Tag Archives: self published

Pound of Flesh

Book Review of Pound of Flesh (Half Demon Warlock #1), by J. A. Cipriano & Conner Kressley

Leave a reply

I received an Audible copy of Pound of Flesh, by J. A. Cipriano and Conner Kressley, from the one of the authors.

Description from Goodreads:
My name is Roy Morgan, and I’m not your average Atlanta cop. For one, most of them don’t have to kill people to stay alive. I do. It’s a half-demon thing. Yep, that’s right, half-demon. It’s awesome, especially since I’m half-warlock too, and those two sides don’t much get along.

Still, that and a buck will get you a candy bar. So it’s all good.

Or at least it was.

See, I had this dumb idea to stop a robbery in progress and have myself a snack. Turns out these weren’t your run of the mill robbers. No, these were demonic slavers, there to capture the district attorney and sell her off to the highest bidding demon in Hell.

Now if I want to stop them, I’m going to have to fight my way through a city full of hellfire-flinging, gun-toting, spell-weaving demons.

My name is Roy Morgan, and I think I’ll have seconds.

Review:
This is fairly standard male urban fantasy. There’s a first person, self-deprecating hero who likes to make snarky comments and act like an anti-hero, a damsel in distress that he falls in love with, a female BFF who is characterless beyond being vapid and slutty (and condemned for it), a cute sidekick and prevailing against all odds. I enjoyed it, but I wouldn’t call it anything special. It is funny and the writing flows quite well. I also liked the narration of the audible version, done by James Foster. I’d read more in the series, even if I’m not racing out to get the next one.

Book Review of The Wilde Crew: Rhett (The Shifters of Wilde Ranch #1), by Kim Fox

Leave a reply

I downloaded a copy of Kim Fox‘s The Wilde Crew: Rhett when it was free on Amazon.

Description from Goodreads:
Skin Shifter, Rhett Jones, is the new shifter cop in Colwood, Montana. His first day on the job has him going toe to paw with a truly dominant grizzly bear shifter and the beautiful girl who is desperately trying to keep the fierce animal under control. He thought the bear was tough but she was nothing compared to the feisty girl hiding inside.

Bear shifter, Joan Heller, is just trying to find a new home but her out of control grizzly bear is ruining everything once again. She’s one phase away from being kicked out of town until she meets up with the sexy cop with the entourage of ravens who offers his help and his home to her.

Things get wild when the Wilde Crew get thrown into the mix and threaten to make the unstable situation explode. Will the new boys in town be the new family that Rhett and Joan need? Or will they be the detonator that blows everything to pieces?

Review:
Well, this book has good reviews and it started well, with the main character and his friends being lovable screw-ups. And it was funny. Unfortunately that wasn’t enough to carry the book when the rest of it fell apart.

There is no conflict in this book, not really. The author threw a half-baked love triangle in for no conceivable reason that substitutes for one for a little while. Let me think, hmm, no that was it and it wasn’t even solved by the end of the book. There was no other conflict, so the book was dull.

It’s basically insta-love, but fails even at that since the pitiful triangle meant the main female was admiring two men when the plot should have been solidifying the love between the two main characters. The sex is abrupt, out of no where and includes role play, which would be fine if the characters had known each-other more than 2 days and either of them had a personality that lead the reader to believe they’d be into that kind of thing. Or done anything to suggest to the other that they’d be open to it. I literally rolled my eyes at the sex scenes.

I appreciated the female alpha. (Though it should be noted she still needed a man to become Alpha.) The writing isn’t horrible, like I said it’s funny, but there is too much tell, not enough show, almost no development of characters, world or plot and it doesn’t really accomplish anything. I finished the book wondering what the point had been.

Book Review of Peter Darling, by Austin Chant

3 Replies

I received a copy of Peter Darling, by Austin Chant, from Netgalley.

Description from Goodreads:
Ten years ago, Peter Pan left Neverland to grow up, leaving behind his adolescent dreams of boyhood and resigning himself to life as Wendy Darling. Growing up, however, has only made him realize how inescapable his identity as a man is. 

But when he returns to Neverland, everything has changed: the Lost Boys have become men, and the war games they once played are now real and deadly. Even more shocking is the attraction Peter never knew he could feel for his old rival, Captain Hook—and the realization that he no longer knows which of them is the real villain.

Review:
Oh, how utterly marvelous! I have to be honest, I’m not generally a fan of retellings; I just so rarely read one I think improves on the original. Peter Darling looked more like a sequel than a retelling though, so I decided to take a chance and read it. I am so glad I did.

I loved almost everything about this. I thought Pan and Hook were charming, and Peter and James even more so. I liked how it makes the reader think about the nature of growing up, how you can never really go back, identity, longing, love and loss. The writing is on point and it’s well edited.

Personally, I had a little trouble with Peter and Wendy being the same individual, as they are quite distinct in the original Peter Pan. However, the way Barrie conflated wife/mother in the original Wendy is one of my strongest and most uncomfortable memories of that book. So, this merging of characters might not be so difficult for other readers. It’s certainly creative and wonderfully done.

I would love to see Ernest get a book, since I curious how his life will turn out. All in all, Chant has just made my radar. I’ll be looking for more.