Tag Archives: KDP

Night Angels

Book Review of Night Angels, by Jessie M.

Leave a reply

Night AngelsI grabbed Night Angels, by Jessie M. from the Amazon free list. What can I say? I’m a sucker for a stacked man.

Description from Goodreads:
Kyle, the twin without… 

Until a chance meeting in a wood sets of a chain of events that throw him out of his comfort zone. The easy rhythm of his titled life is lost forever as he discovers a new world and a very new him. An animal version. It shocks and arouses him in equal measure. 

And her… the one who did this to him… he is drawn inexplicably…

He will be tested and pushed to his limits and beyond…

Review:
This was alright, I guess. Nothing stood out and dazzled me, but I didn’t hate it either. It just didn’t feel like it knew what kind of book it wanted to be. Did it want to be a gritty, dark werewolf tale, a light-hearted HEA, baby on the way romance, a pseudo fairytale (complete with Prince Charming and kissed frog references…not to mention the Big Bad Wolf), or a piece of heady erotica? It appears to have tried to be all of the above and fell pretty flat as a result. It would have been much stronger, I think, if it had been a little more selective.

It starts out with a fairly pointless affair and some middling sex. I wouldn’t really mind if it tied into the plot in any way, but it didn’t. So I was left feeling like the actual story didn’t start until about 15% in, and the plot that the reader thought the book was going to be about was dropped almost completely. As was the whole “twin without” aspect, as set up in the blurb and first couple pages. It played almost no part in the book. It was all just a little jarring.

Then, once the reader crosses that divide they’re faced with a hero who was rightly angry about his predicament but able to forgive his assailant in mere moments. Wait, what? I was left behind it moved so fast. The insta-love kinda had the same effect on me. As did the mysteriously experienced virgin who was up for going all night with no discomfort and a shockingly expansive sexual repertoire for a first-timer. Guess she learns fast, right?

Thrown in amongst all of this was a disturbing number of cuddles, I love yous, gentle kisses, stroke the bellies, have your baby, etc. All of the happy domesticity just felt out of place amongst the bloody werewolf battles. Or maybe the bloody battles felt out of place with the domestic bliss. Can’t really be sure which way that should go.

The writing itself wasn’t bad, and I don’t remember many editorial foul ups. So, it’s a perfectly readable book. And the right reader just might love it. I thought it felt a bit disconjointed for my liking. I do have to commend it, however, on being classy enough to mostly avoid the whole sexually abused heroine trope even when provided the opportunity. I only mention this because it’s become so common in recent publications and it was nice to see a heroine not have to play that particular victim role. Again, not a bad book, just didn’t do it for me.

Book Review of Susan Ee’s Angelfall

Leave a reply

Angelfall

I picked up a copy go Susan Ee‘s YA novel, Angelfall from the KDP free list.

Description from Goodreads:
It’s been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back.

Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.

Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.

Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels’ stronghold in San Francisco where she’ll risk everything to rescue her sister and he’ll put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again.

Review:
I thought that this was a pretty good read. There were some really great parts. Such as the paranoid schizophrenic mother who forced her daughter to take numerous self-defence classes, in case the daughter should ever need to defend herself from HER. That does something moving to my insides. I also liked Penryn and Raffie, as well as Obi and his crew.

I did occasionally wonder where all the normal people were. I mean there had to be a few non-homicidal or non-victimised people out there. There just had to be. But Penryn only seemed to meet up with potential murders or completely broken people. That didn’t feel particularly realistic to me. Sure there’d obviously be some, even a lot, but EVERYONE?

That’s a small quibble though. I only have two real complaints. One is that the whole thing had a bit of a ‘we did this, then I did this, and then this happened’ feel to it. This is often hard to avoid with any first person, present tense narrative, but I REALLY felt it here. What’s more, it felt very much like we were JUST getting an accounting of what Penryn was doing, without feeling like it was also leading up to anything. It felt like it just so happened that this minute to minute accounting of her life occurred in the midst of a post-apocalyptic dystopian future, as opposed to this future angelic war zone and her contributions to it being pivotal to it in any way. Interesting, but unimportant to the whole. I’m not saying that was the case, just that it felt that way.

The second is that the question of WHY is never addressed. It’s a bit like reading a novel set during D-Day without anyone knowing or telling the reader what World War II was about or why June 6th, 1944 was important. This lack of understanding stole a bit of the gravity from the story.

On the whole, however, I read it in a day and enjoyed it. I’d even be interested in picking up the sequel at some point.

Ember’s Curse

Book Review of Gena D. Lutz’s Ember’s Curse (Prime Wolf, #1)

Leave a reply

Ember's CurseI grabbed Gena D. Lutz‘s Ember’s Curse (Prime Wolf, #1) from the Amazon KDP free list.

Description from Goodreads:
For Prime-Werewolf Ember Stilwell, life has been far from normal. Decades ago, a vengeful Witch cursed her Pack, leaving the women of her line incapable of feeling love. When an organized group of immortal killers begin to stalk and capture wolves from her pack, she sets out on a path fraught with danger. Just when it seems the world as she knows it will be changed forever, she meets Collin, an Alpha Werewolf with a body built for sin. As her heart begins to heal, she comes to find that the demons of her past are not nearly as dangerous as the nightmares she will be forced to face in her future. Can finding her true love conquer all? Or will the ability to feel for the first time be overshadowed by losing everything else she holds dear?

Review: ** Mild Spoilers**
This book had an interesting story behind it. Unfortunately, it seemed to start in the middle somewhere, with the main character, Ember, being mentally molested by a pervy vampire who never reappeared or played any role in the book. (WTF was that about? I’m still wondering.) It didn’t get any better after that. There was absolutely no world building, no character development, and no time between events to allow tension to build.

At one point a character was using a semi-automatic gun to shoot out the tires of a passing motorcycle and I thought to myself, “that’s what this book it like.” It’s literary automatic fire, with action as ammunition. There was no time between occurrences to rest or figure things out or get to know anyone. Further, there didn’t seem to be any real aim. Not to stretch the analogy too far, but like bullets shot in such quantity, there was no need for accuracy. The idea seeming to be if the author sprayed enough ammo at the reader something would hit eventually.

It would be one thing if I could have fobbed this off as erotica, where I wouldn’t expect much plot or character development. But there wasn’t even that much sex and what there was was pretty bland. So I can’t even give it that excuse. 

Now, there was quite a lot of humour in the book. Especially in the way the main group of characters ragged at each other. For example, the bitchy vampire regularly referred to her werewolf counterpart as “mongrel” and he quipped back by calling her “Vampire Barbie.” I liked that. Humour can go a long way toward redeeming a weak plot for me, but in this case, it wasn’t enough. Nor was the fact that the strongest character was a gothtastic female side character. She saved everyones butt on numerous occasions and pretty much rocked my world. I really liked her, but my complaints still continued to pile up the longer I read. I probably would have been better off to DNF this one. But I hate doing that. 

First (or second if you count the Indie-500 pace of the plotting), Insta-love doesn’t accurately depict the speed at which these two main characters fell into ‘true love.’ Seriously, they hadn’t even seen each other’s faces. They shook hands and fell to it. Seriously, 15 seconds, tops! They then instantly exchanged a lifetime of memories. While this neatly negated the pesky need to spend time letting the characters get to know one another, it also denied the reader this same opportunity. I rather like knowing the characters I’m dedicating my time to.

Further, you end up with passages like this, “You’ve been in my head. You know how important my mother is to me.” Really? Maybe he’s been in her head, but I haven’t. It was the first time her mother had been mentioned. I had no idea how she felt about her. So, all that importance she claimed, held absolutely no emotional resonance for me, except maybe a vague resentment for the presumption that I knew something I’d not been entitled to. I simply couldn’t care less as a result.

Next, time didn’t seem to mean anything. People were said to have been off doing things that took numerous hours when they only had one or two available to them. Collin had time to go buy an engagement ring to surprise Ember with, when they had spent the last several days held hostage and or fighting their way to freedom. When did this stuff happen? I’m all for a little suspension of reality for the enjoyment of fantasy, but I still need the bounds of logic to apply. 

Lastly, someone tell me why EVERY single PNR baddie seems to have to be a sexual sadist too. When he started taunting Ember with rape and using Donna, I just groaned. Really, was there no other way to show how bad he was? It’s not that I have any general problem with the use of sexual subjugation in a story, but I feel like I’ve read this same scene in hundreds of books this year and made this same comment over and over again. Do women really enjoy this? I sure don’t. I didn’t used to notice it, but it’s becoming so common it’s now hard to ignore.

The writing itself seemed to be ok and, like I said, it’s an interesting idea. Plus, a large chunk of the middle was dedicated to setting up what will obviously be a sequel (since the arranged event will be three months from this book’s happenings and it wasn’t concluded here) so there is room to grow. And there weren’t too many editorial mistakes. So, if the book had been given another 100 pages or so, spaced out among the action, to bulk up the world and character building it could have been pretty good. As it stands I won’t be looking for book two.