I’ve never read a steampunk book and frankly had doubts that it would be to my taste but since I’m trying to expand my reading of new-to-me authors, I thought why not try a new genre as well. The results weren’t what I was hoping for but the reason for the grade isn’t the gears and goggles. Rather it’s due to some issues with the characters.

Older Olyve Blackwell knows that her actions flout propriety and at her age she isn’t likely to get any offers of marriage from the gentlemen of the ton but since she’s one of THE Blackwells, the effort to be proper probably would have been wasted had she even been inclined to attempt it. Instead she indulges her liking of things mechanical and tries to help those less fortunate than she. Disturbing visions have her asking around about missing women and she knows she’s rattled someone’s cage when an assassin tries to kill her. An unknown man comes to her rescue then gently pushes her off the train at the next station. Olyve doesn’t think she’ll ever see him again but to her surprise, he rescues her again at a ton party she attends.

Olyve quickly realizes that she’s stumbled upon the heart of the evil conspiracy behind the missing women and children but to her horror, she isn’t sure whether her savior is genuine or if he’ll turn out to be one of the inner circle. Does she dare trust her Intuition as her world collapses around her?

My suspicion that steampunk isn’t for me was confirmed but that’s not your book, it’s me. I doubt I’d have liked anyone’s steampunk and will probably avoid it in the future. The steam powered gadgets, gears, flying mechanisms and goggles just don’t do anything for me. However I suspect that you include all the necessary ingredients to make aficionados happy.

No, the reason the book doesn’t work for me are more related to the actions of the characters with a bit of the world building. I never really got a handle on the world here. I can tell it’s England and probably sometime in the 19th century but the rest is a blur. Are the Quarters which are mentioned actual places or ranks in society? What are all the feminine dress codes about? What is the Revolutionary movement? Why does the ton dislike or is it disdain the Blackwell family? What happened to Olyve’s sister? Perhaps this long novella is part of a series and more is explained elsewhere but I felt lost here.

Olyve and James Reeves have what I call insta-love. Immediately they Just Know and are in love. Why? I don’t know – time constraints? Shorthand? I usually like to see a couple interact a little more than these two do and especially if the interactions they do have are mainly life threatening. I also thought they fell into insta-sex way too fast. And the way it starts, with Olyve being threatened by the ring of villains and James having to play along is downright distasteful. She’s unsure of James then, being threatened with gang rape by the slavering others, he’s having to manhandle her to keep in his true motives hidden and she’s getting turned on. Hell to the no. Then after they are taken elsewhere, she’s after him again but it’s James who tries to put the brakes on by announcing she has gone through too much then when that doesn’t work that he wants twue lurve from a marriage and when Olyve announces she just wants him, he gives into the passion. At least this time there was no mention of the earlier “weeping sheath.” Oh, and I got tired of James calling Olyve “his sprite” and disliked the “brave little minx” as both felt slightly condescending.

Reeves has been working on some major project for a while when he’s pulled – via the comb talking box at the gambling den – onto the case of the abducted women/girls. Then when we next see him as an operative, he, while trying to save Olyve, thinks that he can’t blow his cover here since he’s been working undercover for so long to infiltrate this group. Huh? No mention of a lot of passing time between the two scenes so, huh? I do love his instructions from The Comb that the Monarchy wants case closed but without the need for trial – kind of makes James a 00 agent with implicit instructions to kill whoever is doing this.

I was also lost about Olyve. What are the barriers in Olyve’s mind? Her gift is Intuition? Just what is her “gift/power?” For a woman who is supposed to be so intuitive about danger/situations around her, she sure gets caught up in a lot of dangerous things and taken prisoner. Then, after being warned by her Uncle and attacked on the train, Olyve heads back into danger at the party. Smart? Olyve then uses another one of her powers – which she seems to pull out of a hat just when they’re needed – to find out about an object as she holds it in her hand. And she almost dies only to be saved by James. Then she says she wants to try again. James – and I – are astounded and not in a good way. There’s a lot to “being a Blackwell” and it seems to grow by the page. Her glowing/color changing fingertips sort of gross me out. There’s too much “just in the nick of time stuff here.” Though how she turned her powers on the villain-in-charge was cool.

And thus ends my first and probably last foray into steampunk. My main problems of this book wasn’t that but what I’ve outlined above. Nevertheless, the genre failed to impress me so I think I’ll stick to my historicals and contemporaries.

~Jayne

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I’m always on the look out for Paranormal Romance stories that don’t feature the usual set up of vampires vs werewolves or angels vs demons. Though I haven’t read your work before, the blurb for Dreamer, the new book in your Chosen by the Gods series, intrigued me because it offered a paranormal setting in which a variety of old gods are not only real, but active in modern life. Dreamer is listed as a romance with elements of domination and submission. The BDSM sub-genre isn’t really my thing, but I was curious about your world-building, and I’m always happy to read romances featuring multi-cultural protagonists, so I decided to give it a try.

In the world of this series, there appears to have been a Religious Revolution in the 1960s or 1970s which reintroduced ancient gods and magic to the modern world. In addition to temples and worship of ancient gods being commonplace, this world features a select group of Chosen humans who are granted increased longevity and special powers by their patron gods. The hero, Devon King, has a combative, dominant personality commensurate with his role as the Chosen of an ancient war god. The heroine, Shan Harrison, is a potential Chosen and not-quite-closeted submissive whom Devon must protect from the Chosen of the bad gods of Destruction who want to prevent her ascension into the ranks of the Chosen.

I usually like a little moral ambiguity in both villains and heroes, so I was disappointed by the very clear line drawn in Dreamer between the forces of Creation and Destruction. (Creation = Good; Destruction = Bad.) I read this story just before Jane posted her letter of opinion on villains, but I think many of the points raised in that post explain my dissatisfaction with the bad guys, and subsequent lack of engagement in the battle between the two sides.

The romance also did not really engage me, but I think much of my reaction to that aspect of the story stems from the fact that I am not this novel’s target audience. Common trappings of BDSM romances featured in this story, like bondage clubs and leather or plastic clothing, just don’t interest me. Instead, I find myself idly wondering about the janitorial and dry cleaning services the clubs and characters must use, and whether they have to pay a premium.

Though the romance plot leans more toward the sexual than the emotional, it revolves around Shan learning about BDSM and reconciling her desire to be dominated in the bedroom with her need to be in control of the public aspects of her life. While I appreciated that you provided emotional arcs for the heroine in both the romance and action plots, Devon’s character didn’t change much and the characterization in general struck me as shallow. By the end of the book, I realized I was more engaged by the bittersweet love between Devon’s parents—secondary characters who make a brief appearance together—than I was in finding out whether Devon and Shan got their HEA.

Despite all that, there are things I liked about Dreamer. For one thing, this is the second installment in a series, but it worked very well on its own. Although the worldbuilding failed to fully capture my imagination, I did appreciate the respite it provided from the parade of vampires and were animals that so heavily populate Paranormal Romance.

Lastly, I really enjoyed the multicultural cast of characters. While my preferences in fiction tend toward the fantastic, paranormal, or just plain improbable, I do wish more of the stories I read reflected or surpassed the cultural, racial, and religious diversity and complexity of real life.

I had a difficult time picking a rating for this book because I knew going in that a D/S romance probably wouldn’t resonate with me, but read it anyway. I want to be honest, but I also want to be fair. While Dreamer is not a book I would be eager to reread or recommend, I also don’t regret having read it. Dear Author’s FAQ on review grades pegs that sentiment as a C, so that’s the grade I’ll give it.

~Josephine

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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

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This was an especially difficult book to grade. After much reflection, I have decided to recommend it because of the strength of the prose and what, I believe, are the very engaging middle sections of the book. However, despite the fact that Ballantine is billing this book as a paranormal romance, I think that this marketing is somewhat misleading. Although, the book plays with the tropes of both the gothic romance and the PNR, the structure of the novel is probably more akin to both literary fiction and fantasy than either of those latter genres.

Cailleach McFay, newly minted PhD, is on the job market. Her one cherished dream is to get a position at her undergraduate alma mater, NYU so that she can continue to live in New York City. Like many New Yorkers, Callie is convinced that there are still only 13 states in the Union and that New York City is at the center of both the nation and the universe. However, she decides to interview with Fairwick College in upstate New York anyway. After all, there are no guarantees when it comes to academic jobs.  Fairwick is a small college town whose golden age passed with the shipping barons of the late 19^th century. Now, the town is a little seedy and quite economically depressed with its past glories only visible in the grand old houses that line the streets. It is one of these houses, resting at the edges of a national forest, that convinces Callie to take the job. A grand Victorian, the home was once owned by Dahlia LaMotte, the gothic novelist but now stands empty having failed to sale several times since the death of LaMotte’s niece. From the moment Callie walks by it, the house seems to call to her, seducing her.

Such a pretty house to be deserted, I thought. The breeze sighed through the woods as if agreeing. As I got close I saw the vergeboard trim along the pointed eaves was beautifully carved with vines and trumpet-shaped flowers. Above the doorway in the pediment was a wood carving of a man’s face, a pagan god of the forest, I thought, from the pinecone wreath resting on his abundant flowing hair. I’d seen a face like it somewhere before . . . perhaps in a book on forest deities . . . The same face appeared in the stained-glass fanlight above the front door.

Startled, I realized I’d come all the way up the steps and was standing at the front door, my hand resting on the bronze door knocker, which was carved in the shape of an antlered buck. What was I thinking? Even if no one lived here it was still private property.

When Callie discovers that whoever buys the house will have exclusive access to all of Dahlia LaMotte’s papers, her decision is made. A beautiful Victorian mansion with a library and the papers of a dead novelist is a wet dream of mine, so I understood the selling point of this.

It isn’t before long that Callie discovers that Fairwick isn’t what it seems. The college is populated with stranger than usual professors, odd exchange students, and many secrets. Her house, too, is strange—as strange as the manors that populate LaMotte’s novels. It is supposedly haunted by an incubus—the very demon lover that she wrote about in her dissertation, and it is rumored that this demon was who inspired Dahlia LaMotte’s more lurid writing. It isn’t long before Callie begins to believe that the tales are true and when she begins to experience intense and very sexual dreams, the reality of both her teaching and her long distance boyfriend seem to diminish. But these aren’t the only dreams Callie experiences. She also begins to dream about a line of people fleeing their country and a man on horseback, a man she knows that her dream self is in love with. The more Callie allows the dreams of the shadow man to take over her life, the more real he seems to become. And the more real he seems to become, the more her feelings begin to morph into love. But is it possible to fall in love with a demon? A love talker, who does nothing but seduce you with sex? At one point Callie says to him, “You’ve got a lot to learn about women, pal. There’s more to love than being good in the sack.” This love plot is complicated by the other threads of the narrative which include: the mystery of the town and the college, a mystery involving a cursed student, and a mystery involving Callie’s own family history. The way in which these plots are intertwined and resolved is part of the pleasure of reading this book. I don’t want to go into too much detail about them because I don’t want to give too much away.

What I’d like to discuss in this review, instead, is what I believe might be the frustrating or difficult aspects of the book for romance readers. And also talk about my own reading experience of this book. I will try to do this without revealing any spoilers. This review, then, is going to be a little different. I’m going to give as many textual examples as I can so you can see what I mean.

I wasn’t sure I was going to like this book when I started reading it.  Quite frankly, I wasn’t sure I liked this book when I finished it. But I kept thinking about it. And it certainly had a very strong emotional effect on me. The love story in it was disturbing and dark—which I liked. Perhaps I identified with it more than I ought to admit publically. Part of the reason I think this book was difficult was because it doesn’t adhere to the expected genre progression. The way the plot plays out is very different than what I’ve become used to as a romance reader. I had to constantly re-adjust my expectations, recognize that the book was not going to be like other romances.

I think, too, that the heroine, Callie can be a sometimes difficult character to sympathize with and this affected my enjoyment. As a romance reader, I’m used to identifying with and liking the heroine right away. When I don’t, I feel that there is something wrong with the book. I had to actively keep reading after the first chapter, reminding myself that despite the marketing, this book was doing something different than the standard paranormal. Like most Gothics, it is written in the first person. Callie as a narrator swings between being an intelligent, observant and likeable woman to being a total douche. Allow me to demonstrate what I mean by looking at the first few chapters. I think that these portions really indicate the problems with Callie’s character and also show the ways in which this book can be frustrating. I also believe that it illustrates the strengths of the book and, ultimately, why I decided to recommend it.

“So, Dr. McFay, can you tell me how you first became interested in the sex lives of demon lovers?”

The question was a bit jarring, coming as it did from a silver-chignoned matron in pearls and a pink tweed Chanel suite. But I’d gotten used to questions like these. Since I’d written the bestselling book Sex Lives of the Demon Lovers (the title adapted from my thesis, The Demon Lover in Gothic Literature: Vampires, Beasts, and Incubi), I’d been on a round of readings, lectures, and, now job interviews that focused on the sex in the title.

Okay. No. The problem with this is that not only is it inaccurate (graduate students do not have time to query their dissertations out to commercial publishing houses and/or agents, defend their dissertations, AND look for a job. The academic job application process is very intensive, competitive and exhausting), but more importantly, it doesn’t make me very sympathetic to Callie nor is the book being a bestseller in any way important to the plot that follows. It is important that Callie studies demon lovers and Gothic fiction, but totally unnecessary to any of the plot that her monograph be a bestseller. The popularity of her research is totally de trop. Granted, this may grate on me more than the average reader because I am a graduate student who studies a very similar topic. Ditto the fact that Callie not only has a bestselling book already, but:

And it wasn’t that I hadn’t had plenty of other interviews. While most new Ph.Ds had to fight for job offers, because of the publicity surrounding Sex Lives I had already had two offers (from tiny colleges in the Midwest that I’d turned down) . . .

I fucking hate you, bitch. That was my first irrational response, colored by my own professional interests. But I moved on from that. I kept soldiering on. After all, this may just reflect the fantasy of the author and while it is totally annoying and unnecessary, is it any more annoying than heroines who are introduced in the first page as most the beauteous and desirable woman in the world? With flowing red tresses, violet eyes, and slender necks? No. No, it isn’t.

Then I was rewarded for my patience with the book by this lovely description of Dahlia LaMotte, the fictional gothic author whose books create a meta-fictional frame to the story.

They had been reprinted in the sixties when authors like Mary Stewart and Victoria Holt made Gothic romance popular again. You could still find copies of those reprints—tattered paperbacks featuring nightgown-clad heroines fleeing a looming castle on their covers—on the Internet, but I hadn’t had to buy them there. I’d found them hidden behind the “good books” on my grandmother’s bookshelves, a dozen books all with the name Emmeline Stoddard written on their flyleaves, and devoured them the summer I was twelve—

Back on board with you, Callie! I know those types of books. And how many of us have had similar experiences of discovery with romance novels? I love that description. And I love the excitement that Callie feels at the idea that the house belonged to Dahlia LaMotte and the chance to read the un-edited drafts of those beloved childhood books.

But then she goes and says something douchie again.

After consuming Diana’s ample tea, I decided that although I was too full for a run, I’d better take a long walk to burn off the scones and clotted cream.

Bite me, you skinny ho with your “job offers” and your “bestselling book.” So I was annoyed again. But then I get this:

It wasn’t raining hard when I reached the inn, so I stopped on the other side of the road and peered through the hedge at Honeysuckle House. The face on the pediment seemed to look back at me. The raindrops streaming down its cheeks looked unnervingly like tears. Suddenly the rain began to fall harder. I crossed the street and sprinted up the steps to the porch, stopping to shake the rain out of my hair and off my jacket so I wouldn’t shed water all over Diana’s hooked rugs and chintz-upholstered furniture. A thump on the wooden steps behind me made me turn around, sure that someone had followed me up the steps, but no one was there. Nothing was there but the rain, falling so hard now that it looked like a gray moiré curtain that billowed and swelled in the wind. For a moment I saw a shape in the falling water—a face, as if just behind the watery veil, a face I knew, but from where? Before I could place it, the face was gone, blown away in a gust of wind. Only then did I recall where I’d seen that face. It was carved into the pediment of Honeysuckle House.

And I’m back with you, baby.

Once Callie settles into life at Fairwick College, she becomes a much more tolerable person. Her unrealistic success as an academic fades into the background as her teaching, research, and the relationship with the incubus come to the forefront of the story. In fact, Callie is much more palatable as a teacher and the bits talking about grading are funny and true. What I had to ask myself was whether I was annoyed by Callie because of the unrealistic depiction of academia or because she was a more flawed character than I am comfortable with? I realized that it was the latter, a realization which forced me to ask myself whether I would have been annoyed with similar flaws in a hero? The answer is, disturbingly, no. Callie is a snob, but that’s part of her character arc. And if her academic success—albeit unrealistic success—was given to a male character of a similar age would I have had the same knee-jerk, antagonistic reaction? No. I don’t think I would have.  I am not comfortable with that reaction and it has made me think about the way I relate to female characters in books generally. I will not got into my thoughts on the matter here, but suffice it to say I had to re-evaluate my reaction to Callie and realize that my reaction to her was not necessarily a result of failed writing, but my own expectations of both my profession and what a heroine should be.

There was much that I liked about this book. The pacing is slow and the plotting surprised me. I enjoyed both of those aspects. The slow pacing coupled with the long descriptions of the town, the college, secondary characters, and the house, allowed me as a reader to inhabit the world of the book in a way I have not done in quite a long time. Moreover, the slow pacing built the tension that I expect to feel in a Gothic novel.

As an academic, I enjoyed the self-conscious awareness the book had of its place within the Gothic genre. The way that Dark uses LaMotte’s books and excerpts from those books to comment on and add to Callie’s experiences was very well done. I enjoyed the self-referential nature of those books and I could tell that Dark loves the genre as well. They were not parodies of Gothics, but loving imitations by someone who enjoyed every creak and shadow, every murderous uncle and brooding hero of a Holt novel.

The secondary characters that populate this book are not there just for show. From the freshman student, Nicky Ballard, who is suffering under a century old family curse to the vampiric Russian professors who no one ever sees, I was equally interested in the stories of these characters as I was in the main conflict between Callie and her house.

So let me recap. The strength of this book is in its pacing, which is slow, the development of the characters both primary and secondary, and the tightly woven plot. I enjoyed the meta-fictional aspects of the book, the incorporation of folklore and scholarship into the fantasy plot. I ended up coming to like the heroine who, though at times difficult to sympathize with, was complex and engaged with the world around her. She was strong intellectually not physically and that was something I appreciated because I think that paranormal romance often favors physically adept heroines but not intellectually adept heroines. That’s not to say that Callie doesn’t make some really fuckwitted mistakes in this book or that her perspective isn’t flawed (and lets not forget the wildly exaggerated and often inaccurate depiction of academia), because it is. But the more I think about Callie’s flawed perspective, the more I think this is not an accident of characterization but a part of Callie’s personality. Her snobbery is something she has to overcome in order to accept the situation she is in and make things right in the world that she has entered. I think we see the best of Callie in the way that she relates to her students, and in her desire to make things right in both the town and the community of fantastic creatures she has stumbled upon. In many ways, Callie is a very compassionate and accepting person and this is reflected in her relationships to other women and her students. Her love for the incubus is both complex and difficult. I think this is reflected in the weird way she thinks on these issues and sometimes dismisses them. It is only in the last few pages that she begins to realize the complexity of her own emotions.

WARNING: This book has a very ambiguous ending. It does not resolve. There is no HEA because, in effect, there is no real ending. The ARC I got from Netgalley gave no indication that this book would have a sequel so when I finished the book for the first time, I was left feeling betrayed. I immediately went to the Internet. The author, Juliet Dark, has no webpage although she does have a Facebook page. It was there that I learned that there is an intended sequel entitled Water Witch. I look forward to that book and I really hope that it has an ending. I would very much dislike it if the romantic relationship between Callie and her demon lover was not resolved. And I sure as hell hope it is resolved happily. However, I trust that it will be because of the way in which different elements of this book act as sign posts to that resolution occurring.

I would like to add that I would not have felt the level of betrayal I did at the unresolved ending if I had not been as emotionally invested in the characters and plot of this novel as I was.

Thus, after much reflection, thought and head-scratching, I have decided to give this book a B+ for the strength of the prose, plot and characterization as well as the emotionally rich love story. However, I want to emphasize that this book as a stand-alone is NOT a romance. Moreover, Callie as a heroine as well as the way the novel progresses might be frustrating in the extreme to readers. Neither she nor it are everyone’s cup of tea. But for those who may be interested in a slightly more literary take on the paranormal romance, this book might be for you.

Lazaraspaste

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I haven’t been a faithful follower of the Demonica series, but I’ve read several. Having some knowledge of the world helped ground Immortal Rider but I did wonder whether readers who entered at this book or its predecessor would be a little lost. Immortal Rider is the second in the “Lords of Deliverance” series. The premise is that there are four horsemen, three brothers and their sister, and so long as their Seals remained unbroken, the end of the world can be prevented. However, the first seal of Reseph has broken and his evil soul has overtaken the good soul and he is now known as Pestilence. He is actively working to break the seals of his siblings and bring the scourge of evil down to earth.

Limos is a powerful and sexy horseman who has been claimed to be Satan’s bride. Her curse is Famine.  As long as she doesn’t make The Dark Lord jealous, she avoids being captured in Sheoul, or her Seal is intact, she can avoid her wedding in hell and her part in bringing on the end times. In a playful tussle at a backyard barbecue with Arik, a human, they kiss and Limos’ sexual response begins the unraveling of the Seal and the curse. (I am by no means immune to snickering to myself that the horsemen’s “seals” have to be broken like a hymen, added to this that two of the horsemen are virgins, this likely intentional joke is meant to induce snickering). Arik is sent to hell whereupon he is tortured on a regular basis. Once he screams Limos name in pain, she will be whisked down the aisle.

Limos’ only other problem is that she is addicted to lying. Seriously addicted and if she can’t break the addiction, she will break her Seal. “With every lie you tell, your addiction to it will strengthen, and with every lie, evil will grow within you, until you want to go to your husband.”

This high adrenaline story with over the top emotions, over the top circumstances, and improbable sakes which can really only happen in a paranormal. The sexual tension plays an important part but it’s a plot driven story as each party is involved in making bad bargains and double crossing each other in hopes of achieving their end goal. The humor is primarily juvenile banter and insults such as when Arik calls Limos “My Little Pony”. (probably my very favorite insult of the book).  The union of Limos and Arik seems impossible, first because of Limos’ need to lie and self destructive nature and then because Limos’ hell imposed chastity belt prevents any physical consummation.

Limos is a complicated character. She struggles against her evil nature of lying, deceiving, self destruction. She hates herself and is convinced that doom is just around the corner. Yet she acknowledges that mortals and their devotion to each other, their ability and willingness to love her and accept her despite her flaws is so compelling that eventually it overcomes the evil. It’s truly a good triumphs over evil storyline.  I also appreciated the evenness in which the characters were presented and how Arik had to confront his own propensity for lies of omission he told purportedly to shield those he cared about.

The worldbuilding rests primarily on prophecies and people and while references mankind has little to do with mankind. The lack of grounded worldbuilding makes the boundaries too malleable for my taste. While the overriding theme to these books are that the impossible prevents the couple from coming together, the impossible is always overtaken and thus whatever urgency exists is false.

While there are scenes between Limos and Arik, the underlying focus is propelling the series arc. For instance, there is a great deal of setup for the next book featuring Regan and Thanatos. A prophecy is discovered that implies even of all four Seals are broken, a “child conceived by the joining of an Aegis warrir and a Horseman. That child will be the savior of mankind.” Regan must go and get pregnant by one of the Horsemen and the Aegis, the purported good guys, pick Thanatos as the victim.

There are many scenes from Pestilence’s point of view, providing glimpses that the good man inside him is not entirely snuffed out and laying the basis for his redemption story.  Sometimes I felt that the story went too far over such as Pestilence orgasming at his twin brother’s pain.  Thanatos describes their closeness thusly “We shared a womb. We shared battle, pain, loss, and drink.  He is my brother.”  And then in regards to the rape at the end of the book involving Thanatos.

The part of the story involving Arik and Limos was sexy, interesting, although a bit drawn out.  The parts involving Regan and Thanatos had a lot of promise but the ending left me with a very bad taste in my mouth.  The entire storyline of Regan going in to steal Thanatos’ sperm was offputting enough.  I struggled with the grade for this book.  Until the last third, I would have given this book a B-, but the last third was troublesome.  Ultimately I am going to go with B- but with a strong advisory about the last third. Beware, triggers galore.

Best regards,

Jane

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Robin used the word affability to describe Jill Shalvis’ writing and for me,  I would apply the same descriptor to your books.  They are generally affable with likeable characters and likeable settings, however, they’ve often felt truncated to me and this one more so than previous ones that I have read.

I understand that many of these stories have been reworked from their original novella forms but perhaps this one was never meant to be elongated because I sat down for a full length meal and only had an appetizer.  No matter how good the appetizer was, it wasn’t going to be fulfilling for someone who was looking for a complete dinner.

Luc Macanaw is directed by his Queen to leave the land of the fae and retrieve the Queen’s wayward nephew in  the human world. Reporter Corinne D’Allesandro is assigned a paranormal story by her editor, a story that leads her directly to the Queen’s nephew. Luc isn’t a big fan of the Queen but he’d never allow any harm to come to her and her word is law. When she sends him into the mortal world to smooth over any “ripples” caused by her nephew, Seoc’s, indiscretions, Luc goes without murmur. It is his duty.

Corinne knows all about faeries, vampires, and werewolves. Her three best friends have hooked up, married, and even been turned into an “Other” but she must keep their secret while still trying to maintain her distance from the Others. This becomes much more difficult when her newspaper editor wants her to check out a pixie or faerie sighting. Corinne wants to laugh this off as nonsense, even knowing the truth, but her editor is insistent.

Corinne doesn’t really care about most of the Others but she does worry what would happen to her friends like her Missy, a kindergarten teacher who married a werewolf, if knowledge of the Others was revealed to all humans.

Upon meeting Corinne, Luc was shocked at the surge of lust he felt. After all, he was surrounded by women who were more beautiful than any mortal woman could achieve. She was shorter, rounder, but none of that seemed to matter as Luc feels a compulsion toward Corinne. What’s this? Why yes, Corinne, the human, is his heart mate. Faeries have heart mates. OF COURSE THEY DO.

The best part of the book comes in the form of a few funny exchanges between Corinne and Luc.

“I’m Fae,” Luc repeated, then sighed. “As in Faerie.”

The blankness dissolved beneath a surprised laugh. “You’re a fairy? Sure, Tinker Bell. Pull the other leg while you’re at it.”

Luc scowled at Rafe. “You see? That’s the problem with mortals. We leave your world for a couple of thousand years and everyone either forgets all about us, or they reduce us to little glowing balls of tutu-clad good cheer.”

But while Luc might speak Ye Olde English in Fae land (“I’m sure I could find a garderobe for you to clean if you so long for variety in your work.), he drops the formal dialect upon crossing over. Maybe that’s part of the magical process?

Corinne and Luc involve themselves in a little investigating, a lot of lusting, and thinking about the urgency of their situation (find the faerie before he does more crazy things in the mortal world). However, it’s just too little of everything.  Too little of the good natured humor, too little investigating and action on their designated task, too little worldbuilding.  It just lacked in substance.  The lust and sex the two pursued with one another seemed the primary focus and while I liked Corinne’s sex positive attitude, the story telling felt unbalanced. I never felt like I knew Corinne and Luc. Luc, in particular, seemed like a standard romance hero. Manly, attractive, good in bed, and filled with the protectorate instinct.

I wanted more than just the heart mate bond to draw the two together and other than sharing good sex, I wasn’t convinced that there were deeper feelings between the two.  The affability of the story helps maintain the reader’s interest, but it’s easily forgotten and not very fulfilling.  C

Best regards,

Jane

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I loved the first and second book in this series but as the worldbuilding evolved and became bigger, I felt like I lost an understanding of the world. The book started out as a Pack book for me (Pack = werewolf) and has been transmogrified into world where every kind of magic exists from dragons to sorcerers to shapeshifters. There is earth magic, fire magic, water magic, precogs, and with each new book, a new element is introduced. The first book in the series, Tempting Danger, introduces Lily Yu and Rule Turner. (I’ve not reviewed that book here, but I did review the second, Mortal Danger). Lily Yu is a former homicide detective and a touch sensitive who was recruited to be part of the Magical Crimes Division of the FBI. Her supervisor is Ruben Brooks.

Aside: I do not recommend that any one start with this book. I think they would be lost. I was kind of lost and I’ve read all the books.  I do recommend Tempting Danger and Mortal Danger and the seventh in this series, Blood Challenge.  I think a reader could read those three and not be lost.   “Tempting Danger” and “Blood Challenge” are my favorite in this series.  Both focus strongly on the Pack and the romance between the main characters.

Rule Turner is a Lupi or werewolf and the designated heir of one of the strongest, wealthiest Packs in North America. He also wears the mantle of another pack, something that is not supposed to happen. Lupi have fated mates and Lily is Rule’s. Over the course of the series, Lily and Rule struggle with their matebond, a mystical connection that is so strong that it is affected by even distance. In “Death Magic”, Lily and Rule move ever more slowly toward an actual marriage ceremony. I’m not certain how much time has passed since book 1 of this series, but I think it is a bit more than a year.

An enemy of the Pack, an old and powerful god that the Lupi refer to as the “Great Bitch”, is rising up bringing to life old magics and dangers that have not been experienced in centuries. “Death Magic” is a continuation of this overarching plot about the “Great Bitch” and her nebulous plans. Ruben’s precog gift is foretelling something dire and it is up to Lily, Rule, and the other members of their respective clans to discover what they can do to prevent the negative outcome foreseen by Ruben. Ruben sets up a Shadow Unit, to work outside of the Bureau and by the book Lily finds herself conflicted when Ruben asks her to join. Rule is more sanguine. He’s an “end justifies the means” kind of guy and doesn’t see a problem with Lily joining Ruben in order to stop a greater evil.

Lily’s hand is forced when Ruben is accused of killing a Senator.  Tensions are further raised when the Humans First, an anti magical group, gains in power and violence.  Finally, Lily’s life is in jeopardy as she begins to experience strange illnesses that may or may not be connected to a Lupi related power she acquired in a previous book.

While Ruben, a figure that has appeared briefly in all previous books, gets more face time and an interesting storyline, I wasn’t fully engaged. I think it comes down to my own expectations for this series. It’s called World of the Lupi, but I feel that the Lupi often aren’t the focus, but the world surrounding the Lupi is. For readers looking for a broad, full and diverse urban fantasy series with some romance, I think this is very satisfying. For someone who is looking for a strong romance arc in each book, I think some of the books including “Death Magic” will be a disappointment.

The great thing about this series is the diversity. There is diversity in race and religion both on the “good” and the “bad” sides. An effort seems to be made to show each character as an individual instead of a representative token for a particular subset of society. I guess my major problem is that I expected this book to be paranormal romance and instead it is more urban fantasy. I feel emotionally distanced from these characters and would like to see more movement in the romance/relationship. It doesn’t have the visceral emotional power of my favorites but it does move the plot forward.  B-

Best regards,

Jane

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I was excited about this book because while I found your self published title compelling, it was rough. I hoped that a professionally edited and full length story would bring out the best in your writing.  Unfortunately, the voice that I found so interesting in the short self published work seemed missing and the really crazy aspects of the story made me roll my eyes instead of laugh.  The characters and plot lacked originality and details were missing consistency and believability.

First, the first chapter was in the point of view of neither the hero or the heroine, but some random sequel bait and it really had nothing to do with the story at all.  The overarching series plot is that there are four angels that need to find their archesses (fated mates): Gabriel, Uriel, Azriel and Michael. Avenger’s Angel  is about Uriel but we start out with Michael and Azriel fighting each other because their transformation from angel to human has changed them and only their archesses will save them.  Why Michael and Azriel? Why not Michael and Uriel or Uriel and Azriel?

The heroine is some kind of special person with telekinesis and power over the weather. When she was young, their family would move around a lot:

“Her father was a professor, and professors went wherever universities were hiring, so it was easy for him to move around the country. Her mother was an attorney in her own practice, so she was mobile as well.”

Her family would get up and leave at the drop of a hat. She had an “escape bag” so that they could run off right away to get away from the strange cars and strange men.  The parents are wealthy yet they are still able to pick up and resettle in new environs as a PROFESSOR and an ATTORNEY?   First, in order to sit for the bar, you have to be fingerprinted and are subjected to an FBI background check.  After being in practice for some time, you can waive the bar exam when moving from state to state, but not always and it requires an extensive application.  You can’t just swan from one state to another.  A professorship is also not so easy to come buy as say a job making subs at a fast food chain.   I understand that these are throw away passages but they show the problem with the overall book.  There is no internal consistency or thoughtfulness in the way that characters are constructed.  (or actual knowledge of the real world).  Let’s look at how the two characters meet:

The hero is a movie star who starred in a movie called “Comeuppance.”  He is traveling around the country going to bookstores to sign the novelized version of the movie.  What?  I mean, have you ever seen Richard Pattison in Barnes and Noble signing Twilight?  The heroine is a bookseller.   Comeuppance clearly a Twilight ripoff. Witness the exchange between two characters. One named Angel (rolled eyes) and Eleanore, the heroine.

E: You wouldn’t believe who’s here right now, signing autographs in my store.

A: Okay—autographs? I’m officially on the edge of my seat!

E: Christopher Daniels.

There was a long pause while, on the other end of the connection, Angel obviously processed the news.

A: You’re shitting me.

E: lol Nope. I’ve been off work for two hours, but Mister Jonathan Brakes is probably still there, wondering which of his adoring fans he can sink his teeth into for dinner. Or would it be breakfast?

A: I have never been more jealous of you than I am right now.

E: I thought you hated that movie.

A: Oh, I do. With a passion. Am I the only one creeped out by the thought of someone several hundred years old going after someone who’s barely twenty?” Talk about robbing the cradle. But Christopher Daniels is freaking HOT. Did you get to talk to him at all? Get his autograph?

Uriel recognizes that Ellie is his mate and goes chasing after her.  Ellie is used to being on the run but she can’t escape Uriel.

Their first sex scene is really rather awful. It reads almost like a rape or a rape fantasy. He throws her face down on the bed. rips off her clothes and “renders [her virginity] in two”:

Very slowly, he withdrew his fingers from her tight moistness and had to suppress a growl of mounting insanity when she actually moaned her disappointment. She was not herself, he realized. He had taken her over, body and mind, and she was a slender, wanton vessel of desire beneath him.

and then there is this:

He lowered himself until he could once more whisper in her ear. “I’m going to take you now the way I’ve wanted to take you since I saw you that night in the bookstore,” he told her, keeping his grip on her hair tight so that she couldn’t pull away. “I’m going to take you hard and fast,” he promised her. “Because you’re mine, Ellie.” He almost growled his ownership. “And you always will be.”

With that, he covered her mouth with one hand and thrust forward, holding her still as he did so. In one clean, driving shove, he ripped through her virginity and rendered it in two.

The worldbuilding is fairly silly.  For example, the four archangels are sent to earth with a mansion.  Yes, room and board comes with your position as archangel.  But it is not just a living space, but it is a transportation device as well.  The mansion serves as a portal travel.  At one point the archangels describe their place as very modest and I’m thinking that they live in a camper.  A superdimensional RV.  In another scene, they take the heroine shopping for a dress. In Paris.  And three of the Archangels are with her.  There is nothing Archangels love better than shopping for dresses.  Of course they got to Paris through their  transformational RV.  All you have to do is stand before a door.  EVEN A REFRIGERATOR door will work.

Uriel had given them each a buzz on his cell as soon as he’d left the signing and, through the use of the mansion and its magical properties, they’d all managed to head home right away. Any of the archangels could call up a portal to the mansion from anywhere in the world, so long as they were standing before a door. It didn’t matter what kind of door it was. Even a car door or the door to a refrigerator would work.

Okay, maybe I should be laughing.  Remember, though, how I said the story lacked internal consistency?

At the moment, the four brothers were gathered in a relatively small, utterly normal-looking kitchen that sat just off a likewise normal-looking living room. The archangels all preferred their living space on the more modest side these days. Having been around for as long as they had, they already felt as if they’d literally seen everything.

Yet, later the house is described as :

Uriel paced to the landing and peered over the railing. Max Gillihan was just shutting the front door behind him, three stories below. With a blast of superhuman strength, Uriel leapt over the balcony railing, dropped the three stories to the marble foyer below, and crouched to absorb the impact as his boots slammed down.

Three story home with a marble foyer.  Yeah, that’s normal looking and modest.

The end game for the Archangels is to find their mates and thus be saved from madness and turning into monsters.

The blend of reality and fantasy didn’t work here.  The riffs on pop culture fell flat and the world building sounded more ridiculous than fun.  If the story went all out and was entirely crazy all the time (aka Caris Roane books), I would have nodded along in agreement.

At times I felt Ellie was more placeholder than anything.  Ellie played whatever role that the scene needed her to play.  Resisting heroine here. Smart mouthed friend there.  Shy and innocent in other places (girl hasn’t even been kissed before).  Anyone could have been Uriel’s mate.  Uriel, too, has little dimension.  He’s straight out of paranormal romance casting.  The paranormal who has searched for love for 2000 years and finds it only to be confronted by the fact that his archess might not love him back. Uriel doesn’t have any personality. We are told he is rich, gorgeous and powerful but there isn’t anything that sets him apart from any other character. They are even described the same:

As with all of the archangels, his chin was strong,

Killough-Walden, Heather (2011-11-01). Avenger’s Angel: A Novel of the Lost Angels (Kindle Location 623). Penguin Group. Kindle Edition.

Further, Uriel and his posse seemed to have very little agency.  Their encounters with the women, the outcomes, seemed to be orchestrated by powers above them.

The most interesting character was the villain or at least the man who appeared to be attempting to prevent Uriel and his brothers from consummating the bonds with their archesses.  Samael was both good and bad and his duality provided more substance than either Uriel or Ellie. C-

Best regards,

Jane

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After reading Lord of the Vampires, I was encouraged to try another one of your books. Your voice can be light and funny and the sexual tension is fun, but that book fell flat for me. I noticed The Darkest Surrender in your Lords of the Underworld series had a lot of praising reviews, and the harpies sounded intriguing, so I decided to give it a shot. I’m happy to say that this was a fun read, and made me interested in other books in the series.

The Darkest Surrender is the story of Strider, who is an immortal Greek warrior possessed by the demon of Defeat. Strider must accept all challenges and win to appease his demon. If he wins, he feels intense pleasure. If he loses, he feels shattering pain. It is also the story of Kaia the Disappointment, a bloodthirsty harpy who has declared Strider to be her consort. She just needs to convince Strider of this fact. Kaia also needs a consort with her for the upcoming Harpy Games – a brutal free for all where the other harpies are intent on destroying Kaia. If Kaia has a consort at her side, he can heal her and encourage her, so his part is crucial. Kaia also feels that Strider doesn’t truly want her because she once slept with Paris, the Lord of Desire.

I went into this book only vaguely knowing the details of the setting. I think I read the first novella in the series, so I was familiar with the general set-up, if not what has happened since. Greek warriors let loose the demons in Pandora’s Box, and now they are cursed to house them inside their bodies. They are immortal now, but tormented by their very specific demons. I thought this was an interesting premise, and I didn’t have any trouble following the story, though it was obvious that there was a lot of set-up and relationships that I had missed in previous books. I think this stood well on its own, however.

I really enjoyed the harpies. They are a race of brutal, winged warrior women who steal, carouse, and drink blood to heal yet live by very strict rules when it comes to conduct around other harpies. I wasn’t so keen on the fact that they are all tiny and delicate and their skin glitters like a diamond, but I’m willing to overlook that as more was made of Kaia’s warrior-ness than her glittering. In fact, everything that governs a harpy’s nature deals with fighting and attacking. Kaia attacks other women she thinks are interested in Strider. She challenges everyone she comes across. The harpy games were a natural extension of the aggressive, combatative harpy relationships, and I thought it was a fun storyline. I also found it intriguing that in harpy relationships, the woman is the dominant, and she selects her consort, not the other way around. It’s a nice change of pace from the soul-mate trope, where the heroine often has little choice or say in the relationship. Kaia is also very close to her twin, Bianka, and I loved the close, teasing relationship between the two.

“What are you going to say to Lysandy, anyway? Exactly.”

Bianka shrugged her seemingly delicate shoulders. “Exactly…I don’t know.”

“Try me. Pretend I’m your disgustingly in love angel consort and confess.”

“Okay.” A sigh, a straightening of the spine, then lovely amber eyes were staring over at Kaia with trepidation. “All right. Here goes.” A pause. A gulp. “Darling, I, uh, have something to tell you.”

“What is it?” Kaia said in her deepest voice. She propped her elbows on the bar, the hanger hooks digging into her skin. “Tell me quickly because I need to spread my happy fairy dust and wave my magic wand when–”

“He doesn’t spread happy fairy dust! He’s a killer, damn it.”

I did feel like the story was fast paced and fun, but I also felt like the relationship was the weakest part of the story. Both Kaia and Strider are childish characters. Kaia has the mentality of a sixteen year old boy. Her apartment is covered in beer cans and frat-like decor. She loves pranks and arguing. Strider is equally childish at times.  He’s competitive, sometimes surly, and his inner monologue is like that of a teenage boy. He even refers to his dick as Stridey-Monster.  That made me shake my head (and not with amusement). While alpha, he struck me as more Type A personality than aggressive alpha male, and this was probably due to the nature of his demon. Sometimes their bickering made me want to put both of them into time out, but I thought they were a well matched couple, and by the end of the book, I thought even the bickering and juvenile humor between the two meant they were right for each other.

I don’t know if this book would be for everyone. Like I said before, the book is light and snappy and full of frat girl violence and an equally childish hero. I felt like this passage pretty much summed up the hero and heroine:

 ”When Kaia loses,” Juliette went on, “I’ll expect you to come to me. And maybe, after you beg, I’ll allow you to please me. And maybe, after you please me, if you can, I’ll let you use my Rod.”

Use my Rod. “That’s what he said,” Strider snickered.

She blinked at him. “That’s what who said?” When he offered no response, she demanded, “What did he say?”

Kaia would have understood the joke. Probably Kaia would have pretended a beer bottle was the Rod and jacked it off while laughing. Gods, he dug her sense of humor.

If that’s your kind of couple, you’ll probably enjoy this book. I did enjoy it, though sometimes I found the antics of both characters a little overdone. I am not sure that I’m interested in Paris’s book (which is next) but I liked the harpies enough that I’m going to go through your back list and read more about Gwen and Bianka. B

All best,

January

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 Opening line: Goddamned freezing cold.

I’ve heard your name mentioned whenever readers talk about their favorite m/m mysteries and paranormals. You’ve even been the subject of an If You Like column here at Dear Author. But although I’ve read your first two sets of Petit Morts stories, I never read any of your own series or standalone novels and novellas. This past summer I was looking for more m/m mysteries with romance, and I went to your website, where you generously offer half of Among the Living as a free read. It took me about 5 minutes’ reading before I bought and downloaded the whole book, kicking myself all the while for taking so long to discover it.

Among the Living is the first novel in the PsyCop series, which is set in present-day Chicago with one important twist. The Chicago Police department has a Paranormal Investigation Unit, in which detectives with a range of psychic abilities are paired with non-psychic partners (called NPs in polite conversation and Stiffs the rest of the time). You clearly know your Chicago setting, and by the end of the second chapter I knew I was in a familiar place with an expert guide.

Victor Bayne, our narrator, is a 5th-level medium;, yes, he sees dead people. Lots of them. This makes him very good at solving cases, since he can frequently talk to the murdered victims, but it also means he sees ghosts everywhere. He takes Auracel, an anti-psyactive, when he wants relief, and he lives in a spartan, all-white apartment to reduce the sensory overload when he’s at home. Vic is not exactly in the closet, but he’s not out and proud at work.

Vic is tall, dark-haired and blue-eyed, so he’s apparently good-looking, but he’s also klutzy and seriously fashion-impaired:

I finished the wrap before I got home and spent an extra minute trying to get mayo off my sportcoat. I gave up when it became obvious that all I’d accomplished was embedding rolled-up fragments of cheap paper napkin all over myself. I realized that I’d dropped my other coat off at the dry cleaner’s about four months prior. And I wondered if they would give the thing to me without the pickup slip, or if they’d given it away to Goodwill by now.

Vic is one of the most engaging narrators I’ve encountered in fiction. With first person POV, a reader either takes to the narrator or gets tired of him; I can listen to Vic talk all day. He’s smart, funny, and honest about himself to the point of self-deprecation. When he falls for a fellow officer (and Stiff), the gorgeous and accomplished Jacob Marks, he can’t quite believe it’s mutual:

He slid his hot mouth from me and then flipped me around, one strong hand keeping me from tripping over the wad of clothing at my feet. “That’s right,” he said, caressing the side of my cock with his cheek. “I want to look up into your face while you come.”

And then my awkwardness increased exponentially as I realized Jacob Marks was gonna stare at me while my cock sank into his throat. He was gorgeous–simply beautiful. The most handsome man I’d ever been with, that I ever even dreamed I’d be with. And yet it was easier to spread myself wide open and half naked on that damn window than it was to look into his eyes.

Vic and Jacob are tasked to work together on a serial killer case in which the murderer kills gay men after sex and leaves their bodies in set-pieces of shattered glass. Jacob’s partner, Carolyn is a level-2 PsyCop who can tell if people are lying, which makes her a valuable detective but often awkward as a coworker or friend. Vic’s longtime Stiff has just retired, and his new partner is a young woman who has passed the test that differentiates psychics and non-psychics. The mystery storyline skillfully integrates the mundane aspects of police work with the twists that arise when psychics are involved. Vic’s harrowing training to become a PsyCop turns out to be instrumental to his ability to determine who the killer was. I was thoroughly immersed in both the mystery plot and the larger world.

This book is novella-length, but it is so well paced, and the characters are so interesting, that I didn’t notice the shorter word count. I definitely wanted more when it ended, but that was because I was engaged by the characters. I wanted to see where Vic and Jacob went after this installment’s HFN. I wanted to know what happened next to their respective partners. And I definitely wanted to read more set in almost-but-not-quite Chicago.

Much of my pleasure with the novella stems from Victor’s voice, but that voice is a reflection of your overall writing style. It’s deceptively straightforward and lacking in frills, but it rewards careful reading. Some passages that are so understated that they almost feel like throwaways, but they add immeasurably to the story and to the reading experience. The romantic storyline is developed through Vic’s matter-of-fact perspective, so although I realize and believe in Jacob’s attraction before Vic does, the depth of their mutual attachment kind of sneaks up on me. And as a consequence, the utterly romantic last paragraph gets to me much as it does to Vic.

Grade: A-

Ahoy readers: bonus materials! In addition to the novella- and novel-length installments of PsyCop, Ms. Price has written several short stories in the PsyCop world. Two of these are available for free at her website and elsewhere and bookend Among the Living. Thaw is a very short and sweet amuse-bouche that takes place after Among the Living and is set in Chicago at Christmastime. Inside Out is a prequel with an unusual genesis and is written from Jacob’s POV. Both are well worth reading.

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Are angels the new vampires in romance novels? It seems like the number of books starring angels continues to expand exponentially. When choosing to write about angels (or winged beings, in the case of the Guardians), authors invite introspection from readers about the nature of good and evil and the balance of power.

 Vampires are predators and humans their prey. When pairing a vampire and human in a romance the power imbalance that writes must address is one of prey and predator. With angels the power imbalance is fundamentally different. Angels inspire awe but their otherness isn’t necessarily predatory so much as inhuman and powerful. An angel-human relationship isn’t about resolving the prey-predator dynamic but rather about protector and powerless. Angels are a like Knight-protectors (though without the horse and armor) and they are often portrayed as protectors of humanity (think guardian angel, the arch angel protector of women and children, etc.). How does this affect how we approach books starring these mysterious not-human beings?

These were the thoughts swirling in my head as I picked up the ARC of Angels of Darkness. I had read books and short stories by Ilona Andrews, Meljean Brook, and Nalini Singh; Sharon Shinn was a new-to-me writer.

Angel’s Wolf by Nalini Singh

The anthology opens with Nalini Singh’s story, Angel’s Wolf set the world of Raphael and Elena where all-powerful angels rule the world, create vampires to serve them, and humans live their brief lives much like we do. The angel Nimra serves Raphael and oversees New Orleans and its environs. Noel, a vampire recently healed from vicious attack that left him as little more than pulped flesh, is sent by Raphael to work for her. In Singh’s world angels are cold, uncanny beings of power beyond the comprehension of most humans.

Nimra is the most interesting angel I’ve encountered in Singh’s world. She has a horrific power that can take the violence and badness inside of a person and morph it into that individual’s own suffering and anguish. The meaner you are, the more Nimra can hurt you, which means the most powerful angels—all of whom commit acts of violence, have the most to fear from her. But Nimra herself isn’t mean-spirited or vengeful. Underneath her powerful crust she has a deep compassion which is seen through her love of her pet cats and her affection for her elderly human steward, Fen.

Throughout the story Nimra and Noel are on opposite trajectories. Nimra is slowly revealed to the reader as kinder and more compassionate than her merciless reputation and Noel is revealed as more powerful and capable than his broken victim status. They arrive at an equilibrium where Nimra remains the feared ruler of this territory and Noel rises to become her fear-inducing enforcer.

Alphas: Origins by Ilona Andrews

Ilona Andrews’ story, Alphas: Origins is set in the world of the Alphas. This was my first foray into this world that feels post-apocalyptic though it’s not. This is an alien story. Or more accurately, we are all subspecies created by aliens and left to battle until only one remains. At least I think that’s what going on. Most of the story is set in a parallel dimension that has portals into our dimension. I read this Alphas slowly and closely because the world is very complex and I kept trying sort out if I’d missed something. A lot of the time I did not understand what was going on. I was at least as clue-less as the heroine and this confusion created an empathy with her character. (Since finishing the story I’ve wondered if this was a deliberate construct by Ms. Andrews.)

So here’s what I think I know about the story: there is a battle between two factions of mixed subspecies. The “good” side—the one with our hero and heroine—are fighting to get to another dimension in their world while the other faction is trying to kill them. Some beings have more power than others, and fighting, pain, and death are commonplace.

I wouldn’t really call this story a romance. The “hero”, Lucas, is a shifter who turns into a fur covered monster that needs to drink Karina’s blood. Karina is a human who has some genetic link to the original subspecies making her blood food to fuel the hero

I find Ms. Andrews’ world building intriguing, but this such a complex world to introduce in a short story and I became focused on trying to piece together the world-building which distracted me from the character development. The romance, such as it is between Lucas and Katrina isn’t very romantic. They come together out of mutual need—he for her blood, she for her life—and an emotional bond begins to develop. But it the bond stems from the Katrina’s lack of other options—did I mention the leader of Lucas’ faction is holding Katrina’s daughter hostage? I would like to read more about this Alpha world, but as a stand-alone story this one was a tough read.

I should add that when I first saw this anthology was coming and that it was about angels, I hoped that Ms. Andrews was going to write a story about Thanatos, the angel in the Kate Daniels series. I was a disappointed when I found out this wasn’t a story about him and this may have contributed to my dissatisfaction with this story—I wanted one thing and got another.

Nocturne by Sharon Shinn

Sharon Shinn’s story, Nocturne, is set in the world of the Samaria series. This is a story of redemption, forgiveness and hope. Moriah has been running from events in her past and the angel Corban is mired in depression and refuses to face his future after an accident blinded him.

Moriah is abrasive and canny, hardened by a tough life and hiding from events in her past. It’s her skeptical attitude and lack of awe for angels that are what Corban needs to shake off the mantel of depression and hopelessness that cling to him two years after his accident. In each other they each find their paths to redemption and the hope for a happy future.

This story is told in the first person and it took me a while to begin to appreciate Moriah; during the first half of Nocturne I had to force myself to keep reading. Shinn peaked my curiosity about the monster (Corban) in the forbidden house, but that was the only thing that kept me reading. I wonder if readers of the Samaria series will feel differently. Would knowing this world have made the story more compelling to me from the start? I’m glad I finished it, but I don’t know if I’ll seek out the other Samaria books.

Ascension by Meljean Brook

Meljean Brook’s story, Ascension, is set in her Guardian world. Marc is a Guardian trying to identify and remove a demon who is spreading malice and discontent in his territory. Radha a fellow Guardian and Marc’s former lover, has arrived under the pretense of taking a vacation and offers to help Marc in his search.

As they investigate several murders and follow the trail of clues they rehash their past. More than 100 years ago, while in Guardian training, Marc took a vow of celibacy, but he couldn’t resist his powerful attraction to Radha and he broke that vow. She heard him beg God for forgiveness for sleeping with an unclean woman and took offense (Imagine getting out of bed after a hot and steamy night and finding your partner praying for fornicating with your slutty self. Ugh.).

I think Ms. Brook is a particularly fine short story writer. She deftly delivers subtle character development and emotional arc while weaving the investigative elements that reveal, layer by layer, information about the town and its inhabitants. The evil in this story was sown by a demon, but it was enacted by humans. I found the happy ending to the romance was more poignant after learning the identity of the murderer. The years lost between Marc and Radha as they each battled their inner demons were reflected in the choices of the murder. All of them made choices that led to unhappiness. Marc and Radha got a chance at redemption (and love) all these years later. Who knows, maybe the murder will receive the same, in time.

Each story in this anthology complicated my ideas about angels and reinforced my belief that good and evil are on a continuum with no clear lines demarking where you are on that continuum. As philosophical ideas I found each story offered something compelling; as entertainment I found the stories uneven and on that basis I give the collection a B-.

Cheers,

Jaclyn

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Reckless Runaway At the Racecourse, by Ros Clarke. Ros and I follow each other on Twitter and she offered this, her first self-published book, for free on Smashwords for a short time. I’ve had it in the TBR for a while. So far it’s a sweet story, very much in the Harlequin/Mills and Boon tradition. The hero and heroine meet cute at the races when she runs out onto the track while a horse race is in progress in order to rescue her expensive shoe and escape her predatory boss (the hero is more worried about the horses than the heroine, which I appreciated). It looks like an opposites-attract story. The writing is solid (nice, snappy dialogue) and the production values are good so far. I’ll finish and report back.

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Something Different by S. A. Reid. The author offered this book for review, and Joan/SarahF reviewed it and liked it very much. I was intrigued and frustrated in equal parts by the opening chapters. The protagonist is an unhappily married man with a stereotypically horrible wife who denies him sex (authors, can we have a moratorium on this kind of character? Please?). He is miserable but lacks the courage to change his situation. He goes out looking for a prostitute in a park and finds a young, handsome man rather than the woman he was initially seeking. They are attracted to each other and begin a relationship.  The author makes a number of missteps in depicting the setting, including the use of American English and odd contextual information (the setting is suburban London), and the protagonist comes across as pathetic rather than sympathetic. But the writing style is good and I’m curious to see if the author can redeem this guy.

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Bear, Otter, and the Kid by T. J. Klune. This debut m/m romance came out earlier this year and generated unbelievable buzz. I didn’t think it was my kind of book but I was curious, so I downloaded a sample and discovered that the excerpt alone was 9000+ 900+ Kindle locations. It is in dire need of editing and has one of those narrators who talks all the time and tells you everything in his head, if you know what I mean. And yet his voice is oddly compelling. The ridiculous names are explained fairly quickly. The Kid is revoltingly precocious. But the story is engaging, and last week it was discounted to $2.99 at Amazon, so I decided to buy it and see how far I could get. The basic storyline: the narrator, his younger brother, his best friend, and his girlfriend/other best friend form a family-like unit after the irresponsible mother takes off. The (male) best friend’s brother reappears after being essentially gone for three years and upsets the equilibrium. Cue romance and drama.

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Among the Living (PsyCop #1) by Jordan Castillo Price. For some reason I totally managed to miss reading any of Jordan Castillo Price’s m/m paranormal mysteries, even though she was the subject of an If You Like column here at Dear Author. I’d heard wonderful things about her books for years, and I have enjoyed the Petit Morts series. I finally rectified this omission by downloading the first of the PsyCop books. Price makes it easy by offering half the book for free on her website. It’s well worth buying the other half. The protagonist is a psychic detective who sees and talks to dead people. He’s part of a Chicago police force in which psychics of various abilities are partnered with non-psychics (stiffs). The narrator is funny and endearing, the writing is smooth, the romantic storyline is appealing, and the mystery is pretty good. Full review to come.

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The Silent City (Rifter #8) by Ginn Hale. I read it in one sitting and loved it, but you probably knew that. We jump back in time in this installment, to when John was coming to grips with being The Rifter. Much of the story here revolves around his attempts to manage the vast powers he has on Basawar. Kyle/Ravishan is present as well. We learn more about the Fai’daum, and we find out how John became Jath’ibaye (in more ways than one). The story is dark, violent, and almost claustrophic. It is also romantic and even sweet at times. I have no idea how this epic, epic fantasy can be wrapped up in just two more installments. Luckily, I’m pretty sure Ms. Hale does. Full review to come, but not right away.

A Baby for Eve by Maggie Kingsley. When I did my post on the Harlequin Medical Romance line last year, a commenter suggested this book. Not only does the heroine have an abortion, she goes on with her life and eventually gets to have an HEA. I tracked it down and discovered it was part of Penhally Bay, Mills & Boon’s Centennial series in the Medical line. The entire series finally started being issued  in the US market this year, and this month the Kingsley was published (in print form; the ebook releases next month). I read it and liked it last year, but I decided to reread it and see if it was really good, or I just thought so because I was so happy to find a book with this setup. Review to come.

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The Private World of Georgette Heyer by Jane Aiken Hodge. This book, which was first published in 1984, has been reissued in paperback by Sourcebooks. I read it soon after it came out and I’ve dipped into it frequently since then. As biographies go, it’s a bit workmanlike: Hodge, herself a well-known author, employes a straightforward chronology that intertwines events in Heyer’s life with the research and writing of her novels. But it’s invaluable for Heyer enthusiasts. I decided to do a full reread before I embark on the new biography of Heyer by Jennifer Kloester (which is already available in the UK but won’t be published in the US until 2012). If readers are interested I’ll do a full review.

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Your novels have been on my peripheral awareness for a couple years now. I keep meaning to give them a try, but you know how it is. So many books, so little time. Then I heard the buzz surrounding Daughter of Smoke and Bone. I thought it was a great title so ever curious, I looked it up on Amazon. I read the book description but it seemed kind of vague to me. I can’t say that without the interesting title to spur me on I would have picked up this book. The cover copy was so uninformative. While not inaccurate, I don’t think it does the book justice.

Karou is an art student in Prague known for her magnificent, fantastical sketchbooks. But what people don’t realize is that the monsters populating her drawings actually exist. The reason why Karou doesn’t appear to have a family except for a never-seen grandmother is because she doesn’t actually have one. At least not a human family. Karou was raised by chimaerae, what most people would call demons.

But now something has come that threatens her world: seraphs (aka angels). First, they leave scorched handprints on the doorway portals that link our world with that of the other realm inhabited by Karou’s chimaerae family. Then Karou comes face to face with a seraph intent on killing her. Except the seraph, Akiva, doesn’t and even though they are enemies, Karou finds herself inexplicably drawn to him. And as they get to know each other, she finally learns the answer to the mystery of her heritage.

Put like that, Daughter of Smoke and Bone sounds like every other YA paranormal out there on the market right now. But it’s the execution and details that set this novel apart. Having finished the book, I now understand why the book description was so vague and bland. It’s hard to encapsulate this novel without dropping spoiler bombs left and right. So much of the tension depends on the mystery and how Karou reacts to the bits and pieces of information she discovers.

The biggest strength of this novel, for me, was the worldbuilding. It was presented with verve and very little time was spent explaining each and every rule. It wasn’t necessary and in fact, would have been unbelievable. Karou grew up in this fantastical world. Running distasteful errands for a demonic tooth fairy and walking through doors to another world was everyday and mundane to her. It would make no sense for her to talk about how the chimaerae were monsters. They were her family and she loved them just as much as they loved her.

But as I mentioned before, it is a very fantastical world. It features demons and angels waging a neverending war. There’s a magic system that extracts a horrible price. For readers who believe that magic should always have a cost, this system is for you. It’s simultaneously gruesome and elegant. There’s an otherworldly dimension populated by these demons and angels which can only be accessed from ours by a system of doorways. It’s an interesting approach more akin to Neil Gaiman and Charles de Lint than the more popular paranormals that fill the current YA genre.

I also enjoyed the approach to the romance. In so many YA paranormals, we have the girl and guy meet and they’re instantly attracted even though they come from two different worlds. We get a different take on that here. Sure, it proceeds as we’ve seen so often before: they fight because they’re enemies and they can’t kill each other due to some inexplicable attraction. But where Daughter of Smoke and Bone diverges is that it deals with what happens after the girl discovers her world has been altered. I can’t go into too much detail without spoiling but this novel definitely shows that sometimes love is not enough and that some things cannot be easily forgiven.

Tangentially related to the romantic subplot, I thought the novel excelled at showing how love can change your entire world — for good and for bad. We saw how love could have changed the path of the chimaerae and seraph war but it failed. Then later, the survivor of that great love, Akiva, went on to do a horrible, terrible thing that essentially destroyed Karou’s life.

I thought Daughter of Smoke and Bone straddled the line between the familiar tropes and conventions of current YA paranormals and the more otherworldly approaches of the traditionally executed contemporary fantasy genre. What made it stand out for me was the execution of the coming of age story. It is the start of a series (trilogy?) so readers should be aware it ends on a heartwrenching note. I wouldn’t call it cliffhanger myself, but I can see how it’d be viewed that way. B+

My regards,
Jia

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“She has two words for love. “Make me.” Then love changes the rules…

As far as hairstylist Celia Occam is concerned, she’s struck out at marriage twice, and there will be no “third time’s a charm”. So what if one salon employee and the town gossip seem dead set on fixing her up with Prince Charming. She’s nobody’s princess.

She’s all for scratching the occasional itch with the right man, but flirtatious firefighter Mason Delacroix is all wrong. Besides, with three broken engagements on his romantic rap sheet, even a one-night mattress mambo sounds like a bad idea.

From the first moment Mason encounters Celia’s emotional barriers, he’s determined to turn up the heat as high as it takes to melt the ice. If the whole town wants to back him up by playing Cupid, he’s on board. Track record be damned. He wants Celia, and he’s ready for permanent.

When her self-appointed guardian angels conspire to lock them in the basement, their long-denied chemistry explodes. She finds herself relishing every moment—though her subconscious is already on the run.

Funny thing, though. Every time she zigs, Mason’s already zagged. Making her wonder if this time it’s for real, or if Cupid is just up to its old tricks.”

Dear Ms. Jordan,

Sometimes the strangest things in a blurb will make me decide to read a book. In this case it’s the fact that the heroine Celia has been divorced two times. That Mason has had three broken engagements didn’t hurt either. So okay, I’m weird like that but it’s rare that I recall a heroine who’s already been down the aisle twice. I also wanted to see how you’d pull off a HEA between two gun shy people.

Only Mason isn’t gun shy. In fact, he’s the driving force behind the romance and has been after Celia for a year which makes the shorter length of this story still fine for me. It’s Celia who’s as skittish as a newbie in a maximum security lockdown. Yeah, she thinks Mason is hotter than hell but she’s content to look but not touch. The whole town seems bent on fixing them up, including Tori who for an older lady is really pushing the sexing and Jerry the almost insultingly super gay hairstylist, but it’s not until they get locked up with a fishbowl full of condoms that anything happens. And then they enjoy lots and lots of sex.

Since Mason & Celia have lusted for a year, the quick hook up – though done safely with protection – once they’re locked in the basement is fine. Mason thought he’d do the “sex her up once and get her out of my system” thing. I hate that. But, as usual, it doesn’t work! of course. Because they have lots and lots of sex.

So Mason is the one who wants together forevah while Celia is scared due to two past failed marriages. It’s a nice change to see the man be the chaser. And boy does he chase. Only the fact that he feeds Celia, fixes a hair dryer in her salon and unclogs a drain keeps him from heading towards stalker with privileges territory. Of course then there’s the great sex. Lots and lots of sex.

The story sorta drifts into well charted territory. Celia is so scared of marriage and commitment because – boo hoo – everyone’s always left her from her father to mother to her aunt to both husbands. Celia realizes she loves Mason but thinks things would never work out because – see above – so she won’t admit her love. He deserves better. He deserves forevah. And lots and lots of sex.

Tori and Jerry descend to depths to get them together for lots and lots of sex. I hope they didn’t set fire that hurt Mason. But whoa! it’s a change that for a whole month after Mason was hurt there’s no lots and lots of sex. No sex at all. Mason’s studly status is in danger here since all romance heroes are supposed to be able to still perform lots and lots of sex regardless of gross bodily injuries.

Anywho, Celia admits her love, Mason cleverly gets around her hang ups by proposing permanent friends with lots and lots of sex privileges forevah which Celia agrees to.

Tori and Jerry still annoy me but now they can fly off somewhere else and annoy other people while Celia and Mason get down to lots and lots of sex. B-

~Jayne

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You’re one of those authors I feel I should love. Your story ideas are creative and inventive. You’re prolific – one of my favorite traits in an author. Your online personality is sweet and easygoing.  And yet for some reason, your books and I never seem to quite connect. Every time you start a new series, I buy the first book, hoping that this will be the one that converts me into a raving fan. It’s why I picked up Lord of the Vampires. Sadly, this book was not quite the one.

The set-up is intriguing. Jane Parker is a scientist who is recovering from a terrible car accident several months ago. The car accident killed her mother and nearly crippled Jane, and she has had a long, lonely road to recovery. As she recovers, she dreams of a mysterious, sexy vampire who is being held captive. One day, Jane receives a strange book in the mail. The book talks about a mysterious, sexy vampire who is being held captive by an evil princess.  Jane is shocked by the parallel to her dreams, but even more shocking – her own name is in the book and the vampire is demanding that she go to him. She dreams about making love to the vampire that night, and the next morning she awakens to find herself in the kingdom mentioned by the book, wearing the face of the evil princess. Under the guise of the evil princess, she meets the vampire, Nicolai. He has been kept as a sex slave by the evil (and ugly) Odette, and he can see Jane’s true face under the glamor she wears.  Nicolai is a captive and his memories have been stripped from him. He knows that Jane is not Odette and that she has come to save him. They escape from the castle together and run off into the forest, where a series of mishaps befall them as they immediately fall into love with each other.

I found the world in this tale fairly murky. It feels like the storyline is a mash-up of Alice in Wonderland and fairy tales. The two evil, ugly princesses are the daughters of the Queen of Hearts in the kingdom of Delfina. Jane’s appearance in the new world could easily harken back to Alice, though I didn’t see anyone or anything I could point to as the White Rabbit. From there, however, the story seems to be a mishmash of fantasy tropes (evil ogres, witches) with the occasional paranormal element. Nicolai is a vampire. I have no idea why he is a vampire or if anyone else is a vampire. Was he turned? I could have missed it, but I am confused why he is a vampire and none of his other siblings is. Moreover, the story is entitled ‘Lord of the Vampires’, but Nicolai was the only vampire in the story. He is a prince of the fantasy kingdom of Elden, but as far as I could tell, it was not inhabited by vampires. I found the world very confusing and had to constantly re-read certain sections to make sure I was following along. Even now, I still feel like I’m missing big chunks of the story.

Jane was a problematic character for me. She’s sympathetic and strong-willed, but I had trouble with the concept that she’s supposed to be a brilliant scientist who graduated early from high school, finished college in a blink, then worked for years at a top secret branch of the government doing experiments on quantum theories and on mysterious, otherworldly creatures, which has a bigger role later in the story. My problem was that Jane did not act like a scientist or think like one.  She is also a very, very rich, very young scientist.

She didn’t need to work because one, she’d made so much money through her research, she could never spend it all; and two, she’d made so much money in the car accident settlement she could never spend it all.

That struck me as…odd. Does science pay that much? If she loves her job so much, why isn’t she attempting to go back to her job? How would she have such high government clearance at such a young age? These are questions I kept asking myself and did not come to a satisfactory answer. For the record, at the start of the story, Jane is 27 and had been in recovery from her car accident for almost a year, so she would have ‘retired’ from her beloved career somewhere around the age of 26.

Nicolai as the hero was very sexy and charming, however. I do find that you do the obsessive, devoted hero very well. He was adoring of Jane and extremely protective, and I find that is always a joy to read about. Their banter was sometimes very charming, and while Nicolai was the big, possessive alpha male, I still had the impression that Jane was running the show. I like that in a story. The sex between them was not as explicit as your other series, perhaps, but that might have to do with the Nocturne line more than anything else. I still felt the chemistry between them was sufficiently spark-worthy. There was instant lust and love between the two characters, but given the rest of the setting, I let this slide. Insta-lust does not really bother me in a paranormal, since I feel there are a lot of elements in these stories that require the suspension of disbelief.

I have to say that I hated the ending. It was too perfect. As Jane has said in the past, this was definitely a Care Bear ending. Not for me.

Overall, this was a mixed read for me. I liked the concept but found the execution flawed. The hero was sexy but the heroine was hard to believe. You don’t need to read this story to grasp what is going on with the others. There is an overarching story plot about the four siblings, however, I didn’t feel that it was more than window dressing.  And while this did not work for me as well as I’d hoped, I’ll still be there to buy the first book of your next series.

All best,

January

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I was really intrigued by the description of your book, No Proper Lady, which touts itself as a being a cross between Terminator and My Fair Lady. And indeed, this is a very apt description for the plot of this book. More importantly, based upon the excerpt I read before deciding to review the book, the heroine seemed to fit my current desire for a female protagonist who is neither attractive nor particularly good. So I gave it a shot and I was happy I did.

The book opens in the middle of battle. Joan, daughter of Arthur and Leia, stands in a circle of blue as priests chant. Beyond this circle, she can hear the sounds of death and destruction. The sounds of people she loves dying. This ritual—a ritual designed to detach Joan from time and space and send her into the past, never to return to this moment—is the last chance the human race has against the demons and monsters that have invaded the world.  But the novel is not spent in Joan’s time, circa 2188. It occurs in Victorian era England. That is the time—as the priests have learned—where the dark magician, who will open gates to other worlds and let the demonic into ours, lives. This is the pivotal point. The point when humanity’s hope for a future without the death, the destruction, and the demons that shape daily life in 2188 is still a possibility. This is the time to which Joan has been sent in order to kill Alex Reynell and his horrible book before he can open the gates to other, hellish worlds, and never close them.

Simon Grenville is riding the forest, riding off his frustration and sorrow.  He and his sister Eleanor have retreated to the country. In London, there are still whispers of scandal attached to his sister’s name. Nobody knows the truth. What rumors and innuendoes are exchanged—that Eleanor was ruined, that Simon tried to kill Alex Reynell—all suppose a more human, a more mundane cause.  The truth is much more unbelievable and far darker than anything Society might conceive of. Though they were once the best of friends, Simon had begun to suspect that Alex was no longer just dabbling in dark magic. He had begun to keep his distance, detach himself from his old friend. But he never would have believed that Alex would do what he did. So when Simon stumbles upon the strange woman in the blue circle of light on his property, he is not surprised. Another attack by Alex convinces him to trust the woman, Joan, because she saves his life. It isn’t before long that they realize that they have a mutual enemy in Alex Reynell.

So much could have gone wrong in this story that didn’t. As a long time fantasy reader, one of my chief pet peeves concerns the problem of world-building. I would argue that any book, regardless of whether or not it slides into the Sci-fi/Fantasy genre, requires a certain deftness with constructing a world. Too often I see books in which the magic seems to have no rules, the plot and the conceit gets bogged down in minutiae, and the complexity of our actual histories (with their attendant religions, politics, various cultures, foods, music, perspectives, attitudes etc.—and that’s just this week!) get reduced down to a singular and rather unimaginative How-It-Works-In-This-World-Is-Like-This. For simplicity is always less imaginative than complexity. This is particularly so when one has to balance the world-building and adventure that is a part of the fantasy genre with the focus on the central love relationship that is the hallmark of romance.

So I was leery, author. Very leery, indeed, when I opened this book.  But my fears of a sloppy magical world or alternate England were almost immediately put to rest. The world-building in this novel is, perhaps, one of the most seamless and effortless examples I have seen in a long time. Fantasy has the unfortunate tendency to proselytize a certain ideology (-coughs- Philip Pullman –cough-), which is all well and good if you don’t notice. Because once you, the reader, start asking questions about how the world operates, you know you’ve stopped caring about the characters. If you are more concerned with how the mail works, then it’s over.  No Proper Lady, I’m happy to report, does not make you question train schedules in Victorian England, or magic rituals. Instead, it weaves an apocalyptic future in which mankind is enslaved to demonic forces with Victorian era England in such a way that you don’t notice the threads.

One of the other strengths of this book is the heroine, Joan. Joan is another thing that could have gone horribly wrong but didn’t. Aren’t you tired, readers, of kick-ass heroines? I am. All that ass-kicking in leather pants and a halter top really is rather chaffing. What’s particularly awesome about Joan is that she’s a person. It seems so silly to say that, to have to point that out as the thing that, at least, I am looking for in a heroine, but there it is. She’s a person. And as a person, even though she’s tough, and even though she’s a warrior, she’s also vulnerable and scared and overwhelmed with the duty she has been sent to the past to perform. Like anyone would be. So Joan, like anyone, finding themselves in a strange world with no friends or family ties, is a little lost. Nor is she afraid to admit to Simon that she is:

“No, please,” Simon insisted. “I must know. Is something wrong here? Has anyone been uncivil to you—were the girls—” Improbable—impossible—for Joan to be crying over what a bunch of village chits thought or said or did. He knew that even before Joan shook her head. “No. It’s nothing you did. Nothing anyone here did. I just—”

She stopped and looked at Simon, then swiftly away again, at the desk and the opened book on it. A flush crept up her neck and over her face. “What the hell,” she said, in a tight voice he’d never heard from her before. “If I’m going to act like a six-year-old anyhow—I want my mother. And my dad, and my friends, and the world I knew. It was a shitty world, but it was mine, and everyone I love is there. Was there.” At the last her voice cracked.

Joan spun around to face the bookshelves, but Simon saw her face before she did: stripped of control at last, a study in weariness and far and stark bleeding grief. The pain there made his own look like a stubbed toe. “Oh,” he said, sounding awkward and insufficient to his own ears. “But—won’t you see them again?”

“No.”

What I like about this exchange is that Joan wants her mother. I think that is a very telling desire. Joan, for all that she is a highly trained, extremely efficient soldier, is still a daughter in a family—not a dysfunctional family—but a family that was proud of her, that she wants to see again, that she’s not going to see again. This emotional and human aspect to Joan’s character is directly a result of the world-building because, as Joan explains a little further on:

“There were rituals,” Joan said. “I’m cut loose from time. That’s how I could come back, and I guess it lets me survive any changes I make by being here. But that’s just me. If I succeed . . . then there’ll be a different world two hundred years from now. Mine won’t be there anymore.”

Character arc, world-building, and the progress of the relationship are all interwoven in this one small exchange. And what’s even more extraordinary is that this aspect of magic, the limitations of the world, and previously unknown aspects of Joan herself, is not information forced upon us through some roughly inserted exposition or awkward dialogue, but comes to us readers through what I think is one of the central components of romance: conversation. They are talking, talking because Simon caught Joan crying. How normal! And in world where demons exist, to boot!

In fact, the greatest strength of this book is that our understanding of each time period comes through the encounter of that period by one of the characters. What I mean is, that instead of being told what such and such a place is like for Joan or Simon, we experience their wonder or terror or joy, etc. along with them. Moreover, we understand what kind of a magical world we are operating in through those encounters—not just with places, or things, or manners, but with each other. Joan starts out as a foreign object in Simon’s eyes. He can’t even decide what she looks like beyond being utterly strange. A concept like beauty or plain or ugly can’t be applied to her because she is a person, a being totally outside his experience. He cannot place or categorize her. Joan, conversely, can take nothing for granted. The world she came from was diseased and bleak. Where every moment was shadowed. Where every moment was a beat in an ongoing war. She has trouble adjusting to world with sunshine and grass. Her first experience of a living, breathing city is overwhelming. We understand what Joan’s world is like not because she tells us, but because in her reactions to Victorian England we are able to deduce what the place and time she came from were like.

Neither does this book try to answer all the metaphysical questions fantasy novels inevitably evoke. Things like what is time? What is evil? Why are there other worlds? Is there a God? What kind? Maybe Gods? A conscious universe? Where does consciousness come from? Is there life after death? It does, in some ways, address these questions, but it does not answer them definitively: for they can’t be answered in fictional world anymore definitely than they can be in our world. They are answered, in a limited and ambiguous way, in the experiences of the characters. And as a person who has read far too many SF/F novels who attempt to explain everything, I appreciate that underlying ambiguity that still maintains a resolution of the pertinent plot points.

If there was any weakness to this book, then it was that I wasn’t totally emotionally invested in the outcome. I read the first half quite quickly and then put it down. I had to because I had to go to work. But then, instead of rushing home to finish reading it, I just didn’t. I just didn’t pick it up again. Even I find this strange, what with all my previous praise. But there you go. I’ve had trouble writing this review because even though I truly believe from an objective perspective that this is a solid and very good piece of writing, I somehow didn’t emotionally connect to it. When I was reading it, I enjoyed it, but I was not enthralled by it. There wasn’t a visceral connection for me, and that really signals the difference between an A book and B book in my mind.

Perhaps this lack of an emotional connection was because I wasn’t as invested in the romance as I was in the adventure. I remember the action much better than I remember the love scenes. I found the romance between Joan and Simon almost entirely forgettable. Nothing about it stood out for me. Joan, as a character, does somewhat but mostly because of her unusualness. Simon has dark hair, I think, and that’s all I can remember except for the fact that he is a very honorable man. The magic and the fantastic elements of the novel are quite well done. The prose was smooth and easy to fall into. The villain, Alex Reynell, is probably the most memorable of the characters. Partly, I think, because unlike so many other villains in romance, Reynell is both complex and evil.  He is frightening, and not just because of the things he does but the way he does them. He is frightening because, as Simon’s friend and in Simon’s memories, especially, we see that he was not always this way.  Yet . . . like two people on a first date who ought to be soul mates, who have all sorts of things in common, this novel and I found ourselves unable to relate to one another on a fundamental level.

So, yes. This is a strongly written, well-constructed magical world with complex characters. More importantly, Ms. Cooper doesn’t tell or show when she can imply. But for me, even though this book and I ought to be compatible by all 142 eHarmony points of compatibility or whatever, we simply didn’t quite click. There was a certain spark missing from the whole experience for me. And so I give this book a very well-deserved B+ with the full acknowledgement that for some other girl, this one’s a keeper.

Lazaraspaste

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My favorite thing about your books is the interaction of your main characters and your dry wit that seeps through the dialogue.  ”Canyons of the Night” is set in the same world as the Jayne Castle series that involves glowing green alien artifacts, rezzed amber, and dust bunnies.  The idea behind this world is that there are different talents out there – individuals who have extrasensory skills.  Charlotte Enright, for example, can tune an artifact so that it harmonizes with the the recipient’s auras.  Slade Attridge served for a Federal Bureau of Psi Investigation but after a particularly bad case, Slade believes that he is suffering psi-blindness which will inevitably result in the death of his psychic abilities.  For a psy enabled person, that is akin to losing a limb and for Slade, who relied on his psychic abilities in his work with the FPBI, it is a compounded tragedy.

Charlotte and Slade grew up on Rainshadow Island. Slade was a slighter older, slightly dangerous teen who saved Charlotte one night and took her into the Preserve, a dangerous and mystical place.  Both have gone on to success. Salde achieving agent status with FBPI and Charlotte using her aura reading talents to ferret out some of the best antiques.  Fifteen years later, they reunite on Rainshadow Island where Charlotte takes over her deceased aunt’s antiques shop and Slade takes up the interim sheriff position at Rainshadow for 6 months until he goes psi blind or recovers.

Initially, they embark on an affair, knowing that it is only temporary.  In classic Krentz style, the first sexual encounter is a bit disastrous.  I don’t know if there is an author who does a better job of using sex for comedic effect.

There is an overweaning feeling that Charlotte and Slade are destined for each other.  At one point, Slade thinks that Charlotte’s return to Rainshadow Island  is as if she waited for him, a forgotten child raised in the system.   I wished for more character development.  In fact, one of the biggest problems I have with this blend of paranormal and contemporary is that I feel time that could have been spent on character interaction, witty banter, and development was spent on the world itself.  Sadly, the world isn’t one in which I have a keen interest.  Yet the characters themselves keep me coming back.

The pacing of the story is a bit slow.  The first half introduces us to Rainshadow, hooks Slade up with a fatherless boy, and displays the charming nosiness that occurs in small towns while the latter half is devoted to a suspense plot involving Charlotte which allows Slade to put his investigating and sheriffing skills.

HANK LEVENSON TOSSED THE HEADLESS, TAILLESS FISH onto the scale. “Lot of expensive Amber River salmon for one person to eat. Planning on sharing with the dust bunny? I can always sell you a smaller piece of the salmon and give you some cheap bottom fish for Rex. Doubt if he’d know the difference.”

Slade leaned one arm against the glass display case and contemplated his options. There was no point trying to finesse the situation. The news that he’d had dinner with the owner of Looking Glass Antiques would be all over Shadow Bay by tomorrow morning, no matter what he did.

 

The other issue was that this was advertised as Book 3 in a trilogy. That means, to me, the book should wrap up all the loose ends.  Instead it reads like a set up book for further arcane books. For instance, the mystery of the Preserve is never fully revealed and it is clear that there are more stories to take place which will involve the Preserve.  This isn’t to say that I don’t want more arcane books but just that I thought Book 3 signalled the end of a trilogy.  C+

Best regards,

Jane

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I read your first novel, 666 Park Avenue, earlier this year. In it, readers were introduced to architect Jane Boyle who gets swept up in a whirlwind romance with the man of her dreams, only to discover that not only does she come from a long line of witches, she just married into another family of witches that covets her power. The Dark Glamour picks up where the previous novel left off, with Jane on the run from the Doran family.

Forced to go into hiding, Jane doesn’t have many options. Lynne Doran is a powerful woman, both magically and socially. There’s nowhere in the world that Jane can escape from Lynne’s connections even with her estranged husband’s advanced planning. So instead she tries to outwit her mother-in-law and remain in New York City. Whether this is actually a smart choice considering the circumstances, I leave up to the reader. With this series, you have to accept Jane’s haphazard way of thinking.

That said, she does learn a couple things by staying in NYC. First, Jane discovers that a pair of siblings from another witch bloodline are in “business” negotiations with the Doran family. More importantly, however, she learns that Lynne’s daughter, formerly presumed dead, is still alive. As a result, Jane goes on a globetrotting trip to find Lynne’s daughter and deliver her back to her mother. After all, the only reason Lynne wanted Jane to marry her son was so that she could give birth to a daughter to continue the Doran bloodline. If Jane can find Lynne’s daughter, then she can have her life back. Maybe not the most altruistic motivation, but I never said Jane was a nice person.

There are times when I really question Jane’s judgement. It’s not just the part where she chose to stay in NYC, with her face plastered all over TV and knowing that Lynne could stumble across her at any moment. It’s the part where she sleeps with the brother of the sibling pair negotiating with the Doran family. I realize part of it is that magic attracts magic — sort of a way to keep the bloodlines strong — but she wasn’t ripping the clothes off Harris in the previous book despite the existence of that magical attraction. And I’d think after the whirlwind romance with estranged husband Malcolm, she would have known what was going on. That she didn’t realize the reason behind her attraction to this stranger requires a heavy amount of disbelief, especially when combined with the mystery woman stalking Jane all over NYC. Of course, I freely admit I have a hard time understanding characters with raging libidos despite being on the run for their lives. In my opinion, there are more important things on which to focus your time.

I thought the clues regarding the big revelation at the end were a bit too obvious. As I’ve mentioned in the past, I prefer discovering those revelations with the characters. Figuring things out ahead of the characters tends to ruin things for me because I then start questioning the characters’ competence and lack of insight. On the other hand, I know other readers like that sort of thing (figuring something out and then watching how the characters reach the same discovery) so your mileage may vary. Or maybe it’s not as obvious as I think, and I just made a lucky guess.

That said, I did like the big twist of that revelation. It builds upon the story told in 666 Park Avenue and complicates the history of the different witch bloodlines. It wasn’t without its flaws, however. I thought the events bridging Jane’s finding Lynne’s daughter to the climax were rushed. I liked the character of Lynne’s daughter so I wished we could have seen more of her reactions towards discovering she’s the long-lost daughter of a wealthy family and how she copes with that change of fortune.

Like its predecessor, The Dark Glamour takes longer than it should to get moving (and once again, the cover copy reveals far too much information) but when it does reach the point of no return, it’s a steamroller. The main highlight of this book for me was that it portrayed how you could do something considered a good deed (even if it was for selfish reasons) but things can still go wrong. The climax of this book came about because Jane found Lynne’s daughter but didn’t realize the true reason why her mother-in-law was so desperate to find a female heir.

Overall, this novel is an easy read, good for lazy afternoons. It’s not particularly deep but sometimes that’s the kind of book I’m looking for. While I could have done without all the lusting over men who are a danger to her and would have liked to have seen her interact with more female friends (because she does have them!) outside of plot necessity, the ending twist made the book for me. But I can only hope that this series is finite and doesn’t intend to drag this plotline out. The ending was a bit of a cliffhanger. C

My regards,
Jia

Previous book in this series: 666 Park Avenue (review)

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About 1/3 of the way through this book, I realized I’d read another in the Broken Heart series. I think it was Cross Your Heart; I remember something about a ghost and some sort of evil. That was the only book I’d ever picked up in the series, and it was amusing but didn’t push me to jump on another series wagon. I have to admit, I pulled Must Love Lycans off the TBR stack because I liked the fact that Damian (the hero) shows up naked. Yeah, I needed a thrill while on our family vacation since the door to our bedroom never closed.

Dr. Kelsey Morningstone is a psychotherapist who is lucky to have a job. After allowing a psychotic killer to manipulate her, Kelsey was sued by every relative of the killers victims, lost everything including the shirt off her back and was repeatedly interviewed by the FBI. Adding insult to injury, Kelsey’s mother, a famous psychotherapist (think appearances on Oprah), has cut off all communication. But Kelsey manages to land a job that pays off all her debts and takes care of all her associated problems at the Dante Clinic, a privately funded psychiatric hospital that seems a lot more like Promises in Malibu than Pilgrim State Hospital. It’s weird enough that I wouldn’t take that job, but Kelsey is an empath, hides her abilities, and knows her options are limited to the Dante Clinic or nothing.

Damien is a new patient that is brought into the clinic. Suffering from amnesia, Damien doesn’t know who he is, where he’s been or what’s happened to him. But the minute he senses Kelsey, it all starts coming together for him. Kelsey’s first encounter with Damien is her observation of him after he’s been brought to the clinic. He’s naked, has a giant wang, and hair that the Herbal Essences chick would kill for. So she falls for him immediately. You may be wondering why I’m not writing much more about Damien here. Since the book is written in first person from Kelsey’s POV, I had a hard time getting much of what Damien was thinking or feeling beyond what Kelsey thinks about. As the story progresses, Damien bites her and wants to mate her but fights it because his bite could end up killing her. Surprisingly, the sex was well written for first person, but it could have been in a vacuum because I felt so little connection to Damien.

Kelsey, on the other hand, has an amazing backstory and crazy parental and barely-explored sibling relationships. But obscuring a lot of this (and confusing me) is the fight between the parakind (author’s word) and ETAC (the Ethics and Technology Assessment Commission, tasked with destroying anything alien) which is the thread that helps link all of the Broken Heart novels together. I found following the Para/ETAC stuff and reading all of the Glossary’s (there are three of them) mentally exhausting. Damien has two brothers that are sequel bait, and there is a giant cast of characters that were all in the previous Broken Heart novels. I was able to glean enough from the text to not have to go through all of the Glossary entries with a fine tooth comb, but I’m sure I ended up missing a lot of the humor and how and why all of these people are connected to each other. With all of that, I still managed to read the book in a day and a half, while playing with five kids, four in-laws, swimming, biking, running, hitting the beach and getting hit by a hurricane (Irene). Because I had to repeatedly pause for clarification and couldn’t get more from Damien, this one gets a C.

~ Shuzluva

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