tosses out. I never felt that Claire was a martyr though or that she was annoyingly plucky. Being accommodating is part of Claire’s strength and part of her weakness.

What we see of Claire is a woman whose emotional and psychological profiles were stunted because of her gift and when her gift fails her because she can no longer play due to panic attacks, it allows her to embrace life. Claire’s character is one of those who is glass is half full and you can’t help but be charmed by her and her outlook.

Wyatt is also an appealing figure. He’s raised his deaf daughter by himself. He’s very protective of Nicole. He’s a straight shooter, finally admitting to Claire his wants but being up front about the inability to care for anyone on a long term basis besides his daughter.

While Wyatt’s excuses for not being able to be with Claire on a permanent basis are thin, there is enough chemistry and emotional development for both that the reader isn’t left wanting. It’s a fun, emotional, and sexy read. A good way to spend an evening. B-

Best regards,

Jane

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells or ebook format.

REVIEW: Irresistible by Susan Mallery

Jane — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 09:00:02 +0000

Dear Ms. Mallery:

This is the first Buchanan book that I read but the second in the series. I think its my favorite Mallery book I’ve read in my recent glom.

Elissa Towers is a woman who has made some past bad mistakes and is still paying for them, but she’s righting her ship and trying to make a life for herself and her daughter, Zoe. She lives in a poorer part of town, sharing an apartment complex with Mrs. Ford, an elderly woman, and a newcomer, Walker Buchanan.

All Elissa knows about Walker is that he was in the military and doesn’t appear to have a job. She doesn’t really want to know more because men are a bad thing and she’s done with bad things. But one day she’s struggling with her taking the tire off her car and Walker shows up and lends a hand. One thing leads to another and Walker has bought her a new tire.

This makes Elissa unhappy and she proceeds to tell him that not only does he not have the right to buy a new tire, but she also has no interest in going out with him, EVER.

"Fine. But you don’t have to pay me in cash. We could work out a trade."

White-hot anger blew up inside of her. Here it was-’the truth. Behind that pretty face was a disgusting, evil, heartless bastard. Just like nearly every other guy on the planet.

Of course. Why was she even surprised? She’d been momentarily attracted to Walker, and based on her stellar track record, that meant there had to be something wrong with him. She’d expected a massive flaw. But she hadn’t thought it would be this.

"Not even if you were the last man alive after nuclear winter," she said between gritted teeth. "I can’t believe you’d suggest that I would be willing-" She wanted to slap him. "It was a tire. It’s not like you gave me a kidney."

He had the nerve to actually smile at her. "You’d sleep with me if I gave you a kidney?"

Walker is at loose ends. He thought he would stay in the military until they kicked him out. Instead, after seventeen years, he leaves and now he’s not sure what he wants to do other than find Ashley, a girl that a young man in his unit spoke about with reverence. Ben wrote a letter for Ashley and Walker is going to deliver it even if it takes him months and hundreds of Ashleys. Ben took a bullet that was meant for Walker, died for him.

There was something wonderfully poignant about Walker’s search for Ashley, his disconnect from the world, and his struggle not to fall for Elissa or her daughter. =Elissa had plenty of reasons to swear off men, the most recent one being the father of Elissa’s daughter. She struggles mightily to ward off the feelings she has for Walker. Even when it becomes physical, Elissa tells herself that it is only temporary; that she just needs a temporary release.

Walker keeps telling Elissa that she can’t trust him; that he can’t be relied upon. And the reason for this is pretty heartwrenching. It’s some thing that is real and powerful enough to have affected someone for the rest of their lives and it was interesting to see how Walker ended up working through it. There are a couple of scenes in the book that are real tearjerkers and the one in which Walker let’s go of his past and his guilt and his self hatred was one of them.

Elissa reminds me of a Nora Roberts heroine. Capable, smart, honest with herself.

It’s apparent that Walker and Elissa fit together like two pieces of the puzzle. Elissa has the family that Walker always searched for but never realized he wanted. Walker is the man that Elissa can finally rely upon, who won’t use her up and walk away even when he believes he is not that man. B+

Best regards,

Jane

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells or ebook format.

REVIEW: Succubus Blues by Richelle Mead

Jane — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 18:00:05 +0000

Dear Ms. Mead:

When I pulled up your book out of the stack to read, I thought that if I had to read one more female first person narrated paranormal that I I may poke out my eyes and never read again. Then I began to read and remembered why I had read so many female first person narrated paranormals in the first place. When the lead is charming and unaffected and the alternate reality is richly drawn, it is easy to escape into the author’s world.

Georgina Kincaid is a succubus who draws life energy from having sex with mortals. She sold her soul to Lilith many thousands of years ago to rectify a mistake she made and she now pays for it with her life. Georgina does not, in any way, feel sorry for herself. She has made the best lemonade she can from her situation but the hundreds of years that have passed have only heightened her state of loneliness. She cannot love because every intimate touch draws life away from the mortal and who kills the person that they love the most? [rhetorical question, of course]

Georgina is currently inhabiting a cute ~~redhead’s~~ brunette’s body and has made a life for herself in Seattle as an assistant manager of an independent bookstore. She obviously has no love life. Her looks are unimportant as she can shape shift. Her John Cusack look alike boss, Jerome, wants her to seduce more men. There is a succubus quota that Georgie’s not quite filling. She’s kind of a slacker succubus. Plus, someone is going around hurting Georgie and her friends (an incubus and a couple of vamps) and it may lead to an immortal throw down of some epic kind.

Georgie’s personal life heats up with the arrival of her favorite author, Seth Morgenstern, in the bookstore for a signing, and the appearance of a very attractive stranger, Roman. Roman aggressively pursues Georgie and while she enjoys the attention, she knows that she cannot be intimate with him. Meanwhile, she and the very shy Seth begin developing a relationship which can also go nowhere.

Georgie’s dissatisfaction is completely believable. She wants a personal connection but her nature denies her. Her life is spent hanging out with her guy friends and reading books. She’s a bit neurotic but she’s had centuries to refine her seduction tecniques to perfection. The shy Seth contrasted with the bold Roman was a great touch.

The problems are that the story is completely devoid of any other meaningful women. There are passing appearances but Georgie has not even one immortal female friend. It seemed odd. A cast of a thousand men appear in this book and many of them could be future love interests for Georgie which makes me leery of future books. [I like to call this the Anita Blake effect]. There was also an issue I had with an event at the end of the story which I felt was unexplained but in clarification I will state I thought while it was explained it seemed weak and contradictory to the fundamental rules that had been built up for Georgie and her world.

Having said that, Georgie is very appealing. The dialogue is smart and the story sped by. I will definitely be aboard for another book. B

Best regards,

Jane

REVIEW: A Babe in Ghostland by Lisa Cach

Jayne — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 22:00:57 +0000

Dear Ms Cach,

I’ve been following your writing career for years now and one thing’s for certain, you don’t just write the same old same old. Even when you revisit certain themes, such as ghosts, you handle the issue in a new and different ways. This time at bat we have a contemporary story, set in Seattle, featuring a hero and heroine battling spirits in his old, derelict mansion.

Case Lambert is obviously ill at ease when he enters Megan Barrows’ antique store. After wandering around a little, he finally gets down to business and starts to ask Megan some odd questions, almost as if he’s testing her. Megan goes along with him until he finally mentions the real reason for his visit. A former, a very former, acquaintance of Megan is now working with Case to try to discover what’s going on in the huge, Victorian house he’s just bought to renovate. Eric told Case that Megan might be able to help figure out who’s been moving things, making noises, fooling with the electricity, crawling into bed with him among other things. At first Case’s skeptical attitude plus the mention of Eric makes Megan say hell no but he and a friend of hers finally talk her into a one time, one time mind you, trip there to see what she can discover.

Well, as far as Megan’s concerned, one trip to this spirit infested, gloomy house which feels like it’s trying to trap her spirit inside the tall iron gates surrounding the entire block sized grounds, is half a trip too many. Yes, she tells Case, you’ve got spirits now get Eric and his wiz-bang paranormal investigation devices to deal with it. She’s had enough. Or at least she thought she had until Case agrees to her bet: if she can prove there are ghosts and if she is instrumental in getting rid of them, he’ll let her pick 20 pieces of antique furniture from the house to sell in her shop. If she can’t, then she’ll owe Case the time and labor it will take to restore all the furniture in the house. Oh, and Case wants her to move in so that she can be on hand at any time to deal with the spirits while this is going on. Deal.

Case finds that Megan is growing on him and soon he’s as worried as she is about the ghost-hunting stuff that Eric has rigged up. Megan’s convinced it caused harm to her before reluctantly agrees to his guarantees that he’s fixed it all. What she starts to experience and, along with the others, uncover at the house puzzles then intrigues then terrifies her. There are some very determined ghosts in the house and they’re not planning on taking no for an answer.

I like that Megan doesn’t come across as a flake. She treats her talents very matter of factly, doesn’t try to play things up, looks for the obvious reasons things could appear haunted but is very sure of what paranormal stuff she does see. Case comes across as a “guy.” He’s constantly wondering if he might get lucky with Megan, the whole situation with the “ghosts” annoys him but when weird stuff really does start to happen, he sure as hell doesn’t want to admit that he almost passed out from the experience. Eric comes off as slightly bizarre but then he does get what’s coming to him in the end. I like that the romance between Case and Megan goes as slowly as it can for the short time period of the book and that the epilogue shows they wait a while before marriage.

I wasn’t too thrilled with the little subplot intended to push them temporarily apart. It felt tacked on and out of place. I’ve swung back and forth about the ghosts’ story. At first it felt too melodramatic but on second thought, it takes on gothic tones appropriate to the late Victorian era.

While this one won’t take a place beside my other favorites of yours, it’s very readable, the woo-woo stuff seems well thought out and I enjoyed the hero and heroine’s relationship. B for this one.

~Jayne