Tag Archives: PNR

Blood of the Beast

Book Review of Blood of the Beast, by Tamela Quijas

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Blood of the BeastI grabbed a copy Blood of the Beast, by Tamela Quijas from the Amazon freebie list.

Description from Goodreads:
There is a scent that fills the night, far more delicate than the beat of the heart, more fragile than the whisper of breath escaping human lungs.

The echo that fills the darkness is the scent of blood pulsating through the mortal body.

Commonly overlooked by those among the living, it is a sound fervently sought by those residing on the fringes of the world existing between the living and the undead.

Blood is what the beast craves.

Detective Valentina Kureyev had been assigned to one of the worst murder cases of the century. A serial killer haunted the streets of her city, depositing bloodless corpses throughout the section of town known as Little Europe.

She hadn’t a clue to the identity of the culprit.

The case was hopeless.

The terror was real.

As real as Demetri Daskova.

The Professor of Russian Antiquities had been targeted with the murderer’s special form of a calling card. Val couldn’t turn away from his offer of aide in the bizarre case, even though he whispered tales of ‘those that walked on the dark side of the moon’ and the beast that hungrily fed on human blood.

He was the primary suspect.

Review:
Good lord that was just horrible. I almost didn’t even make it through the prologue. But it’s the end of the year and I’d set myself an alphabet soup challenge (read a book by an author for every letter of the alphabet) and I only have Q, X,Y & Z left and I DNFed my Y yesterday. So, I wasn’t going to do the same with my Q. So I was trapped with it.

Eventually I just started reading passages aloud to my husband, because sharing the shocking horridness and strange, STRANGE over-use of the word quiver/quivering was the only way I could keep going. (Seriously, the word is used a lot, often in questionable ways.) The whole book is painfully wordy. No one has gold eyes, they’re golden hued eyes, etc. It contradicts itself. It is painfully dependent on tropes. There is no palpable chemistry between the characters. The female MC is pathologically angry and extremely unlikable (but all the men lust after her). The male MC was a jerk in the beginning and we’re never shown that he changed. It’s just supposed to be assumed. In addition to too many words, there are also misused words, missing words and anachronistic language. The villain is a cliche scorned woman (who spent one purchased night with the man she goes bad over) and the whole thing was just jumpy and clunky. But hey, the author’s name is Quijas, so it’s all good.

Book Review of Bloodshot & Hellbent (Cheshire Red Reports #1 & 2), by Cherie Priest

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I picked Bloodshot and Hellbent (by Cherie Priest) up from my local library.

BloodshotDescription from Goodreads:
Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn’t usually hang with her own kind. She’s too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist—even though Ian doesn’t want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files—documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn’t bargain for is a case that takes her from the wilds of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride. 

Review:
A fun, if shallow read. I enjoyed Raylene’s OCD self-identified craziness. I loved the drag queen side kick and I thoroughly enjoyed that the vampire love interests was a little broken and vulnerable—no alpha a-holes here.

It was a little on the predictable side and the writing was nothing extraordinary (though perfectly readable). Basically, the book was a fun fluffy vampire read.

HellbentDescription from Goodreads:
Vampire thief Raylene Pendle doesn’t need more complications in her life. Her Seattle home is already overrun by a band of misfits, including Ian Stott, a blind vampire, and Adrian deJesus, an ex-Navy SEAL/drag queen. But Raylene still can’t resist an old pal’s request: seek out and steal a bizarre set of artifacts. Also on the hunt is a brilliant but certifiably crazy sorceress determined to stomp anyone who gets in her way. But Raylene’s biggest problem is that the death of Ian’s vaunted patriarch appears to have made him the next target of some blood-sucking sociopaths.  Now Raylene must snatch up the potent relics, solve a murder, and keep Ian safe—all while fending off a psychotic sorceress. But at least she won’t be alone. A girl could do a lot worse for a partner than an ass-kicking drag queen—right?

Review:
Another fluffy, easy read. As in the first book, I liked Raylene’s OCDness and the way she was just so matter of fact about it. I liked her side kick. I liked her family-building, as well as the fact that romance is hinted at but never becomes part of the story. I also liked the writing and narrative style, which is surprising as it’s first person and I generally don’t like first person. I did think this one came across as a little juvenile. Mostly because Raylene was tasked with hunting down baculum, which requires 14 thousand references to penis bones and the likes. It because apparent that this was there for comic effect, but it also made me feel like a 15-year-old would have appreciated it more. Despite that, if there were a 3rd book I’d pick it up.

Book Review of Wicked as They Come (Blud #1), by Delilah S. Dawson

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Wicked as the ComeI bought a copy of Wicked as the Come, by Delilah S. Dawson.

Description from Goodreads:
When nurse Tish Everett forced open the pesky but lovely locket she found at an estate sale, she had no idea she was answering the call of Criminy Stain, from the far off land of Sang. He’d cast a spell for her, but when she’s transported right to him, she’s not so sure she’s ready to be under the spell of another man. (It didn’t go so well last time with controlling, abusive, domineering Jeff.) If only Criminy wasn’t so deliciously rakish….

Half the inhabitants of Sang are Pinkies—human—and the other half are Bludmen, who in Tish’s world would be called vampires. But they don’t mess with any of the bat/coffin/no sunlight nonsense. They’re rather like you and me, just more fabulous, long living, and mostly indestructible. (They’re also very good kissers.) But when the evil Mayor of Manchester (formerly Bludchester) redoubles his efforts to rid Sang of the Bludmen once and for all, stealing Tish’s locket in hopes of traveling back to her world himself for reinforcements, Criminy and Tish must battle ghosts, sea monsters, wayward submarines, a secret cabal, and thundering Bludmares to get the locket back and allow Tish to return home…but has she found love with Criminy? Could she stay in Sang forever?

Review:
Meh, I found it unimpressive. It wasn’t bad. The world-building was pretty good and there was some humor. But it just was nothing new or exciting either.

I think the author was going for a strong determined heroine, but she just came across as selfish and stubborn to me. She also did a lot of crying and sleeping. There was a POINTLESS and BASELESS love triangle for a little while. I didn’t understand Criminy’s obsessive love for woman he just met. I thought the bad guy was cheesy and she defeated him too easily. But most of all I thought the whole thing felt random. They ran here and did this. Then, they ran there and did that. Then, they ran into this creature or interesting contraption. I was not overly impressed. If my library carries the books, I’d probably read another but I’m not buying any more.