Tag Archives: Fae

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Book Review: Bad Girls Drink Blood, by S.L. Choi

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S.L. Choi‘s Bad Girls Drink Blood has been featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight a couple times and, somewhere along the way, I ended up with an ecopy of it. I think I probably won it in one of the giveaways.bad girls drink blood cover
Part sun fae, part blood fae, all abomination.

There is only one hybrid fae in existence, and that dishonor goes to Lane Callaghan.

After a life spent dodging slurs, threats, and assassination attempts, Lane gave her past the one finger salute and ditched her former fae home for good. The detective agency she and her sisters run on the edge of Las Vegas continues to limp along, with Lane doing more debt collecting and intimidating than investigating, but anything to pay the bills. Between working for low-lifes to bring down even lower-lifes, eating cheesy poofs by the bucket, and flirting with the criminally attractive bartender where she conducts business, life is good.

That ends when a routine job goes sideways, leaving Lane with a sack full of stolen sun shards—the source of sun fae power. Without the shards, the sun fae face giving up their magic completely, or risk death if they use their power. Considering they would rather see her dead, good riddance, as far as Lane’s concerned—except her father and adopted sister are sun fae. Lane must choose—return home to save the fae bastards that almost killed her, or let them burn.

my review
I generally enjoyed Bad Girls Drink Blood. I liked that Lane was a strong female lead, despite her personal insecurities. I appreciated her love and loyalty to her family and that, considering two of the three sisters were adopted, it’s very much a found family. Teddy made for a good romantic partner. I especially liked how he supported her without ever trying to stifle her more dangerous tendencies. The world(s) seemed interesting, the plot moved along at a nice clip, and the writing was pretty clean. So, lots of good stuff here.

I did think it was longer than need be—maybe tried to cover too much ground—there were a couple notable inconsistencies, and I felt a little cheated out of the romance. I liked Teddy and Lane, but we didn’t really get to see them falling in love or either one romancing the other. It seemed to have happened prior to the events of the book. As such, I wasn’t overly invested in them as a couple.

However, if there are future books, I’d be up for reading them.

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Review – Bad Girls Drink Blood by S.L. Choi

 

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Book Review: Fae Bound, by Verity Inkwell & Aspen Winters

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I do this thing sometimes, where I go to Amazon, limit my search to paperback books available through Amazon prime, in a certain genre, and then order them by lowest to highest price. It’s fun to see what the algorithm throws at me for like 2 bucks. If it offers up something halfway interesting and not number 37 in a series, I buy it and read it. It’s not so much about getting a cheap book, it’s about the chaotic joy of letting mysterious math and fate recommend a book. That’s how I ended up buying myself a physical copy of Fae Bound, by Verity Inkwell and Aspen Winters (a book I’d never heard of).

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Changelings are well known in lore. Fae take the human child and leave their own behind. But nobody has told the story of what happens to the human child taken.

My name is Amelie le Fae, and I am a human Changeling. High King Oberon declared long ago that Changelings had to marry and stay within the realm. I’m a bit of a different case.

I was born a witch, and being brought to the Underground realm only increased the potency of my magic. Unfortunately, Oberon had a clause ready for Changelings like me. Upon our three-hundredth birthday, we must be bound to no less than three mates.

Every fae in the Underground would give their left leg for the chance to be bound to a witch. The problem is, I want love. So, I’ve kept my magic hidden from suitors for two-hundred and ninety-nine years. I’m running out of time.

my review

This had a very simple plot, very little world-building, and basically no character development. But it was still a fun little sexy romp. Amelie needs to find no less than 3 men to marry in the next few days. Because, despite having had 300 years to do this, she’s waited until the last moment and not even bothered to learn anything about the requirement. (She’s 300, but this still reads like YA. Partly because of her lack of concern or knowledge about her own situation, but also because of the sort of interactions the characters have with their parents.)

Luckily, all she has to do is stand still and the men will throw themselves at her and, like any good fairy-tale, only the right ones will stick. Nothing in this was believable—yes, I know it’s fantasy, but even fantasy has to meet the suspension of disbelief threshold, and this doesn’t. But, again, it’s an enjoyable read anyway, if you’re willing to just let it be silly.

It is oddly in-explicit in the sex though. So, don’t go in looking for high steam. It’s not quite fade to black, but the sex scenes just aren’t particularly full or robust.

The book ends on a cliffhanger. But being only 148 pages, I feel like there really wasn’t any need to break this up into multiple books, except that that seems to be the thing to do lately.

All in all, not a finely crafted piece of literature. But there is an innocent joy to it that makes me interested in continuing. The 5 characters basically meet, decide they’re a family now, and go about being good to one another. There is something to be said for that.

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Book Review: Fae’s Torment, by Atlas Rose & Kim Faulks

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I received a signed copy of Fae’s Torment, by Atlas Rose and Kim Faulks in a Supernatural book Crate I ordered.

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Hate. Retribution. Revenge.

It burns in my veins and keeps me awake at night, hunting Crown City’s streets like the ones who took from me. 

But it’s not these streets where I want to spill blood. It’s over there, across the bridge. Where the shadows of this world cloak their sick, foul secrets…and where they trade magic for mortal lives.

I can’t get across there. Can’t walk in their world. If I could, I’d take this knife and shove it between his ribs.

But I doubt I’d find a heart.

None of them had hearts. Not their leader, Shrike, or Mojin, the one I see the most, or Honor and Ruin, the ones I don’t see. The ones no one sees.

They’re the ones who corrupt. They’re the ones who kill.

They’re the ones who took my brother from me…

Only I found a way to get to them now. This new seductive club the Wolves opened  called Dark City needs mortal women to entrance these beasts and I’m the one they’ll want.

The one who hides the truth behind her smile.

And a knife against her thigh.

Only when I take my chance I’m the one taken instead. But my enemy doesn’t want me dead…they want something else. Something those dark Unseelie eyes promise…and I might never sleep again.

my review

I was reluctant to dive into this book. It does have a note that says, “Each Mafia Monster series can be read as a stand alone in the same world. There is cross over of your favorite characters to help you understand underlying motivations better, but it’s not necessary to read from book one.” The thing is, I don’t always trust authors when they tell me a book can be read as a stand-alone, especially when—like here—it is either book 7 in an over-arching series or book 1 in a new one. In the end, I gave it a read. I’d say it’s just followable. I was really confused in the beginning and, honestly, never had a firm grasp on the world.The struggle is trying to pick apart what I wasn’t understanding because I’d not read the previous books (that the authors say aren’t necessary) and what I didn’t understand because of poor plotting and world-building.

Despite all of that, I was still able to enjoy Izzy and the fae’s insanity. None of it makes much sense, if you think too hard about it. She’s always trying to kill them, for example, but never seems to do more than press a knife to their neck or leg. If you really wanna kill someone, why are you pausing to threaten and not just doing it? Over and over again, I wondered this. And the potent mix of hate and lust that the fae so liked in Izzy would be seriously detrimental to her mental health. Talk about toxic and abusive! But by the end I was invested in the craziness enough to look for the next book (which isn’t out yet).

My only real gripe (besides the thin world) was the utterly unnecessary attempted rape scene. It contributed nothing to the book other than the apparent authorial need to ask, “can a heroine truly be strong unless someone’s at least tried to rape her?” It didn’t even make sense. She suicidally throws herself at groups of immortals but basically does nothing but beg when  a couple human men nab her. Ummm, that’s one seriously inconsistent characterization there.

Outside of that, I did have fun with this one eventually. It’s never going to top my favorite list, but I look forward to book two in a “it’s bonkers but fun” kind of way.