Currently reading a book with an action heroine?

[Janelle]

Sounds like a good book, Sadie.

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

Sadie wrote: "I'm surprised this one hasn't been mentioned, but I've just finished the The Emperor's Edge series (all seven of them). Amaranthe is a fun heroine and the whole thing is set in an i..."

I have a few of these on my Kindle. Looking forward to reading them.

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

I finished City of Jasmine, which has a heroine who is an aviatrix who flies all around the world. Not strictly an action book, but I consider Evie along the lines of an action heroine.

[Sadie]

I really enjoyed them Janelle.

Yeah, Danielle, I got the first for free early last year and never got around to reading it. Glad I finally did. Apparently Encrypted is an associated series. The MC for them shows up in the last Emperor's Edge book. She definitely promises to be an adventurous heroine too.

[Werner]

Very often, the way I read short story collections is intermittently, sometimes as filler between scheduled reads of novels. (I enjoy short fiction; and with that kind of collection, you can finish individual stories and have closure without having to read the entire book straight through.) The urban fantasy collection I'm reading now, , has its share of actual action heroines and just plain brave women, both as protagonists and as secondary characters.

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

I'm glad you can vouch for Dark and Stormy Knights, Werner. I pick up most of the UF collections because they have a lot of my favorite authors. I'm just slow to read them, unfortunately!

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

Sadie wrote: "I really enjoyed them Janelle.

Yeah, Danielle, I got the first for free early last year and never got around to reading it. Glad I finally did. Apparently Encrypted is an associat..."

It looks like it will be a fun series to follow.

[Derrick]

Insurgent, the second in the Divergent trilogy, is definitely a step down. The romance aspect that was only hinted at on book one takes center stage here. We get a lot of "why doesn't he love me anymore" and "why do I have a problem trusting him" and "our bodies touched and I wanted him so bad but I just couldn't frak him" whining. It gets old fast.

Plus the plot is ridiculous. And from what I've read about book 3, it only goes down down down from here. Pass. Too bad. Tris is a fun action heroine in the first book. Now she's just Bella Swan with a death wish and wannabe martyr complex.

[Werner]

As mentioned on another thread, our own Clive Lee recently was kind enough to offer me a signed copy of his new World War II espionage novel featuring a teen heroine, . It arrived in the mail yesterday --perfect timing, since this morning I finished the book I'd been reading, and was able to start this one. So far, I'm only on the Prologue; but the hook is in!

[Werner]

While I read almost solely in the paper format, I do have a seldom-used Kindle app on my PC; and one thing I use it for occasionally is trying out a freebie e-book to see if I like it. If I do, I purchase the print edition. (Of course, I only read this way on an intermittent basis; it doesn't fit into my schedule to do it very much!) A freebie I stumbled on recently is by Goodreads author Percival Constantine. His protagonist is a female archaeologist; and I quickly discovered that she's an action-heroine type very much in the mold of Lady Lara Croft, or Sydney Fox of the 90s TV series Relic Hunter. And she may have both of them beat for sheer lethal fighting prowess --here, she drops five dead bodies (in self-defense) in the first two or three frames of the Kindle text!

[Werner]

In my post above, I mentioned Percival Constantine's Myth Hunter series opener, The Lost Continent. He actually has two series-opening novels permanently available for free in the e-book format; the other one (which I got a copy of at the same time) is the first book of his Infernum series, . I've recently begun intermittently reading that one, and protagonist Angela Lockhart is definitely a heroine within our group's scope of interest! (She might be called an anti-heroine --but one you can nonetheless like and respect.)

[Werner]

By way of an update to my last post, I didn't finish Constantine's Love and Bullets, not because the heroine ceased to be likable (she didn't), but because I felt his plotting fell completely apart in terms of plausibility and character consistency. :-( (On the other hand, while his The Lost Continent involves some challenges to belief, it earned three stars from me, which means I liked it.)

However, I did recently finish (in just two days!) my most recent Kindle app read, K. W. Jeter's series opener , and that one got five stars from me! This one is free on Kindle (the paperback edition isn't in print anymore; when and if it's reprinted, I'm buying it!), and I don't think that offer is time-limited. (But just in case it is, what are you waiting for? :-) )

[Werner]

At the moment, I'm reading , by one of our own members, John Reinhard Dizon. It's listed on my "being read intermittently" shelf, since I'm reading the PDF review copy the author kindly sent me onscreen, here and there as I get time. (But I'd previously bought a print copy!) It's fairly short and flows quickly, so I expect this to be a quick read despite the haphazard schedule of reading time that I'm able to give it.

[Werner]

Currently, my wife Barb and I are reading , the first book in Suzanne Arruda's Jade del Cameron series (mysteries set in post-World War I Africa), as our "car book." Jade's ability to handle physical dangers and challenges definitely entitles her to action heroine status. A decorated (and wounded) ambulance driver in the lately-concluded war, she grew up on her parent's ranch near Cimmaron, New Mexico, where she learned to hunt and handle firearms; she once killed a mountain lion single-handed --and that's not bad training for what she's up against in colonial Africa.

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

I just finished Rogue Spy, with a heroine who was trained from childhood to be a sleeper spy. She comes out of retirement when she's blackmailed. Definitely an action-caliber heroine.

[Janelle]

Looks interesting Danielle.

[Werner]

Danielle, I added it to our group bookshelves just now. (It looks like the author, Joanna Bourne, has written a whole series of spy novels. Hmmmm, I wonder if she's any relation to Jason Bourne.... :-) )

[Danielle The Book Huntress]

Werner wrote: "Danielle, I added it to our group bookshelves just now. (It looks like the author, Joanna Bourne, has written a whole series of spy novels. Hmmmm, I wonder if she's any relation to Jason Bourne......"

Thanks!! She has a whole spy series that is acclaimed in historical romance.

[Sadie]

I just finished Memento Mori. While it's not action packed, Sunday is a pretty kick-butt assassin and the story, while a little slow, weaves together marvellously.

[Werner]

At least one of the stories in the newly released anthology I'm reading now, The Tanist's Wife and Other Stories: Stories of Alternative Histories, features an action heroine. (That's always a nice surprise to encounter in a book!) I got my review copy of this one as a PDF file from one of the contributors, my Goodreads friend Andrew M. Seddon; it's available for purchase on Kindle (and probably other platforms), but not currently in paper format.

[Sadie]

I about 1/2 done now and Stella has so far proved herself more than capable to taking care of herself and not inclined to TSTL moments.

[Jim]

I just got my socks knocked off by Doha 12 by Lance Charnes. If you like spy thriller with a lot of action, yet very realistic (it could be happening now) then this book is for you. One of the main characters is quite an action heroine.

Here's my 5 star review:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Werner]

Yesterday I started on (Dark Sword Press, 2014) by Juliene Lloyd, who's a member over in the Girls and Guns group; she was kind enough to offer a couple of review copies to group members who wanted one, and I snagged one of them. It's the first novel in a projected series; the heroine, Elizabeth Ashton, is an FBI sniper whose fiance has just been murdered in Honduras by the minions of a drug lord. I'm already thoroughly hooked!

[Juliene]

Thanks Werner! Glad you are enjoying the story.

[Werner]

Thank you for giving me this chance to read it, Juliene! And sorry I didn't pick upon the fact that you're a member of this group, too. Glad to have you! I'll add Operation Angelica to our "written by group members" shelf.

[Charles]

I just finished Vic: Double Trouble, by Jerry Gill, a Goodreads author. It featured a female hero and she definitely fit into the action mold. I reviewed it.

[Werner]

Good review, Charles; I just officially liked it. And I added the book to our group shelves, as well.

[Charles]

Thanks, Werner!

[Mike (the Paladin)]

I just finished Spider's Bite which has a pretty "b** a**" female protagonist. It does have a pretty graphic sex scene but the book's pretty good.

[Werner]

Mike, Spider's Bite has been on my to-read list since I read four-star reviews of it from Danielle and a couple of my other Goodreads friends; and I recently snagged a copy of it from BookMooch. So I'll be interested in your review, whenever you post one! Any graphic sex scenes are a negative for me; but I'm still prepared to judge an individual book on its overall merits, and Gin's character strikes me as intriguing.

[Mike (the Paladin)]

I was simply relieved that the book didn't get swamped by a paranormal romance. Gin does fantasize whenever she sees the detective and there is one graphic scene. It doesn't overwhelm the book.

Of course, Gin is an assassin.

[Werner]

Well, just because a lady happens to be an assassin doesn't always mean that she's necessarily a bad person. :-)

[Mike (the Paladin)]

I'd call Gin...Neutral for the time being.

[Alison]

Just started The Serrano Legacy Omnibus One by Elizabeth Moon. I can see some similarity with Vatta, but I'm enjoying the read immensely.

[Werner]

My Goodreads friend Andrew Seddon doesn't generally write action heroine fiction (though I've beta read one of his novels that will be a fine addition to the field when it's published!). Most of the stories in his collection Ring of Time (which I'm currently reading), about a time-traveling historian from the 27th century researching the Roman Empire firsthand, don't feature heroines of this type. There is, however, one exception to that.

It's a historical fact that the brutal blood sports of ancient Rome featured gladiatrices as well as gladiators, whose combats were as deadly as those of their male counterparts. "Asellina's Last Fight," which finds our protagonist researching the lives of some of these women in first century Britain, is one of the greatest action heroine yarns I've ever read, and title character Asellina --slave, gladiatrix, fierce fighter and loyal sister-- is one classy lady!

[Alison]

Have you read Russell Whitfield's 'Gladiatrix' series about a female gladiator? Very nicely done, IMO.

[Werner]

No, Alison, I haven't read those books, although I'm aware of them. Russell's a member of our group, and I think has a thread here for the series (at least he's mentioned it on the discussion board). I've never officially added the series opener to my to-read shelf; but since that shelf is already so out of control anyway (it recently passed the 380 mark, and counting!), I use our group's bookshelves as sort of an extension unit for it. :-)

[Werner]

For anyone interested, the thread for Russell's series opener is here: www.goodreads.com/topic/show/526531-g... . The Goodreads entry for the book is here: .

[Alison]

Werner, it's a sad fact of our mortality that we will never get to the bottom of our TBR pile!

[Werner]

I'm coming to think the same way, Alison! But I guess that's not such a sad fact after all; it would be even worse to some day run out of books one wanted to read. :-)

[Derrick]

Werner wrote: "For anyone interested, the thread for Russell's series opener is here: www.goodreads.com/topic/show/526531-g... . The Goodreads entry for the book is here: [bookcover:Gl..."

I picked that one up some time ago when I first joined this group - it might be going on 3 years now! I should probably read it.

[Werner]

Noetic, you're not the only one who owns unread books that have sat around for years. Actually, if three years is the furthest back any of them go, you're probably doing well --there are books in my piles that I got back in the 90s!

[Derrick]

Yup! I certainly do have several books that go back quite a few years unread.

[Laura (Kyahgirl)]

Hi group, haven't commented much but its nice to see you :-)
This month I've commited to catching up finishing the Jane Yellowrock series. Jane is absolutely an action heroine to get behind. Its very fine urban fantasy, very little sex, some swearing, lots of supernatural beings..awesome! Just finished and am moving on to The world building is quite dense so this is a series its probably best to begin with book 1.

[Werner]

I'm definitely behind Jane and rooting for her all the way, but I'm sorely behind in reading about her. (Pun intended. :-) ) I loved Skinwalker, but so far I haven't read any further in the series. ("So many books, so little time." :-( ) Just now, though, I put the second book, , on my BookMooch wishlist. (It's been on my to-read shelf ever since I closed the back cover of the first book!)

[Laura (Kyahgirl)]

If you don't have a lot of time, the short stories sprinkled throughout the series are really good too. :-) I know how it feels to not have enough time. My TBR keeps growing but I am cutting down my reading commitments....so many other things to try and accomplish!

[Werner]

Thanks for the tip on the short stories, Laura (I wasn't aware there were any). I'll have to check those out! (Would you say they can be read out of series order? I find that with short stories, that's often the case, even though I usually prefer to read series novels in order.)

[Werner]

Laura, you can disregard my question in the previous post; I checked just now, and found that the short stories are prequels to the series. I've got the first one on my to-read shelf!

[Laura (Kyahgirl)]

I know you said not to bother answering but I did want to add a comment. The short stories for this series are not all prequels. They often flesh out one of the other characters or show something from another POV. For example, there is a short story about how Rick got his tats and what they mean. There is one about the early days when Jane was very young and its told from Beast's POV. I have a compilation called 'Cat Tales' that is good. I also have 'Have Stakes, Will Travel' but haven't read any yet. I plan to read everything in this series as my January reading goal so will let you know if there are any you should really try to read.

[Werner]

Thanks, Laura! I added to my to-read shelf, too, a few minutes ago; but I noticed after I'd added it that it only seems to be available as an e-book. If I'm going to buy a book, I prefer to do so in the paper format (though I don't mind reading single short stories electronically). I'll be interested in your recommendations! (And thanks for letting me know the stories aren't all prequels --I picked up a wrong impression from the way Goodreads lists them.)