Tag Archives: challenges

Book Review of Mystic Ink, by Casey Wyatt

Leave a reply

Mystic Ink

I grabbed Casey Wyatt‘s Mystic Ink from the Amazon KDP list. 

Description from Goodreads:
Welcome to Mystic, Connecticut, where a Satyr owns the local pawn shop, a Minotaur serves the tastiest pizza in town, and the nearest gate to the Underworld resides in the alley outside a tattoo parlor.

Nix–Sea Nymph, talented artist and proprietor of Mystic Ink–just wants to run her tattoo shop in peace and quiet. Peace and quiet, however, are the least of her problems. Mortal corpses keep springing up in her alley like daisies. Hades is angry that the mortals’ souls are missing. And to top it all off, the human authorities suspect Nix of foul play. 

Before long, the supernatural police force takes an interest. They dispatch Agent Calder Quinne to investigate. His assignment is simple: determine Nix’s guilt or innocence by observing her daily routine. Instead, he’s faced with an uncooperative Nymph who resents his presence and evades him at every opportunity. 

Nix finds Cal far too attractive and a challenge to her self-imposed ban on relationships. She wants him out of her life as soon as possible. When Cal’s soul is stolen next and Nix wakes up missing memories of the evening’s events, even she starts to wonder if she’s guilty. Now, she has only two weeks to locate Cal’s missing soul, or he’ll be doomed to spend eternity as a Shade.

Review: **Warning, slightly spoilerish**

Meh, it was alright. The writing was perfectly readable and it was well edited. I have no complaints on that front. But the story had a number of elements that I just plain dislike. For one, though Nix was the main character and the events centred around her, it wasn’t her who saved the day. Nope, Gods forbid the woman be in on the important action. Instead, she ran around from the start of the book until the end, encountering and being attacked by one mythological creature after another. Note, not intentionally doing anything but instead reacting to a presented stimulus. Then, in the end, all her male protectors went behind her back and saved the day. It was subtle, but all the impetus was taken by the men. At one point, Cal even asked her, Do you trust me?… Then hold your questions a little longer. In other words she not only wasn’t in on the action, she wasn’t even allowed to ask about it. This was all further exasperated by the fact that all of the power players were Gods. The only real Goddess you get to know is vapid and too busy with her facials and pedicures to be important.

Then there was the complete mishmash of pantheons. I get that this was intentional. The D.L. was, after all, an alliance of them. But come on, first we’re presented with the Greeks (including Sitars, Cyclops, Titans, Nymphs, Fates, Furies, Basilisk, etc), then the Egyptians. I’m still on board at this point. Then the Elves show up. Huh? And then Aliens! Really, WTF, it was just too much, too cluttered, too many disparate genres thrown together.

Then there was how easily everything wrapped up. The bad guy was defeated with absolute ease. More than once, problems were overcome almost miraculously. Nix being able to call in a favour based on winning the office raffle the year before, for example. Thats handy. Cal was given his prize and avoided a fate worse than death despite technically not completing his quest. Then, in the end, Nix rails at her father for three or four minutes and manages to convince him to change the rules that have been in effect for, presumably, millennia. I seem to recall stubbornness being a trait of the gods. Plus, these were pantheon-wide rules, so they affected everyone, not just her. It was just too easy.

Now I know I’ve bitched a lot. I was annoyed by the end of the book. But as I said, it was well written. There were some really fun characters. I especially liked Zeph and Devlin. I’m not discouraging anyone from reading it. Heck, I might even pick up the sequel if I come across it. I enjoyed the read, just not every aspect of the book.

A Blood Seduction

Book Review of A Blood Seduction, by Pamela Palmer

2 Replies

A Blood Seduction

I downloaded Pamela Palmer‘s A Blood Seduction from the Amazon KDP list. At the time of posting it was still free. (Plus, if you follow the link to her website you’ll find a contest to win a signed copy.)

Description from Goodreads:
Take me down to Vampire City…

Vampires live only for lust and pleasure in the eternal twilight of Vamp City. But the city’s magic is dying. The only person who can restore it? A beautiful woman from the mortal world…one who knows nothing of the power she wields.

Quinn Lennox is searching for a missing friend when she stumbles into a dark otherworld that only she can see—and finds herself at the mercy of Arturo Mazza, a dangerously handsome vampire whose wicked kiss will save her, enslave her, bewitch her, and betray her. What Arturo can’t do is forget about her—any more than Quinn can control her own feelings for him. Neither one can let desire get in the way of their mission—his to save his people, hers to save herself. But there is no escape from desire in a city built for seduction, where passion flows hot and blood-red.

Welcome to Vamp City…

Review:

I’ve had this book on my Goodreads wish-to-read list for a while because it’s raved about and tops quite a few Must-Read listopia lists. So, when I saw it come up on the KDP free list I grabbed it. Honestly, I’m not seeing what everyone loves so much.

It’s like one long, protracted rape scene. It felt like every vampire and trader in Vamp City must be walking around with a hard-on all day, constantly on the lookout for any female that they are somehow obligated to assault on sight. Seriously, I don’t think the book goes 5 pages without someone being molested in some fashion. People are killed, tortured and raped endlessly in this book.But this seems to be a fate reserved solely for women. Are horrible, psychopathic vampires really so picky? The reader is forced to confront women being literally ripped apart, drained dry, burned, beaten, raped by a penis wrapped in a barbed sheath, as well as just raped en masse and on display, fondled, molested, humiliated and intimidated non-stop (and I mean that almost literally. It is the backdrop of the novel), but only one man was embarrassed because he had to show his bits in an auction and one man was hunted for sport. That’s pretty much the complete list of male victims in the book.

I know rape is a pretty common motivator in fiction. It’s also used fairly common to ensure the reader knows bad guys are really bad, but I just couldn’t take a whole society based on it. I found reading this book extremely uncomfortable, and I read for fun. This was not fun for me. 

Then there is Arturo and Quinn’s relationship. There is a constant back and forwards between them in which he says he ‘I want you’, she counters with ‘as a slave,’ he then counters her with ‘no, in my bed.’ Now this wouldn’t be so horrible except that she’s his slave either way. He owns her.  There is no indication that (or even social process by which) she could be anything but a slave in Vamp City. So, there’s a mixed emotional message being sent here. She’s supposed to somehow accept that his wanting to make her a sex slave, as opposed to say a scullery maid, is somehow better or even acceptable. Here’s a direct quote about his thoughts on the matter,”If only he could make her a simple slave and keep her, always, in his house. In his bed.” Yea, he’s not looking for a wife or an equal, just a slave. Lets also not forget that he’s not even offering exclusivity. She’d be one of 4.

Then there is the way this is all cloaked in the illusion of choice. She knows it’s and illusion, but she’s falling for it all the same. She has no power, no control and no other options. Personally, I’d rather call a spade a spade and get on with it. Yea, I’m so not getting what people love so much about this book.

A lesser disappointment, though still a disappointment, is Quinn’s reunion with Zack. He’s essentially her sole motivation. She spends 90% of the book trying to rescue him. Are we, the reader, given a heartfelt reunion? No. Just a ‘go away Quinn.’ Such a let down. Sadly though, having finished it I find myself left with a morbid desire to read the second just to see if it could possibly be as bad. How misguided it that?

I wish I used star ratings on this blog so I could give the book a one star…except I still probably wouldn’t. I really want to. I disliked it that much. But dislike it as I might the writing was still alright and it was still well edited enough to deserve better than a one star. That doesn’t make me feel better about it though. 

Book Review of Shauna Allen’s The Cupid Chronicles: Inked by an Angel & The Halo Effect

Leave a reply

Inked by an AngelI grabbed Shauna Allen‘s Inked by an Angel from the Amazon KDP list. Then I bought the sequel, The Halo Effect.

Description of Inked by and Angel:
Jed Gentry is doing just fine, thank you very much, running his tattoo studio in Austin, Texas. So what if people think he’s a bit on the surly side? He’s been burned by his ex who sticks around to torture him and he lives with a family heartache that he’d rather not talk about. But he’s got a thriving business, his dream car, and good friends. Not much to complicate things. At least, not until she walked in…

Kyle O’Neill has had it with being the sheltered daddy’s girl at the family accounting firm and is ready to spread her wings and fly on her own for the first time. Unfortunately, it seems she’s about to fall flat on her face when her first and only client is – gulp — a tattoo artist! Her country club upbringing certainly hasn’t prepared her for this place or the sizzling attraction her traitorous body feels for the grumpy owner.

But there is a Divine conspiracy at work here pushing these two together. And they are hell bent on bucking the Heavenly plan all the way. Luckily, their angel is a true believer and pulls every trick he knows from under his halo to make this a match made in Heaven.

Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor?

Review:
I grabbed this expecting just a little bit of fluff. I was pleasantly surprised by the depth of characters I found, as well as the humor and a solid story.

I loved the angels and their AA meetings. They were a lot of fun and funny to boot. They all felt a little naive and well meaning. You could really imagine them bumbling through their missions and meeting almost miraculous or divinely inspired success. Oh, and poor Uri! Having said that I loved them, and I did, they did get a little preachy on occasion. They’re angels after all. But it was never so blatant that the book slipped over into prosthelytizing and religious fiction in the stricter sense. As a non-Christian I was never made uncomfortable by it, but I would imagine a committed Christian looking for an inspirational read to underscore the omnipotent, loving altruism of the Holy Father would be happy with it too.

I did think that in the end everything wrapped up a little too well. All of a sudden, and for no apparent reason, Kyle’s over bearing and self-absorbed mother decides to make peace. Kyle suddenly becomes strangely emotive and confesses seemingly out of nowhere despite being emotionally shut down just days before. Michael at least bends a commandment to give Jed a kick in the right direction, even though he showed every inclination of being a rule follower until that moment. Charles isn’t mad in the least when he finds out the truth. One character jumped from denial strait to eternal commitment and marriage, while another suddenly finds herself contrite after years of being otherwise. I realise that if you haven’t read the book these examples make little sense, but you can probably imagine their context and while they brought about a wonderful happy ending, they didn’t really feel very natural.

I’m so glad book two is about Noble. I found him an intriguing character, which is saying something since he was practically mute. All in all, I got more than I bargained for out of this one and would be more than happy to read more of Ms. Allen’s writing. If for no other reason than to see how many more small religious exclamations she can come up with. They were a lot of fun and made for an interesting running joke.

The Halo EffectDescription of The Halo Effect:
He’s gotta earn his wings…again.

Love Detail’s favorite angel has his sights set on his next target: the stoic and mysterious Noble Blackfeather. And it just may prove to be his toughest case yet. Noble’s reclusive ways keep his angel at wing’s distance, and love even further. But he’s not playing a part – he’s truly masking a painful secret and a profoundly wounded
heart.

A cupid’s worst nightmare.

Noble’s been paired with Braelyn Campbell, the cute single mother next door. She’s adorable, friendly, fun…everything Noble needs. This should be a Love Squad slam dunk. Except she’s making a fresh start in Texas to protect her son from a volatile ex, and she’s not about to risk her heart or her son on another man. Even if he’s sexy as sin and always coming to her rescue.

Thank God for possibilities.

But, reluctantly, they are drawn together – thanks to their cupid’s dogged efforts and a whole lotta chemistry. Can the girl next door learn to trust again and help heal Noble’s wounded heart? Together, can they save the lost, hurting boy she’s raising? Can the angels help it happen before it’s too late?

Thank God for love

Review:
The Halo Effect is a nice continuation of The Cupid Chronicles. If I’m honest I didn’t like it as much as the first, but I still liked it. Braelyn is a forward woman who knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to go after it without coming across as easy. I liked that about her. I also liked her relationship with her son. She was protective, without smothering him and he was polite despite being 14 and in the midst of an emotional upheaval. Noble was, well noble. I felt really sorry for him and was so glad to see him finally opening himself up. I would have liked to get to know him a little more though. You learn his history in this book, but hear very little of his internal dialogue, except for lusting over his neighbour (which would be important since he isn’t much of a conversationalist). I was also little disappointed that Michael wasn’t as much of a character. This book is much more a romance with a little help from above as opposed to the story of how Michael goes about his Love Duty mission (as in book one). It was still a really sweet romance though.

Like the first book I felt that the author built up the emotional hurtles to be overcome and then let them fall almost miraculously. I was often not explicitly aware of where characters change of hearts came from. It was emotionally satisfying that they did change, but I would have liked a little bit more understanding of how or why instead of just when.

My only two real complaints are that It was a little predictable (and questionably realistic) and the preachiness was amped up compared to book one. In Inked by and Angel the religious characters spouted off about god a bit. Ok, makes sense that’s part of their character after all. In this one the narrator had a much more religious bent going on and as a result the whole thing felt much more Christian to me. I’m don’t mind religion in my fiction, but since I’m not in the market for a new religion I don’t generally enjoy mini sermons. Luckily, though more apparent, it wasn’t overpowering. I look forward to Eli’s story whenever book three finally comes out.