Tag Archives: paranormal

Knight after Night

Book Review of Knight after Night (Vampire Assassin League #1), by Jackie Ivie

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Knight After NightI downloaded a copy of Jackie Ivie‘s Knight After Night from Amazon. It’s a perma-freebie.

Description from goodreads:
THE VAMPIRE
Highland Vampire Thoran MacKettryck’s lonely. Bitter. Vengeful. For centuries now, he’s taken lives for profit and drained blood for free. Just like always. But then he’s gifted what every immortal craves: his mate. He just can’t believe his eyes when he finally hunts her down. 

HIS MATE
Jolie Pritchard’s young. Studious. Driven. Studying Medieval Literature is her life and this scholarship – her dream. She’s the last thing an arrogant, gorgeous, world-class playboy should be pursuing and she knows it. If only he wasn’t the most thrilling male she’s ever imagined…

THE CURSE
She was warned. She didn’t listen.

Review:
Man, what a waste! Ivie can write. There’s witty dialogue. There’s a cute, kind of clueless alpha male who begs. (I love me some begging man.) There’s smart female lead. There’s vampires. Really, this should have been a slam dunk for me. But no. No. No. No. NO. NO!

It’s not even half as long as it needs to be to allow for a believable plot. So it’s incredibly rushed and almost every aspect of it is underdeveloped. Thornan is apparently some sort of vampire assassin (the series is even called Vampire Assassin League) but that’s not addressed anywhere in the book.

Jolie is unnecessarily rude to Thornan from the moment they meet. Really, people usually present a little social grace when confronted with new people before turning mean. He bullies her into a date by threatening violence against anyone she tries to call for help and ignores all her attempts at agency. Then, despite the author trying to show Jolie angry at the idea of being materialistic, a full on third of the book seems to be dedicated to describing his wealth and Jolie’s response to it.

There is slut shaming and the requisite naive virgin whining about how his big penis will tear her. WTF? Jolie just accepts everything with ease by deciding not to think about it (what happened to the smart girl in the beginning) and seems to have some sort of personality transplant about halfway through the book. Then they declare ever-lasting love after one night together.

I am so disappointed!

 

Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper

Book Review of Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper, by J.L. Bryan

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Ellie JordanI grabbed an e-copy of Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper, by J. L. Bryan, when it was free on Amazon.

Description from Goodreads:
Ellie Jordan’s job is to catch and remove unwanted ghosts. Part detective, part paranormal exterminator, Ellie operates out of Savannah, Georgia, the most haunted city in the United States. 

When a family contacts her to deal with a disturbing presence in the old mansion they’ve recently purchased, Ellie first believes it to be a typical, by-the-book specter, a residual haunting by a restless spirit. Instead, she finds herself confronting an evil older and more powerful than she’d ever expected, rooted in the house’s long and sordid history of luxury, sin, and murder. The dangerous entity seems particularly interested in her clients’ ten-year-old daughter. 

Soon her own life is in danger, and Ellie must find a way to exorcise the darkness of the house before it can kill her, her clients, or their frightened young child. 

Review:
I was really pleasantly surprised by this one. The narrative style engaged me. The ghost hunting characters were fleshed out enough to be relatable, though admittedly not particularly deep or notable. The mystery, while not hard to figure out, kept me interested and it was creepy as all get-out.

I did find it a little predictable, there was a bit of repetition and the hauntees felt a tad shallow. But for the most part, it was a satisfying read. It’s hard to ask for more than that. In terms of pure entertainment, it’s a win.

Dragons Treasure

Book Review of Dragon’s Treasure, by C.J. Starkey

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Dragon's TreasureI picked up a copy of Dragon’s Treasure (by C. J. Starkey) when it was free on Amazon.

Description from Goodreads:
Sean has a type, he’s not ashamed to admit, and Jack fits the bill to a tee.  

Sean 
My life was a blur of work, sleep and the occasional night out. Despite my friends’ best efforts to get me laid on a regular basis I just couldn’t make anything stick. 
It didn’t seem like Jack was going to be any different. I made a complete and utter fool of myself more than once and then our first intimate encounter was a threesome with a werewolf shifter. Finding out he was a dragon shifter should have been more surprising than it was but after that first time, I think I knew I wanted him for keeps. 
I should have known our relationship would happen on it’s own timeline, completely out of our control. 

Jack 
Sean was fascinating from the very beginning. He was a contradiction in every sense of the word – I never knew whether to be blown away by his surprising intelligence or by how deep he could stick his foot in his mouth. 
I’d had too many flings go sour to be willing to risk it, even in spite of the animal attraction I felt towards him. An old friend not-so-gently encouraged me into it and well, I always did tend to plunge headfirst into things. 
Why should this be any different? 

A Dragon’s Treasure is a standalone MM story, with steamy love scenes, Mpreg and a HEA ending! 

Review:
#DNF at 19%, which is the end of A Dragon’s Treasure. The rest being “bonus stories.” Um, No. I’m pretty sure this is just a collection of short stories, despite what the cover and title say. What’s more, I’m pretty sure this is one of those authors you hear about who is cranking out misleading books for the buck they might make, not for the art or love of writing. Starkey just made my Do Not Buy List. I don’t usually review books I don’t finish, but when I think readers are being scammed an author I feel obligated to highlight it.

To discuss the one short story I read, that was sold as a 200+ page book, it was BAD. It read like a court report. I could almost imagine someone standing there saying, “Just the facts, Ma’am.” There was one rushed sex scene and then a whole rushed romance/pregnancy. No development. No world-building. No indentations or hard returns between paragraphs. No consistency in tense. Reading this was in no way an enjoyable experience, even without factoring in the feeling of being manipulated and tricked by it’s inaccurate presentation.

I’m starting to feel like you have to swim with sharks to trust a book purchase these days.