Tag Archives: paranormal

Book Review of The Protectors Series Bundle (Protectors 0.5-2), by Nana Malone

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ProtectorsI originally downloaded Nana Malone‘s Protectors series from the Amazon free list. I’m reviewing them here as number 14 & 15 of my Taking Care of my Own challenge. (I’m not counting the prequel, too short.)

Description from Amazon:

Betrayed – Book #0.05
Cassie Reeser is a bona fide superhero. But what did she have to give up to get that way? Her brother, Peter’s experiments might have saved her life, but now she’s little more than a weapon in his eyes and he’ll use her how he wishes. Before she was a Protector, Cassie was her brother’s personal lab rat. Can she break from his tyrannical rule or will she sacrifice herself to save her friends? 

Reluctant Protector – Book #1 
For five years, Cassie Reeser has been her brother’s personal lab rat. Peter’s experiments have made her a stronger, faster, better human. And she’s not the only one. To rescue her friends, she’ll have to depend on former war correspondent, Seth Adams. Cassie might not think she needs his protection, but he’ll die before he lets Peter have her back. 

Forsaken Protector – Book #2 
The enemy of her enemy is her friend. Almost one year after escaping Gentech Facilities, Symone Jackson lives in the shadows with her nightmares. Garrett Hunter thought he was one of the good guys, but on routine surveillance of a suspected terrorist, he discovers the awful truth…he’s not the only super human around. Can Symone overcome her mistrust of Garrett and stop living in the shadows?

***

Betrayed

After reading this prequel I almost gave up the series, thinking it was YA. Cassie is in high school at the time of the events, agonises over a boy and has her first kiss, etc. I couldn’t be bothered. But I stuck it out and for the record, though of no real consequence to the review of THIS story, the rest of the series is PNR and heavy on the sex, so not YA.

I basically just thought this was an OK start to the series, but it felt a little like it was the middle of something. Overbearing and for some reason in charge brother, random crush, kiss, decision to escape, escape attempt, etc. Then it ends on a cliffhanger, before it even gets started. Only really worth reading if you’re reading Reluctant Protector too.

***

Reluctant Protector

Again, I thought this was an OK read. (I’m seeing a trend.) Cassie has been held captive and experimented on for 5 years, she’s attempted escape before, somehow she’s established a contact to help her give it another go, and here the book starts. This is all basically explained, but like the prequel, it feels very much like we started in the middle of something. A lot happens off set, so to speak.

I liked the story, I really did. I liked Cassie and Seth, I really did. But believable emotions were relatively scarce in this book. I mean, it pretty much boiled down to, “Oh, you accidentally made me a superhuman…OK, moving on.” There was no fear, freakout, anger, really no emotional response at all.

Then there was the ‘romance;’ if I can call it that. The two of them seemed to have an inexplicable pull towards one another. It felt very much like a standard PNR, ‘you’re my destined mate’ kind of affair, but that’s never addressed. Worse yet, it employed the whole ‘Oh, I’m having a really erotic dream that I’m somehow mysteriously aware of’ trope. When of course, he’s awake; of course he’s really having real sex, not dream sex. As if that kind of thing EVER happens. It just felt like a cheap plot device to get them past the awkward ‘I won’t sleep with someone I just met” hurtle.

The sex…it too was OK, though there was a lot of it. There was also a weak attempt to add kink to the sexy bits by “fingering her puckered hole” and blindfolding her, etc. I’ll give it props for not being wholly vanilla, but this is supposed to have been a virgin having sex with a man for the first time or two. You’d think one of them would have been a little hesitant and none of that was really necessary in the first place. Honestly, it just didn’t feel at all natural. There were too many heavy ‘do you trust me?’ pauses followed by pretty light stuff. Meh.

I also had some basic questions. For example, I was curious about Seth’s age, for two reasons. One, Cassie is apparently supposed to be 22. (She’s 17 at the time of the prequel, and book one is set 5 years later.) So, I would expect Seth to be comparably aged, but he can’t be. He’s a war correspondent, so one would expect he graduated HS (18ish), got a journalism degree (22ish), got a job and worked his way up the ranks, since being sent to Afghanistan, Serbia and Rwanda (all of which are mentioned) aren’t newbie assignments, plus the time spent there (5 years minimum, probably significantly more, so at least 27). Two, he acts and speaks like a teenager. Bottom line is that he’s either significantly older than Cassie, but acts younger than his age or is supposed to be young like her, but then can’t hold the professional position he’s supposed to. *scratching head*

I’ll also throw one personal irritant into the mix. I get tired of seeing men teach female characters things they should already know. (It happens all the time in fiction. Men, after all, supposedly have all the answers for us little helpless lasses. grrr) Here, Cassie had had at least some of her powers since she was a teenager and had been training with them and the scientists who created them for YEARS, but within 2 days Seth learned how to use his AND taught Cassie how to improve her own skills in ways she and/or all those well-educated, experienced professionals couldn’t? Realistic or just the normal ‘the man always has the answer’ BS? He was then unquestionably in charge, coming up with the plans and giving orders. Again, Meh.

The book has a sappy ending that I think it could have done without. But I know a lot of readers really like that kind of thing, so OK. It could have done with a little more editing, but the writing is actually pretty good.

All in all, I liked the premise and liked the characters, but the execution was rushed and weak. Not so much that I wouldn’t recommend the book, but enough that it felt like I was just reading the surface of something.

***

Forsaken Protector

If I can be forgiven for my repetition here, I thought this too was an OK read. Though I’m sorry to say of a lower quality than the previous episodes. In theory, it’s a full novel, as opposed to the short story/novelette of the prequel and novella of book one. (I say in theory because it’s listed as 306 pages, compared to 29 for Betrayed and 97 for Reluctant Protector. But the bundle of all three is listed at 301 pages. Figure that one out.) Regardless, I honestly don’t think it was ready for publication.

The issue is inconsistencies, most notably the time frame VERY unclear. The blurb says this book happens, “Almost one year after escaping Gentech Facilities.” Later Cassie says it’s been 18 months since she met Seth (which was less than a week before the escape and Peter’s death), then the book claims, “Symone didn’t buy into Seth’s vision that Peter had survived the explosion a couple years ago.” Symone was supposed to have gotten her GED and attended college at an accelerated pace (which would still take more than a year). Then later it’s said, “When Cassie, Seth, and Jansen had rescued them six months ago…” Further on it’s back to, “I’ve lived in fear of this for the last couple years” and THEN a mere page or so later it’s, “You’ve been mother hen to his house of ruffians for nearly two years…” followed by, “Eighteen months ago, Cassie broke us out…” There were more, but you get the point.

At some point, I started highlighting all the time references so that I could look at them side by side and try to figure out how long it had been since the events of the last book. Instead I found that it was utterly indecipherable, as if every time the author needed to  post a time she just made one up.

Honestly, it’s not just the time between books that is inconsistent though. At one point Symone is said to have gotten her GED at 18 (after the escape) then it said that she was a scrawny 19-year-old when Jansen pulled her out of Gentech. She served Garret fried chicken at one point, when Lisa was said to have made roasted chicken. Symone entered a room in fitted cargo pants, but managed to take off her jeans.

Or how about this one:

You’re the first person in three years I’ve been able to touch who seems somewhat unaffected.” He blew out a breath. “So what you’re saying is, what happened on your couch was just you enjoying someone touching you.” She raised a delicate brow. “Four years is a long time to go without human contact.

There were a few copy edit kind of mistakes, but not enough to really discourage reading the book. But the above type of incongruencies pull me out of a story at almost warp speed.

I also again found myself wondering about characters ages. I’m really not overly focused on this normally, but I needed to know some of them. For example, the way Jansen worried over Symore made me think of him as fatherly (so forties, maybe). Then it was revealed he had ‘feeling’ for her and I was left thinking he must be a comparable age to her early 20s. But this clashed with being an experienced combat veteran, so I didn’t know how to picture him.

In the end, this review is a bit like my experience reading the book. I was so distracted by all of that ↑ that I couldn’t concentrate on the story. It’s a shame too. I liked Symone. I like Garrett. I liked that we got to see more of Cassie and Seth. (Though it felt unnatural that they would just hand the final mission over to Symone, Garrett and Jansen, without participating…and it was hella rushed). I liked that I got to see a few of the other escapees. I even liked the set up for future books, but none of that is what will stick with me and be what I remember in the end.

Fire Rising

Book Review of Donna Grant’s Fire Rising, part one

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Fire RisingI got a copy of Donna Grant‘s Fire Rising from NetGalley. This doesn’t qualify for my Taking Care of My Own Challenge, but since it was short I decided to get it out of the way.

Description from Amazon:
Sammi’s world has been blown to bits—literally. With her pub up in flames, she escapes to Dreagan, the only place she will be safe. Her plan is to recover quickly and leave quietly. What she doesn’t count on is meeting the dangerously desirable and enigmatic Tristan…

Tristan is instantly drawn to the woman seeking refuge at the Manor. Dazzled by her stunning beauty and intrigued by her silence about her past, Tristan knows he will not be able to let this woman go, no matter what the cost. And when Sammi slips away from Dreagan, Tristan is compelled to follow…

 Review:
Ok, I have to admit to a foul up when requesting this book. I saw the big old number 1 on the cover and erroneously believed it to be the first in a series. I WAS WRONG! A) It’s part one of a four part serial (that’s what the number one refers to), so it’s not even a complete book. The complete book is due out in June 2014. B) It’s part of the Dark Kings series, which is a spin off the Dark Warriors series, and the Dark Warriors series is a continuation of the Dark Sword series. (Yea, that took a little investigating.) Sooooo, maybe I shouldn’t feel bad about the fact that I was so lost.

But even though the cover and write up probably could have been clearer about its placement within an extensive preexisting world (dozens of books), I can’t really blame it for my mistake. I’ll admit there were a lot of characters I obviously should have known and didn’t, as well as a whole society and species who’s specifics I also didn’t know. (Seriously, I never even got a description of a dragon out of the deal!) This effected my enjoyment, obviously. However, I decided to try and review it without consideration for this fact. Because, again, not the books fault.

The thing is, even if I allow for not knowing the history I still wasn’t particularly impressed. Everything moved incredibly fast. I mean so fast I never had time to develop a connection with ANY of the characters, or become invested in the outcomes of events, or basically care about anything. It almost felt more like an outline of a story than a truly fleshed out one.

Then there was the romance. It’s just as fast as everything else. It’s your basic PNR, ‘he laid eyes on her and lightning went through his body’ kind of thing with no depth of any sort. So, again, there was nothing there to make me care about it.

Now, I adore dragon shifters. They’re one of my favourites varieties. I liked that the characters had obvious Scottish brogues and the actual mechanical writing/editing was fine. But I feel like this book depends heavily on a readers familiarity with and love of PNR tropes to satisfy them, i.e. if readers always love insta-love, they’ll like it here too, no explanation therefore needed. Or readers always love a arrogant, protective man, so they’ll recognise those traits here and love Tristan for it without too much description. Well, while I recognise those tropes, I don’t love them and I don’t think their identifiability exonerates the author of the responsibly of providing clarifying information. All in all, I finished feeling pretty apathetic about the book. I didn’t hate it, but I’m not rushing out for the rest of the series either.

Whisper Cape

Book Review of Whisper Cape, by Susan Griscom

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Whisper CapeI grabbed Susan Griscom‘s Whisper Cape from the Amazon free list. This is review number four of my Taking Care of My Own Challenge.

Ridiculously Long Description from Goodreads:

Escape to a world where the impossible becomes possible. WHISPER CAPE is a town of secrets and Addison MacKenna soon becomes tangled in a web of them. Plagued with nightmares of her father’s sudden and brutal death, Addie struggles with her anguish and refuses to believe his demise was accidental. 

Fighting to shake off one of those devastating early morning nightmares, Addison finds it even harder to escape from the vision of a man lying on the side of the road—a man she may have just killed. When she frantically tries to locate him, he seemingly disappears, just the beginning of strange occurrences in her life. She also cannot ignore the weird sensations in her own body. Suddenly, the impossible seems possible, but is that a blessing or a curse? 

Believing that her continual and worsening nightmares are both the key to her own new abilities and the clue to her father’s death, Addie knows she will not rest until she has the answers she craves. As she strives to cope with her new remarkable talents, someone else learns of her abilities—a disgruntled maniacal psychopath with his own agenda that involves eliminating Addie. The only one who can protect her, instruct her in the use of her powers and teach her how to destroy the murderous monster is the same man who makes Addie’s heart race and her blood heat with passion. The same man she’d left for dead. 

Cael Sheridan may be arrogant and mysterious but he’s also undeniably gorgeous. A member of a secret society, he is sworn to protect the woman he believes to be the daughter of his recently murdered mentor. In the process, he finds it impossible to resist her magnetic sensuality, complicating his efforts to shield and guide her as she learns to manage her newly acquired skills. At the same time, Addison has much to teach him about trust and commitment. Fate has brought them together, but will it make them stronger or destroy them both in end?

Review:
I have to be honest, I hate giving bad reviews but I’m thrilled to be done with this book. I was beginning to think I might never reach the end and it really wasn’t ringing any bells for me. Mostly because I disliked the heroine, Addie, and didn’t particularly care for the hero, Cael, either.

Addie was pitiful in almost every sense of the word. In the first 1/4 of the book she had nightmares, almost ran someone over and drove off a cliff, bumped her head into a metal sign so hard she almost fell onto jagged rocks, fell over a cliff and almost died (Seriously, who falls off a cliff that they know they’re standing on because they don’t pay attention to where they put their feet?), got buzzed off two beers and head spinning, passing out drunk off three. The trend only continued after that, tripping into Cael’s arms, staggering on her big girl high heals, etc.

It all made her feel like she couldn’t take care of herself. And not only because of her ridiculous accident proneness, but in little things like her tendency to forget to eat and the crying (even crying herself to sleep at one point). She’s either very child-like or just basically inept and a failure as an adult. I’m going with the latter, since at 26 she had only just gotten her first apartment on her own.

Then there were passages like this, “…the spell of his kisses rendering her helpless. His hands were so sure and knowledgeable…” Yes, that’s obviously a statement that needs to be considered in context, but that’s also essentially the ongoing dichotomy here. She’s helpless and he’s sure. Everyone knows more than Addie. Everyone is more capable than Addie. Everyone looks out for poor fragile, naive Addie. Gag. Helpless women (especially ones who are contradictorily made out to be strong and capable, despite what is shown) drive me up the wall.

Cael, was just…well, I don’t know how to say this less bluntly, but just too predictable. Almost everything, no matter how ridiculous, was seen a mile in advance or a PNR trope. For example, deciding Addie would be better off without him and trying to push her away by being verbally cruel in order to make her believe he doesn’t care for her (for her own good, of course). A) stupid and makes no sense. How is hurting her protecting her? B) a regular, and no less hated for it, PNR event.

Addie’s limp-ragness was the main reason I disliked the book, but a close second was that I kept asking, ‘where is the antagonist?’ No, seriously, he shows up for about a page at 75% (where we see a quick cliché baddie monologue along the lines of  “oh, they’ll pay…blah, blah, blah”) and then for about 3 pages at 95% (where he is defeated with painful ease) otherwise he’s just a cut-out for Cael to protect Addie from while 98% of the book is dedicated to their lightning-speed romance or sex. What more, he had ample access and opportunity to kill, kidnap, maim, rape, or whatever Addie before the big reveal and climactic fight. So, why didn’t he?

Despite all the sex the book has a very YA feel. The way a big deal is made of Addie and Cael having sex, the ‘parent figures’ being seriously over-protective and everyone’s mental agony over being a ‘boyfriend’ or not. These are supposed to be adults? No, these felt like teenagers, with teenage issues.

I found the writing repetitive, in the sense that the reader is told the same thing over and over again, but also in that things happen and then the characters tell other characters about it or events are relayed from various characters. Like Darcy talking about why she and Jarod broke up and then Jarod telling Addie why he and Darcy broke up. Same story, why do I need to hear it twice? Then again, after hearing the story twice, why do we also need multiple reminders of it? (Like Darcy in the bath remembering it.)

I also found the dialogue often (but not always) stiff, occasionally losing contractions, saying names too frequently, or too often starting a comment with yes or please, for example. Whatever the reason, it didn’t feel natural to me. This lent an oddly formal feel to the book.

Lastly, random odd POVs are thrown in occasionally. Despite being side characters we see Darcy and Jarod’s POV. I didn’t understand why. Their small side-story didn’t contribute enough to the plot to necessitate (or excuse) breaking the set POV pattern for inclusion. So I often found myself wondering why I was watching them do whatever unimportant thing they were doing.

All in all, not a winner for me. Believe it or not I dropped a number of minor complaints because I thought too much more would start to border on cruelty.  The above is just my opinion and I apologise for not having more positives to sandwich in there, but by the time I finally finished I was just too far past objectivity to manage it. I disliked the book, but you’ll notice I’ve never claimed it isn’t a quality book or unworthy of being read. The book has an interesting premise and I know a lot of people enjoy it. Maybe you’ll be one of them, even if I wasn’t.