Tag: book reviews

Soul Purpose

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

There must have been a generation of veterinarians who thought it would be just like James Herriot’s practice is All Creatures Great and Small. Herriot probably has a lot to answer for. Alan Reece, the vet in  Nick Marsh’s Soul Purpose (and its sequel, Past Tense) certainly didn’t expect that his practice would mostly be either mind-numbingly boring or involve being called in the wee hours in the morning because something horrible to a poor cow in a cold and mucky barn. And the middle-of-the night calls are always in barns. And always about cows.

But our story begins when Alan’s middle-of-the-night farmer call involves a perfectly normal birth–of a completely transparent calf. The calf is transparent, but its organs are quite visible through the skin. The farmer is also quite visibly certain that something is not right, but is too shocked to give his fears a name. Alan can’t believe his eyes, so he does something both stupid and brave, which turns out to be typical of him. He touches the transparent calf–and it becomes a normal calf.

By the next morning, after almost no sleep (not atypical of mornings after Alan has been on call) Alan wants to forget the whole thing. The farmer calls and says he doesn’t want to mention the visit again. Ever. And Alan is more than agreeable to that.

There are a couple of problems with this plan. One problem is that the transparent calf was not either Alan’s or the farmer’s imagination. It really happened. And the force that caused it, well, let’s just say it more than noticed Alan’s intervention. And now, it’s noticed Alan. In fact, there’s a voice talking to Alan, and Alan is trying to pretend that he’s not hearing it.

But Kate brings in her cat Roger, and Kate can see the person or force behind that voice. Kate has always been able to see souls, and now, she sees lots of them surrounding Alan. Kate has another problem. Kate’s a physicist, and she’s been running computer models on the new ion accelerator that’s scheduled to start running in Kent in a week or so. Her models show that the ion accelerator will bring about the end of the world. Really. Scientifically.

And that’s just what the voice in Alan’s head is predicting.

There’s one other person involved in this. George is Alan’s housemate. George works for a magazine, Mysterious World. Mysterious World covers paranormal phenomenon, and usually everything that George finds is a complete bust. Until he goes to see a strange fireplace at a pub, and guess what? The fire is transparent!

Escape Rating B: This is a hilariously snarky genre-bender. It has elements of horror, but also some urban fantasy and science fiction thrown in. Alan and his friends are terrific fun, so I’m really glad there’s another book. I want to see how they do now that they know each other. And how everyone puts their life back together, since they totally chucked everything in this one. But all in a very good cause.

I did figure out who the bad guy was way before the end.

Did Trevor (Kate’s ex) have to caricature every stereotype of the male librarian, and was it necessary to launch into a “why Alan fears libraries and librarians” in the middle of the book? Really? Can librarians possibly be as scary as demon worshipers and zombies? (And yes, this question is relevant in context)

There’s a nod to P.D. James’ Children of Men, or at least I saw one. YMMV. Some bits even reminded me of the classic horror videogame Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem — not an exact correlation, but I wasn’t sure of that until the end.

If Ford Prefect had picked up a vet instead of Arthur Dent, this is the sort of horrific journey that might have resulted. And if this reference makes sense, you’ll have fun on this trip.

Ebook Review Central for Carina Press for December 2011

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Ebook Review Central> ebooks

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. If you’re thinking that was last month, you’d be right. But Ebook Review Central is featuring the Carina Press titles from December 2011, and that means it’s Christmas all over again.

Carina’s biggest titles in December were their three Christmas anthologies, A Clockwork Christmas (steampunk),  Holiday Kisses (contemporary), and Men Under the Mistletoe (male/male). All three titles were published as collections, and, in case readers were interested in just one of the included stories, the novellas in each themed collection were available for individual purchase.

December is also the month when a lot of reviewers publish their “Best of the Year” lists.

Because of the Christmas anthology, and because of the “year’s best” lists, there’s something a little different about Ebook Review Central this month. The purpose of ERC is to show how many reviews are out there for ebook titles, and how many different reviewers and different opinions are in the blogosphere. Although many of us post our reviews in multiple places, an effort is made so that the same review only appears on ERC one time.

There are two exceptions. Because the Christmas anthologies include four separate stories, if a reviewer gave separate ratings for each story, the review is cited with the rating for each story. If the reviewer rated the book as a whole, ERC shows the review once with that rating only. Story collections are always examples of the YMMV principle, except that each reviewer has a different opinion of which story was the weakest or strongest story in the collection.

“Best of the Year” posts are the second example of a reviewer getting a second “bite” at the list. If a reviewer thought enough of a book to not just review it, but also list is as one of their best books of the year, that listing deserves a second mention on Ebook Review Central.

And speaking of best books, let’s take a look at the Carina Press’ featured titles for December 2011.

The Christmas collection that received the most reviews, both for the collection as a whole and for the individual stories, was absolutely Holiday Kisses. There were 15 reviews for the collection and 11 for each of the individual stories. This contemporary romance anthology clearly included stories that hit just the right notes for pulling at the heartstrings for the holidays. The standout story in the collection was definitely Shannon Stacey’s Mistletoe and Margaritas. This was a “second-chance-at-love” story about a widow and her best friend, who just happened to be her husband’s best friend as well. All the reviewers loved this one.

One Perfect Night by Rachael Johns is another Christmas story. This is also about second chances at love, but this time between two people who have come to expect that they will never get what they really want out of life. Peppa wants a family, but believes that she is infertile. Her fiance broke up with her when she found out. Cameron is a widower, and since his wife’s death, has refused to let himself get involved with anyone else. But when Peppa sideswipes his expensive car, and Cameron asks her to be his “date” to a family dinner to prevent his loving family’s inevitable matchmaking attempts, things snowball in ways neither of them expect. This 100-page novella is surprisingly deep.

And for something hot to warm you up on a cold winter night, the final featured title is Pulled Long by Christine d’Abo. Thirteen was the lucky number of reviewers, including a “Best of the Year” rating from Heather Brewer at Everybody Needs a Little Romance. If you are looking for a series of erotic novellas to heat up your winter try Long Shots. Ms. Brewer placed Ms. d’Abo’s entire Long Shots series (Double Shot, A Shot in the Dark, Pulled Long) on her Best of the Year list. The series has also been a previously featured at ERC. A Shot in the Dark was one of the Carina Press featured titles in November. Each story in the Long Shots series has featured one of the Long siblings, their coffee shop and a local sex club named Mavericks. Pulled Long is finally oldest brother Ian’s turn, now that his younger siblings are taken care of, and the man who has been waiting for Ian all along.

Now that we’ve transitioned from the holidays to a hot January, we’ll leave Carina Press for another month. But Ebook Review Central will be back next week with Dreamspinner Press’ December 2011 titles.

What’s on my (mostly virtual) nightstand? 1-15-12

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Virtual Nightstand

Martin Luther King Day is tomorrow. No mail. No school. It’s a day off for a lot of people. But I’ll be working, Galen will be working. There’s no rest for the wicked, as my mom usually says to me. (And I fully recognize the implication!)

Mid-January in this library household means one other thing–the impending doom of the American Library Association Midwinter Conference. January 20-24, this year in Dallas, Texas. At least it might be warm? (2010 was in Denver, 2013 will be in Philadelphia, this point is very much NOT moot.)

ALA Midwinter is a major household disruption. We bring out suitcases. The cats hate suitcases. The suitcases take their people away! They might have to train new staff. This is very bad.

But the conference represents major headaches all the way around. In June in New Orleans, our hotel did not have connectivity in the rooms, so I only posted once, using Galen’s iPhone as my net connection. Not fun. This conference, I admit I’m going to queue up as much as I can, just in case connectivity is a tad “iffy”.

On the one hand, plane rides are still a terrific opportunity for reading. Not to mention that lovely extra two-hour wait ahead of the flight for “security”. On the other hand, ALA conferences are a sea of Advance Reading Copies, unfortunately all print. What’s a girl to do?

I have four books to read on the airplane on my way to and from Dallas, because these are scheduled for release January 24. Except I really only have three.

Heiress Without a Cause by Sara Ramsey popped up on NetGalley as a historical romance debut that just sounded interesting. According to the blurb copy, it was selected by Barnes & Noble for an exclusive release on the NOOK beginning Jan. 23rd.

The Stubborn Dead by Natasha Hoar was featured in January 2012 print issue of RT Book Reviews as one of the five debut authors not to miss in 2012. So I couldn’t resist picking up first book, about a “rescue medium” when it appeared on NetGalley. Whether this is urban fantasy or paranormal romance or a combination, it looks like a terrific start for this new author.

Daughter of the Centaurs by Kate Klimo is the first book of the Centauriad. It’s YA and it’s something I pulled from NetGalley when I was researching YA genre lit for a table talk I did for the South Carolina Collection Development mini-conference. Since this is definitely fantasy, I’m going to give it a try.

Banshee Charmer by Tiffany Allee is the last book on my calendar for January 24. I had downloaded it from NetGalley because I liked the premise, an urban fantasy about a half-banshee detective solving a serial killer murder. Sounded cool. Then Book Lovers Inc asked me to review it for them. Cool beans, I already had it.  I’ve read it, loved it, and written both reviews already, one for my blog and one for BLI. Done and dusted. I just can’t queue anything up here until the BLI review is posted.

And now for putting the cap back on the old recap.

My review of Nick Marsh’s Soul Purpose is already scheduled to post on Tuesday. I’ll get to Past Tense after I come back from Dallas. BLI says I can have two months. I promise I won’t take anywhere near that long! Besides, Soul Purpose was too much fun for me to wait that long to read the sequel. I want to see what happens next.

And I received an unstained copy of Todd Grimson’s Stainless this week. Woo-hoo! I take one “dead-tree” book with me on the plane, so I have something to read for those horrible minutes when they make me turn off my iPad. Stainless might be it.

I also finished A Lady Awakened and Don’t Bite the Messenger from last week, so reviews for both those books will be part of this week’s postings.

Reaching back, to the Christmas Nightstand, I’m in the middle of J.L. Hilton’s Stellarnet Rebel. As a blogger, and a science fiction fan, I’m caught up in the story on multiple levels. I mean wow, living on a space habitat, kind of like Babylon 5 or Deep Space 9. And, earning your living by being a blogger, live, full-time pretty much, total life immersion blogging. 3,000 posts or 3 years until she can go back to Earth. And will she want to?

Going even further back, I took a look at the 12/17/11 Nightstand and read Forever Mine, the prequel novella to Delilah Marvelle’s Forever and a Day. Yes, I’m a completist. I have to read the whole series.

That’s all we have time for in this pre-conference madness issue of the Nightstand. We’ll see you next week, live from Dallas, hopefully not blogging from the hotel lobby. The bar, on the other hand…

Tomorrow will be the Carina Press December 2011 edition of Ebook Review Central. And it will seem like Christmas all over again.

Heat Wave

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | book reviews

I read Heat Wave by Richard Castle just for fun. We’re in the middle of a Castle marathon and I just couldn’t resist the impulse. And this was definitely a case where an irresistible impulse turned out to be a totally excellent thing!

“It’s raining men.” What a great way to open a case. This is just the kind of snark that comes with any potboiler, whether on television or in police procedural-type mysteries. Because what makes these shows watchable, or these books readable isn’t just about the case, it’s about listening to the characters smart-off with each other.

It always begins with a dead body. There’s a victim. Matthew Starr. He was the man who rained down, in this particular case. And as his death is investigated, any superficial resemblance to a low-budget Donald Trump is strictly intentional, but that is one reviewer’s humble opinion.

In all murder mysteries, it’s the victim’s life that gets taken apart. Matthew Starr is dissected piece by piece, and not just on the autopsy table. When the story ends, the detectives will know more about the victim than anyone in his life. They have to so they can figure out who murdered him and why.

And the readers learn a little more about the detectives and what makes them tick. And a little more about how they tick along together.

And how well one particular pair are going to tick together outside of “work”. Whether that’s going to be a one time thing or maybe more?

Escape Rating B+: The mystery had plenty of twists and turns. The case threw out the usual school of red herrings and I fell for a couple of them. I had most of it figured out, but one thing threw me. I had fun. But I’ll admit I’m not sure how well it will work for someone who isn’t a Castle fan.

This book is the introduction to a police procedural mystery series. Whether you swallow the whole Castle-thing or not, it still has to do what the introduction to any cop-based mystery series has to do, which is introduce you to the cop shop characters and their dynamic and get you to like them enough to get the next book. It worked for me. I’ve already got Naked Heat and Heat Rises on my iPad for the next time I need a fun book to read.

If you are a fan of Castle and you like reading mysteries, just give into the impulse now and buy the book. You know you want to. Stop resisting. You’ll be glad you did.

Cinder

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

Cinder by Marissa Meyer is a retelling of the Cinderella story with a YA/cyberpunk twist. And it’s a pretty good retelling at that. I just think it would have been a better story if it didn’t try so hard to be sure it stepped on each and every base on its way around the story.

Cinderella is always a second-class citizen. In Meyer’s variation, Cinder is second-class because she is a cyborg. Cyborgs are considered less-than-human by those who have been fortunate enough not to have lived through catastrophic accidents such as the one that cost Cinder her hand and her foot at age 11.

But Cinder does not remember the traumatic accident, or anything about her early life. And the man who might have told her is dead. Linh Garan adopted her and left her in the care of his wife Adra just before his death. Garan was an inventor; he liked to tinker with things. He may have adopted Cinder to tinker with. He might have done something to her internal processes. But no one knows, least of all Cinder.

Adra hates and resents Cinder, while at the same time greedily taking every credit that Cinder earns as a gifted mechanic. Adra is entitled to retain all of Cinder’s earnings, forever. Adra is Cinder’s guardian, and Cinder’s earnings are the only thing keeping the household out of the poorhouse. The household, of course, contains not only the nasty stepmother Adra, but Cinder’s stepsisters, Peony and Pearl.

This Cinderella tale has been transplanted in time and place. We are still on Earth, but it is a future, post-apocalyptic Earth, after a dreadful Fourth World War first devastated, then finally united humanity under an Imperial Commonwealth. Cinder lives in the Eastern Commonwealth capital of New Beijing. The moon was not just settled, but broke away from the Earth pre-WWIV and created its own government. The Lunars have become not just a separate government, but in some ways, a separate race, because they have the capacity to manipulate bio-electric energy to a point that seems like magic. It’s a LOT like the Force in Star Wars, and too many of the Lunars mostly act like the Sith. The Lunar Queen and Emperor Palpatine would probably have a lot in common, if they didn’t try to kill each other on sight.

Prince Kai brings his personal android to Cinder at her stall in the market to repair. He says it’s because it was his teaching android when he was growing up, and he’s emotionally attached to it.

Cinder, who shouldn’t have the neural circuitry to swoon, practically swoons over Prince Kai. She is able to suppress her reaction. What she isn’t able to suppress is her knowledge that he is lying. There is something important about the little android, and it isn’t merely an emotional attachment.

Kai lets something slip, he is doing research on leutmosis, the deadly plague that is sweeping the world. It is 100% fatal. Cinder wonders if his android contains some of his research.

The research that Kai might or might not be conducting becomes even more important to Cinder when her stepsister Peony contracts the deadly plague. Peony was the only person who truly cared for Cinder, and now she is gone. And in her rage, Adra signs Cinder over the government as a test subject. Cinder, as a cyborg, has no rights at all.

Once Cinder is tested, the truth of her origins begins to be revealed, not to Cinder, but to others who have been searching for her desperately. Nothing in her life has been as it has seemed.

But Cinder is going to the ball.

Escape Rating B-: The cover of this book is awesome. The book has its moments but I figured out the big reveal very, very early on. It’s better if the surprise remains a surprise as long as possible. Instead, everything was telegraphed miles ahead of time.

I loved the scene where Cinder drives to the ball and shows up in all her grease-stained glory to try to rescue Kai, but I saw it coming miles away.

And, as many other reviewers have noted, what does Kai look like? He’s never described. Ever. There’s a rule somewhere that all brides are, by definition, beautiful. Is there a corollary that all princes are handsome? Therefore there’s no requirement that they be described? Is he blond? Does he have black hair? Brown eyes? Blue eyes? Swoon-worthy is just not a sufficient description.

And I still want to find out what happens next. I want to see that Lunar Queen get what she deserves. Ring-side seats for that show would be very nice indeed.

The Black Stiletto

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

What if you found out your mother used to be a superhero? That’s the premise behind Raymond Benson’s The Black Stiletto, and it makes for one amazing story.

When I say superhero, don’t think of the family from Pixar’s The Incredibles. It wasn’t that kind of book, and this isn’t that kind of family. Benson’s Black Stiletto is way more like a female version of the original Bob Kane Batman.

What do I mean by that? Unlike Superman, the X-Men or the Fantastic Four, Batman is an unmutated, grown on Earth, human being. Highly trained and highly skilled, and possibly obsessive-compulsive to the max, but completely human. In the original Bob Kane comics of the late 1930’s, Batman began by avenging the deaths of his parents.

The Black Stiletto also has revenge on her mind.

But the story begins with a middle-aged man named Martin Talbot reading his mother’s diaries from the late 1950’s. His mother Judy is in a nursing home in suburban Chicago with Alzheimer’s; she doesn’t recognize him, or anyone else, anymore. So her lawyer gives him a floorplan of her house which shows a secret room in the basement, and a key.

Behind that hidden door, Martin discovers a treasure-trove and a puzzle. His mother’s diaries are there, from 1958 onwards. All of the original comic books featuring the Black Stiletto, which are worth a fortune on the collectible market. Two Black Stiletto costumes. But the diaries are astounding. The diaries of his mother’s life in New York City as a young woman, when she lived over a gym and learned to fight.

Martin remembers his mother always kept in shape. There’s still a punching bag hanging in that basement. He remembers her practicing in every place they lived. He knows she lived in New York, but not with him. He was born in Los Angeles. But he never knew his father, the mysterious Richard Talbot. And reading the diaries, he realizes that he never knew his mother. But for the diaries, because of Alzheimer’s he never would.

But was she really the Black Stiletto? And was the Stiletto a hero, or a just a vigilante? Read along with Martin to find out.

Escape Rating B: What an astonishing book! Superheroes are always larger than life. To suddenly discover that one of your parents was one, how much would that rock your world? When Martin discovers that his mother was nothing like he thought she was, it makes him question the whole of his life.

The diary that Martin is reading only covers the very earliest period of Judy’s time as the Black Stiletto. Those early years do come back to haunt the present, but it’s those early years that I really want to know about. Martin has lots more diaries to read, and I’m dying to know what’s in them. Read The Black Stiletto and you will be too.

What’s on my (mostly virtual) nightstand? 1-8-12

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | book reviews> Virtual Nightstand

And it’s January! Post-holiday doldrums anyone?

I live in the Atlanta suburbs, so let’s call it the South, more or less. I have for the last four years. But I grew up in the Midwest, and spent most of my adult life either in Cincinnati (OH) or Chicago, with the exception of three years in Anchorage Alaska. To me, winter is supposed to be cold, and sometimes snowy. (It doesn’t actually snow lots and bunches in Cincy). Winter in the South is like autumn everywhere else I’ve ever lived. Not that I miss the snow!

The weather is just not as conducive to curling up with a good book as a Chicago blizzard. But I make do.

I have books from some very different sources this week. In December, back when I thought I had a breather (silly me!) I volunteered to become an occasional reviewer for Book Lovers Inc. I received my first book from them over New Year’s, and it looks really neat.

Past Tense by Nick Marsh is described as Doctor Who with a dose of Being Human, with a slice of All Creatures Great and Small thrown in for body. I’m wondering if that might be a literal furry body somewhere down the line, since the hero is a vet. The opening scene has the boring anatomy lecture he’s attending temporarily getting hijacked either into Alien or the Cthulhu Mythos. Howsomever, his return to the real brought my attention to the fact that this is book 2 in a series. I begged the author for book 1. He sent it.

Which means that I now have Soul Purpose by Nick Marsh to review for Reading Reality before I can finish Past Tense and review it for Book Lovers.

I am also on the hook to Book Lovers for Todd Grimson’s Stainless, but I don’t have a date for reviewing it yet. They only have print ARCs, and their last shipment seems to have been dropped in sake, so they don’t have any to send me. (I’m not making this up, that’s really what I was told)  Yes, there is a pun in there, and I’m ashamed to say I wasn’t able to refrain from making it to the publicist.

I have seen a absolute ton of reviews for Cecilia Grant’s A Lady Awakened. I had to find out for myself, and this was available on NetGalley, so I grabbed it. None of the reviewers are neutral because there’s no way to be neutral about this one. Can you have a romance where the sex isn’t any good for the first half of the book? You can if there’s a reason for it. I’m more than halfway through, and it all does make sense. This is very character driven, and it is working for me.

Mea Culpa. I should have listed this last week. Stephanie Rowe’s Hold Me If You Can is on my list for January 1, 2012 and it got lost in the shuffle for the holidays. Almost literally. This is the third book in her Soulfire Series, which starts with Kiss at Your Own Risk and continues with Touch If You Dare. I have paper copies of both Kiss and Touch somewhere in a box, because I was able to get them cheap from Powell’s, but heaven knows which box. I was also able to get Kiss really cheap for my iPad, because Sourcebooks was having a sale on first books in series.

There’s one truly new book on the list. Don’t Bite the Messenger.

Don’t Bite the Messenger by Regan Summers is a Carina Press book I got from NetGalley about vampires living in Anchorage, Alaska, and one human courier who seems to be resistant to their charms. Vampires in Alaska? What do they do in the summer? Even in Anchorage it never gets completely dark, and believe me, I know. Fireworks on the Fourth of July are a real problem.  I read Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Dance with the Devil. Zarek mostly suffered in the summer. I’ll have to read this book to see what these vamps do.

Looking back keeps me honest. Or it makes me suffer as much as those vampires in Alaska in the summer, take your pick. But I did make progress.

I found the box with Demi-Monde: Winter in it. I put it in one of the boxes marked for my office with “VIP Papers” marked on them. I obviously should have left myself better notes.

My new book from last week, P. Kirby’s The Canvas Thief, has not been doing terribly well on the review circuit. But I still need to get to it.

Looking back at the Christmas Nightstand, I finished Marissa Meyer’s Cinder. That review will be posted this week. It was pretty good, but I wish she hadn’t tried quite so hard to hit every single point of the Cinderella story. Or something like that. It didn’t quite live up to the hype.

A post at The Galaxy Express about Superhero romance reminded me that I had a book about superheroes, although not a romance, in my long backlog. The Black Stiletto by Raymond Benson is the story of the birth of a very human caped crusader. It’s fascinating the way the story is told. The woman’s son is reading her diaries, because the Stiletto herself is in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s. And yet she lives again. See my review on Wednesday.

Well, that all we have time for this week. See you next week for another exciting edition of “what’s in that box?”

Don’t forget, tomorrow is Ebook Review Central‘s turn at the last of November 2011. We’ll see Amber Quill (really that’s Amber Allure publishing at the moment), Astraea Press, Liquid Silver and Riptide Publishing.

 

Just for Fun Reading Challenge

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | reading challenges

This is the last challenge that I signed up for. Because I absolutely, positively couldn’t resist this one.

After all, I started writing book reviews because I love to read, and I wanted to share that love. But one of the things that happened was that I ended up reading a lot of books that I had committed myself to, and not as many books “just because”.

Not that I have not enjoyed the books I’ve picked out to review. Far from it.

After all, I only choose books I think I’m going to like. Occasionally I’m wrong.

Sometimes I’m really, really wrong. (The Windup Girl comes to mind)

Lori at Escape with Dollycas into a Good Book is hosting the Just for Fun Reading Challenge this year on Goodreads. The challenge is really simple. Every month, I get to, not have to, but get to, read one book just for fun. Not because I’ve committed to review it, but just because I want to read it. Just for me.

This doesn’t mean I can’t review it after I’ve read it. I probably will, if only to keep track of what I’ve read. And I’m allowed to count it toward one other challenge. So if I drag something out of the back of beyond (my TBR from hell pile), I can count it for that. But the idea is to read a book I just want to read.

Oh goodie! Just try and stop me.

Midnight Reckoning

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

Midnight Reckoning by Kendra Leigh Castle is something to read when you want a paranormal romance that takes all the standard elements and throws them in a blender! The mix that pours out makes for a very enjoyable read, while adding a few interesting twists to the usual recipe.

We met both the hero and heroine of Midnight Reckoning in the first book of Castle’s Dark Dynasties series, Dark Awakening (reviewed here). And when they met, they pissed each other off.

Lyra Black is a member of the Thorn, a werewolf pack. But Lyra is much more than just a member of the pack, she’s the Alpha’s daughter. And she’s an only child. Lyra wants what’s best for the Thorn, and she knows that her cousin Eric isn’t it. But the wolves have always chosen their Alphas through a physical contest, based on who is the strongest, fastest and cleverest. Females may be fast and clever, but they just aren’t as strong as the males. Traditionally, they don’t fight to become Alpha. But Lyra believes that Eric is so tradition-bound that he will lead the Thorn back to the human-enslaving dark ages, and in the 21st century, those days are long gone. Lyra has declared herself as a challenger for the right to become the Alpha’s Second, her father’s named successor. Being her father’s daughter will not help her. Her father wants her to mate with someone strong enough to fight in her place.

Wolves mate for life, and all that is required for the mating bond is sex. It doesn’t even have to be willing sex. Rape will cause the mating bond to lock into place. Lyra is being hunted.

Jaden Harrison threw Lyra Black out of a vampire sanctuary the first time he met her. Not so much because she was a werewolf, although there is that whole vamp/werewolf rivalry thing, but because he wanted her. Bad. And because there was no way he should feel that much desire for a wolf. Any wolf. He wanted her as far away from himself as possible, so he threw her out of the sanctuary. But he never forgot her.

So when he found her in his clan’s territory again, but this time threatened with rape, he helped her kill her would-be rapists. But he didn’t expect Lyra’s gratitude. He expected what he got. She took his head off. But only verbally. And only after stumbling into him and revealing, just for a second, that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Even if it was inappropriate. And impossible.

She left behind a necklace, a talisman, under the body of one of the wolves that Jaden had killed. Since she had been protecting the talisman, Jaden chose to go into Thorn territory to return it.

Why? Because he was delaying decisions about his own future. His newly-formed vampire clan, the Lilim, wanted him to become Chief of Security. He wasn’t sure he was ready to become an officer, when he had so recently been a slave of the Ptolemy clan of highborns.

But when he returned the necklace to Lyra, he was faced with another, and much more tempting offer. Teach Lyra to fight wolves, so she could take her own place in the Alpha challenge.

Why would a werewolf ask a vampire to teach his werewolf daughter to fight other werewolves? And what temptations will Jaden and Lyra face as teacher and student? And what is really going on within the werewolf pack? So many questions, and so little time to find the answers when threats come from all sides.

Escape Rating B: The action in this was even more fast and furious than in Dark Awakening. But I think the story probably works better if you’ve read both books, although that’s far from a hardship. I liked Dark Awakening, and I would recommend for paranormal romance fans. Midnight Reckoning a fun and very fast read.

I am really starting to want some more information about the Shadows. They are clearly moving events and people behind the scenes, and their motivations are murky to say the least. I hope more of that is in the next book. Since the next book is titled Shadow Rising (July 2012) maybe I’m going to get my wish!

The First Rule of Ten

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

The First Rule of Ten by Gay Hendricks and Tinker Lindsay is a surprise. It is surprisingly good. There are a lot of things about this mystery that are unconventional, including the detective it introduces, but I was hooked from the first page.

Tenzing Norbu (“Ten” for short) grew up wanting to become a modern-day Sherlock Holmes. The ambition would not have been that far out of the ordinary, if it weren’t for the location where Ten did that growing up. Ten spent his formative years in a Buddhist monastery in Dharamshala, India, where his father expected him to become a monk, just as he was. The fact that Ten was the product of his father’s impulsive middle-age marriage to an American college dropout attempting (and failing) to “find herself” on a trip through India (and Europe) didn’t seem to matter to his father’s plans. Nor did his father understand what role Ten’s mother’s wanderlust, or her influence, might have had in his makeup.

Not to mention, eight-year-old boys are lousy at obeying mindless rules, never mind teenagers. Ten just wasn’t cut out to be a monk. He wanted to be a detective, even if he had no real clue what that meant. But he tried to please his father.

An intervention from a lama when Ten turned 18 sent him to the Buddhist Cultural Center in Los Angeles on an exchange program. From there, his journey took him to a GED program, US Citizenship, and eventually, the LAPD.

But several years after making detective in the police department, Ten is no longer satisfied. He still enjoys police work, what he hates is paperwork, meetings and rules. Most of the same things he disliked in the monastery.

As The First Rule of Ten opens, Ten is wounded while trying to intervene in a domestic disturbance. For Ten, it is the last in a series of signs that tell him it is time to resign from the LAPD and become a private investigator. So he turns in his paperwork and does just that. Ten tells his partner Bill that the incident was a case of his “cosmic alarm clock” telling him it was time for his “job karma” to change. While this wouldn’t work for most people, Bill’s “job karma” is part of the reason that Ten is making the switch. Bill and his wife have recently had twins, and Bill wants to move into an administrative job and off the street. Their partnership is breaking up whether Ten leaves or not.

As a private investigator, Ten’s first case arrives before he has even hung out his “shingle”. A woman comes to his door, looking for the previous owner of his house. She’s not looking to hire him, she just wants Zimmy’s whereabouts, because she’s Zimmy’s first ex-wife. But Zimmy used to be a big rock-and-roller before he got clean and sober and left LA, and Ten doesn’t provide a forwarding address. He can tell the woman is hiding something, maybe a lot of somethings. But when she turns up dead the next morning — and not just dead, but tortured before she died — Ten feels like he owes her for not listening to what was wrong. He didn’t want to get involved, and now he’s involved. He has a case, even if no one is paying.

Ten believes that if he investigates, someone will eventually pay. And someone does, in more ways than one.

And if you’re wondering what the The First Rule of Ten actually is, it’s “Don’t ignore intuitive tickles, lest they reappear as sledgehammers.” Words to live by. Or die by.

Escape Rating A-: I started this one night, and re-surfaced over 100 pages into it. I was amazed at how fast I got sucked into Ten’s world and his point of view. He’s a fascinating character to follow. He retains just enough of his “outsider” perspective to make his perspective and internal voice different from the run-of-the-mill private eye. His choices work for him, but they wouldn’t for another detective. His screw-ups are definitely his own, too.

There’s a teaser for The Second Rule of Ten in the back of the book. I don’t want just a teaser. I want the whole book!