Gypsy Madden's Blog, page 9

Book Review: Captive of Darkness (Heart of Darkness - Book 1)

Captive of Darkness (Heart of Darkness – Book 1) by Debbie Cassidy

4 stars
Category: Adult

Summary: Wynter Ashfall has always been able to see the silver riders and remember the people who are taken each year, unlike the rest of the town that just on about their lives as if the victims never existed. And as the day of the silver riders approaches, she sees their mark appear on the forehead of her beloved adopted brother Finn. And knowing he is about to be taken, makes her realize that she can’t live without him, and she realizes that he’s in love with her. But the silver riders can’t be stopped. So, Wynter must follow the riders into the chasm, and take Finn back.

Comments: In the footsteps of Orpheus and Eurydice and the journey into the underworld, or even Sarah’s journey in the Labyrinth movie, an epic journey is made into a dark world of mystery to take back a loved one. I loved the beginning of this book! The silver riders and the mark appearing on the designated victims was deliciously eerie and creepy with a side of impending doom. I also loved the idea of the town being cut off surrounded by impenetrable mists. It paints a dark fairytale atmosphere loaded with mystery and danger. And I loved the idea of normal people living in the middle of it, going about their lives. I did think less of this book when I read in the description that it is a reverse harem, so I’m not looking forward to that aspect of it. It diminishes her drive to retrieve Finn and makes her seem fickle, and untrue, and like she doesn’t love Finn as much as he loves her, which is rather tragic. In the beginning there are pages and pages spent on this friendship she has with a mouse, and then the mouse just vanishes as soon as she steps foot into the chasm. I was expecting the mouse to be pivotal from the amount it was talked about in the beginning. An animal accompanying her would have been a lot of fun. I was also looking forward to understanding the silver riders, and the guy in town really needs some come-uppance, but none of that happened in this book (maybe in an upcoming book. One reason why I am itching a bit to pick up the next book). We really just follow Wynter in her quest, which is a really interesting quest through a dangerous, wild world where creatures don’t hesitate in cannibalizing other people, and other depraved acts. We meet Veles who is just as wild as all of the other characters, but he is darkly attractive once we get past his licking her. Ewww. And he nearly rapes her on at least two or three occasions (though the book does manage to stay clean). I never really spotted any romance between the two of them. Lust, yes. Attachment, yes. Romance, no. He appeals the women who love that dark alpha type. -I’m not one of them though. He serves as her guide through the land as we unravel secrets and mysteries and explanations of what the world really is (which comes in one excessively long and convolutedly detailed infodump toward the end, which confused me even more, especially when more hidden history got clichédly added to Wynter’s background (like it was convinced a normal girl couldn’t succeed at this quest. Magical girls seem to be a dime-a-dozen these days. I really could have done without the whole Morrigan plotline). I really do love Finn, far more than anyone else she meets in this story. He’s loyal, protective, shy, caring, and has to work up his courage around Wynter. I am itching to get the next book mainly because I want to see Finn rescued (It ends on a cliffhanger and he’s still captive), and for Wynter to realized fully she loves him since he is her home (but reading some of the reviews on Book 3, I might be disappointed on that last item).

Book Review: Demon Kingdom Fairy Tales (Box set)

Demon Kingdom Fairy Tales (Box Set) by Kassandra Lynn

5 stars
Category: Young Adult
Note: This trilogy includes: Demon Princess, Demon King, Demon Queen

Summary: Princess Adrianna is just about to assume the throne of the Demon King after the disappearances of her father and older brother when she is summoned by a human mage and ripped away from the comfort of the demon land. She finds herself bonded to a human teenager who doesn’t give a moment’s thought to her needs, and only concerns himself with how his new bonded beast can advance him in standing in the magic academy that he attends. He immediately uses her to fight against other beasts, against her will, forcing her to obey him, to advance his placement at his magic school. He refuses to even treat her as a human being, suggesting that she should eat with the other bonded animals. The only one who gives her any consideration and sympathy is Keldrin, her bonded master’s cousin. She finds herself growing closer to Keldrin each time he tries to help her, but he is a Savior Blood, which when partnered with a Wiseman, and a Warrior blood, form the perfect team to kill the reigning Demon King. And Adriana knows she must escape her bond before they discover that she’s the Demon King. When she does finally return home, she finds a usurper on the throne.

Comments: The first book is the best of the three! (I ranked the first one at 5 stars and the following two at 4 stars). I loved the whole idea of her being trapped as a familiar with her master with no consideration for her being human and female. And I loved Keldrin showing his heroic side as he took on the idea of freeing her since it just plain felt wrong to enslave a person, regardless of how much power she had. I really wished the cousin appeared in further books, but we really never saw him again. I also loved the sweet, adorable forbidden romance that brewed between Keldrin and Adriana, though most of the time I really didn’t get why they were all that forbidden since she was a rather pathetic demon and definitely not in the same class as all of the others thirsting for the destruction of the human race. Book 2 successfully continued the story, while still hinting at larger things to come in the third book. But with Book 2 and Book 3 there is a lot of repetition of the demon throne getting usurped by demon after demon. You really needed a scorecard to keep track of who was on the throne at this point. I also got tired of Adriana constantly questioning her relationship with Keldrin with him being her mortal enemy. In the first book Adriana comes off as being this stubborn, determined person, willing to learn and figure out things and manipulate things. But then in the second book she becomes this damsel-in-distress, constantly walking into traps and running headlong into trouble, and rather cowed and not standing up for herself. I also liked that her bodyguard got a larger role in this book, though I never got a clear mental image of him, other than being muscular and imposing. I also liked that we got the answer of what happened to her brother. In Book 3, Adriana had devolved from damsel-in-distress to fragile piece of glass, who just went along with everything, and naïve to the point of idiocy (concerning her father. She just refused to accept the truth about what kind of person he was, even though multiple people told her otherwise). In Book 3 I got rather bored of battle after battle. I loved the ending on this trilogy. I was very happy with how it was wrapped up for our main players. Though there were loose ends that never got tied up, like what happened to her brother, and what happened to Xander and their Wiseman.

Book Review: Demon Queen (Demon Kingdom Fairy Tales - Book 3)

Demon Queen (Demon Kingdom Fairy Tales - Book 3) by Kassandra Lynn

4 stars
Category: Young Adult
Note: I read this as included in the Demon Kingdom Fairy Tales Box Set

Summary: Demon princess Adriana has now returned home to fulfill her betrothal and marry the reigning demon king, her former bodyguard, Sebastian, turning her back on her love for human Savior-blood Keldrin. But before the ceremony completes, the kingdom is overrun by another force of demons, commanded by Adriana’s missing father, who takes back the throne. Adriana has to make a decision on who she is going to stand behind: her father, her brother, Sebastian now branded a traitor, or Keldrin. Her father has decided the time of living in peace with the humans is over, and with the newly recovered scepter of the demon king taken from Sebastian, his power has increased to where he can destroy all of the human towns between the demon kingdom and the human capitol city.

Comments: I loved the ending on this story. I thought it wrapped up the story to where I was happy to end there. It had a good ending for the characters I had grown to love over the course of these three books. The book overall, I wasn’t entirely happy with. My main reason was because Adriana, who is usually a relatively stubborn, determined character, just felt like she was going along with things. I mean, she was going along with her wedding to Sebastian because she had been promised to him. It really irked me that she had blinders on when regarding her father. He was the demon king and commanded his army against the humans in the past, yet she was convinced he was a good man. Everyone around her, including her brother and Sebastian told her how horrible of a person he was, yet she was still convinced he was a good person. He killed Keldrin’s mother, and Sebastian’s parents, yet she was still convinced he was a good person. He tried to kill her, etc. She was just beyond naïve to the point of idiocy. I was irritated that everyone in the book kept treating Adriana like she was fragile and made of glass. I got a bit bored by all the battles in this story. I felt like we needed more on the Wiseman -he always felt rather marginalized, and her brother, and I never got that clear of a mental picture of Sebastian other than muscular. I did love all of the moments between Adriana and Keldrin, waiting for Keldrin to talk to her. And I did love some of the twists, like the scepter, going on the run, and their usual differences of being a demon vs a savior-blood. In all, a lot happens in this book and didn’t leave me bored at any point.

Book Review: Neron Rising (The Neron Rising Saga - Book 1)

Neron Rising (The Neron Rising Saga – Book 1) by Keary Taylor

5 stars
Category: Adult
Note: Free on Amazon! Novella-length.

Summary & Comments: Think Star Wars. Specifically the last three movies with Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver. In this futuristic galaxy, there is an energy called Neron (yeah, like The Force). It’s in everything, from the air the people breathe to in the land and water and all through the universe, but the largest quantities can be found at the core of certain planets and in deposits. Neron can be used as a drug, or as energy to power a person’s house, or as weapons, and certain special people, known as Nero (Jedi/Sith) can wield it like magic. There is a corporation force called the Dominion (the Empire) that whenever Neron is discovered somewhere, lays claim to it and has taken over the galaxy and they have the last Nero working for them (yeah, this would be our Kylo-Ren wanna-be). Nova (our Rey stand-in), who says she’s nobody interesting, works as a Nero weapons crafter and sells the weapons illegally to make money. And she realizes she’ll need money in spades once the Dominion gets wind that there’s a Neron mine on her overpopulated planet of Korpillion. There are further things that link to Star Wars, like there’s a scene where she’s sparring with Neron powered weapons with her friend Zayne with Neron making blue-glowing blades of energy (sound familiar?). She also has this random telepathic connection to a strange man, who she talks to as her confidante (if you’ve seen the three movies, I’m sure you can guess who she’s talking to). And if you’ve seen the three movies, you can easily guess why she has the telepathic connection and the direction her character grows into. For me, this last three movies, were the weakest of the trilogies. I hated how Kylo Ren threw temper tantrums like a little kid. And I wasn’t a fan of how the plotline tried to borrow from the Luke Skywalker movies, rather than pave its own way. This book read like the author didn’t like those things either, and tried to make it what she wanted that trilogy to be like. It’s light on the technical, which I prefer. I loved the future city setting, and the impending threat of the Dominion on the horizon. I loved the friendship Nova had with Zayne, her former boyfriend. I loved that they had history. And I loved that she wanted to include Zayne in on her escape plan. I loved Nova’s telepathic connection. I loved that she had someone she could talk to, almost like therapy, and we had that mystery of what he might look like and be like since at that point the character I had been assuming him to be was just a legend, and I loved the suggestion that he was different from what he showed her, giving his character dimension, even though he was technically only a voice in her head at that point. He was a little like a pen pal since he was always mentioning he was in other sectors of the galaxy. And I loved the podcast she watched, which info-dumped a bit, but also gave us rumors of what might be awaiting in the near future. And I loved that Nova was a flawed character, loving the thrill of illegally selling arms, in addition to the love she had for her father. And, there is an exciting action scene as her arms dealing catches up to her and everything comes together. I actually finished this book faster than I intended to since the last couple of chapters had me continuing right on into the next. I already bought the collection of Episodes 1-3 since it’s being sold for a dollar since I’m dying to continue this story. I can’t wait to continue the adventure.

Book Review: Until I Sleep (The Alora Chronicles - Book 1)

Until I Sleep (The Alora Chronicles – Book 1) by Lara Wynter

4 stars
Category: Middle-Grade

Summary: After the death of her mother, Australian teen Ashlee moves in with her father in Tasmania who she just learned about. He gives her a necklace, and when she falls asleep on her first night there, she dreams of a land called Alora populated by elves who can wield magic. But her dream feels more than just a dream, it feels real, like she had been transported there. And she meets a handsome young elf named Wyn. But when she falls asleep in Alora, she wakes up back in the human world. She has to fit in to her new school, eager to get back to sleep to Alora and to Wyn. But humans and elves are forbidden from being together, and Wyn doubly so since he is the son of the reigning queen, and the popular choice for taking over after her. But right now the queen is a captive of an evil king, and Wyn wants to rescue her. Though Wyn’s friends tell him that he needs to hide until he can come of age to take the throne, so they encourage him to go to the human realm with Ashlee and blend in at her school.

Comments: This felt aimed at a young tween/middle-grade audience. I think I prefer my fantasy a bit more gritty and aimed at a late teen audience, at least. This felt more aimed at a tween audience and felt rather simplistic, and didn’t delve into deeper emotions or topics. Because of that, it was clean and wholesome. Wyn was a nice idealistic romantic hero, stubborn, determined, selfless, self-sacrificing. I did like how naïve he was, and how he was awkward and out of place, especially when he was in the human realm. I was annoyed that he didn’t seem compelled to fight for anything that he personally wanted, unless it benefitted the elven people. Ashlee was really a basic teenage girl, without any personality traits that stood out, other than being a bit spoiled and selfish. She didn’t even really blink at all the conveniences that her father’s place had. And she was rather self-centered. She didn’t really get to know her father at all. For instance, the largest thing that rankled with me was that her father was supposed to be a famous author. Not once did she mention what type of books he wrote. I haven’t a clue of what genre they were in. She only picked up one of his books once, because she was looking for something to fall to sleep to. I did love the bond between Ashlee and Wyn. It was the stereotypical forbidden romance, so they couldn’t act on it and had to just be friends. But it was a really sweet friendship, even though Ashlee kept convincing herself that because Wyn was being her friend, meant his interest in her had vanished, so we got a lot of tween drama of jealousy, and moaning about the guy not being interested, like it was the end of the world for her and her world revolving around him. I got a bit bored at times with the journey, and it does feel a bit repetitive at times, especially with the human world that just felt like school classes and home and not really anything else to it (it did have the typical school dance though), while the elven world was a lot of time spent around campfires. The human world was practically just a summary each time it was mentioned, just enough to flesh it out, but didn’t really spend any time in it. The detail was all in the fantasy elven world, as they journeyed around. It was a fun, light-weight diversion, but probably won’t pick up book 2.

Book Review: Queen of Secrets/Secrets at Midnight (Royal Hearts - Prequel)

Queen of Secrets/Secrets at Midnight (Royal Hearts – prequel) by Elizabeth Briggs

4 stars
Category: Adult
Note: I obtained a free copy via the author’s newsletter.

Summary: After moving in to a tower outside of the castle walls because of her brother renovating to accommodate a new nursery, Princess Dahlia finds an assassin stealing into her room in the night. Garon stops his blade in time to notice that he has almost assassinated his former beloved and long-time best friend. He returns to confront his assassin guild, the Ravens, on why they sent him to kill one of their royal family, only to have his stepfather and two stepbrothers beat him nearly to death, call him weak for not going through with his assignment, and lock him up and send someone else to kill the princess. Seeing Dahlia again, reminded him of how passionately in love with her he still was, and that he would defy his family to save the princess.

Comments: This a stand-alone gender-reverse very loose retelling of Cinderella, with common elements being the prince(ss), the step parent determined to bring the hero under control, the two step siblings determined to prove themselves better, a ball, and a shoe that got left behind. This story also has a lot of politics thrown in with various forces scheming for control. I got rather confused on who was with which country and who were allies and foes since there seemed to be quite a few countries scheming or fighting against Teledor. I actually read Beauty in Darkness first and loved it (so if you’re considering reading it, I recommend it!), so it was nice seeing the previous generation with mentions and cameos of the characters from that book. I am still hoping for this series to continue, since I would love to see stories featuring the younger princesses. Garon was an interesting character in a bad situation and it was fun seeing him rescue himself and take charge of the situation. From the brief glimpse of Dahlia in Beauty in Darkness as the king’s spymaster, I was expecting her to be front and center in this as a take-charge, taking over the Ravens on her own or infiltrating it, or something along those lines. She was a bit of a disappointment in that she pretty much stayed just the pretty princess, and maneuvered things from inside the walls of the palace, and patched up Garon when need be. She didn’t even manage a rescue at any point. But I did love the romance between the two, especially with it being a rekindled romance.

Book Review: Fangs for the Memories (Providence Paranormal College - Book 2)

Fangs for the Memories (Providence Paranormal College – Book 2) by D.R. Perry

4 stars
Category: Young Adult

Summary: Psychic vampire Henry was hired to make a memory amulet for umbral witch Maddie May because as umbral affinity, she blends with the shadows and no one remembers her, not even her roommate Lynn. But she needs to be remembered, to pass the course she’s taking. As a psychic, Henry remembers Maddie without the amulet, and she finds she likes being remembered and she likes Henry. But Henry has had to deal with a lot of animosity and prejudice since becoming a vampire and no one should be tied to a vampire if they don’t have to be. But they don’t have a choice when paranormal shadow and seelie creatures start attacking them, wreaking havoc on campus. The group of PPC students band together to support Maddie and stand strong and find the culprit behind the attacks.

Comments: I loved Bearly Awake, the first book in this series. I thought Bobbie was adorable, especially when sleepy, and Lynn was a good contrast to him. And I thought the campus felt fascinating in its retro-ness. It felt like something out of the 1960s. That 1960s vibe is still strong in this story, and even more so with Henry feeling like an old private eye from the 40s awkwardly trying to fit into the current period. This book stars Maddie, Lynn’s roommate, who we saw briefly in Bearly Awake. She is a fascinating character with being umbral affinity, people forget her as soon as they look away, making her character lonely, tragic, and determined who is accepting of not being remembered, but still doesn’t want to be forgotten. I liked her romance with Henry, which focused more on his old-fashioned-ness and less on his being a vampire. I didn’t like this book quite as much as the first mainly because this story felt like it got swamped in magical details and innerworkings of the magical system, trying to establish the foundations of the rest of the book series. The talk about complicated affinities reminded me a lot of Sarina Dorie’s Womby’s Wayward Witches series. It felt like it was trying to cram in way too much, spending so much time on the seelie and unseelie turf war and who was on which side (cliché and I’m not looking forward to the books dealing with that). And it spent a lot of time blatantly trying to introduce all of the other characters/creatures who would be starring in later books. On one side it was taking away time that should have been spend on Maddie and Henry and way overcomplicating things (and tying up some strings just by pure the author pulling a card out of a hat and sending them in a direction which felt like cutting corners and didn’t actually tie together -like when they went to question the professor), but on the other hand, it does have me intrigued in checking out the other books. For instance, I hate wolf shifters, and especially alphas, but I did feel like I got to know Josh enough that he pops out of the mold and could potentially be an interesting character in the next book (just hope he kicks the smoking habit before I pick up the book though). I’m eager to find out more about that genie lamp, which is in one of the future books. But I checked through all of the books, and it’s making me beyond sad that Olivia, the owl shifter, doesn’t have her own book. Honestly, I had never heard of Trogdor before picking up this book. When they kept calling Blaine that, I figured it was his last name, until I heard otherwise. I ended up having to Google it since there was no explanation for why they were calling him that in the book.

Kelpie Curse (The Celtic Fey - Book 2)

Kelpie Curse (The Celtic Fey – Book 2) by Roz Marshall

4 stars
Category: Teen
Note: Serial-length.

Summary: Corinne finds a horse that reminds her of one she quested with in the Feyland VR-MMO game and suspects that it might have fey magic. She enters it into a local horse competition and though she does well in the competition, she tangles with one of the other girls who takes lessons at the farm. She still spends time in game, since she made a friend there with a guy named Elphin who keeps coming to her rescue and helping her on her quests. Elphin yearns to be free of the Callieach, the blue haired witch who keeps him in her service on the ice mountain and suspects Corinne might be the key to saving him.

Comments: BTW, this is really more an installment of a serial than a full-fledged book (actually, all the books combined together would have probably made one proper length 3-dollar book, so when each section is being sold for 2-dollars each, it feels a bit of a rip-off in price). It’s a continuing story that begins in a previous book (the beginning of this story is in Unicorn Magic with this really being a second book) and cliffhangers to be picked up in the next installment. I loved the Feyland world built in this. It has so many interesting fey characters and dangers waiting around every corner and each time Corinne enters, there always seems to be a new character waiting to do a corny introduction, but then that’s in character for quest givers in games. And this time she did in fact have to so several quests and I loved the adventure and rescues. And I liked Elpin, who has gotten better defined this time around (though we still don’t know much about him). The Callieach still lacks an introduction. We really don’t know anything about her other than having blue-hair, is a witch who controls wolves, and lives on the ice mountain. How did she enslave Elphin? What does she have him do, besides the vague title of cup-bearer? What does she do as a witch (aside from control wolves)? Each time we see him, he’s usually on his own. But, like the previous section, Corinne still is completely obsessed with horses, and barely gives Elphin a second look. It’s kind of irritating and superficial that she doesn’t bother to get to know him at all beyond her assumption that he might be an NPC. Quite a bit of time of the book is spent on the horse competition (which I was bored by) and her rivalry with the other students, which ultimately felt like a waste of time and not worth all the animosity. But then, Corinne doesn’t seem that interested in the Feyland world (yes, she was using it to battle the sadness of losing her horse Midnight, but now she has a new horse and a new focus), and I keep wondering why she returns to it. I know she said she dreamed of the minstrel and wants to find him again, but then she doesn’t really mention him while in game. And the titular Kelpie was pretty much just a cameo.

Book Review: Mage's Apprentice (Mages of New York - Book 1)

Mage’s Apprentice (Mages of New York – Book 1) by Sean Fletcher

4 stars
Category: Young Adult
Note: Free on Amazon!

Summary: Aspen has always lived in the magical boroughs of New York City even though she is a normal non-magical person. And because of that, the magical community has always looked upon her like a roach or a plague, even before the murder of her parents when she was just a kid. But it has just made her tougher and more stubborn to live there. So, over the years she has become a thief-for-hire armed with an arsenal of weaponry, gadgets, and magical tricks. But one night, she tries to rob from the wrong person. And finds herself caught in a deal with High Council mage Lucien to compete in the contest for the open council seat as his apprentice, even though she doesn’t have any magic herself.

Comments: Even though the contest is a major plot point, not much time is actually spent on it. But then, the contest didn’t seem like all that much of a challenge anyway. The heart of this book was mainly fleshing out the magical world of New York City and all the main players inside it, from the flashy mages, to the criminal underbelly (reminded me a lot of Chicago in the Harry Dresden books). It is a fascinating world and all of the characters were interesting. The least interesting character though was Aspen herself. She had an interesting background and things to discover about her, and she excelled at action scenes (which there were plenty of), but she was rather focused on the one guy who screwed her (even though she really didn’t have any evidence that pointed to him, and she knew another certain character was bad, which didn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense). But with being a cliché tough chick in black leather (I gripe about those regularly since they all seem to be clones of Black Widow), she considers showing emotion as a weakness. And because of her being emotionally distant, I’m not feeling emotionally attached to the story. Lucien reminded me mostly of Doctor Strange from the Marvel movies, complete with the cape that could move on its own and Chinese training facilities (okay, so the one in this book was Japanese, but you get my point). He was also a lot like Harry Dresden. He had the same scorn, cavalier regard for, and itch to screw with the High Council that Harry had, and the same reputation as a loose-cannon (come to think of it, the High Council itself felt very borrowed as well from the Harry Dresden books or even the Star Wars prequels). He also used a lot of the same rune powered rings and shield bracelets. Isak was interesting that I couldn’t pick out who his character was borrowed from and he had a lot of depth to him and loyalty, even though he was hiding behind the same emotionally distant wall that Aspen was hiding behind and I liked that they had similar backgrounds and were able to bond over it. I was a bit annoyed that the elven borough was named Rivendell, without even bothering to acknowledge that it was borrowed from Tolkien. I did like Aspen and Lucien’s relationship, the little I saw of it. And also like the Harry Dresden books, this world also has plenty of diverse supernatural/paranormal creatures residing within the city (from mages, and druids, to necromancers, and ghouls, and ghosts, and vampires, and fairies and elves, giants, and even primordial gods). Fans of Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden books might find this an action-filled read with their vein of fantasy.

Book Review: Quick Study: A Federal Paranormal Activities Agency Prequel

Quick Study: A Federal Paranormal Activities Agency Prequel by Katherine Kim

5 stars
Category: Young Adult
Note: Only $0.99 cents on Amazon! I obtained a free copy via the author’s newsletter.

Summary: After an incident at school, Caroline hides in the small museum inside the City Hall. A group of thieves hold up the small museum, taking with them some relics, and Caroline. They throw her into a locked room with the hope of getting some ransom money for her. She finds she’s not alone in the locked room. Her fellow prisoner claims to work for a federal agency known as Federal Paranormal Activities Agency, and he’s a vampire. He tells her that the group that took them prisoner are elves, and that his agency won’t be coming for him because his agency sees him as a problem, so it’ll be up to the two of them to escape their captors.

Comments: I liked this story. It’s aimed at a young audience, with Caroline being a typical teenager. She’s awkward, and bullied by other students, but she’s also smart to know when people are lying to her and devises an escape plan, and she keeps an open mind, allowing her to accept the idea of Darien being a vampire and a good guy. And I loved that she was able to hold her own without being a cliched shoot-first black leather wearing tough chick. I liked Darien, too, who was a nice guy in a bad predicament, and relatively young, so still a rookie, and I liked his determination not to let prejudice of his species and other species ruin his job, and I loved that he had flaws to him, like his hero complex which seemed to get him into bad situations, and his problematic previous relationship that got him black balled with the entire agency, and that he was talkative. The plot is a fun one, though straight forward with the two of them locked up together with plenty of time to build the paranormal world around them. And I liked that there was chemistry between Darien and Caroline, though at this point it was just a nice blossoming friendship topped with Darien’s hero complex wanting to protect her. And I liked Point who had a lot of humor to him. The copy I obtained did have typos in it. Not a lot, but I noticed them every couple of pages. My largest quibble with the story was that the copy I had never really described what happened to Caroline that prompted her to seek refuge in the museum. All it mentioned what that something happened during gym and that the bully Monique was involved. I really have no idea what happened. I liked both Caroline and Darien enough that I’m eager to see further adventures of them working together, but I’m really not a fan of paranormal organizations -they’re just so cliché.