Tag: 2012 NetGalley Reading Challenge

The Devil of Jedburgh

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

The Devil of Jedburgh is a title granted by superstition to Arran Kerr in Claire Robyns’ historical romance set in the Scottish Lowlands during Mary, Queen of Scots reign. There are no actual devils or demons involved. But if you have a taste for historical romance, this story is wickedly good.

Breghan McAllen’s father has promised Arran Kerr of Ferniehurst that he will give his daughter to him in marriage. The marriage will unite two of the strongest families in the Scottish Lowlands, families that are both loyal to Mary, Queen of Scots.

Bree is 19 years old, and has been indulged by her parents all of her life. She is the youngest of her parents’ 13 children, and the only daughter. She’s a little spoiled and a little wild. And she’s scared to death of marrying Arran Kerr.

Not because she’s afraid of men (she has 12 older brothers, after all). She’s not afraid of marriage itself. Or sex. She’s still a virgin, which is expected in that time for a woman of her class, but again, 12 older brothers, and there are horses and cattle and sheep. Some of her older brothers are married. She’s not stupid. Far from it.

But Arran Kerr is known far and wide as the Black-Hearted Kerr. The Curse of Roxburgh. Or the Devil of Jedburgh.

Breghan does not want to marry the demon-spawn who acquired all those horrible names.

Arran, on the other hand, wants to marry the daughter of Laird McAllen’s wife. Not because he’s ever met the Lady McAllen. Or her daughter. But because Lady McAllen gave her Laird 12 strapping sons and lived. Arran’s met some of the sons, and the Laird himself. Arran assumes the Lady must be a big, buxom woman to survive that much childbearing. And that’s just what he needs. He doesn’t care what her daughter looks like.

All those nicknames? Arran can be the very devil in battle. But that’s not unusual for the Scottish borderlands during the 1500s. His real problem is that he believes there is a curse on the Kerrs. He is the last of the Kerrs of Ferniehurst. Because of the curse. The curse that all of the Kerr women, wives or not, die in childbirth with the baby.

So the rumor that Arran killed his mother? Well, it’s true. After a fashion. His mother died in childbirth. His birth. Not that death in childbirth was uncommon in the 1500s.

But Arran believes in the curse. So he wants to marry McAllen’s daughter, thinking that the McAllen women must be veritable brood mares, not just capable of bearing an entire clan all by themselves, but looking like it, too. Arran figures he’ll just blow the candle out every night.

That’s what he tells Breghan when he meets her. While she’s running away–from marrying him. She tells him that her name is “Bree” and claims to be, well, her own servant. And Arran takes one look at her and falls, well, deeply in lust, at the very least. But decides he can’t have her, even to dally with, because of that curse. Because Bree isn’t big and buxom. She’s feminine enough, but on the slim and athletic side. (We’d call her a tomboy today.)

In the morning Arran arrives at the McAllen home, after Bree has run away from him. Again. Only to discover that 1) Bree is the woman he was supposed to marry and 2) the Lady McAllen is built along the same lines as her daughter, in spite of that fine brood of strapping sons, and 3) he wants Bree anyway, in spite of, or because of, her defiant spirit. At least for a while, and he’ll have his sons with some broodmare of a woman, later.

Arran and Bree are handfast by the priest who was supposed to marry them. A handfast was a trial marriage. A year and a day, unless there was a child. (Handfastings did exist, and were quite legal.)

Arran and Bree go into the marriage with very different expectations. Arran expects to have Bree, just for a while. Then find some other woman, and quite probably have her die in childbirth. He already cares too much for Bree to let her die bearing his child.

Bree has Arran’s word that after the year is over, he will let her go, and let her marry whoever she wishes. Her dream is to live in Edinburgh, to live a relatively civilized life in the city and be near Court.

So Arran brings Bree to Ferniehurst as his handfast Lady. And Bree discovers that the fearsome “devil of Jedburgh” is not quite as black as the rumors have painted him. But the Court in Edinburgh, that, on the other hand, might be worse than any evil she ever imagined.

Escape Rating B+: There’s a lot going on in this love story. It’s complicated and it mixes in some very real history from a period that has always fascinated me. Which is what made me get seriously sucked in to the story.

First there’s the love story between Arran and Bree. These are two really strong-willed people. They both think they can have their trial marriage and walk away unscathed after the “year and a day”. Watching them learn otherwise is a major part of the fun in this story. They both need to learn a few lessons before they’re right for each other. But watching their journey is very much worth reading!

The icing on the cake for me was the events that occur in Edinburgh. This story ties into some of the real history of Mary, Queen of Scots and her second husband Henry, Lord Darnley. This period of Scottish and English history has always been one of my favorites, so visiting again was a special treat for me, even if Arran’s and Bree’s involvement with the Court was somewhat problematic for them.

For more of my thoughts on this book see this post at Book Lovers, Inc.

 

 

Miss Hillary Schools a Scoundrel

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | book reviews> C Reviews

Miss Hillary Schools a Scoundrel by Samantha Grace is a Regency romance with one of the tried-and-true plots: the story of the redemption of a rake. Except that in this story, the rake is almost ready to be redeemed, and the lady isn’t quite ready to trust his redemption. Although this story had all the right elements, including a likeable hero and heroine, a matchmaking mama and a pair of dastardly evildoers for spice, the whole thing didn’t quite jell by the finish.

Lana Hillary meets Drew Forest by falling into his arms. From a tree. While escaping from one of the many men her matchmaking mama believes would be a perfect husband for her. Or at least a better bet than Lana officially declared “on the shelf” after two London Seasons and no offers. Well, none after that first lying scoundrel who broke Lana’s heart and left her.

The problem with the men her mama finds is not that they are so terribly respectable, although they are. It’s that they are so terribly boring. And so terribly obviously fortune hunters. Lana would rather be a spinster than be leg-shackled to a man who only wants her for her marriage portion. Especially since he will have control over it, and her, once she marries.

Being caught in a compromising position with one of the bores would require marriage. Escape by tree climbing is infinitely better.

But being witnessed by Drew Forest is not. Being stuck in the bushes listening while Drew breaks off his relationship with Lady Amelia is even worse. Drew is a handsome, charming scoundrel. And Lana’s brother Jake is in love with the widowed Lady Amelia.

Andrew Forest found the spirited creature he rescued from the tree to be the most fascinating woman he had ever met. The fact that her brother Jake warned him off in no uncertain terms made the challenge that much more interesting. rven if Drew normally never pursued supposedly marriage-minded misses like Lana, the lure was simply too great for him to ignore

And even though Lana knew that Drew was the exact opposite of the type of man she should be interested in, she couldn’t resist his charm.

So began a cat-and-mouse game, from ton ballroom to country house party, except that it was difficult to tell who was the cat, and who was the mouse. Their mutual attraction proved stronger than anyone’s plots and plans to throw them together or keep them apart, and there was plenty of mischief in both directions.

Meanwhile, there was a villain in their midst with an evil plot of his very own that could ruin not just Lana’s happiness, but her very life!

Escape Rating C: The opening scenes were some of the best I’ve read in quite a while. The set up was excellent, the slightly unconventional heroine, the rake who’s getting a little bored, the matchmaking mama who’s not looking carefully at the husband candidates, and some very witty dialogue.

For this reader, the story went on a bit too long. There were enough roadblocks without the dastardly plot, or there needed to be a few less roadblocks before the plot. Lana and Drew fought and argued and railed at each other just plain too much after they fell into bed (or coach as the case might be). For two people who had such fun talking with each other the first half of the book they made a right mess of it the second half.

When books are very short, I have a tendency to want them to be a bit longer. In this case, I think I would have enjoyed the story more if there had been a bit less of it in the middle.

Wrapping up NetGalley January

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | NetGalley> NetGalley Month

NetGalley January is a wrap. Well, the thing is, January is over, and since the little snowman in the picture says it was NetGalley January, there you are. That’s it for the month.

Those of us signed up for the 2012 NetGalley Reading Challenge are just going to have to soldier on, chortling with glee at all the lovely egalleys NetGalley will be sending us through the rest of the year. Every month can be NetGalley Month.

But back to the wrap. And I must use plastic wrap, since everyone needs to be able to see what I read.

Two books came out of my NetGalley TBR pile from September and October:

 

 

 

 

 

In addition to The Black Stiletto, which was fascinating, I also read the start of a very neat new mystery series, The Dharma Detective. I can’t wait for The Second Rule of Ten.

 

 

I also read a couple of Regency Romances from relatively new authors that were both a little different from the usual. It’s always interesting to see authors take the standard tropes and stretch the boundaries just a little bit. Or in the case of A Lady Awakened a “lotta” bit.

I read one YA/Cyberpunk that received a lot of buzz, and from the other posted wrap-ups, it looks like I’m not the only one who read Cinder. This title was highly anticipated. (I was turned down the first time I requested it, so I replied directly to the publisher outlining my specific review qualifications and was okayed on the second go-around).

Banshee Charmer is the start of a great new urban fantasy/paranormal series from a brand-new author. The author is doing a blog tour and the book is getting a lot of very nice attention.

 

 

I liked the first book in the Dark Dynasties series, Dark Awakening,  quite a bit, so when the second book, Midnight Reckoning listed on NetGalley, I grabbed it. Definitely fun for paranormal romance fans.

 

 

And, as always, I rounded out my reading month with titles from Carina Press. The icing on my reading cake: more urban fantasy and paranormal romance, and my science fiction romance fix for the month.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I posted thirteen reviews this month on NetGalley. I did finish a fourteenth book from NetGalley, The Devil of Jedburgh by Claire Robyns. But because I reviewed it for Book Lovers Inc., I can’t post the review on my site until after the review on BLI goes live, and that’s scheduled for February 9. I also finished The Night is Mine by M.L. Buchman sometime the night of January 31, but I can’t swear whether it was before or after midnight. I know that night was his, I just didn’t keep track of how much of it! So there you have it. My tally for this NetGalley Month. It’s all good for the 2012 NetGalley Reading Challenge. And it was all good reading!

The Night is Mine

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

The Night is Mine by M. L. Buchman has got to be the lightest-weight military-oriented romantic suspense story I’ve ever read, in spite of the number of times the heroine gets injured. What I’m saying is that I found the story to be a tremendous amount of fun, and I absolutely got sucked way into it the first night, but that I totally checked my reality-meter at the door. And I had a wilder ride than any of the chopper pilots in the story!

Let’s start with our heroine. Emily Beale is a Captain in the U.S. Army. This is totally believable. And she is a helicopter pilot. Again, totally believable. She is also a member of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) generally referred to as SOAR, the elite unit that transports Navy SEALs and Delta Force teams in and out of covert missions. In other words, she flies in forward combat operations. I want to believe this is possible, but I don’t think we’re there yet.

Emily is the first and so far only woman in SOAR. And as the story opens, she and her unit are watching a profile of her that is being played on CNN. In spite of the secrecy that surrounds SOAR, this profile was okayed by “Command”. Because Emily is not just an ace-pilot. Her father is a career FBI agent and is now the head of that agency. And when Emily was growing up in the suburbs of DC, the “boy next door” that she had her girlhood crush on, well he’s now the President of the U.S. The youngest president ever. And no, he’s not Clinton. And Mrs. President sure ain’t Hillary.

That CNN profile showed nothing of Emily’s piloting skills and everything about how good she looks in her flightsuit and how well she’s figured out how to cook in the desert with minimal supplies. Someone back at CNN turned it into a girlie “puff piece”. Emily is so pissed she shoots the laptop her unit used to watched the profile. The crew buries the laptop with full military honors and gives Emily the tiny flag.

After the profile runs, Emily gets mysterious orders to report to an aircraft carrier in the Pacific Ocean, which is not where she wants to be. After two months, she’s finally earned her place in SOAR as just another pilot, albeit a damn fine one, and that’s how she wants it. All she wants is to fly helicopters. All she wants is to fly. The DC political social whirl is not for her, even if it is the air her mother breathes and the water she swims in like a shark in an aquarium tank. Emily’s sure her mother is behind all the machinations as a move to get Emily back to DC and out of the military. Somehow, someway.

But Emily’s commanding officer, Major Mark Henderson, sees Emily’s mysterious orders and becomes even colder to her than she thought possible. Emily’s never quite been able to live up to the Major’s expectations of her, as a pilot or as an officer. She’s worked all the harder for it. Little does she know that the problem is completely different. Mark Henderson has been bending over backwards to treat her just like any other officer, because he can’t see her as anything except the one woman he wants more than any other. So he’s just a tiny bit colder and more distant than he needs to be, to keep himself under control–because he barely has any. And one misstep will cost them both their careers.

But Emily’s orders are not her mother’s doing. The former “boy next door” is now Emily’s Commander-in-Chief. He’s calling on his best friend to come back to DC and protect the First Lady from repeated, but so far unsuccessful, attempts on her life. Emily is the only one the President trusts.

So Emily goes back to Washington, to the world she left behind, to help her best friend. But President Peter Matthews, back when he was just a Senator, broke her heart when he married another woman, even if he didn’t know it. And he’s breaking her heart again by taking her away from the life she loves, to save the life of a woman she really doesn’t like very much.

And just before she gets on the flight that whisks her away, her commanding officer kisses her goodbye. For real. And Emily nearly breaks his hand and walks away.

So he follows her to Washington, and fakes his way into her secret mission. Then the real fun begins!

Escape Rating B: I started reading this one night at about 11:30, and 150 pages later I was telling myself that I really, really needed to get some sleep. I didn’t want to shut my iPad off; but this is a 400 page book, and finishing wasn’t realistic. I’ll admit I thought about it.

As a character, Emily is a little too good to be true. She’s not just an ace pilot, but all her commanders say that she’s the best they’ve ever seen. Her dad being head of the FBI and her childhood friend being President are both integral to the plot, but it stretches belief. DC may be a company town, but that level of connectedness smacks of a Tom Clancy novel. I will say that Clancy’s aren’t quite this much fun.

What The Night is Mine reminded me of most is Stargate SG-1 fanfiction of the Jack and Sam persuasion. It has the same flavor and the same problem to solve. This is not a criticism, I like Jack/Sam SG-1 fanfic. The issue is that both are in the military, they are in a commander/subordinate relationship and they have to deal with the military frat regs. Jack and Sam are even both pilots, they just happen to be Air Force instead of Army. Faking a relationship for a covert operation that turns real is one of the tropes.

A fun story is a fun story. The Night is Mine is the first book of the author’s The Night Stalkers series. Book 2, I Own the Dawn, will be out in August, 2012.  A couple of my nights were M. L. Buchman’s thanks to The Night is Mine. Looks like a couple of nights in August are pre-booked.

 

How to Dance With a Duke

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

How to Dance with a Duke by Manda Collins has all the elements to make a delightfully frothy Regency romance; the hero is a Duke as well as a wounded warrior and the heroine is a bluestocking who only needs a little wardrobe consultation to transform from ugly duckling to beautiful swan.

Then there are the added elements from the dawn of modern archaeology, the men of the mysterious Egyptian Explorer’s Club who refuse to let our heroine translate her father’s diaries from his most recent expedition. And there are mummies and curses and of course, grave robbers and black market collectors.  A little mystery and mayhem always spices up a romance.

This romance starts out a bit rocky. When our couple first meet outside that Egyptian Explorer’s Club, they have both been shown the door. Miss Cecily Hurston, because unmarried ladies are not permitted inside under any circumstances. His Grace the Duke of Winterson, because he is not a member. And he is never going to be a member, either. On the Club’s most recent expedition, his brother, Mr. William Dalton, disappeared under mysterious circumstances, and is presumed dead. Cecily’s father, Viscount Hurston, led that expedition, had some kind of falling out with his secretary, and now lies in a coma. His death is believed to be imminent.

Of course, Hurston’s secretary was the Duke’s brother William. Lucas wants to find out what Hurston knows, but Hurston isn’t talking. He isn’t conscious. Failing that, Lucas would like to talk to Cecily. But when they meet outside the Explorer’s Club, they have their first fight. Not their last.

In spite of the continuous arguments, they finally agree to join forces. Lucas needs to find out what happened to his younger brother, not just for his own sake, but also for his mother’s. Not knowing is eating them alive. Cecily needs her father’s journals to figure out what happened; the stories going around London of a mummy’s curse may be ludicrous, but her father is deathly ill. Without the journals, she has no answers. Her father wrote in cipher, and Cecily is the only one who can translate the cipher besides Lucas’ brother. If something tragic occurred that brought on a seizure, they all need to know what that event might have been.

The action in this story takes on the breakneck pace of a serial melodrama, between the romance, the mummy’s curse, and the society parties that form the backdrop of the investigation into the Egyptian Explorer’s Club and its possibly nefarious ways.

The Duke doesn’t actually dance. War wound.

Escape Rating B-: This is a romance defined by how much the hero and heroine fight their attraction to each other, fight with each other, and fight about everything that happens between and around them. If “obey” was in the marriage vows, Cecily probably didn’t repeat that bit.

I would have enjoyed this book more but I felt that Cecily held on to her grievances a little too long. I understood why she protected herself after her disastrous first engagement, but she stayed angry and withdrawn too long after the marriage, which takes place in the middle of the book. Cecily and Lucas’ arguing was part of their pattern, but her cold withdrawal went on too long for this reader.

 

The Canvas Thief

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | book reviews> C Reviews

I kind of liked The Canvas Thief by P. Kirby…once I totally threw my disbelief out the window and treated the world of the book as if it were a cartoon world, which is just the way the main character, Maya Stephenson, created the hero and the villain. The underpinnings of the whole NeoVerse/EverVerse thing never gelled for me, but the breakneck pace of the story mostly carried me along, like Wile E. Coyote over the cliff, as long as I kept reading (running) and didn’t look down.

Maya Stephenson is an artist, with a gift. All artists have a gift, but Maya’s is special. She sees demons. That might be a little too special for most of us.

Maya knows that the world we live in has a few folks in it who are a bit odder than we think. However, Maya promised her mother that she would suppress her vision, and act normal. Because her Uncle Andrew could see the way Maya can, and Uncle Andrew wasn’t just “taken away”, but his family was made to forget him. The taking away part would have meant he was crazy, but the making people forget, that’s powerful stuff.

So Maya began channeling all her visions into her art. Except Maya didn’t draw what she saw. She was trying way, way too hard to be normal. Maya drew people. Since she was a teenage girl trying very hard to be normal, she drew boys. And she made up a story about them. A cops and robbers story. Adam Sayre was the cop, and Benjamin Black was the robber, the extra-talented thief.

Maya was so talented, and she concentrated so hard on making those drawings of Adam and Benjamin so perfect, that eventually Benjamin and Adam manifested from the NeoVerse to the Real. And because Maya’s magic created them in endless pursuit of one another, they remained tied to one another. For ten years, as Maya changed from girl to woman. And her fantasy men learned the ropes of the real world.

Benjamin Black lived and loved and lost. And decided he wanted to Fade from the Real to EverVerse, so that he might never lose anyone again. Adam Sayre learned to manipulate the system that, as a cop, he was supposed to be a protector of. Adam decided he wanted to stay in the Real forever.

Both Benjamin’s and Adam’s decisions required something from Maya to fulfill. Their ‘key drawings’. That first, perfect drawing that made them ‘real’. Benjamin tries to steal it, and Adam tries to manipulate Maya into it. Neither succeeds. Any woman strong enough to create life from the NeoVerse too strong for that.

But the collision course of their three lives changes everything. Maya discovers that the rules of ‘normalcy’ she has lived by are so, so unreal. Benjamin learns that being hurt once does not make him immune from being hurt again.

Escape Rating C: The story catches you up and keeps you in its grip, which is a really good thing, because the worldbuilding doesn’t quite hold up. I couldn’t make sense of the whole NeoVerse/EverVerse concept, and I decided to just go along for the ride.  Unlike Wile E. Coyote, I chose not to look down after I ran off the edge of the cliff.

There’s a famous quote from Margery Williams’ The Velveteen Rabbit, or How Toys Become Real where the Rabbit asks “What is REAL?” and that kept coming back to me when I read this book. Maya never intended to make her characters real; she had no idea she had that power. When love enters the picture, as it does in The Velveteen Rabbit, the question of whether love is enough to make the man she loves ‘real’ enough to remain in the so-called real world becomes one of the big questions of the story.

 

The Stubborn Dead

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

The Stubborn Dead by Natasha Hoar is every bit as good as the teaser in the January print RT Book Reviews claimed it to be. At just under 60 pages, the whole book is a teaser, and a damn fine one.

Rachel Miller is the resident member of the Order of Rescue Mediums in Vancouver. Her duty is to release trapped spirits from this earthly realm. Not all spirits want to be released, and sometimes Rachel has a supernatural fight on her hands. Occasionally, that fight manifests physically, and the spirit shoves Rachel into a wall. Lucky for Rachel, being a rescue medium means that she heals quickly.

Being summoned to a haunted house to exorcise a trapped spirit is all part and parcel of Rachel’s life. The local priests even know who Rachel is, because she handles the spirits who are beyond their powers.

So when Rachel gets a call from Sylvia Elkeles asking her to remove a spirit that’s already sent the local Catholic priest to the hospital, Rachel is concerned, but still comes to the house. Even after she calls the diocese and discovers that Father Simon is not only not in the hospital, but has never heard of Sylvia.

Rachel is not prepared enough for the lying, cheating, sociopathic Sylvia. Because Sylvia has studied up on rescued mediums, and uses the code that binds Rachel’s power into supernaturally forcing her to dealing with a special kind of stubborn undead. A rodach. A wraith who is still tied to his living body and still has a soul.

Rachel has 48 hours to either find the rodach’s body or eliminate his soul. And if she fails, her supernatural powers will be bound, forever.

While the clock is ticking, Rachel has her own personal issues to deal with. Her perpetual stalker, Janus Ostara. Janus is a mob boss. But not of the usual kind of mob. Janus’ mob only contains members of the supernatural, and he wants to add Rachel to his crew, personally.

Meanwhile, about that rodach…they’re supposed to be extinct. Which means that information on dealing with the problem appropriately is limited in the extreme. And that clock keeps ticking away…

Escape Rating B+: This is one of those cases where my biggest complaint is that the book was way too damn short! I want to know more about these rescue mediums and the world that requires their services. If you’re an urban fantasy fan, just about the time you get really sucked in, it’s over.

The story itself wraps up very, very well. It’s just that I want more of the worldbuilding. I want it bad. The second book, titled The Ravenous Dead, is out on submission according to the author’s site. I really want a publisher (Carina, hopefully) to pick this up. Like yesterday.

Banshee Charmer

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | A Reviews> B Reviews> book reviews

Banshee Charmer by Tiffany Allee is labeled as being “from the files of the Otherworlder Enforcement Agency”. I took that to mean that this might be the first book of a series. This is an excellent thing! Banshees are not usually charmers, but in this case of this particular half-banshee, if you like urban fantasy, you’ll be charmed.

We meet our heroine at a crime scene. Which is only fitting, because Mac is a cop. Not your standard, run-of-the-mill cop, of course, but a member of the paranormal unit. There are generally two kinds of people who get assigned to the paranormal unit–paranormals, and regular-type human cops who have really, really pissed off someone in authority. For a human, being assigned to the “freak squad” is an even worse type of career purgatory than Internal Affairs.

But Keira “Mac” McLoughlin is definitely a freak. She’s half-banshee. Her scream can be a weapon. When she wants it to be.

When Mac’s partner Amanda becomes the victim of a serial killer, her Lieutenant takes her off the case. He thinks she’s too emotionally involved to see things clearly. He’s sure that Mac is out for payback instead of justice.

But Mac can’t stay away from the case, so when she comes back to her place to find an Otherworld Enforcement Agent sitting at her kitchen table claiming to have more evidence about the killer, she lets him into her confidence, and they join forces. And Mac keeps investigating a case she’s supposed to be miles away from.

The more Mac investigates, the stranger things get. Even for an Otherworld Enforcement Agent. This serial killer should never have targeted her partner, because he targets the weak, not bodybuilder cops. But then, this killer seems to be a member of an otherworld species that is supposed to be extinct.

And that OWEA agent, well Aiden Byrne is not exactly what he appears to be, either. And the biggest problem with that is Mac’s feelings for him are anything but professional.

Escape Rating A-/B+: This was one of those books that was just plain fun. Within the first few pages I was absolutely hooked. It hit all the high notes of an excellent urban fantasy, the heroine was not just kick-ass, but she was interesting and slightly different, the hero was conflicted but not too much, and the world-building was gritty and real.

We haven’t seen a banshee (even a half-banshee) as a heroine before. Mac’s conflicts about her background make her perspective new. Aiden also has just the right amount of torment (I like a little bad in my boys, but not to the point of wondering why the heroine gives them the time of day!). And a world built on everyone knowing and dealing with the otherworld is cool.

I want to read the next book. If this is “from the files of” that means there are more files, doesn’t it? Please.

If you want to read more of my thoughts on this story, check this post at Book Lovers Inc.

 

Don’t Bite the Messenger

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

Don’t Bite the Messenger by Regan Summers was every bit as intriguing an idea as it sounded when I read the description. And every bit as much fun to read.

Vampires would love Alaska in the winter. The nights are close to endless. But the summers would have to suck. And not in a good way.

The idea that vampire powers would also fry electronic technology made for an interesting start to this story. There are already people who go to Alaska for a short-term, high-paying job. Just think of the oil fields. But this makes for a whole new twist.

Our heroine, Sydney Kildare, is a human courier for the vampires. Without technology, the vamps are forced to rely on good, old-fashioned methods of communication. Like messenger services. And Sydney Kildare is the best messenger in Anchorage. Why? Because not only has she lived long enough to learn all the tricks of avoiding hijackers and general bad-asshats, but she’s immune to the vampires’ allure. That makes her a trustworthy courier.

At the ripe old age of twenty-six, Sydney is within days of buying her way out. She’s put money down on a house in Hawaii. She’s practically counting the hours until her escape.

Then suddenly Sydney is the target in a vampire turf war, and she doesn’t even know why. All she knows is that every safe haven she thought she had isn’t safe anymore, and every friend or even friendly acquaintance is either compromised or a target.

There’s only one person who is willing to help her. Malcolm Kelly seems to be right there on the scene whenever Sydney is in trouble. But is Mal an ally, or just the only vampire Sydney isn’t immune to?

Escape Rating B: On the one hand, I love these really short teaser books for urban fantasy/paranormal series. I get a quick introduction to the world, and I get to figure out whether I’m going to like it or not. But, but, but, it’s the potato chip problem all over again. One is not enough. If I do like it, and I definitely did like this, there should be more than just a tiny taste!  The whole problem with a teaser is just that, I’m left feeling teased. It’s not a sensation I’m really fond of.

Don’t Bite the Messenger is billed as the introduction to a series. And it reads like one. So let’s have it already.

 

Stellarnet Rebel

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

Stellarnet Rebel by J.L. Hilton is really good science fiction romance. The heroine is a blogger, which made it particularly fun for me! Not many blogger/heroines in science fiction romance. Or anywhere.

Genny O’Riordan is the blogger. She “shifts” in from Earth to Asteria to find a story that will make her blog, that is kick it up into the Stellarnet Top 100. That’s her big dream. The story she wants to break is a universal story of corporate greed, just moved out to the deep-space colony of Asteria.

Asteria sounds like Babylon 5 without the aliens and without the interstellar wars. (Well, almost, but we’ll get to that in a minute) Babylon 5 had “Downbelow”, where all the people who were too broke to buy passage back “home” and not skilled enough to get decent paying jobs mostly lived in the corridors. “Downbelow” was a slum, except with even fewer options. Asteria is a lot like a civilian Babylon 5, and there are too many people on Asteria who have either been forcibly shipped to or conned into shifting to Asteria and living as “overload” — in other words, living in the corridors and overloading the ecological systems. On a space station, that’s even more serious than on a planet, any planet. Humans can’t breathe vacuum.

There are also a lot of obsessive online gamers on Asteria, playing an immersive Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) called Mysteria. There’s no lag time if you live on Asteria, the way there is on Earth. That’s a big deal to a truly obsessed gamer.

Asteria has a military commander, Colonel Blaze Villaneuva. Blaze is the one trying to keep the lid on the pot. His U.S. Air and Space Force mostly act as MPs. And they keep Asteria flying. Blaze is a realist more than he is a stickler for the rules. And part of Blaze’s reality is that there isn’t any water in space.

Blaze gets most of Asteria’s water from Duin’s clandestine raids on a nearby planet, his former home.

Duin is a Glin. He’s an alien. He’s the only alien on Asteria. His planet was conquered, and devastated, by another alien race, the Tikati. So Duin spends his days in the Asteria Colony market, making speeches about the oppression of his people to anyone who will listen. Because Duin has read all about the human drive for freedom, and he believes that somewhere, some human will want to help him free his people. He just has to keep believing. And speaking.

The first time Genny walks through the Asteria market, she hears Duin speak. He is passionate about the plight of his people. He is also incredibly articulate, even in a language manifestly not his own. And Genny is utterly captivated by him. At first, she believes it is because she has found a story, and a cause, that will rocket her blog not just into the Stellarnet 100, but maybe into the Stellarnet Top 20.

But the more time she spends with Duin, the more she involved she becomes with him and his cause, the more she realizes that it is the man, the Glin himself, who has captured her heart and soul.

Does love mean the same thing to a Glin that it does to a human? And will the blind prejudice and hatred of other humans conspire to keep them apart?

Escape Rating B: I absolutely adore the idea of the Stellarnet. It seemed like a merger of the blogosphere, Twitter and the constant stream of headline news all rolled into one. As a blogger, Genny is online to her fans almost constantly, to the point where Genny does debate whether or not to blog herself having sex, complete with video. But the concept of the all-invasive, all-intrusive Stellarnet, of fans living vicariously through a blogger/star does not seem far-fetched from here.

Duin was a little bit too good to be true for me. Especially when Belloc, the second Glin, came into the picture. I understand that the author used Belloc to show that the Glin attitude toward sex and relationships was not just different, but, in fact, alien, but that part of the plot didn’t quite work for me.

I liked Genny and Duin together. It felt more realistic in the relationship when he got so caught up in the cause that he lost sight of the person he was involved with. That happens. Belloc’s plot maybe should have been book 2.

Speaking of book 2, Stellarnet Rebel is the start of a series. I’m looking forward to it!