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Spider's Bite (Elemental Assassin, #1)

Jennifer Estep

Start date: January 1, 2017

Finish date: January 31, 2017

Discussion: Challenges: What's the Rush

Why we're reading this: Part of our group series (re)read: Elemental Assassin …more
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Challenges: What's the Rush

* 2025 Series Read: K.N. Banet's "Jacky Leon"
By Steph , Serious series addict · 102 posts · 33 views

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* YEAR-LONG CHALLENGES
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last updated Aug 17, 2010 11:14PM

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What Members Thought

Sep 17, 2011 Chelsea rated it really liked it

Shelves: vampires, uf-pnr, magic

This review was originally published at Vampire Book Club.

Gin Blanco is the kind of protagonist I love. She knows who she is and is completely at ease taking charge. Also, she has wry wit, which is always appreciated.

Spider’s Bite heroine Gin kills people for a living. She’s an assassin, and has never had any real qualms about killing people. They deserve it. She’s good at it. And it’s never personal. However, when a client sets her up to be murdered, to take the fall for some nasty things and i This review was originally published at Vampire Book Club.

Gin Blanco is the kind of protagonist I love. She knows who she is and is completely at ease taking charge. Also, she has wry wit, which is always appreciated.

Spider’s Bite heroine Gin kills people for a living. She’s an assassin, and has never had any real qualms about killing people. They deserve it. She’s good at it. And it’s never personal. However, when a client sets her up to be murdered, to take the fall for some nasty things and involve her family — well, she’s going to make them pay.

While Gin uses typical fighting skills, she is actually an elemental. She, like others within the Elemental Assassins world, is one who can wield magic tied to her element. She can call on stone to bring down a building if she wanted, but, well, that’s too easy. Plus, those who use their magic too much go insane. While investigating who is after her, we get to meet some engaging characters including a vampire former prostitute, a goth who loves to dispose of bodies and even an air elemental who runs a salon.

There’s a great juxtaposition of high society and its seedy underbelly. Mob queens out flaunt their power on the charity circuit and just about every cop is dirty. I say just about because the one good guy left on the force, Donovon Caine, finds himself under attack from the same person after Gin. They strike a truce, though he tells her he’ll hunt her down the moment it ends. I liked these two together. Gin makes no apologies about her serious crush on the detective and I appreciated her owning her sexuality by taking the lead.

There were a few writing quirks that threw me off while reading Spider’s Bite – mostly repetition of phrasing — but I believe they may be purposeful. Gin is methodical. She will wait as long as it takes to get revenge. So, it makes sense that she might say the same things or repeat her process of strapping on knives, each time. The function is well-thought, but I kept thinking “I just read that.”

With such a rich world, Spider’s Bite offers so much potential for an amazing series, especially as Gin begins to question what she really wants out of life. The events of Spider’s Bite shake her, and I will definitely continue with the series to see how she progresses. Fun and edgy, Jennifer Estep’s writing voice hooked me. I’m game for more.

Sexual content: Sex scene ...more

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Oct 05, 2011 Ruby Jo rated it really liked it

I have to admit I was a little torn with the rating. If I had to be honest, the "real" rating is somewhere between 3.5 cups and 4 cups. Not that I didn't enjoy the book, I did. A lot. But then there were the tweaks. But I'm getting ahead of myself, so let's start at the beginning, with Gin.

I liked Gin. There's this trend with Urban Fantasy: every female assassin is afraid, deathly afraid and scared spitless before and during a fight scene. I was SO glad Gin isn't like that. Yes, she has the heal I have to admit I was a little torn with the rating. If I had to be honest, the "real" rating is somewhere between 3.5 cups and 4 cups. Not that I didn't enjoy the book, I did. A lot. But then there were the tweaks. But I'm getting ahead of myself, so let's start at the beginning, with Gin.

I liked Gin. There's this trend with Urban Fantasy: every female assassin is afraid, deathly afraid and scared spitless before and during a fight scene. I was SO glad Gin isn't like that. Yes, she has the healthy, normal dose of fear or apprehension. But it's not overwhelming, it's not constant and it's not paralyzing. She also kicks major ass, which I liked. And she's a smart girl. She's not what I'd call funny, but she is entertaining.

Speaking of funny, Finn is hilarious in my opinion. Or maybe my sense of humor is just that twisted. He's a great character and I have a feeling there are many, many great things he'll do in the future books. I sure hope he doesn't die by the end of the series *pouts**crosses fingers*.

Here's what makes my rating go down. First, Donovan Caine, detective and potential major hottie. While he's an ok character, he's not what I'd call hot. He has too many prejudices. He seems way too judgmental for my tastes. I like to think there's more than meets the eye. Some dark secret. Some childhood trauma that makes him the way he is. I'm not talking about his sense of justice, that's fine. But about his "criminals are bad, cops are good" thinking. I felt like up until the end, he tired so hard to keep thinking that all cops are good and that no cop can be corrupt, even when everything showed differently. And I think Gin proved that even though she's an assassin, she has morals, codes and lines she won't cross. But even so, Donovan kept thinking she's bad and ruthless and every target she ever had was innocent.

The second thing that bothered me (a lot I might add) was the repetition. I've noticed it in numerous scenes throughout the book. How certain expressions were identical and were being used in similar scenes. (I'll have a button at the end of this post if you want to read more and are not afraid of spoilers, so if you want to know what I'm talking about, push the button.) They just bugged me, enough to make me want to skip a few paragraphs. And I have a high tolerance for this things.

I also kept hoping we'd get a scene with the towns "bogey woman", Mab Monroe. I want to see what she can do, how bad can she get.

Bottom Line: I enjoyed reading this book and the good parts far outweighed the not so good parts. I'll keep reading the series, as I'm very curious if Gin will find out what happened when she was a kid and who killed her family.

(view spoiler) ...more

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Oct 02, 2010 Vivian rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-2010, first-in-series

This is a great first book. Loved Gin, she's a strong female heroine who is absolutely unapologetic about who she is and what she does, is fiercely loyal to those she loves, and is a pretty much kick butt character. The story was intriguing, Estep's world and concept of elemental powers is something I'm interested in reading more about in future books, and I found it easy to fly through the book.

A couple of things that I didn't love:
1. A lot of the descriptions are repetitive - a lot of bad gu ...more

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Apr 22, 2011 Tammy rated it it was amazing

This was an AMAZING book. I didn't want to put it down. I will warn that its very violent and not for the squeamish. I loved the action and fast way the plot moved forward. The characters were all very well developed and interesting. I liked the small romantic twist thrown in, I really liked that It didn't overpower the story line . Highly recommend this book to anyone who wants a dark ,fast paced read in urban fantasy. ...more

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