Tag Archives: self published

heart of fae veins of magic banner

Book Review of Heart of the Fae and Veins of Magic, by Emma Hamm

Leave a reply

Last week I listened to Emma Hamm‘s The Faceless Woman and so enjoyed it that I went in search of the beginning of the series and spent this weekend listening to Siobhan Waring narrate Heart of the Fae and Veins of Magic.

Description:

Once upon a time…

A plague sweeps across the emerald hills of Uí Néill, leaving a young midwife’s father with months to live. To save her people, Sorcha makes a deal with a dangerous Fae. She must travel across the sea, through merrow and kelpie lands, to find a forgotten king on a crumbling throne.

Born king of the Seelie Fae, Eamonn fought battles unnumbered to uphold honor, duty, and freedom… until his twin brother sank a blade between his shoulders. Crystals grew from the wound, splitting open skin and bone. His people banished him to a cursed isle for his disfigurement, now king of criminals and fools.

With the help of brownies, pixies, and will-o’-the-wisps, Sorcha battles to break through his crystalline shell and persuade him to take back his stolen throne.

This determined beauty could come dangerously close to stealing his beastly heart.

Review:

Since Heart of the Fae and Veins of Magic form a duology, neither standing alone, I’m going to write a single review encompassing both. But one of the main takeaway potential readers should understand is this point that they need both books for a complete story.

I really enjoyed this, both the story and the narration. I really like that Hamm’s fae are old school scary fae, her female characters are strong and full of agency, and her male ones aren’t afraid to show need. I especially appreciated that it was Sorcha who took the lead in most sexual situations.

My only complaint here is how very gendered everything is. While I appreciate that Hamm’s goal was to emphasize that both a king and a queen are necessary, neither an accouterment to the other. (A pleasant change from most stories that center a king and make the queen little more than an accessory or political pawn.) But the book leans hard into women being soft and kind and caring and men being violent, rough and in need of tempering. True, Sorcha had to go against that in the course of the story but it was still a strong theme in the book. (As was how much bigger he was than her, another classic gendering technique.)

All in all however, I can’t wait to dive into more of Hamm’s writing and Waring’s narration.

the faceless woman

Book Review of The Faceless Woman (The Otherworld #4), by Emma Hamm

Leave a reply

I received an Audible code for a copy of Emma Hamm‘s The Faceless Woman, narrated by Siobhan Waring.

Description from Goodreads:

Once upon a time…

A town will only suffer the presence of a witch for as long as she is useful. Aisling watches the flames lick her thighs and prays for a quick death. But when an Unseelie prince appears through the smoke, she does what any self respecting witch would do.

She curses him.

Bran should never have traveled to the human realm, and is shocked when a witch binds them together. His life is hers and he refuses to die. He saves her from the fires, casts a hex on the townsfolk for good measure, then whisks her away to safety. His only stipulation? She has to remove the binding curse.

Unfortunately for them both, she can’t. Witch and Unseelie must travel across the Otherworld to break the ties that bind them. Secrets and lies stand between them, but both will stop at nothing to save themselves.

Review:

I was honestly surprised by how much I enjoyed this. I love that almost every time I thought it was going to fall into some PNR trope it subverted it. Here’s an example (I’m paraphrasing), during the only (mild) sex scene Bran trotted out the common “say ‘no’ now, I won’t stop after this.” I hate when heroes do this and you hear it all the time in PNR, like the hero he isn’t saying “I’ll just go ahead and rape you if you try and stop me past this point” and the reader is supposed to feel it’s something else, romantic even. I groaned when he said it and then cheered when her response was, “I don’t want you to stop, but if you think I couldn’t stop you if I wanted to, you don’t know me well.”

That’s Aisling in a nutshell, never afraid to call someone out, never making herself smaller, never dulling her shine for someone else, but also never falling into harridan or shrew. I so much appreciated that both she and Bran were as honest with each other as they could be, never faulted the other for what was out of their control, and Hamm never took the easy ‘misunderstanding’ or ‘angry over secrets’ plotting path.

I look forward to reading more of this series, maybe going back and starting at the beginning. And if I can get the audio, even better, because Siobhan Waring did a marvelous job.

hide and keep

Book Review of Hide and Keep (Boys of Lake Cliff #1), by K. Sterling

Leave a reply

I received an Audible code for a copy of Hide and Keep, by K. Sterling. I also happen to have a compilation of the first five novellas in the series. However, since I listened to this one and don’t know when I’ll read the rest, I’m going to go ahead and review it on its own.

Description from Goodreads:

A scared, lonely past and a dangerous secret follow Dr. Aiden Sharp to the peaceful town of Lake Cliff, Illinois, when he arrives to testify in a murder trial for the district attorney.

Some heroes are built a little differently than the rest of us and some hearts love in a way we’re not used to. Blood spatter and exit wounds make more sense to Aiden than a casual remark or a quick wink. Living faces and expectations have always been more of a mystery to Aiden than the cases he handles for the FBI because of his Asperger’s but he’s never let it stop him from getting what he wants. He wants Lane as soon as their eyes meet in the airport but Aiden gets a lot more than he expected when danger arrives with a text message and a threat he can no longer outrun. Luckily, Aiden finds a safe place to hide and learns he actually has a heart, he was just waiting for someone to teach him how to use it.

Detective Lane West is prepared to protect the gorgeous but confusing forensic psychologist from himself and just about anything fate throws at them. But what about Lane’s heart? Despite his best intentions, Lane can’t keep his hands off Aiden, keep it in his pants, or keep his heart out of it as soon as Mr. Morning After works his magic.

Passion and pancakes bring two lonely hearts together and an errand for the district attorney turns Lake Cliff upside down.

Review:

This started out roughly for me (both the actual book and the narration) and I wasn’t sure if I was going to like either of them. However, they both quickly smoothed out and found their rhythm. I enjoyed them a lot by the end.

Granted, I have a strong suspicion that the representation of Aspergers Syndrom wasn’t at all accurate (and I feel like that is a term not used anymore). But I also don’t feel like it represented people with Aspergers in any sort of derogatory way. So I chose to accept that this is a fictional book with a fictional representative. Much as I did with the detective and forensic expert aspect of the book. Neither was well developed or integral to the plot.

I also felt the book went on a few chapters (and an epilogue) too long after the story came to a natural conclusion, and other reviews say there are editing issues. I can’t say I noticed them in the audio version I listened to. All in all, this isn’t a perfect book, but I’m awful glad to have a compilation of the first five books.