Category Archives: First Reads 2015

Sleepless

Book Review of Sleepless (Curse of the Blood Fox, #1), by Sera Ashling

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SleeplessI nabbed a Copy of Sleepless, by Sera Ashling from the Amazon free list.

Description from Goodreads:
Curses are not subtle.

They are things of pain, and for a very long time Santo has been caught in one. She haunts the roads of the country of Kurdak as a mercenary, fighting back sleep every night so that she won’t have to face the horror that comes for her when she rests. Weary, with sanity almost gone and no end in sight, Santo doesn’t know who did this to her or why she is still alive.

Someone does, though. 

As the mythical Week of Colors arrives, she receives a visit from a long-time acquaintance. Traken is a sharp-tongued sorcerer with a sadistic streak, and he comes bearing an “invitation” from his master, a secretive lord who has been watching her for far too long. Santo isn’t thrilled, until another message arrives in the form of an ominous prediction: following the sorcerer will mean the answers she wants, but she’ll likely die in the process. 

That’s fine with Santo, though, because she isn’t searching for a way out… she’s searching for revenge.

Review:
Wow, I am thrilled 2015 is starting so well. I stayed up way too late last night to finish this book. Then, tired as I was, I had to check if the sequel was available before I could drag myself to bed. (It’s apparently not, but I would have bought it if it had been.)

I had very low expectations from this book, being an Amazon freeibe. But it surpassed them by some distance. Santos and Traken are a fun pair. At the start of the book they are long time acquaintances, familiar and comfortable (if wary) with one another, but not friends. That changes over the course of the book and the back and forwards banter was great.

Santo is a wonderfully strong heroine, never flailing helplessly or swooning for a man. Meanwhile, Traken is nursing a touching fragility (while still remaining badass). Plus, though there’s no sex or even much romance, seeing a man practically begging a woman to give him orders is darned sexy. Having read what I just wrote, it doesn’t sound like it would be, but in the context of the story it really is.

I’m also happy to report that this isn’t a YA book. There isn’t anything in it that would be unsuitable for younger readers, but it’s pleasantly adult for a fantasy. There is violence and surprisingly grown-up themes of healing and redemption.

The writing was fun to read and the editing was fine. I noticed a few dropped particles here or there, but that could have been a character’s speech pattern. Hard to tell.  And, though never dull, the book does seem to drag a bit in the middle. There just seems to be a lot of middle, if that makes sense. All in all, a real win in my book, made especially sweet since I really hadn’t expected as much.

Talking to the Dead

Book Review of Talking to the Dead, by Bonnie Grove

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Talking to the DeadI’m making an effort this year to read books that have been on my TBR for more than two years. I downloaded Talking to the Dead, by Bonnie Grove from the Amazon free list on November 15, 2012. So, it qualified for my TBR challenge.

Description from Goodreads:
Twenty-something Kate Davis can’t seem to get this grieving widow thing right. She’s supposed to put on a brave face and get on with her life, right? Instead she’s camped out on her living room floor, unwashed, unkempt, and unable to sleep-because her husband Kevin keeps talking to her.

Is she losing her mind?

Kate’s attempts to find the source of the voice she hears are both humorous and humiliating, as she turns first to an “eclectically spiritual” counselor, then a shrink with a bad toupee, a mean-spirited exorcist, and finally group therapy. There she meets Jack, the warmhearted, unconventional pastor of a ramshackle church, and at last the voice subsides. But when she stumbles upon a secret Kevin was keeping, Kate’s fragile hold on the present threatens to implode under the weight of the past . and Kevin begins to shout.

Will the voice ever stop? Kate must confront her grief to find the grace to go on, in this tender, quirky story about second chances.

Review:
Before I get into the review of this book I should fess up to some discomfort. I downloaded this thinking it was Women’s Fiction and it passes as it until about 90% into the book, when the main character had a clear Transcendental experience with the “One True God” and the rest of the book was heavily Christian. Looking at the rest of the book through that religious lens also changed my interpretation of a lot of the previous events.

I say all of this because I’m ok with Women’s Fiction, not so much with Christian fiction. I literally stuck my finger in my throat and made gagging sounds at my Kindle. I would not have read the book if I’d known where it was going. This is not a condemnation of the book, just an informative statement of genre classification. So, the rest of what I have to say should probably be taken with the above in mind.

My primary response to this book was, “I’m apparently not a nice enough person to read this.” Now, acknowledging the religious bent of the book, I can understand that forgiveness is obviously supposed to be important and the book focuses solely on Kate’s experience. BUT, and this is a big BUT for me, none of the characters who do her seriously wrong ever get their comeuppance. Hell, Kate never even says a cutting word toward them let alone does anything that leaves the reader feeling satisfied that the bad guys got what was coming to them. NONE!

Yeah, yeah, ‘all things before god. It’s not her place to pass judgement. She’s a better person for not.’ Bla, bla, bla. They got off too easy and I wanted to at least see them being told what shits they were…preferably in public, with significant and measurable consequences. Didn’t happen.

The book is well written and I didn’t really see any serious editing issues. And I did really like Jack and Maggie reminded me of someone I know and love in real life. I appreciated the representation of how easy it is to get trapped in the mental health system. I’m not even blind to the small kindnesses of the people who did Kate so wrong, giving their characters a bit of grey. (Too bad all those kindnesses were in response to situations they created and threw her unsuspectingly into.) So there is something worth praising here.

I just get stuck because the very things that are supposed to provide emotional satisfaction and closure for the reader (they are there for the right reader), mean nothing to me. Therefore, I’m left in the cold still waiting for a happy ending I’ll never get because what I want to happen wouldn’t be ‘Christian.’

So, if you’re the type of reader who likes to see a woman totally and unfairly destroyed by her corporeal life in order to accept God into her life, this is a must read. I’m not that reader. In fact, I tend to actively avoid such books. It’s a shame I got sideswiped by this one.

Book Review of Flash Bang, by Kellen Burden

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Flash BangOver a year ago, I downloaded Kellen Burden‘s Flash Bang from the Amazon free list.

Description from Goodreads:
Sebastian Parks is drowning in a flood of his own creation. Dishonorably discharged from the Army, he’s wracked with night terrors and an anger that he can’t abate. Unemployable and uninterested in anything resembling a normal job, Parks makes his living in fugitive apprehension, finding wanted felons on Facebook and thumping them into custody with his ex-military buddies John Harkin and Eric “Etch” Echevarria. When the body of a teenage Muslim boy is found in front of a downtown Denver nightclub Parks, Harkin and Etch are called on to do what they do best: Find bad men and make them pay.

Review:
Wow, color me impressed! I went into this book with very few expectations, but I sure didn’t expect to like it as much as I did. Parks is such an incredibly compelling character. He’s funny in a sarcastic, ironic, somewhat desperately sad sort of way. You really feel him and hope ’till the end for his better tomorrow. The book is told from his first person point of view and the narrative is definitely indicative of his mental headspace. Here is an example (pulled pretty much at random):

When we’re done eating, she sighs, a very satisfied, pleasant sound. I don’t remember the last time I sighed because I was content, and there’s something about the way she does it that makes me hope for myself.
Says: “Okay. So, to business.”
And I nod, say: “I really appreciate you doing this for me.”
Says: “Tarik’s geography teacher didn’t have a lot to say about him.

Notice the use of Say (him)and Says (the other person in a conversation). This is how a lot of the book is written and it takes a little while to get used to. It’s not technically proper and it’s undeniably clipped, but stylistically, for a strong, damaged, silent-type, ex-CID soldier character it works perfectly.

And the man is damaged. He’s a bit of an anti-hero. Though not named, he’s obviously suffering some PTSD issues and struggling with guilt and feeeeeelllings. His two partners are fairing better, but they are all pretty much propping each-other up to one extent or another. (And I do love finding this in a book.)

There are a couple running…not gags, so much, but funnies that pop up more than once. My favorite being the “He said ‘Oh’…not like…but like someone asked who stared in Die Hard and you said Bruce Willis.” It’s dryly funny in context, believe me. I think I highlighted about half the book just because I found so many of the passages memorable for one reason or another—humor or poignancy or just blatant, unexpected honesty.

This book was a surprise hit for me. It’s gritty, and violent, and darkly noir-like. I found myself telling my husband about it in the exact same manner our seven-year-old reports the grand adventured of Phineas and Ferb at the dinner table. Though it’s only Jan. 4, I wouldn’t be surprised to find I finish the year with this still in my top 5 reads of 2015.