Tag Archives: post-apacolyptic

deal with the devil

Review of Deal with the Devil (Mercenary Librarians #1), by Kit Rocha

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I pre-ordered a copy of Kit Rocha‘s Deal with the Devil.

Description from Goodreads:

Nina is an information broker with a mission–she and her team of mercenary librarians use their knowledge to save the hopeless in a crumbling America.

Knox is the bitter, battle-weary captain of the Silver Devils. His squad of supersoldiers went AWOL to avoid slaughtering innocents, and now he’s fighting to survive.

They’re on a deadly collision course, and the passion that flares between them only makes it more dangerous. They could burn down the world, destroying each other in the process…

Or they could do the impossible: team up.

This is the first book in a near-future science fiction series with elements of romance.

Review:

I really quite enjoyed this. I liked the characters, the diversity, the world, the humor, and the plot (though the twists at the end were easily guessable). I liked that you get a little of everyone’s POV, without head-hopping and that, while there is one main couple, there are also hints of side couples to come. My only real complaint is that, for a series called Mercenary Librarians, books/libraries/librarians play essentially no role. Maybe they will in future books, but they don’t here and I was super disappointed by that. All in all, however, I can’t wait for more.

Scorpius Rising

Review of Scorpius Rising (Scorpius Syndrome #0.5), by Rebecca Zanetti

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I picked up a copy of Scorpius Rising (by Rebecca Zanetti) at Amazon, way back in 2017. I’ve held on to it because Z-authors are always a challenge to find for my yearly alphabet challenge.

Description from Goodreads:

With a deadly disease spreading like wildfire across the country, microbiologist Nora Medina needs to focus all her energy on stopping the pandemic. Playing with dynamite—in the form of her way-too-hot ex—is the last thing she should be doing. ​But forced to work with Deacan McDougall against unexpected enemies with the seconds ticking by, she knows the explosion is coming…

Review:

Honestly, I thought this was pretty bad. The plot has too many holes in it. The heroine is spineless and the hero is a neanderthal jerk. (I can handle an alpha a-hole hero in a paranormal romance, where being a werewolf or vampire or sea monster explains away the assholeness. But in a plain old human, he just feels abusive.) The sex wasn’t sexy, being of the no foreplay, “he pounded/hammered/slammed into her” sort. The science was hand-wavy. And the whole thing just felt ridiculous.

Book Review of Hell Divers (I, II & III), by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

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I won a copy of Hell Divers II (by Nicholas Sansbury Smith) through Goodreads. But I didn’t want to read it until I’d read the first one. So, I borrowed an audio version of Hell Divers through Hoopla and then I just sort of kept going until I reached Hell Divers III, whew I stopped. 

Hell Divers:

I went into this skeptical. I expected a lot of male bravado and that too often equals toxicity. But I was pleasantly surprised. Yes, it was still a little heavy on the importance of a man’s duty and the stabilizing influence of family (even if family was usually just the tragedy that spurn men to action and fairly cardboard in actuality). But there was also some depth to the story. I appreciated the difference in perspective of the upper-deckers and the lower-deckers, and how having a limited perspective (especially if you don’t know it is limited) can be dangerous, even to the righteous.

I did find the suspension of dis-belief necessary to believe a whole mutated species developed and bred widely enough to infect at least two distant cities without anyone noticing or ever encountering them a little hard to come by. If Hell Divers have the brief life expectancy they’re said to have, then they must dive relatively frequently.

All in all, I enjoyed it and don’t dread reading book two. And R. C. Bray did a nice job with the narration. He occasionally sounded a little machine-like, as if he was imitating a computer or robot, but not too often. I look forward to book II.

Ghosts:

I didn’t appreciate this second book as much as the first. I thought the characters’ motivations more cliched and the characters themselves not as interesting. Plus, Xavier is barely in it.

Having said all that, I did still like it. I’m still invested in the story and one of my questions from book one was partially addressed, how the Sirens evolved so quickly. I have no complaints about Bray’s narration and all in all, I’m up for book three.

Deliverence:

I wouldn’t say this was bad. It was structurally and editorially sound. However, I found the characters’ motivations even shallower than in book two. And I commented on how much more cliched I found the motivations in book two than in book one. So, we’re pretty far down the relatable, investment scale by book three here. Honestly, I was just plain bored with it. Unlike the first book, there was nothing new or interesting here. I don’t feel any pressing need to continue the series. Bray still did fine with the narration though.