Tag Archives: fantasy

Storm Raiders

Book Review of Storm Raiders (Storms Of Magic Book 1), by PT Hylton & Michael Anderle

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I received an Audible copy of Storm Raiders (by P. T. Hylton & Michael Anderle) for review.

Description from Goodreads:
In a time when magic rules the sea, she only trusts her sword.

Abbey has always been an outsider in Holdgate. While the people of her adopted city dominate the seas with their weather-controlling storm magic, she prefers the work in her father’s blacksmith shop.

Besting any foolish enough to question her skills with a sword.

But when her father is falsely accused of murder, she has to sneak aboard a stormship and take to the seas in a quest to clear his name.

Teaming up with a young storm mage and a no-nonsense Captain, Abbey sets off on a swashbuckling adventure.

She’ll soon learn that the legendary Storm Raiders–a terrifying group of seafaring pirates–are all too real.

Set on the foundation laid by the Kurtherian Gambit Series, Storm Raiders tells an entirely new story in the Age of Magic–and of the heroes and villains who battle for control of its destiny.

Review:
Generally enjoyable and I thought Gabra Zackman did an excellent job with the narration.

The good: I liked Abby and Dustin. I liked that she’s pretty much badass and he’s more than willing to let her go forth and kick butt, while he takes a step back. I thought the writing was quite readable and the world, future Earth, is interesting. Though that same world seems to be part of a larger series in which several authors are creating stories. (I didn’t realize that until I got to the Authors’ Notes section at the end.)

The bad: I simply could not believe that there was such a large and long running conspiracy and no one knew about it. Which mean, I pretty much didn’t believe the underlying premise of the mystery and plot. Further, I don’t believe that even if such a large, long running conspiracy had been occurring two separate groups could undercover it in a day or two. That was all far too convenient and easy.

Personal quibble: I didn’t like the cursing. Now, I don’t have any issue with cussing in general. I, myself, curse like a sailor. But the book is YA and I would say on the lower side of YA. Not quite MG, but certainly I could see a tween reading it; which means the cursing seemed out of place. So, my complaint isn’t any sort of prissy, moralistic one, but stylistic. It felt like the author aimed for a certain audience, which genre-wise generally doesn’t include ‘dirty words,’ but then dropped a curse in every once in a while and then I didn’t know which age bracket he was aiming for after all.

Vanity in Dust

Book Review of Vanity in Dust (Crown & Ash #1), by Cheryl Low

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I won a copy of Cheryl Low‘s Vanity in Dust through Library Thing.

Description from Goodreads:
In the Realm there are whispers. Whispers that the city used to be a different place. That before the Queen ruled there was a sky beyond the clouds and a world beyond their streets. 

Vaun Dray Fen never knew that world. Born a prince without a purpose in a Realm ruled by lavish indulgence, unrelenting greed, and vicious hierarchy, he never knew a time before the Queen’s dust drugged the city. Everything is poisoned to distract and dull the senses, even the tea and pastries. And yet, after more than a century, his own magic is beginning to wake. The beautiful veneer of the Realm is cracking. Those who would defy the Queen turn their eyes to Vaun, and the dust saturating the Realm. 

From the carnivorous pixies in the shadows to the wolves in the streets, Vaun thought he knew all the dangers of his city. But when whispers of treason bring down the fury of the Queen, he’ll have to race to save the lives and souls of those he loves.

Review:
What a lovely cover that is. I wish the book lived up to it. It’s accurate and all, there’s a well-dressed, handsome man and he drinks lots of tea and eats lots of pastries, but I didn’t love the book as I loved the cover. Now, I didn’t hate it. And for most of the rather plodding, slow book I held out hope I’d end it happy. But I did not. Mostly because a very small mystery developed toward the end of the book and it was solved, but the larger mysteries were never even touched on. Not touched on in a way that makes me doubt they’d be solved in a next book or one after that.

I thought the world was interesting. Magic is basically a drug, it suffuses almost every aspect of the wealthy citizens’ lives, making them vapid and useless. And you see this in everything from their attitudes, to their sex to the tea cakes and torts that constitute food. It was a well-drawn world. I thought the writing a little purple, but still good. The pace was very slow, but it was atmospheric and I didn’t mind until I realized it wasn’t going to go anywhere important. So, some really good points for the book, but a few demerits too.

I was annoyed that the one thing that spawned Vaun to action was his affection ( won’t call it love) for a woman. The one woman he previously has never been able to have. I HATE this plot device. You have a man who has sexual access to every woman in the kingdom practically. He’s a man-slut (they all are). But one woman won’t sleep with him. So, she’s THE ONE. So, she sleeps with him. I’m always annoyed by this.

But on a more world-level scale I was not happy with the use of bisexuality. At first I was really thrilled to see that bisexuality seemed to be the norm. But it really was just presented as a way for characters to have more sex (twice as many options for sexual partners, you see), and not explored at all. But what’s more, it was all inferred. Like, the author was willing to allow for it, but not brave enough to show it. Granted, most of the sex was off-page, but there were plenty of ‘waking up in bed together’ scenes and they were all M/F, except one, and I didn’t sense sex had been involved so much as one man coming into the room in the morning to avoid being seen elsewhere. So, it kind of felt like a cheap use of bisexuality, instead of a representation of it. Similarly, if they were all so sexually debaucherous, why was prostitution still so shamed? More so than a child-like woman who trolls the rough side of town for her rape fantasies and is still considered the only “innocent Vym.”

All in all, I had complaints, but I would have rated this quite a bit higher if I felt the overarching mystery was touched on at all, instead of set up to hover over the book like a giant spider and then ignored. I probably will give book two a chance. If it looks like it is going to move the bigger plot along I’ll finish the series. If it remains focused on the smaller dramas, probably not.

Land of Gods

Book Review of Land of Gods (Falls of Redemption #1), by Justin Sloan

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I received an Audible copy of Justin Sloan‘s Land of Gods. I believe I requested it when the author was offering codes for free.

Description from Goodreads:
In a world where men believe they can become gods, Narcel searches for his missing brother while trying not to let the girl of his dreams slip away to his older cousin. Evidence for his brother’s disappearance points to the rival warrior clan, the Mawtu, a viscous group of warriors… which could mean only one thing: war on the horizon. 

The FALLS OF REDEMPTION trilogy: A young man is forced to become the warrior he never wanted to be, attempts to earn the love of a woman he seems destined never to get, and struggles to find himself in a world of betrayal and intrigue.

Review:
Sigh, I think this was a case of wrong book for the wrong reader, because while I have no issue with the violence or even that the plot just kind of plodded along, the feminist in me couldn’t not notice the treatment of females in the story. I’ll grant that one of the leaders was female and that’s a plus. But she was virtually characterless. Other than her, every single woman was there to be sexually available. Maybe they were all meant to be prostitutes, I don’t know, but it was very noticeable.

Then there was Kaire, the love of the main character’s life. She was just an object, a prize for two men to fight over. But that wasn’t what sent me into a froth though. What got my goat was the way she was supposed to vacillate between two men. I can see what the author was TRYING to do. Unfortunately I cannot express how poorly he accomplished his goal.

The problem was that Sloan’s characters were as subtle as a sledge hammer, making one a “good man” and one a “bad man.” So, Kaire’s affections for the bad man made no sense. She’d have to be very, very stupid to honestly not see it and she wasn’t supposed to be. Sloan tried to do too much. She was supposed to love one man with all her heart, but still want the second guy. (I kept hoping that she was playing some deeper game, a spy or something.) It made no sense, was not believable and basically ruined the book for me.

It’s the same sort of dissonance Sloan created when he tried to convince readers a person would change national and familial loyalties and become a perfect warrior in six months, but also still be loyal to their homeland. You just can’t do both. So, this whole book was full of contradictions that made no sense to me.

I also lost track of the time line, so people’s ages. But none of them seemed old enough for what they were doing. And I felt quite a lot was left unexplained. Why, for example, did Narcel kill Jordan? What is the ‘room of contemplation’ (or something like that)?

The writing itself is fine and Hays did a fine job with the narration. I imagine guys (who are less likely to be attuned to the poor/stereotypical use of gender in the book) will like it a lot more than me. I gave the author a try and, while they’re a fine writer, they’re not for me.