I’m finally all caught up in the Mercy Thompson series, it only took a buddy read with Books of my Heart to make it happen.
Mercy knows how to get intI’m finally all caught up in the Mercy Thompson series, it only took a buddy read with Books of my Heart to make it happen.
Mercy knows how to get into trouble at every turn doesn’t she. Her marriage is having a couple issues and she isn’t sure what they are, there are some rouge werewolves in their territory with dubious intentions, Wolfe is stalking Mercy and Underhill has but a door in Mercy’s back yard that will stay there for a year and a day that might have let out one of the creatures stuck in Underhill.
So again, there is a lot going on some of it tied together and some of it is not. What it gives us though is an interesting story as we figure out the motives and identities of the players involved. Dealing with Underhill and the creatures that were once her residents is always interesting and I really liked the spin on a fairytale of old. Mercy has a riddle to figure out if she is going to save a few of her friends that have been bitten by a smoke creature and taken over by that creature. If she can’t figure it out she will lose a few people she loves dearly.
There is also Wolfe who is being a little extra creepy at the moment and seems to be hanging out around Mercy’s home and showing up at the strangest times.
“Not mere luck. I am stalking Mercy. Of course I was around, because that’s what stalkers do, or so I’ve read. It’s my new hobby.”
If you have read this series then you know what to expect from a Mercy Thompson story and I do like that Briggs is great at delivering a wonderfully throughout story full of action and smarts.
Adam’s dilemma was as infuriating as it was interesting. He is struggling with some bad magic and I think that it might have some lingering effects. I did think what Briggs did with this storyline made sense and I hope that with Mercy Adam can deal with the demons that he has had for a long time.
Always a good time and I’m glad that now I’m all caught up on the series. I think that means that I need to get to the Alpha and Omega series. ...more
Dawnshard follows Rysn on a journey to the mysterious Island of Aimia after the ship from one of the interludes for Oathbringer is found with no persoDawnshard follows Rysn on a journey to the mysterious Island of Aimia after the ship from one of the interludes for Oathbringer is found with no personnel, drifting in the ocean. I was happy to see a certain sailor made it out of Words of Radiance alive.
I have always liked Rysn’s interludes as they introduced us to other places and people. But I wasn’t sure what to think of her being the main character in a novella. It seems that Chiri-Chiri is not doing well and has grown larger than her fellow larkins. Rysn needs to get to Chiri-Chiri’s homeland of Aimia to see if there is something that will help her little larkin. Good thing it seems to line up with an expedition Navani would like to make to see if there is an Oathgate on that island.
For a novella there are some exciting things happening in regards to the entire Cosmere and some huge implications. Rsyn needs to help Chiri-Chiri but she is also going to enter into the biggest trade of her life.
I really enjoyed the side characters chosen for this journey. Lopen, Huio, Cord and Rushu all brought something to the story. Lopen learned a few lessons before he was able to say his oath. Huio is there for Lopen to run lines on and to possibly push his cousin to be something better.
“Cousin,” Lopen said, “do you know why it is that people stick you to the wall so often?” “To judge the relative strength of Radiants by oath level, measuring the duration of Lashings against the Stormlight expended.” “It’s because you’re no fun.” “Nah, I decided to let it be fun. You get an entirely new perspective on life when hanging from the wall.”
Rushu found an interesting way to help Rysn get around using fabrials and may have discovered a secret or two on the mysterious island. Cord, well I knew Rock’s daughter was going to be interesting and she leads me to believe that the Horneaters will be very important in the Stormlight Archives series.
Do not miss out on this book as it is the tie in between Oathbringer and Rhythm of War, but more than that there are some huge implications for the Cosmere and something about gravity and Greatshells is confirmed in Dawnshard as well. ...more
I don’t want to give too much away because the fun part of the book was teasing out all the strangeness and there was a lot of it.
⤳ A town that can’t be found on any map
↝ A pink moon in the sky
⇝ A strange creature with a rabbit skull head killing people
↬ Spots no one is allowed to go unless you have an arrangement
And much much more.
The downfall of this book is that it takes a long time to get going and I can see why many might get distracted and not come back to it. Everything is just odd and while you want to know why, there are a lot of pages to get through to figure it out.
I liked Mona the main character whose mother lived in Wink and then one day just left. Mona has come back some 30 years after her mother’s death to claim the house she just found out about and try to find out more about the mother who has been gone for so long. She is about to get so much more than she bargained for.
This book was long and part of it got a little sciency with explanations, even for me. But overall I was engrossed in figuring out what was happening in why it just took a little longer than I wanted it to.
Definitely a different Robert Jackson Bennett read...more
Warning: There will be spoilers for some of the prior books of this series.
This is the tenth book in a series and world I’ve grown to love. I’m havinWarning: There will be spoilers for some of the prior books of this series.
This is the tenth book in a series and world I’ve grown to love. I’m having a hard time with a few things though because, well because I loved Daemon and Jaenelle so much. We spent so many books waiting for them to find their way to one another and now that Jaenelle has lived her very human life and moved on it is difficult to see Daemon with another woman even if it is Surreal.
Daemon is the Highlord of Hell, Prince of the Realm, Father to a very precocious little girl and a husband who is having a few marital problems and isn’t sure why. I loved time with Daemon the father and warlord prince. Trying to deal with a child who feels like she is ‘special’ is coming with a few extra challenges. But I’m certain that he is up to them in his own unique parenting way.
But when the foolish girl began slamming doors to indicate her extreme displeasure, he quietly informed her that since words spoken quickly could be misinterpreted, any requests to visit friends or go on outings in the foreseeable future would have to be submitted in writing, using proper spelling, full sentences that provided the necessary information he would need in order to make a decision, and, of course, good penmanship.”
Daemon and Surreal. Well for me that marriage is just a trainwreck. For a few reasons, Surreal is just not Jaenelle and doesn’t understand Daemon or his power. She is also afraid of him and not in a constructive way. She isn’t his Queen, that woman is dead now and just a song in the darkness he still hears sometimes and Surreal isn’t doing a good job at being honest with him.
Daemon knows something is different and possibly wrong with him. He feels like he is unravelling and Tersa as always has seen what could happen to her boy.
If her boy’s pain went away, the one person he would need the most wouldn’t be there. The one the winged boy would need wouldn’t be there. Daemon’s pain was the only key. Could she let her boy suffer now in order to spare him from greater pain later? “Everything has a price,” she whispered as she retreated from the visions.
I did get wrapped up in a lot of this story. I wondered it Daemon would find the help he needed to make sure he stays tied to this realm, I’m sure his daughter is going to need him eventually when she is a little older.
There is still some corruption in the blood it seems and a young Dillon is paying the price, not as heavy a price as some of the other young Lords but a steep price none the less. He has been cast out of his family and as he tries to fix his reputation falls meets Jillian from Yaslana’s household. He might have bit off a little more than he can chew there.
I liked much of this story. There is the same wonderful storytelling that we have had throughout the series and I definitely get drawn into it. There is the saying ‘There is always a price’ and that is true in this series. I loved getting to spend some time with the Scelties again and their herding and friendly ways. I LOVED every page we got with Witch on it, I have missed her.
This book seems like it is setting up for a new storyline and I think that yes you could enter here and be okay, but you would miss out on the brilliant and tragic story that made Daemon and Yaslana the men they are today. I don’t know if the same connection to the characters can happen if you were to enter here. But it seems that a new danger is just on the horizon and Daemon and Yaslana will be ready with the help of some old friends to face it....more
James Islington has grown as a writer from his first book The Licanius Trilogy. I thought that perhaps this was not going to live up to my enjoyment lJames Islington has grown as a writer from his first book The Licanius Trilogy. I thought that perhaps this was not going to live up to my enjoyment level of the first book and was pleasantly surprised that it not only was as good as The Shadow of What Was Lost, but surpassed it. An Echo of Things to Come takes what we learned in the prior book and builds on it in interesting ways. Sometimes what you think you know/believe is so wrong it destroys you when you learn the truth.
“The lesser of two evils, or the greater good. Get a good man to utter either of those phrases, and there is no one more eager to begin perpetrating evil.”
This is an epic tale spanning millennia if you take in the full scope of the story. We learn who/what Caeden really was as he starts to remember things from his past that he hid from himself. Every memory he relives shines a new light on the overall story and why Caeden made the choices in his past that led to his decision to wipe all his memories of the past clean and come through the boundary. He is trying to hold on to this new version of himself as every new revelation shows him the lengths he went to in the past and the atrocities committed for his cause.
“A friend of mine once told me that when I got my memories back, I would have a choice. That no matter what I’d done, who I’d been … that I had a decision to make, moving forward. That the man I have been since I woke up in the forest, the one I want to be, doesn’t have to be erased by what I remember. Shouldn’t be erased.”
There is a lot going on in this story and none of the PoVs were superficial of just filler. Every moment and character is needed for the tale and you need to pay attention because there is a lot going on and while there are some clues along the way I was gob smacked by a couple of the twists in the story, especially the epilogue. It once again through me for a huge loop.
“I’m telling you that you should doubt—as I do my own beliefs. The day on which you decide not to question what you believe, is the day that you start making excuses for why you believe it.”
Wirr is trying his best to be the North Warden when almost everyone on the council is trying to undermine him because he is also gifted. Wirr has grown a lot from the first book and how he is handling himself and those poised against him shows he was taught well how to be a political creature.
Asha has a more interesting storyline this time for me. Still a shadow she is on a mission to discover where all the other shadows in the city went after the battle in the last book. She also has had a run in with a few of the Venerate and learned some interesting things. I do like the woman she is becoming. Finding out what the shadows really are was just wow. I didn’t see that coming, but it made perfect sense.
Davian is again at the center of some rather large happenings. At Tol Shen he is trying to convince the gifted to go north to the boundary to start to put it back together again. But there is pushback, fear and some other augers standing in his way. We get to see just why all the augers were feared so long ago.
So much happened in this book and a lot of the most important reveals came from the memories that Caeden is reliving. Nethgalla was the most interest new character explored. The shapeshifter’s history with Caeden especially is very interesting to say the least and messed up.
An Echo of What Was Lost is aptly named as the true history of the world is revealed and so much of the lore is explained. This ended with everyone in a lot of danger and Caeden devastated by his last memory. I do wish that the only relationship I’m really rooting for got more page time. Davian and Asha could have a great love story eventually if they ever get to be in the same place for longer than a day of two. The devotion the two friends show for one another even while separated it adorable if slightly unbelievable. Still here is hoping in the end they get a future, right now that is not looking very hopeful.
Can’t wait to finish out this trilogy to see where the next story takes us. ...more
The Wayfarers series with Record of a Spaceborn few has now given us a look at three distinctly different types of lifestyle since the humans left a dThe Wayfarers series with Record of a Spaceborn few has now given us a look at three distinctly different types of lifestyle since the humans left a decimated earth centuries ago. Each book also delves deeper into the culture of one of the alien civilizations and with this installment we get to see the Harmagians and learn a little of their culture, studies and also what it is like to come from the sea to be a creature that lives on land.
“We are the wealthiest species alive today. We want for nothing. Without us, there would be no tunnels, no ambi, no galactic map. But we achieved these things through subjugation. Violence. We destroyed entire worlds - entire species. It took a galactic war to stop us. We learned. We apologized. We changed. But we can't give back the things we took. We're still benefiting from them, and others are still suffering from actions centuries old. So, are we worthy? We, who give so much only because we took so much?”
It seems that both the Harmagian’s and humans have more in common than they like to admit. As one of the Harmagian’s tours the Fleet of ships that left Earth so many years ago to learn about their lifestyle we also learn about how the humans on the ships live together in harmony for the most part. How everyone has a job and a purpose and how trade functions as currency. They are a community of thinkers and repurposers, leaving nothing to waste and making new and sometimes interesting ways of re-using resources.
Through the stories of a few on these ships we learn what is like to be a family with some children, a older couple who’ve lived their entire life with the fleet, a kid coming of age and trying to decided if he wants to stay with the fleet or venture out into the world and live on land. In the wake of one of the ships having a catastrophic failure and the loss of so many, more and more people are questioning if it is right to still live on these vessels orbiting a moon or if it is time to leave a home they’ve know for centuries, give up on some traditions and live a different kind of life.
The Wayfarer stories aren’t action packed or anything like that but delve into how people would live, what they would do for fun, how they’d get into trouble as kids, how they live their lives on a day to day basis and why they make certain choices. I enjoy these tales but it is a little like watching the discovery channel in some ways.
So if you are just looking to venture out into space and see how everyone is fairing this will be a great book for you. But if you were thinking space fights and constant action then you will be sorely disappointed. I’ve definitely enjoyed the books but I totally get the reviews that say there isn’t a lot of plot happening. It is more a character study than a plotted out story....more
A Closed and Common Orbit was a complete gear shift from The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. To say it was a little jarring would be an understatemA Closed and Common Orbit was a complete gear shift from The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. To say it was a little jarring would be an understatement. For one I thought that we’d be hanging out on the Wayfarer ship with the crew again but we don’t even see them. Instead we spend the time with Pepper and Lovelace planet side and work through an AIs journey from being made to be in a ship, into being in a body.
[image]
Pepper’s backstory that gets doled out in small increments was the most interesting to me. She was from a planet that pretty much decided that they could genetically modify everyone to fit into specific areas of need. Pepper was made small with no hair for this reason since her whole existence was supposed to be for finding scrap and cleaning it. I loved seeing what it took for her to break out of that role and who raised her, it made her decision to save Lovelace more understandable.
“The enhanced call us misfits - people who don't fir their intended purpose. So maybe you're a misfit too. Doesn't mean you're not deserving. Doesn't mean you shouldn't be here.”
I’ve come to realize that there isn’t a ton of plotting in Becky Chambers series. There is stuff happening to the characters and interesting events. Don’t get me wrong I’m thoroughly entertained throughout the story. But it is more like she wanted us to think about a certain way of life and so I feel like the books are more of a fictional documentary of a specific group of characters so far.
In this book it is more about Ais and should they have rights. When you create an intelligence and build that intelligence to grow over time shouldn’t it at some point be thought of as more than just a program? In the case of at least two AIs that seems to be the case. Then there is the exploration of the Aeleon culture. Make like we learned all about Andrisks in the first book of the series in A Closed and Common Orbit we learn much more about the culture of the Aeleons and how they mate, procreate, think about gender roles and so much more. It was really fascinating.
[image]
“At the core, you’ve got to get university certification for parenting, just as you do for, say, being a doctor or an engineer. No offence to you or your species, but going into the business of creating life without any sort of formal prep is . . .’ He laughed. ‘It’s baffling. But then, I’m biased.”
I liked the friendship that Sidra formed with Tak and the information about Aeleons were are able to glean from this friendship. I am going to say that while I liked Sidra overall some of her trails fitting into her new body were taxing on me. I was a little sad that (view spoiler)[Sidra/Lovey didn’t find that hidden file about Jenks and fall in love with him in some way again. I was still holding out some hope for that (hide spoiler)]
Overall this is my kind of story that just dives into the real feeling yet fictional life of characters. I enjoyed my time with all of them and while I missed the crew of the Wayfarer it was interesting to spend some time with some other character in Port Corial. ...more
“Do not judge other species by your own social norms”, is the lesson I learned in this cross between Firefly, The Orville and the discovery channel. The Wayfarer is a ship with a multi-species crew that punches holes through spacetime to make what is essentially mini wormholes for travel. We join the crew on one such journey as they embark into hostile territory to create one such wormhole into this space.
“So we travel to one end – whoosh – and all the people seeing us fly by are like, oh my stars, look at that totally amazing ship, what genius tech patched together such a thing, and I’m like, oh, that’s me, Kizzy Shao, you can all name your babies after me – whooosh – and then we get to our start point.”
I really found this book to be so interesting because it is a little like watching a show on the discovery channel as we meet new species and find out how the culture is so very different in some ways from human culture. Take the lizardlike people called Aandrisks, everything about them is pretty different from humans. Their family structures, how they raise children, how they think about children how they have intimate relations with people. Everything. I loved all the little details we pick up over time in this book on their culture.
”We tend to think about coupling the same way that—hmm, how to put this—okay, like how you think about good food. It’s something you always look forward to, and it’s something everybody needs and enjoys. At the low end of the scale, it’s comforting. At the high end, it’s transcendent. And like eating a meal, it’s something you can do in public, with friends or with strangers. But even so, it’s best when you share it with someone you care about romantically.”
The Wayfarer is completely full of a cute little band of misfits and I love seeing how they work together to get the job done. We come into the crew with Rosemary who is a human who used to live on Mars and is running from her past. What better place to hide than on a ship in the middle of the verse.
Kizzy is an A.D.D. tech who works on the mechanics of the ship with a sidekick Jenks who is a bit small by earthen standards but has a big personality and unusual romantic tastes. Sissex was one of my favorite characters on the ship since she is an Aandrisk and every knew cultural norm we discovered about her I found fascinating. Also Dr Chef who is both the ships doctor and cook and just happens to remind me of what the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland looks like. Alone with a blue Monkey like being that can navigate through wormholes. All the characters in this were fascinating to me.
We travel to far off places with a funny crew and captain. There are many discoveries made along the way and some significant surprises. I really enjoyed my time getting to know this crew in all of their quirky glory and seeing various locals on their long trek across the universe.
The only down point of this book is that there isn’t really a strong struggle. I mean they are trying to get to the job spot in the right amount of time and there are some hiccups along the way and then bam a lot happens at the end but mostly this is just a story about the people on a ship. I like that but if you were hoping for big conflicts and space battles you won’t really find those in this book.
I totally enjoyed this and never thought I’d care so much for an AI system. Who knew?...more
If you would have told me during the first few books of the Night Huntress series that
A – I was going to love Ian
and
B – His books would be
If you would have told me during the first few books of the Night Huntress series that
A – I was going to love Ian
and
B – His books would be better than Vlad’s.
I would have called you a dirty liar.
[image]
But it is totally true and the reason for that isn’t just Ian but it is also Veritas. She is such a cool character with a lot happening and she is the perfect match for Ian in every way.
“Clever, calculating, and cruel.” Ian’s voice dropped to an insinuating purr. “No wonder I married you.”
Once again Veritas and Ian need to team up to search for a demon both has past dealings with. As they travel around the world both dodging him and trying to find a way to kill him we learn more of what Veritas’s nature really is and how she is really one of a kind.
Ian is all kinds of smooth and it is funny the number of people that still can’t believe he is a changed man and willing to try out monogamy let alone marriage. I enjoyed seeing some of the more tender parts of Ian and his utter acceptance of everything Veritas is.
As always seeing a few of the members from the Night Huntress series mixed in was great and did I catch a few hints of possibly another story in the Night Huntress world involving Cat, Bones and a little munchkin they call daughter. I think I might have. *fingers crossed*
The ending is a bit of a shocker once again but at least Veritas and Ian are in a whole slew of trouble together this time. I’m looking forward to seeing how it is all going to shake out especially with that reveal at the end. So until next book remember
sometimes you have to kick the darkness until it bleeds daylight.
Hmmm…Where to start. It took me forever to get through this book and I got distracted by a lot of other things along the way.
[image]
I think Peter V. BHmmm…Where to start. It took me forever to get through this book and I got distracted by a lot of other things along the way.
[image]
I think Peter V. Brent falls into shortfall category a lot of male fantasy writers do. They are pretty good at worldbuilding and plot but really horrible at romance and writing women.
Inevera was fascinating in the previous book, she was a mystery and I was convinced she was an evil genius. But, in the Daylight Wars we get her PoV. Her past and many of the things that happened in the Desert Spear were rehashed and for me, it made them less, it made her less. Instead of being a mastermind she is just a woman trying to hold onto the power she has and the man she loves. It was also a little boring, I enjoyed learning a little bit about the Dama’ting but to go through scenes in the previous book again just from a different perspective…*sigh*
Leesha gets worse in every book for me as well. For someone so smart she sure is stupid. She didn’t exactly totally turn down Jardir’s proposal and there are Kraisans sent to protect his intended in the Hollow living on her land. Yet she decides after finding out about Arland and Renna to jump in the sack with someone. Um, didn’t she have enough complications happening in her life at that moment? Didn’t she think that the Kraisans would find out and there might be repercussions?
The title of the book is also deceiving. With a name like The Daylight Wars I thought there would be some movement on the human wars front with Jardir taking over more towns or a fight between Alrand and Jardir or something. But a good portion of the book was spent in Inevera’s past and then hanging out getting ready for the Princes to come lead the coreling armies when there was no moon. But even that fighting didn’t happen until 80% in.
I’m still on the fence about the entire Renna/Arland situation and as much as I want to root for them, I’m just not on board yet there either. All the romances seem a little forced. The one I like the best is actually with Rojer and his two wives.
There are a few cool discoveries made in this book and I did like how Amon got revenge on someone who had done him some grievous wrongs. But overall, I think a good 100-150 pages of this should have been clipped out to make it flow better. It seemed like PVB maybe didn’t have a clear idea of where he was going in the story and how to plot it out to give us the pertinent details when they were happening in the other books hence the rehashing in yet another PoV.
And then there is the cliffhanger at the end. Just when I was really getting into the story at the critical moment it just ends. Its like on a results show when you are waiting to see who the winner is and it cuts to commercial right when they are going to tell you. It isn’t a real cliffhanger so much as a you’ll have to buy the next book if you want to know who won.
I enjoyed the first two books more. But at least I didn’t have to suffer through another rape in this one so there is that going for it. I’ll most likely continue with the next book to see how things play out but they seem to keep getting longer so I’m currently not holding out much hope to make it through without rehashing from yet another PoV.
I think that anyone who has read a book in this series gets that Alex is a Fencey (dude that hasn’t picked a side). Just like in politics the independI think that anyone who has read a book in this series gets that Alex is a Fencey (dude that hasn’t picked a side). Just like in politics the independent rarely wins the race, they just don’t have enough backing. Well if you haven’t guessed by the title Alex is about to get kicked off that fence and fall face first into some hard decisions.
[image]
Fallen follows the pacing of other books in this series where the first half is just the day to day meanderings of a mage until BAM-WHACK-CRACK something horrible happens and then everyone is out to get him. Then the rest of the book is a lot of action as Alex tries to survive with the aid of some friends.
There are a few things that really worked for this book: Alex has finally made a few hard decisions and it is time to really commit to taking charge and stop trying to be both a light and dark mage at the same time. There are some alliances to be made, some to be broken, friends gained and friends lost. I’m happy to say that I finally feel like some serious movement has happened.
There is a moment in this book when Alex is talking with Richard and some of the things Richard is saying makes complete total sense. Alex is in the position he is currently in due to his choices and behavior. Richard is definitely more eloquent about it, but I think that it was a big wake up moment for Alex.
[image]
The thing that I’m really excited about is how Alex and Anne both change in this book. In the past I’ve found Anne to be a bit of a doormat and I was just waiting for the moment when she remembers she is the most dangerous person in the room and acted like it. I love the twisty-turny direction that entire arc has taken and like the opportunities that it could be opening up.
Luna is still the best former pupil a guy can have and I totally love that girl’s loyalty to Alex. They have this great friendship/mentorship and I think that grounds them both.
This is about the time in a series that I’m looking for the end. I’m not saying I’m not enjoying living in the Alex Verus world, cuz I am. But, I like authors to have a clear direction and go out strong. I’ve read a few series that just keep going like the energizer buddy until its just annoying background noise. I see some great and some horrible possibilities for Alex’s character and I’m just excited to see how it all is going to play out.
Best moment – Learning what Richard’s magic is and using that knowledge.
Worst moment – Let’s just say it involved a mind mage we all hate and a girl Alex loves.
My hope is that the next book is titled something like Gotcha
Thank you to Berkley Publishing for supplying the ARC for review....more
Note: There are very few books I suggest that Audio is the only way to go, bSale Alert: Kindle Daile Deal 28Jul20 $2.99
3.5 “One flesh, one end" stars
Note: There are very few books I suggest that Audio is the only way to go, but this will be one of them. The dialogue throughout is strange and in the hardback the formatting is odd and can be a little too much.
Gideon is not anything like I first thought it would be based on the cover. For one I thought Gideon was a boy. She isn’t, she is a sword wielding woman, stuck on a dying planet/territory called the Ninth that has more dead things running around at the will of one person that it has living. Gideon has tried 87 various ways to escape this dead planet only to be thwarted at every go, mostly by her nemesis Harrow to be stuck on a planet she hates. From the beginning you could see these two could be just a few turns away from turning from enemies into something more.
The Lady of the Ninth House stood before the drillshaft, wearing black and sneering. Reverend Daughter Harrowhark Nonagesimus had pretty much cornered the market on wearing black and sneering. It comprised 100 percent of her personality. Gideon marvelled that someone could live in the universe only seventeen years and yet wear black and sneer with such ancient self-assurance.
The Ninth is a land full of secrets and dead and Harrow is keeper to both. But she needs Gideon to be her swordswoman for a trial set by the emperor. If Harrow succeeds in this trial, she will get something special akin to immortality and a way to save the dying Ninth house. If Gideon helps, she is promised freedom.
I really wasn’t sure what I was getting into when this was said to be Queer Necromancers in Space. I definitely thought there would be more lesbian like things, but other than the fact Gideon is definitely into girls there isn’t much pushing behind that. She likes the look of girls and thinks a few thoughts along those lines. There is a underlying current of something building between Gideon and Harrow, it could blow up spectacularly at any moment into more. But not much time is spent on that at all.
Mostly this is a tale of going to a strange place with hidden catacombs to search for the secrets of the former Lyctors to become one themselves
The whole place had the look of a picked-at body. But hot damn! What a beautiful corpse.
It is dangerous as the other eight houses are there also and everyone is competing for keys that will show them the secrets of how to be better necromancers to the point that eternal live becomes yours. It gets messy as Harrow and Gideon are thrown into ever more dangerous situations trying to stay alive, discover who is killing off the competition and learn the secrets for themselves as well.
I’m going to give the author some big props for having such a strange idea full of imagery, brutality and death. She did a great job of not doing the expected in this. I didn’t really get some of the motivations of why a few things happened the way they did but I was surprised by so many things especial Gideon and Harrow’s connection in the end.
Gideon was easy for me to like. She has a great fun sense of humor that is very out there and I think that listening to the Audiobook for this novel made it better for me. The dialogue is a little twisty at times and the narrator sorted it for me so that I didn’t have to think about it too hard.
“My uncle can’t eat with your kind around,” he said. “Please leave.” Gideon had a million questions. Like: Your kind? And: Why do you have such a baby uncle, one the colour of mayonnaise? And: Is “your kind” people who aren’t nephews and who have middle fingers?
For all of it’s inventiveness there is a large chunk of time where nothing is really happening in the story. The worldbuilding could have been flushed out a bit better as well. We are in this really cool story where there is a galactic war happening. But other than there being 9 necromantic houses to the emperor, each with their own way of performing necromancy I don’t know much. There seems like there is so much to explore in this setting and I didn’t get enough info on the characters to really form strong attachments to most of them. Also, some of the deaths still didn’t make sense to me later when the perpetrator was revealed. Since I couldn’t reconcile a few events I have to drop the star rating. Don’t let that discourage you, there are some great, strange wonders throughout the book and the ending literally shocked and amazed me. I will definitely be picking up Harrow when it comes out.
“It’s bad enough that we’re stuck in this burnt-out old hovel without me scaring you. Isn’t it fantastically abandoned? Imagine all the ghosts of everyone who must have lived here … worked here … still waiting to be called, if we could figure out how. The Seventh doesn’t do well with ghosts, you know. We offend them. We’re worrisome. The old division between body and spirit. We deal too much with the body … crystallising it in time … trapping it unnaturally. The opposite of your House, don’t you think, Gideon the Ninth? You take empty things and build with them … We press down the hand of a clock, to try to stop it from ticking the last second.”
In some ways I liked it more than the Warded Man. In others less.
It starts off really well. In the prologHow do I feel about The Desert Spear?
[image]
In some ways I liked it more than the Warded Man. In others less.
It starts off really well. In the prologue we find that the Corelings seen to date are just the tip of the iceberg and there are others out there that think, plot and strategize and they’ve just taken an interest in the happening’s topside. Then we jump back in time and learn all about Jardir’s training as a boy with the Dessert tribes. We follow that tale and how he became the man that eventually betrays Arlen and leaves him to die.
This was an interesting side to the story. The switch up completely from the PoVs of the Warded Man was a little hard to take since I really wanted to see the old gang again. But we spend the first third of the book with the backstory of the Krasians and the rise of Jardir. It was interesting and almost felt like a different tale. Jardir’s wife who makes him the man he is today was also captivating. I wasn’t sure if she was more power hungry than him or just a believer. Either way she is a powerhouse and extremely devious. This culture too is brutal and I’m not a fan of their conquer the land rape all the breeding age women to create more sons to battle mentality. Historically accurate, probably. Fun to read, not really for me, it made me hate their culture.
I loved it when we finally got back to the trio of PoVs from the first book. But then all the drama started to happen. I’m not sure why a lot of male fantasy writers don’t do relationships in their stories well. The Desert Spear suffers from the main characters Arlen and Leesha being wanted/loved by everyone they meet and again Arlen is put in a situation where someone that was recently raped it throwing herself at him. *shakes head* no just no. It really turned a little into a sad parody of a drama. I’d rather all of the relationship stuff got left out and just focus on the main plot if you’re bad at them.
For Arlen the good things were:
The changes he is going through because of the tattoos on his skin. Seeing the foster family that raised him and getting some closure there. Traveling between lands to spread his wards. The fight with a Coreling Prince.
The bad things were:
Every freaking relationship he has with women. His refusal all the time of being the Deliverer.
For Leesha the good things were:
Her strides forward in warding and leading the village. Coming to terms her mother being awful and sometimes wise, but usually in an awful way
The bad things:
Her total lack of sense when Jardir shows up The drama llama that is her relationship with Jardir *ugh*
I really like the plot and fight against the corelings but the side plots of murder, rape and mayhem just wasn’t my thing and I cringed every time Leesha and Jardir talked. The sub plotting of jardir’s wife against Leesha was interesting but again I could have done without that bit of drama in the book.
Overall the world building and main plot to destroy the corelings is interesting but I think that Brett could would on interpersonal dynamics a little. Also, tone down the raping and pillaging while you are at it. Did we really need another scene with Renna and her father, like the one we got? I get it, you don’t have to rub my nose it in anymore. ...more
We are at the end of this crazy ride and it was CrAzY.
The last book in the series is a run for your life kind of free for all and all bets are off. Because of that it lost a little of the magic of the first two books. There isn't that OMG-my-jaw-just-hit-the floor-what-the-heck-is-going-on. Because, mostly you know what is happening now it is just time to deal with what that means.
There were still a few eye openers to be dolled out but they are more on a personal and emotional level so the impact wasn't quite as hard hitting as the big reveals in the first book.
Still I definitely enjoyed this series and I'm glad I've gotten to know Mr Crouch a little better. He is the entire reason I ended up with a mindfuckery shelf in the first place.
Now is this for you? Did you like any of the following movies/tv shows Twin Peaks, The Truman Show, The Matrix, The Walking Dead, The 100. If you liked any of those then there is probably something in this series that is going to work really well for you.
It was a fun ride and I'm glad I jumped on the CrAzY train....more
“Before I built a wall I’d ask to know what I was walling in, or walling out.” Robert Frost
Wayward is a good follow up to The Pines. It is just as trippy in its own ways and still manages to have a few surprises up its sleeve.
This is a hard book to review because I don’t want to give away any of the key motivations or surprises for Wayward or it’s prequel. It is still a mind trip as we discover more about Ethan and Theresa’s lives both before and after coming to Wayward Pines Idaho. As new relationships are explored, I wondered if their marriage was going to make it to the other side of this strange journey they are on.
“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.”
Ethan is a flawed character but likably so. He has made some mistakes in his past but has owned them and because of that, he remains likable. Now in a position of authority as Sherriff, Ethan is even more in the middle of things and ends up investigating a murder and a group of people who might be up to something shady in this sleepy little town.
[image]
Once I started this journey I couldn’t really put it down until it’s jaw dropping conclusion. Be sure you have the next book ready to go, because I don’t know who could just stop right there without jumping into the next one right away after that ending.
The Pines had a bigger surprise but this book messed with my head nearly as much and twisted my emotions up too. I’m a little nervous to see how/if this all shakes out later, but I’m excited to continue the mind twisting ride that is happening in Wayward Pines....more
Recursion, a love story. Probably not what you were expecting and I don’t blame you since this is definitely in the Sci-Fi, what-the-hell-is-happening camp too. After reading Dark Matter, which is a book that still pops into my mind from time to time, I was ready to read this author's entire catalog and go on whatever twisted, messed up mindfuck he had in store for me.
In the beginning, we learn of False Memory Syndrome (FMS). There have been new occurrences of this popping up for about a year and one woman is sitting at the edge of a building ready to jump because of it. She woke up a month ago and remembers an entire life, where she was married with a son and worked with her husband. But those memories are all grayed out and it isn’t what her life is. She is single, never been married and the man she remembers being married to is married to someone else. What do you do when the life you have, isn’t as good as the life you remember?
"If memory is unreliable, if the past and the present can simply change without warning, then fact and truth will cease to exist. How do we live in a world like that?"
Recursion is told in dual time line perspectives. One is present day with Barry a cop just trying to figure out why a woman vividly remembers two different lives, dealing with the disappointment of his own life. The other follows Helena, a brilliant scientist, set years before as she is trying to build a way to help her mother who is ailing from Alzheimer’s. Much like Einstein, she is about to regret the greatest discovery she has ever made.
“Saint Augustine said it perfectly back in the fourth century: “What then is time? If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know.”
Barry and Helena have had very different lives and I felt really attached to each character. Eventually they end up meeting and having an extraordinary impact on each other. I don’t want to say too much because the beauty of the story is the mystery and the sheer chaos of it at times. But eventually Barry and Helena have a romance for the ages, even though it isn’t the focus of the story it added to my overall enjoyment and connection to the characters.
I really loved how it was all teased out, I thought I might get a little bored due to the recurrent nature of the story, but I never did. I was invested almost from page one and it never stopped. Wow, there are so many things to think about that really stuck with me in this story just as much as they did with Dark Matter.
This isn’t my normal genre; I stay away from Sci-Fi a lot as I’m a scientist and a lot of the time it is so flawed, I can’t look past it. But Blake Crouch did all of his homework and this is smart and plausible, without being dry. As I learned what FMS really was, it was just a matter of time before it all blew up.
Blake Crouch is definitely Auto Buy list from now on.
Narration: Jon Lindstrom and Abby Craden did a fantastic job with the narration. Each embodied the character so well and made me feel what was happening to them. I enjoyed Jon Lindstrom recently when listening to Dark Matter and his voice seemed perfect again for the character of Barry.
The Demon Cycle series is a fantasy that has been in my TBR pile for years and I’ve finally found time and a group to read it with making it more of a priority. The Warded Man is a really good introduction to the world of the Demon Cycle, a lot of it is world-building and I really didn’t mind that since it was all pretty interesting. This is a world that could have been ours once upon a time, but it has been broken back to small towns and cities where elemental demons come out at night and the only thing between you and them are the ward on your house or around your city.
We follow three different people from their childhoods into different stages of adulthood: Arland, was a boy from a small hamlet who learned young how fear ruled his home and his family. He ends up leaving for a walled city never to return to the home of his youth and has a special kind of vendetta against the demons. I liked the journey Arland has and how his journey lead him to become the Warded Man later. He has seen some stuff and taken risks that no one else has dreamed of.
“I think, sometimes, when he's busy loving you, he forgets to hate himself.”
Leesha is the second character we follow. She also grew up in a small town and found out that she had an aptitude for healing. In the early story, I liked her chapters the best as she chose between the life she always thought she would have to the life she was meant to live.
“We are what we choose to be, girl,' she said. 'Let others determine your worth, and you've already lost, because no one wants people worth more than themselves.”
Last, but not least, is Rojer. He lost his parents at a very young age due to failing wards and was taken in but a Jougler (man who entertains for a living). You realize at this point that sometime Arland, who once became a messenger and Rojer will eventually meet up but I didn’t guess how that was going to come about.
I totally loved the different world-building in this and the nightly fight against the Corelings or Demons as they are known. Every type of town has a different method of protection but you could see how fear and hiding were the method most used. I was extremely caught up in the journey all of the PoVs were taking.
This would have been a near perfect introductory story except for an event that happens near the 90% mark that just made me roll my eyes at Peter V. Brett and how he definitely doesn’t seem to understand women or how they would react in a certain situation. The event is super spoilery (view spoiler)[Leesha is 27 but still never been intimate with a man. At least it isn't because all women in this are supposed to be virginal. But there is an event where she is gang raped. At least we don't experience it first hand as a reader as it is told mostly from Rojar's PoV after the fact, small mercy there as I don't really like reading about rape in books and think it is used too much by authors. Still in the context of them travelling it was a real danger and so I'm not super happy about it being tossed into the story, but I'll let it go. Then Leesha meets the warded man and it has only been a few days that they are on the road together but she decides she is going to have sex with him...seriously? I really didn't understand the need for that at all and didn't think for a second that her body or mind had healed enough to want sex with a near stranger. I honestly don't know how someone didn't give PVB a heads up on that one and suggest changing it. Then there was the secondary rub that Leesha was mad that The Warded Man and Rojar stole the horse and ward circle back from the men leaving them to die. The men that stole from them and raped her have probably done the same thing before and would have again, but she is upset about it cause she is a healer, come on I can't even. Complete nonsense for about 5% of the book (hide spoiler)] I’ll just say this lost an entire star because of it. The book got ridiculous for about 5% but then we were back to fighting the Corelings and everything was back on track.
I’m totally excited to see where this journey takes us and how the new trio of Arland, Leesha and Rojer will carry all of their new findings to more people to try to help move all of the humans out of being on the defensive only against the Demons to starting to think offensively and what that will bring.
There are some hints along the way that the demons we have been shown in this installment aren’t the only ones out there and this is just the tip of the iceberg in the war to come.
Narration: I got this on Graphic Audio which is a full cast reading with sound effects, like there advertisement says it is like a movie for your mind. Graphic Audio is a lot more money than just an audiobook but for some of my favorite series it is totally worth it. I did have a little trouble with this production because the demons make a lot of noise and sometimes that could be distracting from the actual story. I haven’t really had that issue with other Graphic Audio I’ve listened to so it could just be this story production didn’t work as well. I do love how the music and the full cast of voices can add so much more emotion to the story and would recommend Graphic Audio versions in general if you have a chance to check them out.
Jane’s journey has been a long one, she and the Yellowrock Clan have been through some very dangerous and trying times. Shattered bonds started off a Jane’s journey has been a long one, she and the Yellowrock Clan have been through some very dangerous and trying times. Shattered bonds started off a bit dark, in that Jane is not well, she is a little defeated and not even close to being into true fighting form. It seems I’d forgotten a lot of the details from the prior book(s) but Faith Hunter did a great job of peppering in the details I needed to be up to speed.
After becoming the Dark Queen in the prior book Jane pretty much gave up all of her claims to lands and titles to go hide outside of Ashville and die. She tried to slink away alone so the people she loves don’t have he watch her go through this (silly Jane) but they found her and are trying to figure out how to save her. Jane has been spending a lot of time as Beast, since the magical cancer is only affecting her human form. It seems like Jane has kinda given up and is just waiting to die, that is until Edmund being kindnapped by the Son of Shadows, calls on her purpose to save her friend and protect the rest of her people.
Shattered Bonds is not only about the bonds that Jane has with her people but also the bonds the Son of Darkness (SoD) has with his Brother the Son of Shadows (SoS) with the rest of his followers. Jane’s bonds are built with love and mutual respect for the most part, while the SoS’s are built with fear, pain and violence. It is interesting to see the contrast between the two.
Jane and Beast have some great moments together in Shattered bonds. Beast is a cat and has some secrets of her own that she is hiding from Jane but I think that we get to see the mutual respect between them grow all the more as they deal with the SoS, Jane’s magical cancer and coming to terms with being the Dark Queen. There are some moments with the Angel that make me wonder what Jane will be in the next books.
This was a heart wrenching and gripping book. Edmund is a character I care for a lot and to know the danger he is in and how it is not only affecting Jane but Angie, who made Edmund her Knight and shares a bond with him too. I loved seeing the Everharts, Eli, Alex and especially Bruiser surround Jane with there love in this difficult time. The kids Angie and EJ are especially cute and add some light to the dark of this.
Jane has never really wanted to be in charge and I think that Shattered Bonds did great at showing Jane just how much it costs when you abdicate responsibility. It cost her people a lot, especially when they were struggling with losing Leo already, her absence just made everything worse. I felt the worst for Bruiser who lost Leo, is trying to be patient and keep Jane alive but feels like he is losing her too and is struggling with where his new place is in the world. It was a little heart wrenching to see him put on the brave face when in truth he is a little lost.
I love where this ended. Let me rephrase that. I was ready for more, I wanted to see how everyone reacts to the new Jane and I was ready for her to really be the Dark Queen going forward. I was also ready to kick European vampire but, because there is more to be kicked to consolidate power and bring peace. But mostly I just wanted one more scene with Bruiser, I love that man and his loyalty and devotion to Jane. But alas, I will need to wait another year or so to get there, I will be ready.
Thank you to Berkley Publishing and Netgalley for the ARC. This does not affect my rating or review....more
Hidden is the fifth book in the Alex Verus Series. So far this series has been getting better and better with each installment and while I did enjoy Hidden quite a bit it wasn’t my favorite book of the series so far, Chosen still holds that space but it is another really good story which captured my attention from start to finish and had a few characters moving in directions I wasn’t expecting.
After the events of Chosen, Anne has moved out of Alex’s life in every way possible. She was still under a little protection by being in the apprentice program, but after an incident there, Anne is left outside the magic world and vulnerable. When she disappears, Alex and Co. team up to find out what could have happened and who could have taken her. There are apparently a lot of Dark Mages ready to do dark deeds and the list of possibly suspects isn’t really short.
I enjoy how every book of this series builds on the one before it. Alex is still dealing with some of the fallout from Chosen. While Luna seems to accept Alex for who he is and has no disillusions of what he is capable of, a few of the other young people in his life are devastated by the choices he was willing to make. I really liked seeing the varying degrees of that play out with all the characters we’ve seen before.
I did get a little bored in the sub realm Alex visited, which was just me since there are shadow monsters and the threats were real. But it felt like Alex spent a lot of time there. I did like finally learning about Anne’s past and what she has done. It really helped me understand her reactions to the events in Chosen. She and Alex are more alike than she wants to admit.
With the threat of Richard coming back into the magic scene and a new push to have Dark Mages on the Council you can tell there will be a bigger story arc that will definitely involve Alex’s old master at some point. I don’t know about the rest of you gentle readers but Richard scares the crap out of me. The guy is Lex Luther smart and seems to have a very elastic morality when it comes to getting what he wants.
I did very much like where this story ended though. I can tell that the tension for the next books is really building and Alex is going to have to find some even better tricks if he is going to make it through the changes that are definitely on the horizon.
Narration: Gildart Jackson is really great in this. I like his performance for all characters and he really brings everyone to life, but especially Alex. His accent is perfect for this since the location of the story is mostly London. Fantastic flow and attention to inflection, I particularly enjoy when Alex speaks to the reader/listener. I listened to this at my usual 1.5x speed.
Daughter of the Blood is a brutal and twisted tale and isn’t going to be for everyone. Heck I think that with a lSale Alert: Kindle Deal 16May20 $1.99
Daughter of the Blood is a brutal and twisted tale and isn’t going to be for everyone. Heck I think that with a lot of the things touched on in this book nine times out of ten it wouldn’t be for me, but Anne Bishop’s writing and ability to weave a tale kept me captivated. There is so much brutality in this against Men, Women and children that it goes really dark at times. The story also touches on child molestation and a bit of human trafficking neatly disguised as something else. There are times that the story made me uncomfortable, as it should with the subject matter, but there was no time that I wanted to put the book down as I was so engrossed in the story.
Anne Bishop has built a unique fantasy world full of complicated and broken characters. This dark world has been twisted from what it should have been. Some people, known as the Blood, are gifted and wear jewels. The color of the jewel indicates the power level of The Blood and they are given from the mist or a different realm at birth and then at other major moments in someone’s life. The Blood used to be the protectors of the land, but their power has been twisted by a bad ruler who has either enslaved the strong Blood or killed them, but there is a prophecy that Witch will come and set right what has been broken.
“They twist things to suit themselves. They dress up and pretend. They wear Blood Jewels but don’t understand what it means to be Blood. They talk of honoring the Darkness, but it’s a lie. They honor nothing but their own ambitions. The Blood were created to be the caretakers of the Realms. That’s why we were given our power. That’s why we come from, yet are apart from, the people in every Territory. The perversion of what we are can’t go on. The day is coming when the debt will be called in, and the Blood will have to answer for what they’ve become.”
There are a lot of characters in this story, but the majority of it is seen though three character’s arcs. Daemon, an enslaved Prince forced to be a whore for the aristocracy, Saetan the guardian of the dead and not really a bad guy, and Jaenelle a child with extraordinary power and the prophesized Witch that will one day put right all that was wrong in all of the realms.
Any book that can make Saetan into a mentor and father figure is a win in my mind. I really liked the twist that the characters that are normally going to be the bad guys in any other book are really the good guys in this one. Saetan is a friend and teacher to Jaenelle, she is a little girl with so much power that most fear her and what she will become, or they want to control her. But Saetan has a different plan, one that just might work.
“So she can’t move furniture around a room, but she can destroy an entire continent.” “She’ll never do that. It’s not in her temperament.” “How can you be sure? How will you control her?” They were back to that. He took his cape back and settled it over his shoulders. “I’m not going to control her, Cassandra. She’s Witch. No male has the right to control Witch.” Cassandra studied him. “Then what are you going to do?” Saetan picked up his cane. “Love her. That will have to be enough.”
It is slowly teased out the danger that Jaenelle is in and how this little girl sees and does things so different from the rest of the world. She isn’t understood by her family but innocently she is collecting friends from all the realms and will one day be a force to be reckoned with if Saetan can protect her until she reaches adulthood.
Daemon’s story is so sad. He has been enslaved for most of his life and didn’t know that Saetan was his father for a long time. Daemon has been waiting for Witch to come for seven hundred years, since the night the prophecy was spoken. He knows that one day he will be her consort and it is the only thing that has been keeping him sane. When he finally encounters Witch he is so surprised that she is only twelve at the time. He wants desperately to protect her from all the evil surrounding her but his position as a slave is precarious and so he plays the game and bides his time, watching over her and trying to protect her. I did love their interactions in this. It was fun to see how well Jaenelle could twist not only Daemon but also Saetan up.
“Daemon had written: "What do you do when she asks a question no man would give a child an answer to?" Saetan had replied: "Hope you're obliging enough to answer it for me. However, if you're backed into a corner, refer her to me. I've become accustomed to being shocked.”
Like I’ve said before there is a ton of dark moments in this. If you have a sexual hot button it is probably going to press it. There is incest, pedophilia, molestation, rape, human trafficking, torture and much much more. I wanted most of the aristocracy in this book dead and while every part of the dark deeds done in this added to the story and it is written really well the moments are uncomfortable and sometimes devastating.
I really loved the world created her with the different realms, creatures, magics and lands. It is unique and interesting and I can’t wait to read more of the story. I was drawn in and completely captivated by this tale....more
I’ve enjoyed the Black Jewels series. We’ve now made it past the main conflict story of the first three books and Shalador’s Lady doesn’t have all theI’ve enjoyed the Black Jewels series. We’ve now made it past the main conflict story of the first three books and Shalador’s Lady doesn’t have all the horror of the first trilogy. What it does have is an interesting tale of trying to rebuild a land after most of the corruption has been cut out.
Cassidy is so likeable that she is an easy character to root for. I’ve enjoyed how in her kind and simple ways she has taken over the care of the land in Dena Nehele and it is starting to prosper. The only person in Dena Nahele that hasn’t been completely charmed by her is Theran and since he is the only living heir of The Gray Lady and the owner of the residence, they are lining in currently he still has some sway. I can’t help but think that Jarrod would be so disappointed in his heir.
When Kermilla, the Queen that stole Cassidy’s first court shows up, Theran finally feels the draw to the beautiful Queen he thinks would be great for Dena Nehele. As Theran tries to find a way to make Kermilla the new Queen lines will be drawn, lands with be divided and people will be tested. Is Cassidy going to lose another court to the pretty Queen or can she hold on to them and this land that calls to her.
I get so caught up in the day to day of the people living in these books. I enjoyed the story of Cassidy and Jared Blaed Grayhaven. The way that he came out of his shell for her was fantastic. The slow growing love story between them was totally adorable. Jared had some good teachers in Sataen, Daemon and Lucivar so I think Cassidy is going to have her hands full with him.
I’ve grown to love this world and the characters in it. This tale was a little anticlimactic in the resolution, but I didn’t see that as a really bad thing. This is the new world that Witch gave her power for and I think that the resolution was perfect for that. I also LOVED the Queen Theran ended up serving in the end and how funny Janaelle can be.
Wonderful conclusion/beginning to Cassidy and Shalador’s story. ...more
There is a note to the readers that I think sets up this story beautifully.
Dear Readers, In the Realms of the Blood, the war has been fought,
There is a note to the readers that I think sets up this story beautifully.
Dear Readers, In the Realms of the Blood, the war has been fought, the battle has been won, and the epic tale has been told. But life goes on, so there are other challenges to face, smaller battles to be fought, and other stories to tell.
This is one of them.
It lets you know where to set your expectation level right off the bat. This story does not have the big bad of the past, but that doesn’t mean that there are no dangers for our beloved characters.
This reminds me of a Halloween story, so much so I thought that it should have been released in October for sure. [image] Life is settling in after the events of Queen of Darkness. Jaenelle is healed and up to a few shenanigans again. It seems the Landon children have some funny misconceptions of who/what the Blood are and how they live. These have been amplified by a writer, who believes he is blood but didn’t grow up in that world so he gets most of the details in his stories hilariously wrong.
“When we have sex, does your penis weep with gratitude?” A handful of answers flashed through his mind. If he said any of them, he would end up sleeping in the Consort’s room. Alone. “In what context?” he asked. She lowered the book. Since he’d acknowledged being awake, he raised his head and read the passage. Then he read it again. “Sweetheart, if my penis ever does that, you will be the first to know. Not as my wife, but as a Healer.”
I swear I’ve had a very similar conversation with the hubs while reading some want-to-be-smut.
Enter Jaenelle who thinks that building a Spooky House for the kids to go through with some illusions and tricks in it that match the rumors be hilariously fun. I think she is the only one of the Blood that thinks this is a good idea, but she is Jaenelle and so her family goes along for the ride.
But what happens when the house that is supposed to be fun is set up as a labyrinth to trap the blood. While deadly games being played inside and a few of our favorite characters are trying to figure out how to get them and a few kids out alive.
Remember there aren’t rules against murder for the Blood, but there is always a price and someone will have to pay a big one before everything is said and done....more
Dreams Made Flesh is a compilation of stories told in the world of the Black Jewels. It is four stories of various lengthsOverall Rating 4 Stars ★ ☆✰⭐
Dreams Made Flesh is a compilation of stories told in the world of the Black Jewels. It is four stories of various lengths and I can’t say that I usually enjoy that since you don’t get the same depth in a short story but since we have a lot of world building and knowledge of this world it works.
★ ☆✰ Weaver of Dreams is a pretty short story of how the Black Widows and Weavers were gifted their magic from one of Draka’s daughters. It is a cute story shown from the perspective of a spider and that isn’t something you read every day. Because it is so short it wasn’t my favorite of the compilation.
★ ☆✰⭐✩The Prince of Ebon Rih is my favorite story in this book and the main reason I’d recommend reading it. It is set before Queen of Darkness, which is great since I was so confused with Lucivar was already married in it and we’d never read anything about his wife prior to that.
Marian comes from a family that didn’t value her because she was a hearth witch and not powerfully jeweled. After her father makes an unforgivable bargain, Marian is saved from a horrible fate and ends up in Lucivar’s household.
“Marian sank down on one of the kitchen chairs and braced her head in her hands. He got mad at her for sweeping up spilled sugar but dragged her outside to throw a skillet at bales of hay. She threw a pot at him and missed, so he was going to teach her how to clobber him with a skillet. Even taking into account that he was an Eyrien male, there was only one explanation for his behavior. The man was insane.”
I loved the story of how Lucivar and Marian became friendly and then more than friendly. They had plenty of things to overcome due to his power being so much greater than hers, his mother’s interference and Roxy who is a spiteful little twit. But the patience that Lucivar shows to Marian to make her his wife eventually was incredibly tender and sweet.
So happy for his HEA love story.
★ ☆✰⭐ Zuulaman explains why even though it might have been easier to kill Lucivar or Daemon, Heckatah wouldn’t dare. Saetan has been the mentor in these books. He is the quiet patient man with crazy kids and kindred running around everywhere. But once he walked in the land of the living and married the wrong woman, once she tried to play him and an entire people paid for her vicious game. This story shows that even when you thought you hated Heckatah as much as possible, you are wrong and could hate her more. Saetan is a powerful man and no one remembers Zuulaman now because of the part they played in Heckatah’s schemes.
I liked how this story shows how vicious Saetan could be if pushed. It also showed how he was with his boys when they were young and what a good father he could have been to Daemon and Lucivar, had they not been stolen from him. The take away from Zuulaman…Don’t mess with Saetan.
★ ☆✰⭐ Kaeleer’s Heart is in the aftermath of Queen of Darkness. Jaenelle has paid a price to save the blood and the land and the price was high. Only the kindred believed enough to save her. She is weak and healing and Daemon would never press her for anything, he will stand by her through it all, so why does it feel like she is pushing him away.
I really liked how this explored how sometimes when someone has been ill, they are put in a little protective box and it is so hard to see when they are ready to be better. Jaenelle is healing and while weak she is better but the boys of the family aren’t ready to see it. With a little push from Surreal and Marrian they will try to help Jaenelle out and get her back into fighting and loving form. ...more
There is a huge gear shift in this book as it is a prequel to the events in the first trilogy of the series. I actually wasn’t really excited to read There is a huge gear shift in this book as it is a prequel to the events in the first trilogy of the series. I actually wasn’t really excited to read it as I loved the characters from those books so much. But once you get past that the story in The Invisible Ring flows really well and again it was difficult to put the book down. The few cameos we get from The Sadist were just enough to add to the story but not take it over and show some of the little ways he rebelled against Dorthae long before Witch was born.
Jared was a pleasure slave, until the night he broke and killed both the Queen he served and her brother. He is supposed to be sold to the salt mines to be worked into death. That is until a Gray Lady shows up and buys his contract. Now Jared is on his way to the one of the only courts successfully evading Dorthae’s slow war to take control of all the lands and infect them with her cruel servants.
The only problem, there are lots of people trying to kill them while on route, a traitor in the midst of the traveling party and the Gray Lady, well she isn’t exactly what she seems to be either.
You have to have a solid foundation in this world so even though it is a prequel it shouldn’t be read until after books 1-3. How the Gray Lady and Jared staved off Dorthae and the army is what gave Janaelle the bones of how to save the land and the blood in Queen of Darkness.
It was good to see a few more characters that were good and not twisted into what Dorthae makes people into. We get to see how she took a man with ambition and a streak of cruelty and made him the worst version of himself, until he was almost as cruel as she was.
Great story set in a world I’ve grown to really like, despite its cruelties....more
Queen of Darkness is a fantastic and heart wrenching conclusion to the first trilogy of this series. It ends at a really good point that you could setQueen of Darkness is a fantastic and heart wrenching conclusion to the first trilogy of this series. It ends at a really good point that you could set the series down and walk away for a while. Which you might need since this is brutally dark at times. Or maybe you’re like me…
[image]
Once I picked up Queen of Darkness it was difficult to stop, I couldn’t wait to see how all the events for this trilogy would play out and how many characters would make it out alive.
Dorthea and Hekatah have all their players in place and are moving forward with their plan to conquer. The Demon dead of the inner circle have seen something like this before and fear that it will be just like the last time when they died on battlefields. The tangled web has been woven and Jeanelle has seen the future, if she goes to war no blood will survive. But there is a sliver of a hope a ghost of a chance, but it means a very difficult path that she might not make it out of. Good thing Jeanelle has so many on her side, maybe the Spiders and the Kindred can see how to get her through the trials ahead.
I don’t know why I get so caught up in the day to day at the court with Jeanelle, but I find almost all of it interesting. It was wonderful having Daemon back in the picture after they spent all of the last book apart and how each is so careful with the other until someone helps push them together. Daemon has payed a price for walking in the twisted kingdom and needs some time and help to heal. He has found the perfect place for it.
I enjoyed most of this book and for being so long it seemed to fly by. Jeanelle is so strong in some areas and then in others she is vulnerable and you can tell she is young and sometimes a little to hopeful of people and how they will be and that they will do the right thing. I loved her complete trust in Daemon and how far he was willing to go for her to buy the time she needed.
The way Anne Bishop made all the characters in this essential to the final battle but in unconventional ways was really great. I loved that not all sacrifices in war are on a traditional battlefield and the way the demon dead contributed to saving the blood, well it both broke my heart and gave me chills all at the same time.
The only thing that was sad is how after everything the inner circle has seen of Jaenelle and what she can do they didn’t trust her more. Karla was the only one who seemed to keep faith and not really question if the queen and her consort just might have a plan that would save them all, even if the price for saving the blood was high.
Fantastic conclusion to the first trilogy in this series. ...more
The Black Jewels series is dark fantasy, characters in this do not have easy goes at things and suffer for years 4.5 Not for the Faint of Heart Starts
The Black Jewels series is dark fantasy, characters in this do not have easy goes at things and suffer for years on end. Daughter of blood hit so many of my hot buttons in it, rape, incest, torture, human trafficking, pedophilia and slavery. It was dark and disturbing and I couldn’t look away or put it down. Heir to the Shadows picks up two years after the events of the first book of the series. This is still dark but we have moved away from some of the sexual darkness of the first book and we learn that The Blood have other ways to be horrible to each other.
Jaenelle remains in a coma in Saetan’s care two years after the events of Daughter of Blood. Daemon at least was able to tie her back to her body but it has left him vulnerable with cracks of his own and drained. Because he doesn’t remember the events of that horrible night it is all twisted in his head and he isn’t sure if he helped or harmed the girl that will one day become the woman he is meant to be with.
This worldbuilding in this is really fantastic. There are lands in the physical realm, magical realm and the realm of death. The tie in between all of the places and how they interact with one another is really amazing and I like the idea of Saetan as a Guardian of the world. The Kindred are magical creatures who as legend have it were once normal wolves, dogs, cats, unicorns etc. but a dragon flew over the land dropping her scales and giving the world her magic. Humans that caught a scale became witches, animals became more sentient with magic of their own and became known as the Kindred. I love how much depth there is to the worlds.
While sometimes this is a little slow in places I can’t say I was ever bored, I really couldn’t put this down for the most part as I followed Jaenelle on her journey from the lowest part of her life, to living while blocking the trauma of her past to the final acceptance of all of it on her journey into the future.
“It is easier to kill than to heal. It is easier to destroy than to preserve. It is easier to tear down than to build. Those who feed on destructive emotions and ambitions and deny the responsibilities that are the price of wielding power can bring down everything you care for and would protect. Be on guard, always.”
There are so many great characters and so many terrible characters I love to hate that I was captivated by the entire tale. Plus seeing Saetan with a household of teenage witches as he tries to mentor Jaenelle was pretty hilarious. I’m not sure he knew what he was getting into when that little girl showed up on his doorstep seeking magic lessons.
“I met your daughter recently. I asked her if she found it difficult living with your temper. She looked genuinely baffled, and said, ‘What temper?’” Saetan stared at her for a moment, then the anger drained away. He rubbed the back of his neck, and said dryly, “Jaenelle has a unique way of looking at a great many things.”
Anne Bishop has woven an intricate tale in a cruel world and I just can’t get enough of it. With the addition of the Kindred, Lucivar finding his place and Daemon’s journey this was a full tale that left me wanting more.
I can’t wait to see what our not so little Jaenelle will do now that she has made her choice. ...more
These books are a crack up for me. You would think by book 10 with some many short stories in-between that I’d start gett
[image]
Buddy Read 25Apr19
These books are a crack up for me. You would think by book 10 with some many short stories in-between that I’d start getting bored with them, but you’d be wrong, wrong, wrong. Every time I’m with the crew at St. Mary’s I have the best time. I’ve grown to love all the characters and their quirks like they are family. Max is so much fun and even in a crisis she can see the bright side and get a laugh or two out of me.
With trips to the crustaceous period, the 16th Century, the land of Kush (Egypt adjacent), the future with the Time Police and a St. Mary’s of the future as well there is something to always be entertained by. I usually learn something about a historical time I’m not familiar with in a very fun and interesting way. That is one great thing about these stories. But the other is just hanging out with Max and all the trouble she is bound to get into.
The other beautiful thing is Max and Leon together. I love that they are like a real couple and have some problems at times and a real kind of marriage with real difficulties. Like Leon was hurt extremely badly in a prior book and is having some trouble in the bedroom. I like how this has been handled in the series and that it never changed the love and devotion that the two characters feel towards each other.
There’s a kind of literary tradition that after a prolonged absence, the hero and heroine fall romantically into each other’s arms and indulge in three pages of athletic sex – gruelling for both reader and participants alike. You might want to brace yourself for disappointment. Firstly, because Leon hadn’t been well for some time which meant . . . well, you know. And secondly because Markham jammed a gun in the back of my neck and tried to shoot me. Some days I don’t know why I bother to get out of bed.
Ronan is out in the word causing havoc and Matthew, Max and Leon’s son is living in the future with the time police for his protection at the moment. Max has a brilliant plan to finally get Ronan out of their lives and of course it is dangerous and has a ton of moving parts and involves a really shady sex club owner, the time police and a trip to the Crustaceous period with dinosaurs so what could possibly go wrong. There are also Dodo’s as a cherry on top. How many books have you read with a sex club and Dodos?
” You will want to be careful what you leave within beaking range. Hillary, they tell me, is particularly fond of hard-boiled eggs.’ ‘Isn’t that like some form of cannibalism for them?’ She nodded. ‘Eating one’s young.’ ‘Eating one’s young is a hugely underestimated weapon in the parental arsenal.’
The humor in this is fantastic as always and I devoured it in like a day. Max and her sense of humor is fantastic and I always love the dialogue in every story. Especially when she is talking to the bad guys.
‘Let us all think carefully. Who here has the least value? Who has annoyed me the most?’ He turned to face me. ‘Who is in need of a much-deserved lesson?’ ‘No idea,’ I said. ‘Oh, I think you do.’ ‘Well, yes, I do, but I thought it would be rude to point out it’s you. Not in front of your men. Although it would be good to stop you talking before everyone dies of boredom.’
Time travel books usually don’t work for me, but the rules of this world and how it is set up totally works and I really love the world we are in. The episodic nature of some of the trips within the book is usually fun and then there are the overlaying story arcs that carry from book to book that almost always win in my opinion.
Jodi Taylor has put out another fantastic look into the crazy lives of the Historians of St. Mary’s and I can’t wait for the next adventure for Max and crew. Also I want to say how much I love the character summaries in the beginning of the book of all the characters that we are going to see in this book. It is a fantastic way to know what we should remember from the last books and they in themselves are witty, smart and usually pretty funny. I read them both before I started and after I finished and I bow down to Jodi Taylor’s writing in them. Well done again....more
3.75 "sometimes the ones we call our heroes are the greatest monsters of all" stars
This book actually surprised me. I’m kinda over most dystopian type books and YA and I don’t really have a huge interest in books with Indian culture elements in them so I wasn’t expecting a lot from Trail of Lightning with all of these, but I ended up really enjoying the story Rebecca Roanhorse told.
Maggie is a monster hunter, yes there are monsters of a sort in this new world after the great floods when magic started to leak back into the world. She is an Indian and due to both her clan heritage and a tragedy she has come into Clan Powers. Don’t worry, they don’t make her the chosen one or indestructible or anything like that, but they do kick in when she is in danger and they are useful.
But I’m no hero. I’m more of a last resort, a scorched-earth policy. I’m the person you hire when the heroes have already come home in body bags.
Maggie has an interesting past the is fed to the reader in small doses. She lost her Grandmother and was taken in by an Immortal who taught her to kill the monsters and was her mentor, her father figure and the only being she has much contact with in four years. Her feeling for him are complicated, especially since he just disappeared from her live about a year ago and never came back.
There are some new dangerous monsters around, the kind Maggie has never seen, when she goes to ask the medicine man about them, she reluctantly gets teamed up with his Grandson Kia to get to the bottom of the mystery of who has the kind of magic needed to make this new monster. Add to that Coyote also giving Maggie a quest of sorts and the story has quite a bit of stuff happening.
“You try what?” I snort. “Oh, so now you’re trying to help me? What you said before, that was meant to help me?” Ma’ii stares at me flatly. “I know you do not believe it, but I am always trying to help you, Magdalena.” “You are always trying to help yourself.” “Can I not do both at once?” “No, you cannot do both at once.”
Even I know that Coyote is a trickster and cannot be trusted, Maggie knows it too but she reluctantly takes on his quest as it seems that it should help her find the monsters too.
There is a lot happening in this world and I did enjoy the set up, the ideas of how the magic works and why many of the Indians made it through the floods. The world is both wonderous and terrible and I liked all the splashes of magic in it.
They say the hataałii worked hand in hand with the construction crews, and for every brick that was laid, a song was sung. Every lath, a blessing given. And the Wall took on a life of its own. When the workmen came back the next morning, it was already fifty feet high. In the east it grew as white shell. In the south, turquoise. The west, pearlescent curves of abalone, and the north, the blackest jet. It was beautiful. It was ours. And we were safe. Safe from the outside world, at least. But sometimes the worst monsters are the ones within.
Things got a little jumbled and rushed toward the end, but I will say I was a bit shocked by the solution Maggie and Kai came up with in regards to both Coyote and Maggie’s former mentor and immortal Monster Hunter Neizghání.
I very much look forward to the second book in this world as you can see all the potential that Rebecca Roanhorse has. This being her first novel, sometimes the writing seemed slightly choppy in places, but the ideas are captivating and so I was invested in learning more about this world. This is also a story with a lot of Indian names, which I’m not versed in so I was really glad the Audio for this is well done and the pronunciation really helped me out.
The series is over and man what a ride. I really loved so many things about this completely underrated series. I’m so surprised to find that not more The series is over and man what a ride. I really loved so many things about this completely underrated series. I’m so surprised to find that not more of my fantasy reading friends have heard of or read this. Craig Schaefer did a fantastic job wrapping up this four books series.
[image]
“Everything,” Rose said, “is a reaction. Every choice grows from the consequences of another choice. An ocean of ripples from countless pebbles thrown.” Weiss struck one last match. He held it up between them, casting a flickering orange glow across Rose’s gray veil. “It feels like somebody lit a long, slow fuse,” he said. “All these years it’s been quietly sizzling down. And it’s almost at the end.”
To remain spoiler free, I won’t say much, but I will say that after following these characters through some unexpected turns. I thought I was ready to see how each story played out. Some people made it to the end that I didn’t think would, some I was sure would die didn’t and while not everyone gets their just deserts, I’m really good with Schaefer’s vision for this world.
I’ll miss all the characters in the series, even the ones I loved hating. I’ll look forward to the next turning of the wheel as there is one story that seems like it might get another chance for things to turn out differently next time in a new place.
My only worlds of advice are if you like fantasy, then give this series a try as it was interesting, fascinating, back-stabby with characters that are not all good or all evil but diverse and full of flaws. I like books where no one is guiltless or completely good or evil.
This series throws me for a loop every book. Situations and people I thought I was going to hate, I liked, others that I had been rooting for all seriThis series throws me for a loop every book. Situations and people I thought I was going to hate, I liked, others that I had been rooting for all series I started to dislike and wondered if maybe they shouldn’t end up dead in the end. Every book has my ideas shifting with the story and every book has a twist that is unexpected and not always in the favor of a likable character. This series has really kept me on my toes so far, I can’t believe more fantasy lovers out there haven’t read this.
[image]
Terms of Surrender starts up right after the events of Instruments of Control. There are multiple plot arcs happening that seem more and more like they are destined to meet up in the end in some spectacular way. There are even hints that all of this has played out before in some way and will play out again in some future time. There is definitely a feel of destiny to some of the things happening here.
“Do you ever get the feeling you’ve been here before? That everything happening has happened?” Nessa shrugged. “Everyone does, now and again. A trick of the mind.”
Felix is definitely still the character that it is the easiest to root for no matter what. He is trying so hard to set everything in his life right so that he can find his lady love Renata and they can finally start their lives together. But the entire city thinks he killed his father-in-law and both his wife and a powerful man in the city are trying to get him killed. Good thing he might have a few allies left in unusual places that should be able to help him out.
”…I have nothing left. Nothing but Renata. And so long as Aita and Lodovico draw breath, she will never be safe. I’m nothing now, Leggieri, nothing but a cornered rat.” He leaned close, looming over the artist with fire in his eyes. His voice dropped to a graveyard whisper. “But a cornered rat can still bite.”
Renata is doing everything she can to stay out of trouble, which seems to find her no matter what, and wait for Felix to make it back to her. Sure, he married another woman but she never doubts the reasons or his devotion to her. That in itself is refreshing, she is worried he will make it out of that city alive, but that is totally fair considering the trouble he is in. Renata, I think is one of my favorite characters because she is strong, resourceful and not about to back down from the fight headed her way.
The biggest surprise for me in this book was how much I liked Nessa and Mari’s plot arc. After the events of the prior book I thought for sure that Mari was doomed and I was so worried for her. But maybe she is exactly where she is supposed to be and the friendship between Mari and Nessa was the biggest wonder of all. But it totally worked in the story, I was the most investing in this story line and Mari regaining some of her confidence under Nessa’s careful machinations. Plus, I love it when Mari gets sassy
“This is Mari, my knight. Mari, this is Viper, your new cousin.” Viper snorted. “No relation of mine ’til she’s blooded proper. And a knight? She doesn’t look like much to me.” “Try me,” Mari replied. “Or do you only spar with girls half your size? I could get on my knees and fight you that way, if it makes you feel safer. And I’ll still win.”
Livia, the new pope was my least favorite PoV in the story. It isn’t bad or anything there was just more religion and fanaticism in it. Livia is sure she has every right to be pope and all of her decisions reflect her belief that she is the one to lead the church back to what it once was. But she has been playing with some very powerful magic that she doesn’t understand and now there will be consequences to be paid. The question is, will she be able to hold out against those consequences or will she fall prey to the horrible side effects of the taint growing inside of her. With the fanatical cult that is growing around her Livia might just become the thing she is trying to save the Church from.
There is again a plethora of twists, backstabs and just when you think some characters are finally gaining some ground or ready get their comeuppance the reader is again surprised by the new direction the story takes.
I’m so excited and terrified to read the conclusion to this story. Let’s hope at least a few of the ‘good guys’ make it out alive....more
Loading...
