Category Archives: books/book review

the bone road

Book Review of Mary Holland’s The Bone Road

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Author, Mary Holland, sent me a copy of her novel The Bone Road. I’ve included both of the covers I’ve come across simply because I like them both. But I’m fairly sure the second is the correct and current cover. 

The Bone Roae

BoneRoad

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Description from Goodreads:

A divvy, a dying woman, and a promise

Rhona has the divvy gift; with only a touch she can tell if a baby will be fertile or a sterile Shun, destined to be killed or outcast. The people of the Deom depend on the divvys for survival, but it is a hard and brutal gift. As long as Rhona’s mother was alive, Rhona had followed the old ways, but now her mother is dead and Rhona is free to live her own life. She has one last obligation to fulfill: honor her mother’s dying wish to find a woman named Selina and offer her help.

Rhona has no idea who Selina is, but the best way to find anyone on Deo is to travel the Bone Road, the trade highway paved with the remains of their ancestors. And follow it Rhona does, accompanied by her young son Jak, straight into a twisted conspiracy of vengeance, death, rebirth, and the mystery of the Riders, men who never die and are bent on closing the Bone Road forever.

Review:
It’s been a while since I really mourned the end of a book, but The Bone Road is one that I will. I don’t want it to be over yet, though I’m so glad it ends. It is a nice, tightly wrapped stand alone book. Do those seem to be getting rarer these days, or is it just me? Either way, I’ve found a new author to follow. Holland’s writing is wonderful. The world-building is elaborate and the characters are extremely fleshed out. I absolutely loved, loved, loved, loved Jak and Matteo—wonderful male characterisations. Rhona and Ani are strong, self-assured women. In fact, I think Rhona is my new role model. Her steadfast determination do the right things while refusing to succumb to social pressures was both honourable and a little enviable.

This is fantasy for grown-ups. Now, it’s not light fiction. There are some real social injustices to be considered here. The classification of people into Wid, Zeosil and Shun is very reminiscent of a caste system and those in the lower tiers fair poorly. The reader is forced to face some of humanities crueler tendencies, but it is worth it because you also get to cheer for those fighting the good fight. I’m always a little wary of fantasy books in which characters are trying to change society for the better. Experience has taught me that what this ends up really being is an attempt to remake their fictional world into a moral mirror of the West. I was thoroughly pleased and immensely satisfied to find that Holland created a world and characters with moral quandaries different from our own, in which right and wrong were still identifiable to the reader, and was then willing to leave them alone.

I cannot say enough good things about this book. There is a generational shift in the middle and it slows down considerably for a little while while the reader gets acquainted to the new main characters. But it picks back up after 2-3 chapters and keeps the pace brisk after that. I have no hesitation about recommending this book. It’s fabulous.

Ace harper alexander

Book Review of Harper Alexander’s The Queen, the Jack, and the Master, #1 & 2

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I downloaded Harper Alexander’s Ace and Ace of Hearts (The Queen, the Jack, and the Master, #1 & 2) from Amazon’s KDP list.
Ace

Description from Goodreads:
“There will be crime on your hands, and treachery on your heels. A cruel, cruel world on your shoulders, and no flowers on your grave. And the joke, well…unfortunately, bless your heart, the joke will be on you. Only you. For there is a presence of hostility whose fangs are sunk deep into your future. There are gnashing teeth on your heels and around every bend. There is a price on your destiny. The bounty hunters among the angels will be after you. There is no stealth, Lady Spade. There is only running. So I suggest you run.”

If she had been so lucky, Ace might have received just such a warning. But the entirety of the point, here, is that she’s not. She has been chronically hapless from the web of the womb. Cursed with relentless, ruthless misfortune. Her very own entourage of bad luck, its signature everywhere, its shadow widespread and swift. The only compensation for this forsaken fate, destiny’s sole remedy: the fact that she is gifted and lucky at cards. Grossly lucky.

But survival is far from sympathetic. And not all games are as easy as cards on a table.

Review:
I couldn’t log into Goodreads last night for some reason, which means I couldn’t see my TBR list [the horror]. I was forced to pick something from my kindle essentially at random. I chose Ace. It starts with an A so it was early in the list. I was too lazy to keep looking. Decision made, end of.

I started it largely without reading the description. I’m sure I did when I downloaded it, but who know when that might have been. I didn’t know what I was getting into and this isn’t one of those books that tells you the plot on page one. Once I figured out what was going on, however, I started to really enjoyed it. The writing is sharp and theres’s a certain snappiness to the narration that I liked a lot. I kept on enjoying it until…

If I used star ratings on this blog I would say that I was set on giving it a full five stars right up until the last page, when it just suddenly and unexpectedly ended. There was no tapering off, no conclusion of the plot, no closure with the characters, just a harsh, ragged ending. It was as if someone had ripped several pages out (except that i was reading the Kindle version). It’s 338 pages long, so it’s a complete book, not one of those teaser novellas that are all the rage right now. But there is NO ending. This is not a stand alone book. I hate that! It’s my current number one literary pet peeve. I would almost drop it all the way down to three stars out of simple irritation, but that really wouldn’t be fair. But really, who wants to finish a book and not know the ending?

Lack of satisfying conclusion aside, I liked almost everything else about this book. (Except for the fangs explicatives. It was a cute idea, but there were just so fanged many of them.) It did take a startling long time to figure out where the plot was going. I don’t just mean that it’s such a intriguing mystery I couldn’t figure it out. It felt a bit like it was drifting. Characters have to find their quest, or obstacle to over-come and it took a long time (most of the book actually) for Ace to find hers. If in fact she did. Given the lack of ending it’s hard to know if the final escapade was THE ONE or just another one. That’s part of what made the abrupt ending so harsh. It felt like she had JUST, finally gotten started. Be that as it may, I enjoyed her crazy, unpredictable, curse-ridden journey, even when I didn’t know what it was supposed to be accomplishing. (OK, I’m letting it go now.)

The whole thing had a strange Douglas Adams feel to it. It’s a completely different genre, of course, dragons instead of space ships, lack-luster primitives instead of depressed robots, but the random nature of events felt similar. So did the humour. Ace’s non-plus acceptance of her curse and the unexpected places it took her is very reminiscent of Arthur Dent’s hapless trek through the galaxy at the behest of good old Ford Prefect. I laughed aloud more than once.

Ace, herself, is a strong female lead. Very little makes her loose her cool…very little but one, Mr. Cheater. Cheater gets on her very last nerve on a regular basis and I loved him. He was calm and collected, mysterious and dangerous, witty and just a little sexy too. I want more of him. There were very few meaningful side characters in the book. Palo is the only one I can even think of. But Ace encountered quite a few that popped in and then out again. They may or may not be of any importance.

All-in-all, I generally enjoyed the book, but there is just so much unfinished business that I feel very unsettled about it. (OK, so I couldn’t quite let it go.) What about the pirates, the crazy gypsy lady, the old woman and her amazing mansion? I want to know. I’ve got the sequel, Ace of Hearts. I’m really hoping it clears things up because I genuinely want to go back to loving this story.

ace of heartsDescription from Goodreads:

Following her die-hard pattern of survival, Ace has taken to running again, leaving abandoned companions to tie up the loose ends of failed commitments. She has at last become a victim of involvement, however, and it is not so easy, this time, to up and leave everything behind. Scarcely free of it all, she is pulled right back into its complicated midst – and this time, people of authority are making demands.

As if it’s not enough knowing her frightful sense of bad luck is catching up to her – and therefore those around her – Ace’s involvement begins to weigh on her in ways not anticipated. Learning of the dark secrets of others actually leaves her with a conscience pertaining to sides she has chosen in this detour of engagement, and an evolving tactic of her gift with cards is drawing those she plays games with closer to her.

So close, she just might be developing the treacherous likeness of feelings for them. And this time, running is not an option. From the dawning humanity inside her, or the misfortune that now has the grounds to be more cruel than ever, threatening to descend on those that have come to mean something to her.

Review:

Ace of Hearts is every bit as good as (and as frustrating as) its predecessor Ace. It is just as well written. The narrative is just as sarcastic and indicative of Ace’s personality. Its plot is just as twisted and original and the characters are just as wonderful. But it is also just as incomplete. All of the threads are just as loose and all of the questions I had at the end of book one, plus some are still left unanswered. Thus, I am just as peeved now as I was then. (Then being the end of book one.)

Like the first book I probably would have given this one five stars if it actually ended. The ending isn’t quite as abrupt as in Ace, but there still isn’t any conclusion. The whole book, the whole freakin’ book builds up to one moment…and then it ends just before it happens. Honestly, what the bloody fangs is that? This means that I have now invested the time to read roughly 650 pages about characters I generally like and a plot I’m invested in seeing the end of without ANY payoff. This is exacerbated by the fact that there isn’t a third book yet and even if there was I don’t know how long the series is going to be. This means that I am left waiting for the continuation of the story and worried that even once it (Queen of Hearts I think it’s called) is out I’ll be left in the same boat again. This does not make me a happy camper, or reader. I know this issue may not bother others as much as it does me, but as much as I’m liking the story I don’t know if I’ll be continuing it. It’s starting to feel just a little masochistic to do so.

It’s such a shame too. The author is a truly talented writer. There is a lot of wit in this book, a lot of heart-felt emotion, and a couple really interesting characters. If, by chance, you are the sort who doesn’t mind the possibility of a never-ending story-line I highly recommend this series. I think I might be dropping it however.

Review of Lori Villarreal’s Twelfth Moon

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Twelfth Moon

I chose Lori Villarrael‘s shape-shifter PNR, Twelfth Moon, from the Amazon KDP list. 

Description from Amazon:
Cadence LaPorte is about to be hanged.

For weeks, U.S. Marshal, Jonah Kincaid, has been hot on her trail for the murder of his brother. His pursuit ends in a dusty Texas town at the scene of a lynching – namely, Cadence’s. Since revenge is at the top of his list, he saves her from death-by-hanging – for now.

Except Jonah thinks he’s been tracking a young boy.

And Cadence has this itsy-bitsy little problem: The women in her family are shape-shifting panthers, and once a year they’re compelled to mate with any male who happens to be in the vicinity – and become bound to him for life.

Jonah Kincaid is the last man on earth Cadence would wish to bind herself to. If she doesn’t find a way to escape him soon, she’ll be mauling the infuriating (handsome) U.S. Marshal – but as a woman, not as the panther.

Despite the obstacles thrown in their path, can two imperfect people find perfect true love?

Review:
Twelfth Moon was alright. I passed a couple pleasant hours reading it. It had its fun moments. I really liked Jonah. He was a good, kind soul, and I liked that. Candice…well, not as much. I didn’t dislike her, but when she fainted 13% into the book, I knew that she wasn’t going to make my favorite character list. The Apaches were marvelous.

It was a nice twist that the female was the shifter. I can’t remember reading a book in which this is the case. The rest of the story was fairly par for the course, though. There wasn’t much that stood out as new and exciting. Plus, I never could quite buy the whole I’ll be bound for life to any man I have sex with during this full moon, and I have no control over who that might be. I could roll with that punch as far as Candice having to mate with any male available during the particular full moon. Heck, it even makes sense evolutionarily by guaranteeing variety in the gene pool (though it obviously wasn’t associated with fertility in any way), but being bound to them for life just took it one step too far for me. I had hoped it would make sense after reading the book, but no, I still don’t get it.

I was also left a little baffled when, about 45% of the way through the book, the plot seemed to take a drastic and unexpected turn. I suddenly felt like I was reading a different book. It wasn’t that I disliked where the storyline went; it was just a little disconcerting to have it shift so unexpectedly. New people were introduced. Characters who had previously only been filler in the background were suddenly pulled in as active participants in the plot, etc. Then it did it again at the end when the book went all domestic on the reader, giving us the familial details. The fact that Jonah’s wealth was irrelevant to the plot but needed to be mentioned made me keenly aware that the men in PNR always seem to be obscenely rich. Anyone know why that is?

I don’t mean to infer that I didn’t like the book. It was a fun little read, if a little repetitive at times. I liked that in the beginning a bad thing didn’t almost happen, it actually happened. Villarreal didn’t allow Candice’s rescue until after the fecal matter had hit the rotating blades. It created realism. I think there is plenty more to come in this series too. Enough threads were left open for at least a few more books. I’d be interested in knowing if my guess for Candice’s sisters is right and where the story goes.