Category Archives: First Reads 2015

Chance in hell kampman

Book Review of Chance in Hell (Chance Lee #1), by Patrick Kampman

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Chance in HellI downloaded a copy of Patrick Kampman’s Chance in Hell in October of 2012, from the Amazon free list. Thus, it qualifies for my TBR reading challenge, in which I’m trying to read books I’ve owned for two years or more.

Description from Goodreads:
Chance is a Texan vampire hunter until a botched raid kills his team and sends him running for his life. Looking for a place to lie low, Chance takes what looks like an easy job in California. Dispose of a mysterious object. No vampires involved. But Chance’s life is never that simple.

Within hours of reaching the West coast, his contact is murdered and Chance is left holding the key to a demonic weapon of mass destruction. To make matters worse, the weapon was stolen from the ruthless head of a multi-national corporation who will do anything to get it back.

With supernatural hit men on his heels, Chance has no choice but to turn to the creatures he once hunted. Soon he’s neck deep in otherworldly seductresses, rival werewolf gangs, ravenous witches, and dysfunctional vampires. His only hope is to gain their trust, and their help, before all Hell breaks loose. 

Review:
Hmm, not bad…ok, I suppose. This is yet another book that was entertaining enough to read but contains nothing spectacular. It’s funny. I’ll give it that. And Chance seems like a nice, honorable guy. I respect that. The writing is pretty good and nothing about the editing threw me off. So, on the whole it was all right.

But it’s a bro-book; not that that’s necessarily a bad thing. I don’t just mean all the car, motorcycle and gun specs, or even all the ‘this is how you flatter a girl’ nonsense (a good bit of which is wrong, from a female’s point of view, BTW) but much of the actual humor and all of the romance is geared toward guys. Again, that’s fine. Men deserve books too.

But I have to confess that, while some sexual innuendo can be fun, this book is drowning in it. Add to that a diarrhea-mouth, 17-year-old ‘player’ who constantly hits on anything that walks and what you end up with is a ceaseless barrage of frankly juvenile jokes. Scaled back it could have been great, I thought it was really funny in the beginning. By the end, it had lost all of its lustre.

And the ‘romance’ was just as bad. Essentially, two ultra-sexy, powerful, possessive, competitive alpha-type females lay claim to Chance practically on sight ad then throw themselves at him. Isn’t that every man’s fantasy? No need to work for it. Plus, he seems to have a decided preference for one, so I never could figure out why he strung the second along (and according to the synopsis of book two, continues to throughout the series).

There is very little world-building or character development. I never felt Chance’s history as a hunter. He felt too much like an average college student to have also been a hardened hunter. And you learn none of the other characters’ history.

Plus, the whole ‘this is a dangerous artifact that I can’t give the bad guy’ is all just stated and not really supported in any way, so that it feels very random. A lot of people put their lives on the line for something no one seemed to need to verify. I honestly thought the plot twist at the end might turn out to be that the urn was actually empty the whole time and every one had just jumped to unfounded conclusions. This all left the book feeling shallow and a bit like a gloss.

All-in-all, an ok book that I didn’t hate but didn’t love either.

A Hidden Magic

Book Review of A Hidden Magic (Sentinels #1), by Angela Benedetti

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A Hidden MagicI got a copy of Angela Benedetti‘s A Hidden Magic when it was available as a Christmas freebie from the publisher.

Description from Goodreads:
Fey incursions into the mortal world have been on the rise, and Paul MacAllister’s trying to figure out what the king of the local Elven enclave Under the Hill is up to and how to stop it. Rory Ellison was caught up in one of those attacks and nearly killed by a gang of goblins. He doesn’t believe they were real, though, and is resisting anything Paul might say to the contrary. 

Normally Paul would be willing to let Rory go his own way, at least until he’s taken care of more immediate business. But Rory has a particularly rare gift, one the Elven king needs to have under his control in order to carry out his plan. Keeping Rory away from the fey who will use him, to death if necessary, means protecting him night and day, whether Rory agrees or not.

Review:
This was only ok. Having said that…it was ok, which is not to say bad. The book was ok. The writing was fine. The editing was fine. The characters were likeable…all ok. But I still wasn’t blown away by it.

The issue I finished the book with is that nothing of any significance happens in it. It’s not that nothing happens—they put this fire out, put that fire out, defend against this attack, someone gets kidnapped and retrieved, things happen—but nothing of significance happens, nothing that would qualify as a broad, over-arching plot beyond two men meet amongst all this other stuff and kinda like each-other. As a result, I was never grabbed by the book. I liked it ok, but was never hugely invested in it.

Similarly, I liked the characters (the main ones and the side ones) but the reader never gets to know them. There isn’t a lot of character development and they remain shallow throughout the book. Again, I never felt invested in them.

Roughly, the same could be said for world building. All only ok. So, while not a bad book, by any means, also not a great book. It served it’s purpose of entertaining me for a few hours, but not a lot more.

Hard Fall

Book Review of Hard Fall (Deputy Joe #1), by James Buchanan

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Hard FallI downloaded a copy of Hard Fall, by James Buchanan, from the publisher when it was available a s a Christmas freebie.

Description from Goodreads:
Deputy Joe Peterson is Mormon and in the closet. Then ex-con Kabe Varghese lands in town on parole. When a tourist falls off the mountain, Joe finds he needs the help of this cliff climbing adrenaline junky to solve the case. Will Kabe tear him apart or does Joe need to fall hard before he can start living?  

Review:

Hmmm, well three stars I guess. It wasn’t bad but I didn’t think it was great either. Mostly, there were certain aspects of it I really appreciated and other aspects that just left me cold.

To start with I liked Joe. He was a good ‘ol boy, for sure, complete with the linguistic characteristics, hunting references and preference for Stetsons and cowboy boots. I liked that he was basically a good man. I really liked his faith and, as it’s instrumental to the plot, how he struggled to bring being a gay man in line with it. Outside of being gay he was a devout Mormon. He didn’t cuss; drink alcohol, or even caffeine. He attended church and paid his tithes without complaint. He appreciated the grandeur of nature and used it as a means to connect with his spirituality and God. He even wore all the church-sanctioned undergarments. (And how did I not know, or not remember maybe, that Mormon’s have their own kind of underwear?) GOOD MAN.

I liked Kabe less, but I didn’t dislike him. Honestly, he felt less substantial, as if he was just there for Joe to interact with. But he served his purpose.

Some of the sex was hot and Joe’s internal dialogue of falling in love was sweet. So, the book isn’t without praiseworthy material.

However, Joe’s drawl got on my nerves at times. Kabe’s refusal to understand Joe’s position and difficulties felt selfish. I got lost in some of the climbing terminology. I cringed over some of the handling of evidence in the case (though other aspects of it were well done). I hated the way Joe called Kabe ‘boy,’ even though I didn’t sense he was supposed to be that much older. It grated like an insult every-time he said it. I thought that the first spanking scene felt like abuse (and the second one not a lot better) and honestly the whole Dom/sub spanking thing came completely out of left field and felt wholly out of place with the rest of the book.

So, in the end, it was a fine read but not something that lit me up in any true fashion. Though, I’m totally stealing the phrase “You’re hats on too tight.” for when people say stupid things. This is worth remembering.

As a side note, Kabe was supposed to have been of Indian descent (dark skinned/haired). So, who’s that white, blondish guy on the cover? I hate when publishers put characters on the front of books and they don’t match those actual characters.