Monthly Archives: January 2022

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Spotlight & Excerpt: Huntress Prey + Giveaway

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I accepted a review copy of Selene Kallan‘s Huntress Prey as part or its blog tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours. However, since I wasn’t able to give the book a good review, I’ve held it until the tour finished (yesterday). The book was also featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight. You can find author information and the tour’s schedule there.

VALENTINE

After almost three centuries of running from my past, I should be used to loneliness. Being a mythological monster isn’t compatible with relationships. But the craving for company grows stronger every day, turning routine into an endless nightmare and making me wish for an end to my immortality.


The explosive encounter with a beautiful, lethal fae who knows what I am and how to destroy me reminded me of that proverb: be careful what you wish for.

AXEL
I thought fate could not surprise me after almost six hundred years. And then there she is—the echo of the brave young woman I’ve heard legends about. Only she isn’t human anymore, but a vampire, the greatest enemy of my species. After a fight that could have killed us both, and an uneasy truce, I am left with burning curiosity and so is she.

But will curiosity be enough to quench her thirst for my blood and my impulse to kill her before she strikes?

my review

I admit that when I accepted this for review, I did not realize it was 500+ pages long. If I had, I 100% would not have accepted it. Not only because I wasn’t really in a position to want to commit to 500+ pages, but also because 500+ pages is well outside the genre standard for PNR/UF. And, while not without exception, that’s because PNR/UF plots don’t usually support 500+ pages. That’s epic fantasy territory, not PNR/UF. Had I noticed the page count, I would have felt something rotten in the state of Denmark before I even touch a page.

And true to the norm, at 510 pages this book is FAR too long. I’m talking probably twice as long as need be. I’d say it should be split in two, but that infers that there is enough plot here to carry two 250+ page books, and there isn’t. (There’s barely enough for one!) Instead, I’ll say that half—a full 200-250 pages of this book—is chaff. It just plain needs to be cut. The whole excursion to visit Lily serves no purpose to the plot. Valentine making eyes and friends with Maya is extraneous. In fact, every scene with Valentine at work—with or without Maya—could be cut as not pertinent. Far too many side characters are given history, considering they do almost nothing but cook and eat during the course of the book. None of this excess is neutral. It all dilutes the already thin plot until what is left feels random, disconnected, and all but plot-less.

There are also too many references to things that aren’t expanded on. It made it feel certain there must be another book somewhere, though, as far as I know, there isn’t. Too many characters randomly introduced, even very late into the story.

The story has promise and if it had been given to a ruthless content editor with a scalpel, it could have been something worth reading. Instead, it feels like it’s written by a teen. A teen with a firm grasp of grammar and syntax, true, but a teen all the same. (I’m not saying it was. I don’t know anything about Kallan. I’m just saying it feels that way as a descriptor.) It’s in the shallow use of villainy, the frequent use of sexual assault, misogyny, and lasciviousness to signal evil or even just badness, the characters with a single emotional note, the Whedon-esque banter, the unsupportable wealth and technology of the fae had, etc.

Honestly, I would have DNFed it if I hadn’t accepted if for review.

I did appreciate the diversity (racial and sexual) of the cast (including two bi/pan-sexual main characters) and, as I said, the writing itself wasn’t all that bad. There’s some odd use of language, dodgy phrases, and the dialogue gets pretty clunky and stiff at times. Plus, the editing starts to flag in the last half—especially in terms of missing words, and in/on being confused. But the writing itself is readable.

All of the above is obviously just my opinion. Other people have given this book 5 stars. So, I suppose the best thing to do is decide where your own line and tolerance for such things lie and read the book or not.

huntress prey photo

Other Reviews:

Eye Rolling Demigod: Blot Tour Huntress Prey

What’s Beyond Forks: Book Review Huntress Prey

Book Review: The Witch and the Dreamwalker, by Victoria Rogers

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I accepted a copy of Victoria Rogers’ The Witch and the Dreamwalker for review, as part of its book tour with Rockstar Book Tours. The book and it’s prequel were also featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight. Over there you can find author details and the tour schedule.

It’s 1982, and rising star Vivian McKinley is determined to climb the corporate ladder of a growing paranormal security firm. With the help of Xavier Prince, President and CEO of Prince Charms, Vivian uncovers a plot to take over the business. The pair navigate office politics and machinations to prove a psychic vampire’s treachery.

my review
I have several things to say about this book, some good some bad, some fairly neutral. More than I’d expect for something so short.

First, I’m agnostic on the cover, but I will say it has nothing—tone, topic, content, etc—to do with the story inside it. It’s a pretty picture, but it hardly feels like the power suits, big hair, and machismo of 1982! Also neutral is that the magic aspects of the plot are extraneous. They could have been removed and the story and events could have occurred unchanged, just had non-magical explanations.

Second, on the positive front, the writing is perfectly readable, without feeling too cheesy. Even though I read an ARC, I don’t recall many editing mishaps. The early 80s is not a time period you see used in romance/erotic books too often and Rogers incorporated several period specific elements into the story, which was fun. I also appreciated seeing Vivian in boss-mode, taking no prisoners when she stands up for herself against the sexism of the time.

Third, on the negative front. Any impactful-ness Rogers might have built into the story by incorporating the sexism Vivian faced when everyone treated her as if she only got her position by sleeping with the boss was wholly undermined when she immediately started sleeping with the boss. Also, as I said, the magical elements weren’t pertinent enough to the plot to feel necessary, but similarly, the book’s unexpected swerve into Shibari/Kinbaku was sudden and not at all incorporated into the plot.

All in all, this wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t particularly memorable either.

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january 2022 short story clear out

Clearing Off the Short Story Shelf, Jan. 2022

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Lately, I’ve been making an effort to read some of the short stories (what I call anything under 100 pages) that tend to collect on my shelves. Often I read a dozen or so at a time and review them all together. In this case, I decided to read and review as many as I could in one day. I started around noon and I managed to read six. That’s not too bad. Unfortunately, there weren’t a lot of winners in this batch.

I read The Ghost of a Ninja, Ophelia, Beginning of the End, Fool the Demon, Tribute to the Alpha, and Ambushed.

short stories

The reviews are as follows:

The Ghost Of A Ninja, by Richard Auffrey

I wouldn’t have thought it was possible to make rape, murder, and vengeful spirits boring, but Auffrey managed it. Mostly because the writing is so stiff, flat and dry. There is no sense of peril or tension. I have the rest of this series, but I think I’m just going to delete it.

Ophelia, by Vicki-Ann Bush

Some of the Alex McKenna series was  featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight. So, I picked up this novella as an Amazon freebie to see if I’d like the series. However, where I thought this was a prequel, I’ve discovered it’s a companion novel to book 2. So, I read it out of order. This, no doubt, effected my enjoyment, because there was a certain amount of presumed knowledge that I didn’t have. But, even outside of that, I felt like this novella was super disjointed and hard to follow.

The Beginning of the End, by Emily S. Hurricane

The Bloodlines series was featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight, earlier this year. This was an interesting start to an apocalyptic story. But I’m just not a huge pan of serials. And, prior to reading it, I didn’t realize that’s what this is. Breaking a single story into several less-than-100-page stories makes little sense to me. But the writing is good and the plot seems interesting.

Fool the Demon, by Stacia Stark

I read this after book one, Speak of the Demon. I wish I’d found it first, because it’s a nice introduction to the series. I like the characters, world and writing.

Tribute to the Alpha, by Cara Wylde

Yeaaaah, NO.

Ladies and gentlepeople, your romantic hero:

“We can just kill your men to the last one, until only boys are left to protect you. You’d surrender then, and we’d enslave all the females. We need child-bearers, after all.”

That is his total attitude until has a sudden and inexplicable 180° attitude change at 70% for no reason at all. NONE. He then became loving and kind—a completely different character. Who need consistency?

Then the story ended with the human bride suggesting they set up a boarding school to train future girls to be shifter brides, so that alphas can BUY THEM.

No, this is so much NO for me.

Ambushed, by Rebecca York

I thought these stories would stand alone better than they apparently do. This was pretty clearly a single action scene, followed by a single mild sex scene and nothing more. The mechanical writing seemed fine, but there wasn’t enough of a story here to be worth bothering with.

short stories

I was doing some maintenance in my Calibre database last night, after I posted this, and found a couple more short stories. Some of them I’m fairly sure that I thought I’d deleted during my big purge last year. Meaning they were in Calibre, but no longer marked as owned on Goodreads. And for at least two of them I think it was because of naming conventions. For example, Into the Abyss (Rogue Hunter: Gaia #1) was in Calibre as Gaia: Into the Abyss. So, I see how they got missed. I probably didn’t manage to match them up

The result was that I decided to give this short story spree a little  more time and read six more stories. I chose six for balance. I thought, I read six yesterday and I’ll read six more today. The six are Unspoken, Unwilling, Wintergreen, Gaia, Ink and A Cupid’s Wager and the reviews are as follows:

Unspoken, by Kerrigan Byrne

This story has been republished as Highland Secret. But I have an older copy (as part of a box set). I think it is unchanged other than the title and cover. But since I’m not 100% sure, I’m going to stick with the old title and cover.

I thought this was an entertaining novella by older erotic romance standards. You know, where the language is all gendered—’his manhood’ and her ‘feminine core’—and velvet over steal, her pearl, etc. But I appreciate that the heroine is described as more rounded and soft that a lot of romance heroines are allowed to be and she is the initiator in the pairing.

Unwilling, by Kerrigan Byrne

Like Unspoken, this has been republished. It’s new name is Highland Shadow. But I have the old copy in a box set. I think I liked this the most of the three Maclauchlans novellas I’ve read. I appreciate a fiery, independent woman. I like seeing their male romantic partner stymied by them. However, the villain is SUPER cliched and the story does suffer from enemies, enemies, angry sex, suddenly in love plotting. But I guess I can’t hope for too much in a <100 page novella.

Wintergreen, by Alexis Hall

I don’t know how something with no sex in it can be so sexy.

Into the Abyss, by Kevis Hendrickson

Not so much a story as the start of something else. Also, only about half the listed 35 pages, as the rest is a sample of the following story/book. So, all around disappointing as a stand-alone read.

Ink: Some Like it Haunted, by Ellen Mint

Some of the Coven of Desire books have been featured on Sadie’s Spotlight. So, I picked up this prequel to test the waters. This was a fun, if somewhat insubstantial novella (most of it is sex). But as an intro to the series, it works. I’m curious to see where it goes.

A Cupid’s Wager, by Deanna Wadsworth

Meh, basically just an extended sex scene with a little bit of larger plot hinted at, should one continue the series (if there is a series). Writing was fine though.