Tag Archives: self published

Book Review of I Died In A Bed Of Roses, by Kevin Strange

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I won a copy of Kevin Strange‘s I Died on a Bed of Roses through Goodreads.

Description:
Cult horror filmmaker Brian Sully has isolated himself to a simple life on the Oregon coast after being publicly shamed by the lead actress of his most recent B-Movie monster flick for sending her pictures of his dick. Brian’s years of isolation have left him on the brink of suicide. But after his best friend and producer books him at a 20th anniversary horror festival honoring their first feature film, Brian Sully’s life is about to change. Is true love real? What if you fell in love with something not quite… Human? Would you pursue it? Would you let anything stop you? Even death? I DIED IN A BED OF ROSES is Kevin Strange’s first ever crack at the paranormal romance genre. But if you’re expecting a mushy love story, well, you don’t know Kevin Strange!

Review:
I’m never entirely sure how to review bizaro fiction, let alone bizaro horror, because it’s, you know, bizarre. This one starts out pretty well, which was a relief. The cover left me fearing it might just turn into male-centric wank fodder. (It doesn’t. It’s very male-centric, but not a wank fest.) I’m afraid it does peter out though, veering off into a rushed, simplistic, deus ex mechana climax and ending. This is maybe not surprising, since the author says in the beginning that the book was written during a weeklong writing retreat and the beginning was birthed more easily than the end. It’s not bad. It’s actually pretty finny at times. But I think this will definitely be a case of finding the right reader for the book.

……Ok, I just want to say wank one more time.

Resistance

Book Review of Resistance, by B R. Sanders

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I bought a copy of B. R. Sanders‘ Resistance.

Description from Goodreads:
Resistance has many faces, and one of them is Shandolin’s. When she finds her friend brutally murdered, Shandolin decides to fight instead of run–but her only hope of survival is a takeover of the City government. Shandolin draws everyone she loves into the fray with her: her assassin lover, Rivna; her mentor, Moshel; and her best friend, Kel. Apart, they are weak, but together Shandolin and her friends, lovers and fellows may be just strong enough to save their skins and the skins of the other elves in the City. 

Review:
Another winner from Sanders. The world-building here is fabulous. Though I’ve read several stories in this world, I think you get a pretty good idea of its complexity here in condensed form.

The main character Shandolin (Doe) is likable as are the side characters. But what’s really great is that you get diversity in the cast, both in the racial divisions of the elves, Qin, satyrs, humans, etc (though not all of them play a big part in this book), but also in sexuality, gender orientation, body types, and relationship styles. And all of it is just part of who they are, no need to make it the conflict on which the story hinges.

The infant social revolt that the story does hinge on is sketched out fairly faintly. Much of it depends on connections Doe made before the beginning of the story. But there is certainly enough to follow and believe it. I did feel the end was a bit rushed. Though I liked the ending just fine, it did seem to come about quite easily.

As an aside, and I’m really not sure as it’s been over a year since I read Ariah, but I think some of these might be side characters from the middle of that book. I’m not sure, as I said, but they all felt so familiar but I’m not certain on the names. Can anyone give me a yes or no on that idea? I see another review that said this is a whole new cast. So, now I’m doubting myself.

What I’m drinking: I swear I have been sick more times this year than in entire decades combined. I seem to have caught another cold. So, I’m supping on a some Celestial Seasons Honey Vanilla Chamomile tea. (And I’m sure there is some sort of irony in doing it out of a cup with the queen of a notorious empire-building nation on the front while reading a book about trying to overthrow the outsider government. But that was wholly accidental.)

The Haunting of a Duke

Review of The Haunting of a Duke (Dark Regency #1), by Chasity Bowlin

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I picked up a copy of The Haunting of a Duke (by Chasity Bowlin) from Amazon. It was free at the time and still free when I posted this review.

Description from Goodreads:
Communing with spirits has been both gift and curse to Emme Walters. Now it’s made her a killer’s target.

Emme knows why the Dowager Duchess of Briarleigh invited her to a house party–to investigate whether the duke, Rhys Brammel, murdered his wife years ago. But Emme never imagined she would fall in love with the brooding duke. Branded by society as a possible killer, Rhys is suspicious of Emme and her alleged “gift.”

Then a late night encounter creates awareness of her other, more attractive, aspects. When Emme’s life is threatened, Rhys becomes her protector. Emme and Rhys find passion and peril as they join forces to solve the mysteries at Briarleigh.

She made him believe in spirits, but can she make him believe in love?

Review:
Mechanically the writing here is fine, if painfully repetitive with certain phrases. But the whole plot, every single aspect of it is just so cliched and overused I can’t give it any more. There is literally no aspect of this plot I couldn’t have predicted just by thinking about what motive you see most often in this sort of book and which of the characters were described to match the most common idea of villainy. Plus, it could do with more editing. I mean, the epilogue appears twice in the Kindle copy, so….

I had to just skim the sex scenes as they were so unexceptional and, to me, annoying. I find sex scenes that continuously focus on how “innocent” and “untried” and “untutored” and “inexperienced” the woman is, as well as ones that might as well just be a grocery list of which body parts the man lusts over boring to the extreme. Plus, I found it disturbing how often she couldn’t identify her own feelings. I will give her credit for at least being willing to accept her own desires once she finally identified them and she never pulled the common, “What’s happening to my body” schtick when she lost her virginity.

All in all, I keep trying to like Regency Romance and every once in a while I encounter one I do, which encourages me to keep trying. But this is a pretty classic example of why I generally don’t like the genre, even if paranormal aspects were thrown in.