Comment on H. P. Mallory’s Dulcie O’Neil novels

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It probably would have been better to do this last month for Halloween, but I grabbed H. P. Mallory’s, To Kill A Warlock (Dulcie O’Neil, #1)  off of the Amazon KDP list. I enjoyed it, so I went ahead and bought books 2, 3, and 4. (I borrowed book 5). 

These books focus on Dulcie O’Neil. Goodreads describes the series like this: Dulcie O’Neil is a fairy. And not the type to frolic in gardens. She’s a Regulator — a law enforcement agent who monitors the creatures of the netherworld to keep them from wreaking havoc in the mortal world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Individually each of these books is all alright. Mallory has an easy, comfortable writing style that allows the reader to coast along unhindered. It is much like your best friend is telling you a story over a tall glass of some from-frou alcoholic beverage. There are some interesting characters, a couple steamy sex scenes, and a lot of sexual tension. Taken as a whole, however, I was underwhelmed with the series. 

To Kill A Warlock introduces Dulcie and her friends/coworkers, who share the limelight. However, as the series progresses each book focuses more and more tightly on just Dulcie, which I think is too bad. I know she is the main character, but she isn’t the centre of the world(s). She is like Netherworld crack apparently. All beings lust after her. She almost gets raped more times than I could count. The leaders of The Resistance listen to, and even seem to take orders from her, as soon as she makes herself known. (Guess there isn’t a need for her to prove herself in any manner.) She is the daughter of someone important, the best at her job, etc. The books just seem to spiral closer and closer to her and therefore allow for less and less development of the other characters. Though I did love a few of them. Bram is AWESOME and I really wanted him to find some happiness for himself. He was my favourite character by far. Knight is darned sexy all the way around. Quill keeps you guessing. Dia is a hoot and Sam is Dulcie’s Samwise Gamgee. You can’t help but like her. 

The books do seem to be getting shorter with each new one and ending on sharper and sharper cliffhangers. Book four was especially abrupt. It ended on a such a dun-dun-dun moment that I was almost afraid to even start book five. It is the last one currently available and I didn’t want to commit to another book only to get to the end and find that the pattern of the story not ending on the last page continued (which it does). Toward the end I started to feel like these weren’t even complete books. One bled too easily from one to the other and to be honest I would have preferred it if they weren’t so broken up. Each book recaps each of the previous ones. So, book one was recapped in book two. Books one and two were recapped in book three. Books one, two, and three were covered in book four. You get the point. It got really repetitive and took up a lot of space in the already short books. If there weren’t so many of them this wouldn’t be necessary and I wouldn’t have had to read the same passages over and over again. And considering book five literally started in the middle of the same conversation that book four ended with (to continue the previous example) it is safe to say the two books read as one. 

(I don’t know if it is coincidence, but I seem to be seeing this happen a lot lately. I have to wonder if the spread of the cheap ebook has somehow made it appear OK to create series that are almost closer to extend chapters of the same story instead of actual separate books. -Food for thought)

All-in-all there were aspects of this series that grated on my nerves, mostly because they emerged so often (same phrases used in every book for example). But I wouldn’t have read all five of them if there wasn’t some value to them. The story is an interesting one. You want to know what happens in the end…whenever that might be. There are enough alpha males pumping testosterone into the air to keep a hot blooded female smiling. Mallory lets her imagination run wild on the mystical creature front (though is is also a distraction and could be considered a detraction) and the writing is quirky and fun. I might have enjoyed it more if I had put some time between the books, but that’s just not the way I like to read a series. It’s worth picking up if you have the patience for it though. 

Book Review of Home Lost, by Franz McLaren

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Quite some time ago I requested Home Lost (Clarion of Destiny Volume 1) from Caveab.com to review. (Sorry it took me so long to get to it.)

Description form Goodreads:
In “Home Lost”, Volume I of the the eight volume fantasy “Clarion of Destiny”, Leena receives the Garlan branch. From first contact her life is changed. After a solitary journey she returns home to find her village in ruins. Confused and alone Leena sets out to search for her family and to discover the reason that the Garlan branch has selected her.

**somewhat spoilerish**

I’ll be honest. I am completely baffled by this book. It starts off really well with Leena following her destiny and accepting the Garlan branch before returning to her decimated village. After that…

Usually such books have a fairly predictable progression, the hero (or heroine in this case) sets off on a quest, meets people along the way, fights a few henchman, challenges the enemy, wins, and proceeds to whatever version of a happy ending the genre demands. Here, not so much. It stalled out at the sets off on a quest stage. By the time the reader reaches the cliff-hanger ending that people have been praising Leena hadn’t even reached a destination, let alone her destination, hadn’t truly identified her enemy, and if you discount ‘serving wenches’ etc she met four people. She had two run ins with bad guys, none of which seem associated with her quest and not a single actual battle with her new all-powerful Garlan branch. She used it a time or two, but never had to fight with it or even cared to explore its power. To complicate matters Darius (one of the four people) spent about twenty percent of the book recounting a story that didn’t seem to have anything to do with Leena or her situation. It might become important in future books, but I saw no reason for it here. The book consists of Leena traveling. Period. End of story, pun intended.

None of this however is the worst part for me. These are:

1. Leena is The Chosen and is supposed to be a strong hero for the people, but from the moment she leaves her village she just follows one male and then another. She unthinkingly, and one presumes appropriately, hands all decision making over to them. Apparently, despite being the hero she can’t be trusted to decide which direction to travel in or even when to stop and eat and she never tries.

2. Darius’ story: I don’t want to give it away, but he tells a tale (in which he is by far the brightest of the bunch) about a group of greedy merchants encountering a much less advanced civilisation and practically destroying it. He then saves the day, but in so doing decides to help them by providing them with what they lack socially so that they are closer to the level of his own society. This however, is just a well intentioned version of exactly what the merchants did. They imposed their own culture onto another and declared it an improvement, even while acknowledging that not everyone in the society appreciated the change and there were negative effects. The whole thing stunk of arrogance and ethnocentrism. I’m really not into that.

The book isn’t without highlights. It is well written. I especially appreciated the prologue and the fact that McLaren was willing to allow his characters to fall to their absolute bottom before providing them with any sort of reprieve. There isn’t always a happy ending in life, and even when there is there isn’t always an easy road to it available. It and chapter one make me think that if I was willing to read the whole series and then consider the story as a condensed whole I would find a jewel, but I think it would just take too long. People like this book. I’m not trying to say you won’t, but it didn’t really do too much for me.

Immortal Coil

Book Review of C.I. Black’s Immortal Coil

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I grabbed Immortal Coil off of the KDP list. (Now it’s time to return to my official review list, break is over).

Description from Goodreads:
Two souls. One Body. Sharing is not an option…

Terrible news has turned Anaea Salis’s life upside down. There’s nothing she can do to make it right and the stranger who stops to talk to her can’t help. But when that stranger, Hunter, an ancient dragon spirit, is viciously attacked and forced to transfer his spirit into her body, Anaea’s life takes a new terrifying twist.

Hunter should have known by now not to get involved with human affairs, but there was something about the woman that drew him to her and he just couldn’t help himself. Trapped in her body all he wants is to get out, except whoever is trying to kill him is now after her.

Their only hope of survival… plunge into the deadly world of dragons.

Review:

Anaea’s life is in the gutter and she sees no hope of it looking up, until an unfortunate encounter with a good-Samaritan named Hunter turns everything on its head. Both characters, Anaea and Hunter, are easy to engage with. I got a little tired of Anaea’s self-deprivation, but understood it too. Her strength of will, even in her beaten down state, was something I appreciated. Though I did think that her willingness to put herself in danger in order to establish her independence bordered on the stupid at times. I tend to want to slap such females. Luckily her who personality wasn’t based on this characteristic so it wasn’t overwhelming. Hunter was smoke’ hot, no matter his guise, but I never could figure out why he wanted so badly to protect Anaea in the beginning. It seemed out of character for him, or at least like something the man he had been wouldn’t have concerned himself with. I can’t forget good old Grey. He was a joy. I can see a sequel based on his character easily.

I really liked the feel of this book. I know that is nondescript. It probably comes down to the language choice as much as the actual events. The end result was a certain appealing tone. My favourite parts, however, were when Hunter’s dragon nature slipped through (the tendency to hoard things, the desire to woo a female with shinies and meat, etc). It tended to draw a mental ‘Aww’ out of me. It’s so appealing to see a strong man reduced to acting cute.

I’m did see the solution to Hunter’s body problem coming a mile away, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t appreciate the sad, poetic justice of it. I also wasn’t particularly surprised by the actual reveal that brought around the conclusion at the end. (I’m trying not to give anything away here.) It didn’t happen the way I thought it would though, so I still got a surprise. Over all I’m glad to have read it and will be well up for reading the second when it comes out.