Tag Archives: YA

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Book Review: Serpent’s Touch, by Marina Simcoe

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I picked up a copy of Marina Simcoe’s Serpent’s Touch as an Amazon freebie.

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Mysterious and tragic, Madame Tan’s menagerie is the only home I’ve ever known. It’s a place where two worlds merge, a twilight zone between Earth and the magical Kingdom of Nerifir.
The menagerie is filled with fantastic animals, but I discover that Madame captures and displays sentient beings too.

One of them is locked in a crate day and night, not seen by anyone, and one day I learn why— looking at him kills. Even talking to Kyllen is forbidden, but I break that rule.
I break many rules for him.

He wants his freedom and offers me a chance to escape Madame’s cruelties. Little do I realize that with Kyllen, my heart is in even greater danger than my life.
Can I love a man whom I can’t even see?

my review

For a book with a really dynamic cover, it sure did have an incredibly bland…dare I say BORING story in it! Plus, despite being titled Serpent’s TOUCH (with a sexy man on the front), there is almost no touching in it. It is, in fact, almost a platonic young adult book. It started out well enough, but lost steam before the halfway point. The MMC always felt a little too slick to be trustworthy, and the FMC (despite one desperate act of rebellion) is basically a doormat who literally allows herself to be rendered blind and helpless. This was a no for me and I don’t intend to continue the series.

Other Reviews:

Serpent’s Touch by Marina Simcoe

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Book Review: The Raven’s Tale, by Cat Winters

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I’ve had a copy of Cat Winter‘s The Raven’s Tale on the shelf for several years now. I suspect I won it, but it’s also possible I picked it up second-hand.

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Seventeen-year-old Edgar Poe counts down the days until he can escape his foster family—the wealthy Allans of Richmond, Virginia. He hungers for his upcoming life as a student at the prestigious new university, almost as much as he longs to marry his beloved Elmira Royster. However, on the brink of his departure, all his plans go awry when a macabre Muse named Lenore appears to him. Muses are frightful creatures that lead Artists down a path of ruin and disgrace, and no respectable person could possibly understand or accept them. But Lenore steps out of the shadows with one request: “Let them see me!”

my review

I enjoyed this in the end. But it took me a long time to get into. I was bored for a lot of it. I kept waiting for the story I expected to begin, but eventually realized it wasn’t going to happen. This is a smaller, quieter telling. It’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea; I’m not even sure it is mine. Or that I liked Poe much or his muse(s) much. But I did appreciate Winter’s take on Poe’s early life. It’s just that this seems to ring a single note over and over again, or maybe it’s that only a single bell tolls. All in all, I don’t regret having read it, but I’m glad to be finished and moving on.

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Book Review: The Raven’s Tale by Cat Winters

 

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Book Review: The Once and Future Queen, by Paula Lafferty

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I received an ARC copy of Paula Lafferty‘s The Once and Future Queen from Between the Chapters Book Club.

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22-year-old Vera is at a waiting tables, grieving her previous relationship, and jogging aimlessly each morning as if toward an uncertain future. Then an odd man shows up at her workplace, insisting that she was once the legendary Queen Guinevere of Camelot, and that her lost memories hold the key to changing both the past and the present. Somehow, it all feels like the direction she’s been looking for. But when she asks the mysterious man to tell her more about Lancelot, Arthur, and a faithless queen, he can only say that much of what she’s heard about Camelot is wrong. The truth, he claims, is something she must see for herself.

After jumping through a portal in Glastonbury’s historic center, Vera is not prepared for what she finds. Magic is everywhere, but a curse on the kingdom means it dwindles every day. She has no idea how to perform a queen’s duties. Her fast friendship with Lancelot sets gossip flowing, and the stranger she must call “husband” often refuses to meet her eye. Arthur is a cold, forbidding, and, while angry to her face, keeps leaving secret tokens of tenderness in her chambers. Worst of all, Vera’s memories—and the answers locked within them—show no signs of returning. If Vera is truly destined to save Camelot, she’ll have to trust her instincts. And her king will have to trust her . . .

my review

The Once and Future Queen is basically a time-traveling isekai or portal fantasy where a modern-day Guinevere leaps back to Camelot, Arthur, Merlin, and all the knights of the to-be round table. It has a lot going for it. Guinevere has a good heart and a genuine desire to right past wrongs. Arthur is every bit as noble as would be expected. Lancelot is rogueish and charming. Merlin is mysterious, Camelot itself hopeful in its infancy, if still smarting from the war.

I liked a lot of the characters. Lancelot and Gawain, especially. But I also hoped for something less YA/NA and therefore more interesting. A lot of the book is just slice-of-life stuff. Characters play and eat, sleep and travel. I was, frankly, bored for a lot of it. Plus, I found that Guinevere simply wasn’t very important in the grand scheme of things. She didn’t actually do much that had any significant effect and wasn’t even necessary to the eventual solution to the magic problem.

The cliffhanger does have me curious what might happen next and how it all might work out. But the boredom left me not invested enough to rush right out to see if there is a book two yet.

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Other Reviews:

Bossy Bookworm: The Once and Future Queen