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Audiobook Review: Spark of Lightning, by Jessica Gunn

Somewhere on the internet, I stumbled across an audiobook code for Jessica Gunn‘s Spark of Lightning.

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Be careful what you wish for…

There are very few things I know to be true. I’ve worked hard to stay alive while waitressing at Lunar Royale, a premiere casino in Boston serving explicitly supernatural clientele. I’ve taken these risks because I need money to escape Boston and start over in a new city. That money isn’t coming fast enough, and now this job might kill me before I can escape.

Tonight I plan on carefully maneuvering my way into the most important game of poker ever played at Lunar Royale. The stakes are high, and the players are Boston’s supernatural elite. But by the time I realize it’s not money they’re playing for, I’m stuck in the game. The real prize? A dragon’s egg. Dragons were supposed to be hunted to extinction during the Supernatural War, but before that, they were powerful conduits of magic. This egg, if real, is invaluable.

You may just get it…

All I wanted was to escape the city, and winning this dragon’s egg might be my ticket out…if I can survive the game to the end. I just have to ignore the way the dragon’s magic hums, calling to me from across the room.

As if this dragon has belonged to me from the start…

my review

spark of lightning photoThe basic premise of this story, that a waitress at a paranormal casino manages to almost silently flirt her way into a highroller poker game, is entirely incredulous; so much so that I had more trouble suspending my disbelief about it than I did about dragons, fae, and vampires. But once I got past that initial trouble, the rest of it was okay. Unfortunately, although I think it’s objectively fine, I don’t think it’s for me. I just found the whole thing kind of milquetoast. I never found myself vested or overly interested. This feels very much like a ‘not the right reader for the book’ sort of critique. Shannon Condon did a fine job with the narration, however.


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Audio Book Review: Pretty When She Dies, by Rhiannon Frater

I have had a copy of Rhiannon Frater’s Pretty When She Dies for a while. So, the memory of where I got it is vague. I believe I was probably given an Audible code for a free copy.

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Amaliya wakes under the forest floor, disoriented, famished and confused. She digs out of the shallow grave and realizes she is hungry…in a new, horrific, unimaginable way… Sating her great hunger, she discovers that she is now a vampire, the bloodthirsty creature of legend. She has no choice but to flee from her old life and travels across Texas. Her new hunger spurs her to leave a wake of death and blood behind her as she struggles with her new nature. All the while, her creator is watching. He is ancient, he is powerful, and what’s worse is that he’s a necromancer. He has the power to force the dead to do his bidding.

Amaliya realizes she is but a pawn in a twisted game, and her only hope for survival is to seek out one of her own kind. But if Amaliya finds another vampire, will it mean her salvation… or her death?

my review

The narrator, Kristin Allison, did a good job, and I enjoyed this book beyond the 25% mark. I spent the first quarter of the book thinking I was going to end up DNFing it because I wasn’t having a good time. The beginning of this book just feels like female victim porn. Every person the FMC meets victimizes her somehow (most, even her family, with a sexual edge). I disliked it intensely, and it’s suuuuper cliched. I just don’t enjoy reading rapey stories. I’m not talking about trigger warnings or anything like that; I just mean I do not enjoy it and generally try to avoid it in stories I read for entertainment.

However, once the FMC meets the MMC, the story changes (pacing, tone, and the expected plot arc all shift), and the rapey victimization subsides; I then enjoyed the rest of the book. Now, because I know it’ll be a ‘no’ for many readers, I’ll state up front that cheating is involved. The FMC steps into someone else’s established relationship as ‘the other woman.’ That’s a dynamic you don’t often see because many people wouldn’t forgive an FMC for that. So, fair warning. I noted it with a bit of a raised eyebrow, but let it go easily enough.

All in all, despite the rough beginning, I finished this happy. I loved the side characters (almost pretty when she does photomore than the main characters), and the FMC showed a surprising backbone. Admittedly, the MMC is somewhat of a cardboard cutout, the relationship is quite shallow, and the FMC’s sudden mastery of her power feels a bit deus ex machina. Plus, the story and language are a little dated. (I think it was first published in 2008.) Describing women of color as “exotic” is generally understood as a microaggression now, for example. But, all in all, I’ll likely read the second book at some point.


Other Reviews:

Pretty When She Dies by Rhiannon Frater

Review – Pretty When She Dies by Rhiannon Frater

 

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Book Review: Fire’s Daughter, by India Arden

I received a free Audible code for a copy of India Arden‘s Fire’s Daughter.

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Confronting a gang of dangerous rebels is one thing. Falling for them is another.

You can’t turn on the news nowadays without getting bombarded by stories about the Rebels. They look so scary on TV – blowing things up, knocking things down, terrorizing the declining city of Corona, and making sure even the rubble doesn’t go unscathed.

My father is the reigning Arcane Master of Fire. Since he’s a prominent figure in both politics and magic, it only makes sense that my family is a target.

Still, I never expected to encounter a Rebel leader in person. I never imagined I’d be drawn to him, either. And I most definitely never dreamed I could lose my heart to them all.

The Rebels:

Ember: The leader

Sterling: The healer

Zephyr: The thinker

Rain: The dreamer

And Aurora is the heart of the group, pitted against her own family in this enthralling series.

my review

I actually DNFed this and then later came back and finished it because I was short on my yearly reading goal. (That is the only reason, not because I was enjoying it.) Look, I might have liked this when I was too young to read critically. But now, I am pretty disgusted by it. I’d call this Fundamentalist fiction. You have a smart, capable woman who has all the power in her own hands, but she happily (because it’s inferred to be the right thing) hands it all off to men who will take care of her but have no power to do so without the sacrifice of her power to them. And she turned pretty useless once they came into the picture. Plus, the whole thing is just so ridiculously ham-fisted. I have the rest of the series, but I will not be finishing it.

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