Mina Harker's Blog, page 3

Pre-Loved Books!

My birthday is coming. I think I know what I’m getting myself.

Mystery Date with a Book

Dear reader, you can now purchase pre-loved books on our online shop! Hurraaaay!

Just because our pre-loved books have been read before it does NOT mean they are done bringing us joy[image error] That’s one of the beauties of books – They never expire (unless you borrow one from your local library… Then I’d suggest

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A Rant On: Part One, First Person

Oh first person, how I loath thee. (Presenting Irony by Harker.)

Okay, that’s not entirely true. I am, admittedly, not a huge fan of first person but I’m hardly going to turn my nose up at a book just because of the narrative perspective. Many of my favorite works have been written in first person (see: Dracula, The Hunger Games, Protect Us, etc.) but so have many loathsome ones (see: Twilight, Night Huntress, 50 Shades, etc.). Do the latter condemn the former? No, of course not. I don’t get pissy with quotation marks for hanging around dialogue like “Don’t you like the butt drawer?” (I’m never not going to make fun of 50 Shades.) Because it’s not the quotation marks’ fault, the dialogue’s fault, or even the first person narrative’s fault. It’s all in how it’s used.

And I’m about ready to call PETE (People for the Ethical Treatment of English) to come rescue first person. This poor narrative perspective is being used like a catch all by a lot of people when it should be used like a scalpel. There is always a time and a place for first person. Here and now is an excellent time and place for first person as I, Mina Harker, am talking about things directly related to me and my opinions. First person is also a powerful, beautiful tool in a lot of poetry. In fiction, however, it’s a much trickier thing.

In the last decade or so it feels like the Sci-Fi & Fantasy genres have been positively flooded with first person. And it’s being used as a crutch. It’s being used to avoid dealing with more than one character in any kind of depth and for self insertion via Marry Sue (I’m looking at you, Twilight, and your Shady bastard offspring). One of the things I love most about reading and literature is character development. I adore being able to follow characters through growth and change, good times and bad. I want to become attached to the characters authors create. I want to love them and be genuinely invested in their futures, in every choice they make. This can and has been done with first person not infrequently for me; but it’s not an easy thing. It takes a great deal of skill, patience, and most importantly, the right story to make first person work.

Generally speaking, first person narrative can be tackled in one of two ways; multiple narrators (Dracula and Protect us) or single central narrator (The Hunger Games, 50 Shades, and Twilight). As a general rule, especially if you’re just starting out, I would recommend using multiple narrators for your first person narrative. There’s no guarantee your reader will like your main character enough to want to jump into their head. I didn’t want to be in Bella’s infuriatingly simple mind and I sure as shit did not want to be in Christian “I like to rape chicks and be an abusive dick in the guise of BDSM” Grey’s newest victim (whatever the hell her name was). There was honestly nothing that could save 50 Shades in my opinion (besides maybe a massive amount of red ink and a consult from someone actually in the BDSM community) but Twilight could have be vastly improved by alternating perspective between Bella “my life is run by the whims of my high school crush,” Glitter Boy Cullen, and Wolf Boy “I’m going to sex up my high school crush’s kid one day” McGee. It would have added a lot more depth to the story to get insight into these main characters. Instead, the only breaks in Bella’s narrative is, if I can remember correctly, once when she’s doing that whole catatonic for a few months because “What’s His Face didn’t text me back” thing and possibly at the end of one of the books after Ms. Nondescript gets married or turned or something? Both of which I think were Wolf Boy’s point of view which is a bit disappointing since he’s kind of a throw away love interest.

My point being that over the three main, popular/best selling books I’m covering (because I’m really not into first person and no one can make me read it anymore, suck it book reports), the only one of these that uses a single narrator that really works is The Hunger Games. Mostly, I think this comes from Collins’ skill as a writer but it also has a lot to do with the story and character itself. Katniss is the sort of character you would want to be in real life. Not because she has hot guys fawning over her or because she’s magically impervious to everything life throws at her but because she’s skilled and smart and fierce as hell. We all want to be at least one of those things. So it’s quite fun to be in her head. Moreover, instead of the author letting us wear the character like a fictional people suit (again, looking at you Twilight), Katniss very much feels like her own person. We’re listening to her and watching her story through her eyes, not becoming her. Which means that when she makes decisions we wouldn’t have, there isn’t this sudden need to put the book down and just spend a few minutes facepalming. The story itself also very much lends itself to a great single first person narrative. This is not really a love story, it’s Katniss’ story of survival. It’s her struggle through all the shit the games throw at her. There are points where I really, really wish I knew what was going on in other character’s heads but instead of being utterly frustrated with not knowing 100% of the story, I’m left secretly delighted/terrified at knowing exactly as much as Katniss does.

The bottom line is, first person written from a single perspective is a very delicate, tricky thing that should be used with care, with the right character, and for the right story. (Imagine if Sherlock had been written in first person from Sherlock’s perspective. It wouldn’t be nearly as thrilling or mysterious if we knew who did it five pages in.) First person from multiple characters, however, is a bit easier to use and works on a wider range of stories, romance especially.

Now, earlier I mentioned Dracula as one of the two books I adore that uses first person from multiple perspectives; and when I say multiple, I mean basically everyone involved in the horror show gets a chance to voice themselves at one point or another. It means we get to see the same situations and even some of the same scenes from multiple points of view. This is something I adore. Everyone sees the world differently and with a narrative like Dracula, that is brilliantly highlighted. It adds dimension and its very own texture to the story. This isn’t something you’re along for the ride for, this is a pile of letters and news paper clippings you must sort through to find the truth of the matter. This means, however, that the way first person is handled in Dracula is rather different from the way it’s handled in the vast majority of other first person with multiple narrators. It would be a hard thing to successfully mimic without the precisely right story.

Which brings me to Protect Us. Protect us tells its story through alternating perspective. And it works. It’s not as complex or laggy as Dracula and holds closer to The Hunger Games in the way it deals with narration, just with an extra narrator. We get to know Yumi as much as we get to know Chris. We feel their pains, their longings, their conflicts, their fears. In addition and very importantly, the characters around them are not left feeling flat. Instead, because we are reading from the perspective of people very close to the rest of the cast, we learn to love the others just as much as we love our protagonists. Moreover, like in The Hunger Games, Protect Us is told from the point of view of characters that are very much their own people. We aren’t wearing them to be dragged through a story not our own; we’re allowed to follow Yumi and Chris through their own trials and adventures, learning of their most inner thoughts, their most intimate emotions. Frankly, if Protect us or Dracula or The Hunger Games hadn’t been written in first person, I’m not sure they would be as captivating as they are.

And I think, in the end, that’s sort of my point. There is a time and a place for first person. There are characters that are going to tell you their story through “I”s and “they”s. But there are a lot of stories that lose something in first person. A lot of really good stories that become two dimensional just because an author is young or inexperienced or just hasn’t had access to any good second or third person literature to be reminded that it’s a thing. If you’re an author with something down on paper, write a throw away version/scene in another narrative voice, feel the limits of the dimensions of your work, listen to your characters. There’s always room to grow, to change, to improve. Don’t let yourself be limited by familiarity, by your comfort zone. Don’t let fads and a list of popular books make decisions about your story for you. Hell, don’t even let my rant cow you into changing your story’s perspective. That’s a decision you and your character and your story have to sit down and decide for yourselves. Because at the end of the day, that’s who you should be writing for; yourself.

©Mina Harker 2016

The Defeatist

The Defeatist by Sophie Bowns

★★★

♥ ♥ ♥

If you like narratives constructed almost solely on dialogue and interesting takes on death, The Defeatist is for you. Set in modern day, The Defeatist takes on an interesting tale of what happens after death. Specifically, after the suicide of Jude.

This book is extremely dialogue heavy and thus, the story progresses slowly and by only small measures. Depression, physical disability, and abuse in both hetero and homosexual relationship are depicted in a reasonably accurate way. I’m actually quite a fan of the domestic abuse largely because it is not glorified or romanticized in the least. It is abuse. It is not cut and cry but it sure as shit isn’t romantic.

Unfortunately, as with Blood Magic by Ann Atkins, this is a first person narrative that I desperately wish had been told from the perspective of the other main character. Where I would have liked to hear more about Mason’s struggles through his search for Allie in Blood Magic, I was much more interested in Tiffany’s life and how she died than I was Jude and his suicide. As Cactus says, I apparently want what I can’t have.

Both Tiffany and Jude have abilities in the after life, though their abilities differ. I hesitate to call them “magic” or “powers” as both abilities seem more like standard functions of the afterlife rather than a gift or supernatural ability.

Over all, I think The Defeatist would have benefited from alternating perspectives between Jude and Tiffany, a lot more description and non-dialogue narrative to balance out the massive amount of dialogue, and perhaps a bit of reading aloud of the dialogue as it sounds a bit stiff and unnatural at times.

Breakdown

Pros:

Interesting afterlife theory
Non-romanticized depictions of abuse
Happy Ending

Cons:

Too much dialogue for my taste
Moves very slowly
Not much action

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this work for an honest review.

The Geek’s Guide to Disability

This. All of this. This is why I write the stories I write (and will hopefully be actually getting polished enough to present to the public in the following weeks).

The Bias

Disability issues have become a hot topic amongst science fiction and fantasy fans.

Header image: “Cane on the Roof” by Annalee.Last November, Lynne Thomas, Mary Robinette Kowal, and Michael Damian Thomas published the SF/F Con Accessibility Pledge, and more than 300 folks signed on to attend only those conventions that publish specific statements about disability access, along with contact information for a trained accessibility coordinator, and commit to making accommodations for members as they work to improve access.

The pledge was inspired by a series of accessibility fails at high-profile conventions, including several recent World Fantasy Cons. But in spite of numerous requests, this year’s World Fantasy Con refused to publish policies about accessibility prior to a major hike in ticket prices–a decision that drew understandable ire from people who were waiting to buy tickets until accessibility and harassment policies were available (World Fantasy tickets are not refundable…

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“Arrested by Passion”

Arrested by Passion: The Complete Series by J.D. Carabella

★★★

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Warning: This is definitely not for kids. Lots of fantastic adult content.

If you like BDSM but aren’t into the less than positive portrayal of it in 50 Shades, Carabella’s Arrested by Passion is for you. Set in the 1930s, Arrested has supernatural monsters, a sprinkling of gore, mobsters with a bit of magic up their sleeves, and lots of sex. The series follows Kathleen, a paranormal writer with a bit of a secret, and her boyfriend Stephan, a St. Louis vice detective, as they explore their relationship and have lots of fun in the bedroom–among other places.

 I’m not generally a fan of fiction set after the turn of the century but I have to say this was a pretty fun read. It was also, to my great relief, a much better depiction of actual BDSM compared to more recent popular depictions. I would have liked a bit more drama with the magical aspects of the series. What can I say, I like my porn a bit plot heavy. That being said, I have to say I’m really looking forward to finding out what Ed’s whole deal is and I am positively dying to read the drama between Stephan and Kathleen when he finally finds out her big secret. I am an absolute sucker for that sort of thing. Bottom line, if you’re looking for a lot of steamy reading, pick this up and be prepared to fog some windows.

Breakdown

Pros:

Solid dialogue
Fleshed out characters
Positive depiction of BDSM (consent is key)
Very well written overall
Hot as hell with loads of steamy sex

Cons:

I would have liked to have more story with my lady porn. There are some really, really, really interesting story arcs that seem a bit neglected in lieu of the absolutely amazing sex.
Carabella clearly has the chops to write absolutely amazing horror scenes and I would really like to see more of that.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this work for an honest review.

The End

Victory.

It was suddenly so very surreal. Right until this moment, Sirec hadn’t even realized that he had fully expected for this conflict to continue on and on until the end of his days. But it was done. It was won. They had won! They had taken back their kingdom, their home, and they were putting a king of their own making upon the throne. He was sure men and women of better minds than his would be working out the details for the rest of the ruling class. He was sure, with as many lectures as Helena had given him over the course of their rebellion over how “things aren’t that simple, you oaf!” that Helena would be among those who shaped the course of the new ruling class of Ishtar. Then a wave of elation broke through his dumb shock. His gaze darted about as a grin so wide it hurt cracked his face in two. This was a moment to be shared with friends and comrades and if Girik wasn’t already necking with or proposing to Helena, Sirec fully intended to take his dear friend up in the biggest bear hug he could manage, battered as he was. He was going to sweep her off her feet and bask in the sound of her complaining and grumbling and hollering that she be put down. He would probably guffaw when she tried to beat him with her slipper or whatever non-lethal object she could find at hand.

And then he saw her. She stood out on the field, mostly alone among the bodies of the fallen guard that had stood rank rather than join in freeing the people of Ishtar. The way the wind blew her merchant’s robe and the way the light hit her made Sirec pause for just a moment. She looked like hero from one of those portraits in those books she kept. He could not read them himself but she had read him many tales from those pages and he had looked at every image they kept between the scribbly words.

“Helena!” he called out at the top of his lungs with all his elated joy, then regretted it as he cradled his bruised ribs, “Oof,” he grumbled quietly before he was dashing across the distance. He called out to her again and again as he ran—well, perhaps “ran” was a bit of a stretch, “stumbling quickly with purpose” might have fit the flailing spectacle he made a bit better.

It took some time for the creeping worry to set in. For though he was making quite a scene complete with overly loud hollering, Helena did not turn to look at him. He was still perhaps a hundred feet from her when the winds changed and Helena’s red and gold merchant’s robe billowed back.

Sirec’s heart stopped, his foot caught on some abandoned piece of armory and he tumbled to his knees, jarring his ribs in a wave of throbbing, dizzying pain. A body among the fallen king’s men was not nearly as dead as the rest of his cruel brothers. The not so dead man had used what strength he had left to put a blade through Helena’s gut. The world came to a stop and turned on its head before Sirec let loose a horrible scream. He was on his feet again and scrambling across the impossible distance, over fallen weapons and rotting men. Without a bit of hesitation, he cut the sneering man’s throat with an animalistic sound. The king’s guard had been staring up into Helena’s face with some sort of sick victory and it was not until Sirec turned his attention to his childhood friend that he realized she had been staring right back with a look of only vague surprise.

Without the man to hold the blade steady, Helena began to fall. Sirec rose up to meet her half way and sloppily they fell together, Sirec trying to hold her in his lap rather than let her fall into the mud. He cried out as loud as he could, not minding the pain of his ribs this time, for help. They were so far off from the rest who were all shouting and celebrating inside the palace, he was terrified no one would hear him.

“Help!” He cried again and again as tears began to roll down his face, “Healer! Someone call a healer!” He only paused in his hollering when Helena’s voice cut in.

“Sirec–”

“You’re going to be fine, Hell.” He assured though it was more for himself than anything as he finally realized just how much blood she was covered in. It had blended in his mind with the red of her merchant’s robe but now that he looked at her he could see the quickly growing blotch of red around the hole in her middle where she had slid from the blade. It turned the blue of her dress a horrible color that he would never, in all his days, forget.

“It’s a bit cold out here.” She murmured. Her voice was not as it normally was. It was just a bit croaky and so very small now.

Sirec choked and cried out again, “Help!” he could feel sobs rising up in his throat but tried to reassure his friend anyway, “We’re just sitting in the shade. It’s a nice relief from the heat, yeah?” It was a bad lie considering they were very obviously in the middle of a very open, very sunny field. He tried to laugh for her but the sound was quickly dissolved into sobbing.

“Did we do it?” She asked. He looked up to cry out again but a few people were already running across the battlefield to them.

Sirec could only nod his head for a time as the sobs took away his breath, “Y-es. We won.” he labored out, “Now you’ve got to help sort out these nobles, you know. No one’s got as much brains as you.” he kept trying to smile down at her but the expression could not hold under the weight of his fear and sorrow.

“Where’s Girik? Is he alright?” She asked, brushing past his assurances. She could feel the life slipping from her body. It was frightening and it made her quite sad but Sirec was there and she would not have her dearest friend—a man that was practically her little brother—remember her as being terrified against something neither of them could fight.

Sirec did not know for sure that Girik was unharmed or even alive but he nodded quickly anyway and then yelled brokenly across to the few people rushing towards them, “Get Girik! Get Girik!” A small figure, further back then the rest, changed course and started rushing back to the main populous.

Helena reached up and took hold of Sirec’s arm. It was a weak grasp and it made the thief’s heart lurch as he looked down at her, “A year.”

“What?” he rasped in confusion. He had been trying to avoid looking into her face. Somehow looking into her eyes and seeing the light in them slowly fading away would make this whole thing truly real and he did not think he could bear that. Only now that he was looking into her large, beautiful eyes, he could see the gentle acceptance, the resignation, and the little tears quietly leaking out the corners of her eyes to run hide in her hair.

“You can all be sad for one year. After that, you must relegate your sorrow to only a little time a day if it tries to linger in your life. And you, you big oaf, will not drown your sorrow in pubs or taverns–”

“Stop!” he choked on the word, “Stop! I’ve got no reason to be sad! You’re going to be fine, Helena. You’re going to be fine and we won! We won and you’re going to be fine.” and then he was sobbing so much he could not continue denying it.

There were suddenly hands on Helena and Sirec nearly wrenched her from the healer that had come running to her aid before he even realized who the man was. He could only pick up bits and pieces of what the man was saying.

She’s losing a lot of blood.

Pressure.

Boy, focus! Hold that firm!

He could feel Helena’s blood slicking up his hand and wanted to wretch, wanted to shut his eyes and hide from this horror, wanted to go back and wake up that morning and demand Helena not leave bed much less come liberate a kingdom.

“Don’t go.” He whispered, “Please, Helena. Please don’t go.”

“I’m sorry, Sirec.” The quiet apology made Sirec’s chest heave several times as he closed his eyes and bowed his head to cry over her.

“Wh-where’s Girik!?” He snarled when he could find some breath to spare.

“I think I’m going to have to go to sleep now, Sirec.” Helena said in a patient tone mothers used on children.

“No! No, you have to stay awake, Hell! You have to stay here. You can’t leave without seeing Girik.” he was reaching for straws now, praying the promise of her love would keep her in the world a little longer, at least. Long enough for the healer to mend her, to make her whole and well again, to pull her back from Death’s grasp.

“I’m sorry, little brother. You two have to take care of one another now. I’m sorry.” And then her eyes were closing and all Sirec could do was scream and cry and wail at Helena to stay, at the gods to bring her back, and at the cruelty that had taken her.

Moments later, Girik was running across the still battlefield. His stomach dropped the moment he made out Helena laying in a sobbing Sirec’s arms with a healer and healer’s apprentice standing tall and away from the pair, heads bowed in silent prayers. Girik stumbled to his knees and slid to a stop before Sirec, barely aware that his hurry to be at Helena’s side had resulted in skinned knees.

“Helena? Helena! Sirec, what’s wrong with her? Sirec, tell me!” But Girik already knew. He had known the moment he laid eyes on the scene and Sirec was sobbing so much he could not speak even if he had wanted to answer Girik’s demands.

Girik took Helena’s limp but still warm hand. He patted the back insistently a few times as he cooed urgently at Helena’s still, lax form, “Darling. Darling, please. We’ve come so far, I’m a free man now, it’s hardly fair to hide your eyes from me.” But there was not so much as a flicker of her lashes or a twitch of her fingers. He grit his teeth hard as he silently brought her lifeless hand to his cheek and soaked it in his tears and quiet sobs.

Both men had been ready to pay high prices for their freedom, had been willing to lay their lives on the line and lose them if things turned bad. They had been so very willing to die for victory, had been willing to bury their comrades and friends for this cause. But neither had ever been prepared to—had even conceived of—paying the price of their liberation with Helena’s life. It was not fair.

But no god had ever promised fairness and the world did not stop for a merchant daughter’s death; not even one who had lead a revolution and taken down The Bloody Mad King. Some day there might be memorials or songs or histories of their brave and smart Helena or, like so many other women who changed the world, she might be simply forgotten. None of that mattered to the two men on the field, however.

Helena was dead.

And none could bring her back.

“Blood Magic”

Blood Magic by Ann Atkins

★★☆

♥ ♥ ♥

If you like the new age, lovey-dovey vampires with hearts of gold and absolutely all of the guilt over their blood sucking ways; this is for you. Blood Magic is for people who want something a bit more loyal to vampire cannon than Twilight (I’m looking at you, you god damn vegan glitter hotties) but are horrified by Dracula. I would also recommend this to people who value an interesting plot over character development.

Atkins has absolutely no trouble creating some fairly unique plot for Allie to take us through which is rather nice to see from a teen girl/ancient vampire romance. It’s a bit surprising, it’s fairly terrifying at times, and it’s pretty constantly an adventure of some kind or another. This is a good book to read if you like the more modern, kind hearted, heroic vampires sans sparkling body lotion. It’s also a good read if you like your vampire novels sprinkled with other supernatural beings as there are quite a few in these pages or are looking for a bridge from the hectic plots of fanfiction to the slightly more structured plots of original fiction.

That being said, people like myself who prefer something with a bit more character development or more classic vampires that straddle the line between seduction and terror (usually leaning a bit more into terror), might not be a big fan of this one. I’m a big fan of character development and I just didn’t see a huge difference in Chapter 1 Allie and Chapter 39 Allie. Not to mention, I like my vampires blood sucking and unrepentant about it. I like them evil or at least solidly in the darker grey areas of the moral scale. Mason (our fanged love interest), is a great big softy and suicidal to boot. Which is a bit unfortunate seeing as he’s already waited 400 years to meet her again and thinks she can magically redeem him from his murderous past. (Which is also a bit unfortunate as redemption comes from within. Time to hit up the self help section, bro.)

Breakdown

Pros:

Interesting plot
Fun teen lit
I think this would make a good guilty pleasure

Cons:

Little to no character development
Needs a beta reader or light editing to correct some formatting and spelling mistakes
Not a fan of Allie. She just doesn’t seem to take charge of her life very often.
First person is told almost exclusively from Allie’s point of view with two breaks for Mason’s; once in the prologue and once towards the end of the book. It is more jarring and disruptive than it is helpful to the over all story.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this work for an honest review.

Bienvenue Is Here!

Bienvenue is a series I’ve been writing for a while with Jack Cactus and now it’s finally published for the world to enjoy! The first three episodes of Bienvenue are available exclusively on Amazon in paperback and kindle. The newest chapter is available on Amazon for your kindle and at Barnes & Noble for you nook.

Bienvenue is a story of Adela Wyss and her arranged marriage with Vincent Lautrec. While it is a romance, it’s not your standard paperback airport romance. We work hard to incorporate a lot of character development and drama and general plot. So come check out our penny dreadful!

First Release

Book Review Rating System

Just in case you’re wondering what those stars and hearts on the reviews are, here’s a brief explanation.

Technical Skill:

★★★ – Solid technical presentation

★★☆ – Needs an editor’s touch

★☆☆ – Illegible

 

Personal Appeal:

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ – I absolutely adore this book, will recommend it to friends (read:pester until they give in and read it, too), and will keep it in my library for forever.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ – I like this book. I would recommend to my friends.

♥ ♥ ♥ – Not my cup of tea but not a bad read

♥ ♥ – There are some aspects of the book that simply didn’t captivate me. Would not generally recommend.

♥ – Would not read again. Would not recommend.