Book Review: Enchanted Inc. by Shanna Swendson

Review: Enchanted Inc.
Series: Enchanted Inc. – Book 1
Author: Shanna Swendson
No of Pages: 308
Release Date: 31 May 2005

DON’T MESS WITH THE HEXES

Katie Chandler had always heard that New York is a weird and wonderful place, but this small-town Texas gal had no idea how weird until she moved there. Everywhere she goes, she sees something worth gawking at, and Katie is afraid she’s a little too normal to make a splash in the big city. Working for an ogre of a boss doesn’t help either.

Then, seemingly out of the blue, Katie gets a job offer form Magic, Spells and Illusions, Inc., a company that sells tricks of the trade to the magic community. For MSI, Katie’s ordinariness is an asset. Lacking any bit of magic, she can easily spot a fake spell, catch hidden clauses in competitor’s contracts, and detect magically disguised intruders. Suddenly, average Katie is very special indeed.

She quickly learns that office politics are even more complicated when your new boss is a real ogre, and you have a crush on the sexy, shy, ultra powerful head of the R&D department, who is so busy fighting an evil competitor threatening to sell black magic on the street that he seems barely to notice Katie. Now it’s up to Katie to pull off the impossible: save the world and – hopefully – live happily ever after.

My Thoughts:

Enchanted Inc. was a bit of a bore for me.

Katie has spent most of her working life at her parents feed shop. She did everything for the business there from the general running to the bookwork. Problem is, her parents shop is in a tiny Texas town, so when working in New York all of Katie’s hard work means close to squat.

After struggling for a year Katie gets discovered by a company that no one has ever heard of but is apparently leading in its field. What is that field? No one seems to know that either. Only when Katie starts work there does she discover that they manufacture spells – no, not trick ones, real ones – and are currently struggling to compete against one of their ex-employees evil ventures against them.

Katie for me was a boring character. She moaned groaned and whined throughout and still managed to be miss perfect. Everything just came easy to her, she was working there two days before being promoted to the CEO’s assistant, did that for two days before becoming the new head of the new marketing department that was created just for her.

I was almost glad that Owen the brilliant magician didn’t go for her because then I probably would have thrown the book across the room and moved on.

Then there was the premise of the whole story, it sounded like a slightly older version of Harry Potter, let’s take you into a secret world that no one knows about, where you are so special that everyone wants to meet you. Let’s play with some spells and enchantments and then you can save the day against the bad guy.

The difference? I loved Harry Potter. Enchanted Inc. put me to sleep.

Then there were the spells themselves. People buy spells that are basically little tiny books that contain what you need in them but you can only use them once and not maliciously. Huh? Talk about take the fun out of everything. Yet even though the entire book was about the spell manufacturing industry, we get to see one – that’s right just one – spell in action, and it backfired.

Enchanted Inc. sounded really fun when I first picked it up, but it was a complete disappointment. Merely the fantasy life of an overlooked office worker who wants to be special for being boringly normal.

Others in this series:
Once Upon Stilletos
Damsel Under Stress
Don't Hex with Texas

Book Review: Fatal Embrace by Aris Whittier

Review: Fatal Embrace
Author: Aris Whittier
No of Pages: 251
Release Date: 2 October 2005

Several years ago, Michael Craven gave up his career as a detective when his fiancé was killed and her killer never caught. Living with the guilt, he throws himself into his Montana ranch and his solitary existence. But, when a serial killer starts making his way through a nearby town, Michael is asked to come back and help a good friend and fellow detective, solve the crime. In doing so, he must hire someone to take his place on the ranch.
When horse trainer, Jess Stanson shows up, it takes Michael by surprise. Jess turns out to be Jessica. Jessica convinces him to let her stay. Over time they established a fragile friendship. Although, on the inside both feel more but, Michael's past prevents him from being anything but distant and serious.

As Michael works diligently to track down the killer he finds that Jessica is the only witness to the case. Vowing to protect her with his life and keep his growing feelings separate is no easy task. When Jessica becomes a target it becomes personal for Michael and he can no longer deny his love for this spirited woman. He will do anything to protect her, including giving his own life.

My Thoughts:

Fatal Embrace was nothing if not predictable.

Jessica Stanson is a horse trainer, a female one, and when she shows up at Michael Carven’s farm for her first day of work, he flips. He doesn’t want a girl running his stables let alone a woman living in his house.

But they grow closer as Jessica helps Michael finally get past his traumatic loss and simultaneously fight the common enemy in the form of a serial killer that is after her.

Jessica was a nice enough character, feisty and intelligent, but iin many ways she was also extremely stupid. If there was a serial killer after me I would barely want to leave the house let alone go flouncing around by myself for drives out to other farms or going into a not very busy town by myself.

Michael was a complete contradiction of himself. One minute he is angry at Jess, the next he can’t stand to be without her, but before even finishing that breath he is pushing her away again. He just couldn’t make up his mind and his emotions were all over the place, but not in a good way. Michael was not an asset to this story, no matter how major his part was.

The writing in Fatal Embrace, for me, was very frustrating to read. Facts didn’t add up, leads weren’t followed up and obvious clues were completely looked over. Basically I had the killer worked out as soon as all of the main and secondary characters were laid out on the table, which wasn’t that far in.

Then we have the writing itself, which was jerky and badly formatted. Most formatting errors I can overlook but words were in the wrong place and the wrong “there” was used a couple of times. But what killed Fatal Embrace for me completely was Whittier never seemed to know whose head she was in. The POV would jump from Jessica to Michael in a sentence, no breaks or obvious change overs, it took a lot of re-reading on my part to keep up with whose head we were in at any one time and even after you thought you had it figured out, you still weren’t right.

I also had a lot of trouble with some of the major details in Fatal Embrace, Michael might be working on the investigation, but he isn’t a cop, he’s just a ranch owner, he used to be a cop, but he quit the force, and yet he is questioning people, knocking on peoples doors and acting like he is the chief without so much as a flash of a badge? Women are scared of what’s out there and yet here they are letting a strange man who claims to be a cop, but has no idea, into their house while they are alone? It doesn’t make sense.

My other pet peeve for Fatal Embrace was the sex break we took right towards the end, instead of finding the serial killer Jess and Michael decided to bed down for the last ten to fifteen pages so we could cram the climax into two pages of broken action.

Fatal Embrace had a pull over me, because I wanted to confirm that I was right. Other than that it was a very frustrating and predicatable read.

Book Review: Secrets and Shadows by Shannon Delany

Review: Secrets and Shadows
Series: 13 to Life – Book 2
Author: Shannon Delany
No of Pages: 304
Release Date: 15 February 2011

Nothing’s simple when you run with werewolves. Jessie Gillmansen thinks she’s seen it all, but her eyes are about to be opened to even more danger and a reality far more paranormal than she’s ever suspected. Thanks to Jessie’s startling revelation about the Rusakova’s mother, the group’s choices become harder – and trust is more important than ever. But the dramatic change Pietr’s going through may shake the trust he’s built with Jessie to its very foundation. As the broken Rusakova family struggles to come together to face what may be their greatest challenge, the people Jessie believed were normal show themselves to be much, much more…

My Thoughts:

Ms Delany seems to have a serious Twilight complex and it doesn’t bode well with this book.

Jessie is still struggling to come to terms with how her life has been flipped on its head in the past year. Now she also has to deal with the increasing distance Pietr is putting between them whilst still agreeing to help the werewolves release their captured mother.

Jessie seems to have had a complete character change from how I remember her in the first book. She went from being a likeable, seemingly intelligent character to this clingy, whiny schoolgirl who is having a breakdown every other day and unable to handle her life at all. She went from being well-adjusted considering her situation to a total mental wreck in the space of the couple of weeks between books. She became Bella, basically.

Shamelessly throwing herself at a guy who doesn’t want her then going and making out with his arch enemy to get back at him. Then wondering why he still doesn’t want her and not listening to him after he tells her something is too dangerous, she stubbornly tags along anyway. What is wrong with these humans who seem to think they can match a supernatural's healing abilities?!

Pietr went from an arrogant semi-likable character because of his hotness appeal, to well, Edward. Tortured teen who thinks the world will never understand his predicament, wanting to ”protect” those he loves by distancing himself from them but still keeping an emotional hold over them so they can never move on.

Secrets and Shadows was a train wreck in every sense of the word. The story is a bad copy of Twilight even going so far as to say that the male lead doesn’t think he has a soul anymore because of what he’s become and what he has done and then to say that maybe the family should leave town and everyone they know behind to keep them safe from themselves.

The romance between Jessie and Pietr is becoming laughable now. Jessie pushed Pietr into the arms of another girl and expects him to treat the other girl, Sarah the former Queen Bee, like dirt because Jessie can’t stand the thought of them being together.

I will admit up front that I could barely remember anything from 13 to Life, and Delany’s lack of any form of backstory until three quarters of the way through the book had me scratching my head at times. It goes to show that either I’m losing my memory or that no matter how much I liked 13 to Life, it just wasn’t memorable.

The writing in Secrets and Shadows is engaging once again but the plot is all over the place. There’s trimming down unnecessary detail and then there’s butchering your story. A werewolf got turned back into a human, end of chapter; do we see how said werewolf is faring? How said werewolf feels or is coping with this massive change in their life? Of course not. Vital details were missing; Jessie was at her house one minute then in the car the next. She was possibly borderline date-raped (hmm, I’m seeing more Twilight here) but that doesn’t get explored at all.

I said in the first book that there was a severe lack of information, that pattern continued in the second book. It was a complete mind-boggling circle of the mess Jessie has made of her non-existent love-life and any interesting parts of the story were overlooked because Jessie was too busy panting after Pietr – and quite literally sexually harassing him, I’m sorry but shoving your tongue down someone’s throat who has expressly asked you not to do so is harassment in my book - to notice anything else that may have been going on around her.

Secrets and Shadows was a big disappointment for me. It was a bad copy of the Twilight Saga and the writing was so jumpy it literally gave me headaches to read. I kind of want to know what happens in relation to the Rusakova’s mother but I am wary.

Others in this series:
13 to Life
Bargains and Betrayals

Book Review: Defense Against the Dark by Emily Carlin

Review: Defense Against the Dark
Author: Emily Carlin
No of Pages: 208
Release Date: 15 March 2011

USE REAL MAGICK TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM HARM

When we lie awake at night listening to mysterious sounds, we imagine all the things that could be making those strange noises.

The rumbling is the sound of the refrigerator; the knocking is from the old furnace; the creaking is nothing more that the house settling...isn’t it? Although the modern world has denied the existence of things that go bump in the night and has taught us that the occult couldn’t possibly exist, we know there are things that science has yet to explain.

Defense Against the Dark introduces you to many of those unsavoury magickal creatures and occult happenings that exist outside of fairytales. Our ancestors knew these things were real, and took precautions to protect themselves from whatever evil was lurking in the shadows.

Defense Against the Dark will teach you:
• Common lore and mythology of predatory entities such as goblins, vampires, imps, and ghosts.
• How to identify malevolent spirits and understand how curses actually work.
• How to master different protection methods, including shielding, banishing, and hex breaking.
• Easy, concrete methods for protecting yourself in everyday situations.

My Thoughts:

Defense Against the Dark asks one to go in with an open mind, but even the most open of minds you will come out slightly disturbed at the content you just read.

Defense Against the Dark is a collection of folk lore about the various creatures that inhabit our surroundings, whether they be ghosts, faeries, vampires or werewolves they are all real and Carlin gives us a way to identify them and either rid ourselves of them or keep them from becoming a problem.

In part two of Defense Against the Dark we learn about certain protective rituals and spells that we can cast to help us rid ourselves of the various nasties that are out there to get us. Whether they be elemental circles for protection, hex-breakings or house cleansings, you will be able to find it here.

For me, Defense Against the Dark was just too far-fetched, and too hypothetical. Part One I rather enjoyed, being an avid reader of paranormal books hearing the true lore behind the stories was an extra step into the genre, but it wasn’t really lore as we know it, it was lore stating that people turn into wolves once a month, it was lore that told us vampires were real, whether they be the non-dangerous blood sucking kind or the bad energy sapping kind.

There were disclaimers with everything though, if you think things are moving around your house by themselves, it might be a boggart, or you may have rats. If you think you’re being possessed, it may be an evil demon, or you may be schizophrenic. If you attempt a cleansing ritual, it may work, or you may just not be doing it right, or you may not have enough belief in what you are doing.

I did enjoy some of the lore, most of which was in the faery chapter. Instead of thinking that I’m forgetful, it would be nice to think that it was a pixy moving my objects around. There was no real evidence to back up what she was saying though, no stories, no re-telling, and no crazy cat ladies swear that they have ghosts in their houses, just what Carlin decided to look up on the internet one day and compile.

But the believability ended there. When reading up on Black Ladies (the children eating kind) we were advised as adults to show force or to create an energy ball full of “let me go” energy. At that point I had to put the book down and walk away for a little while. My open mind suddenly pushed the pretty faeries to the back of my mind, and logic started creeping back in, but I kept going and still quite enjoyed the rest of the lore.

In Part Two though, Defense Against the Dark started to lose all credibility, just because the spells didn’t follow through. For example:

By my will the circles are sealed.
My circles of protection will hold until I get up tomorrow morning.
So mote it be.

Really? “Until I get up in the morning”? Carlin really couldn’t follow through with something a little more in character? First sentence is very Wiccan like, third sentence also follows the same pattern but the middle? What happened there? Was her mojo just not working that day?

Defense Against the Dark was definitely an experience, but not the best one to convert a logical mind. I don’t think that there’s nothing out there, but I want a bit more evidence than just “it could be the end of the world as we know it, but it’s probably you just going insane.”

Book Review: Strange Familiar by Hunter Cassidy

Review: Strange Familiar
Author: Cassidy Hunter
No of Pages: 146
Release Date: 14 December 2010

Fate finally brings Olivia her Familiar… too bad fate is a bored bitch with a dark sense of humor.

At last, Olivia Brew's Familiar has found her. Now that the search is over, her weakened powers and strength will be restored, and she can get on with her witchy life. But there's a problem. Her familiar's not exactly what she expected. And she just might be falling in love with him.

Kane Oliver's got problems of his own. He's not interested in being anyone's pet, and he's got secrets so deeply buried even he isn't aware of them. Though he can't deny the powerful connection between himself and Olivia, he's not exactly Familiar material. And there are beings more powerful than either of them who want to keep it that way…

My Thoughts:

Strange Familiar was hot, but extremely shallow.

Olivia is a witch in need of a familiar. Kane is a man who has a sickness he can’t cure. Both are weak from what they lack and are drawn to each other when they meet. Olivia senses it immediately, as strange as it seems, Kane is destined to be her familiar.

Olivia is an easy, shallow, mildly stupid character. Although at times she was good for a laugh, as soon as anyone touched her, all she could think of was sex. That could have been a good thing, but she used sex in ways that just annoyed me, instead of telling Kane when something was wrong she would throw herself at him and forget with the use of pleasure. At times she shone through as a tough, intelligent witch, but all of it was overshadowed by her easiness with not just Kane but anyone else who touched her.

Kane was a stubborn egotistical male, but he was also a fairly well rounded character. He had an element of realness to him in that he would walk away to think and not just use sex to forget like Olivia. Kane didn’t really seem to care for Olivia though, he thought he was under a love spell so wouldn’t reveal himself to her, it was just shallow sex. Even when Olivia told him she loved him, he would never say it back, he could imply it, but would never say the words.

Strange Familiar just seemed to keep going. More than one plot seemed to be playing out even though it was extremely frustrating that we never got any answers to the big questions. There was no real background into the dynamic of witches and their familiars or why it was so strange that Olivia bonded with a part human, there was no back ground into Kane’s story or answers to questions like who Aunt Herman really was or if Olivia’s father ever told the truth to his wife about his heritage.

Strange Familiar had the potential to be a whirlwind of a story, but the sex overshadowed every element of it. The characters were two dimensional and were only ever detailed enough for their small part in the plot to move forward, nothing but the sex was explored and although it was very hot even that became mildly repetitive toward the end.

The thought actually crossed my mind of “ugh, not again” when the characters took another sex break as it felt forced and completely unnecessary. There was no real bond between Kane and Olivia, and it was painfully obvious. All they had was the physical side to their relationship, nothing more was developed.

Strange Familiar kept me interested because of the shred of a plot we got to witness, but other than some hot sex and a few flash in the pan characters it won’t be a memorable experience.

Book Review: Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott

Review: Living Dead Girl
Author: Elizabeth Scott
No of Pages: 170
Release Date: 2 September 2008

The thing is, you can get used to anything. You think you can’t, you want to die, but you don’t. You won’t. You just are.

This is Alice.
She was taken by Ray five years ago.
She thought she knew how her story would end.
She was wrong.

My Thoughts:

I expected Living Dead Girl to horrify me, sicken me and make me feel all sorts of thing for this poor stolen little girl. But I didn’t.

Alice wasn’t always called Alice. There was a time when she was part of a family, had friends and a future. But when Ray kidnapped her from a school trip when she was ten, everything changed.

While being in a traumatic situation, Alice is not likeable or even relatable as a character. I wanted to feel sorry for her and I did at times when she was starving or being abused but it wasn’t enough to make me feel anything more than a passing thought of something being mildly wrong. It may have been the writing or it may have been Alice or it might just be me, but there were times when I couldn’t feel sorry for her.

Alice wished her situation on other little girls in hope of freeing herself. She was supposedly broken and yet she could still fight back in her small ways. Stealing food and coming up with escape plans. She hated herself so much and yet she still wanted this done to a child in hopes of her dying or being free, it made me really dislike her as a character but it also made me feel like she was contradicting herself. She talks about how she used to be selfish and yet she still is. She talks about how shes given up and yet she still fights. She talks about how bad it is to live like this and yet she wants it done to someone else.

Ray threatens Alice with killing her parents if she ever tries to leave him. Beats her if she doesn’t comply with his wishes and starves her so that she will only ever way one hundred pounds or less. He makes her feel bad for growing up and beats her whenever he feels like it. He rapes her because he can and because he thinks he loves her and he makes her tell him all the time about how she will always be his little girl. Ray is a despicable person, and yet I don’t hate him. He just wasn’t around enough for me to hate him. Everything he did to Alice was diluted by constant repetition or complete glossing over of details.

Living Dead Girl sounds fantastic in theory but the writing takes a lot away from it. The short chapters and fragmented sentences don’t drive points home like they are meant to. Too many details are glossed over in the treatment of Alice to the point where there is almost nothing to visualise and the constant repetition of how each day was the same became tedious.

I was expecting a lot more from Living Dead Girl than what I got. I read it in a couple of hours but it didn’t affect me in anyway.

Book Review: A Blue So Dark by Holly Schindler

Review: A Blue So Dark
Author: Holly Schindler
No of Pages: 266
Release Date: 1 May 2010

All I see are murky depths that could swallow me whole.

Mom knew that the mermaids – hand carved from driftwood by the owner of a souvenir shop – were all I wanted to take home from Florida. As she bought them, she looked down at me, her eyes not just glittering but snapping with fire like two Fourth of July sparklers. She ran her finger down the length of my nose, almost like you’d stroke a favourite pet, and said to the salesman, “We’re just alike, me and Aura.”

And you know, back then, the idea of that didn’t scare the absolute hell out of me.

My Thoughts:

A Blue So Dark is a perfect example of how stupid some teenagers can be.

Aura is caring for her mother who has schizophrenia, whilst also trying to juggle school a job and trying to get her mother to work on time. Aura’s mum begged her to not make her take any pills and Aura kept that promise to her at the cost of her mother’s sanity.

Aura killed the entire story for me. She refused to get help for her mother even though she watched her spiral out of control. Aura seemed to start to lose her own sanity for a while too as she convinced herself that she could handle it. But when Aura tried to convince herself that her art was the thing sending her family crazy that’s when I completely rolled my eyes.

Aura is the embodiment of why teenagers should not be left to deal with things on their own, because they are too immature. Her mother would have been well if only Aura had said something, if she had done her research on schizophrenia instead of the many artists who suffer from mental illness. She almost had me convinced that my writing was sending me crazy (until I realised I would be crazy anyway).

A Blue So Dark contained beautiful writing especially when it came to the poems she wrote through Aura. They truly portrayed some of the feelings Aura was going through and helped you get more into her head. They for me were extremely inspiring and helped me with some of my own writing.

Schindler’s writing alone that kept me going and the question of would Aura let her mother die or get her help? Because that is what it was coming down to.

I can understand that anyone in that situation would have a hard time. Aura’s father walked out because he couldn’t deal with the stress of living with a schizophrenic. But the way Aura handled everything was just so wrong and so childish.

A Blue So Dark would have been interesting if it didn’t have Aura in it. A Blue So Dark for me set a bad example as to how to handle mental illness in a family. Aura’s mother, Grace, was shunned by her husband and abandoned, left in the care of her sixteen year old daughter who just couldn’t handle the responsibility and thrown out by her own mother when she was young and she had realised what she would become.

A Blue So Dark just wasn’t for me. It was a good premise but the characters, especially Aura, completely killed it for me.

Book Review: Elizabeth's Wolf by Lora Leigh

Review: Elizabeth’s Wolf
Series: Breeds – Book 3
Author: Lora Leigh
No of Pages: 304
Release Date: 30 June 2005

Dash thought himself alone, a soldier, a fighting machine and no more.

Elizabeth made him realise he was a man.

Danger surrounds the woman his soul marked as his mate, death and blood and treachery that go beyond even his worst nightmares. But he will protect her and what she claims as her own. He was created to kill, trained to do it efficiently, and only a man bound to her, heart and soul, will have the strength to save Elizabeth and her prized possession.

My Thoughts:

You don’t really read Breeds books for their riveting plots, but for me Elizabeth’s Wolf was just too far-fetched in how she brought the pair together.

Dash is a soldier, a soldier who has been wounded very badly. He starts receiving letters from a little girl in a school program. Cassie writes to Dash telling her about her life, about her mother, her troubles and her search for a new daddy as she doesn’t have one. Through a brief, two line description of Cassie’s mother, Dane falls in love with her.

After being on the run for the past two years Elizabeth is running out of steam both physically and mentally, and when Dash walks into the restaurant she’s sitting in with her daughter and introduces himself, she goes with him.

For me, this storyline was just a little too off with the pixies, if I had been on the run from criminals for the past two years and had no trust in anyone, no way would I trust a guy who had just walked into a random restaurant I had picked to eat at after tracking me for the past few weeks. I would not get in his car with my baby and go off with him. And yet Elizabeth, the strong willed, stubborn woman did.

Like I said, you don’t read Breeds for the plot and although this plot was too stretched for my tastes the sex as always is good, even though Leigh took it a little too far in this aspect as well. I will spare the details of the nitty gritties, but there are certain things in certain areas of one’s life and ones anatomy that just don’t work like that regardless of the person on the other ends DNA.

And then there was the shaving scene. There is not much in this world that will make me cringe, and this raised the bad kind of goose bumps. Not only would I be monumentally embarrassed to have someone shave me, let alone my lover, but I would also be inconsolably enraged at the gall my lover would have to even attempt doing such a thing, and for those who haven’t caught on yet; he wasn’t shaving under her arms...

Elizabeth’s Wolf is good in a sense if you want to use it for dirty smutty relief, but if you’re going in there for a good story I really suggest you don’t waste the time or money. I will not warn you off the rest of the Breed’s books though just because this one for me was a flop. I will continue the series, mainly because I need my occasional dosages of smut relief.

 Also in this series:
Tempting the Beast
The Man Within
Kiss of Heat
Soul Deep
The Breed Next Door
Megan's Mark
Harmony's Way
Tanner's Scheme
Wolfe's Hope
Jacob's Faith
Aiden's Charity
In a Wolf's Embrace
Dawn's Awakening
A Jaguar's Kiss
Mercury's War
Christmas Heat
Coyotes Mate
Christmas Kiss
Bengals Heart
Lions Heat

Book Review: Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz

Review: Blue Bloods
Series: Blue Bloods – Book 1
Author: Melissa De La Cruz
No of Pages: 302
Release Date: 27 March 2007

THEY’RE YOUNG, FABULOUS AND FANGED...

And they rule Manhattan from the trendy uptown clubs to the downtown boutiques. Fifteen-year-old Schuyler Van Allen has never quite fit in at her exclusive prep school – she’s more of a vintage than a Versace girl – but that’s all about to change...

Because Schuyler has just found out she’s a Blue Blood. The Blue Bloods are the city’s glamorous and secret vampire elite. They’re young, beautiful and powerful. But now they’re being murdered. And Schuyler must find out who – or what – is behind it, before she’s next.

My Thoughts:

Gossip Girl meets Twilight, and dies.

Blue Bloods follows the lives of the New York teen socialite scene, that scene being full of vampires. Primarily focusing on Schuyler Van Allen, a fifteen year old girl whose family was once powerful, but is now poor, both her parents have died and she is being raised by her Grandmother.

After finding out she is a Blue Blood, Schuyler also finds out that the Blue Bloods are being killed off, and not in a it’s-ok-because-we-will-regenerate-later-on kind of a way, but in a dead-and-not-coming-back way.

Blue Bloods had a suck you in element that made you want to keep reading, but now that I think back to what I felt during and after reading it, well, I’m not entirely impressed.

Why? Because the characters were under-developed and changed too much, Schuyler was completely unlikeable and a lot of the concept was just confusing. No one is really related because they are all actually fallen angels who are trying to get back to heaven because it is their “right”, oh and twins are in love with each other.

What absolutely killed Schuyler for me was not only the fact that she “dressed like a street urchin” but was still beautiful underneath (please), but she was actually filthy in the way that she “hadn’t washed her hair in a few weeks anyway”. I’m sorry, but eww, and she was picked to be a model looking like that? Hello, unrealistic. And of course, she is the only one who can solve the mystery of who is killing the Blue Bloods, because no one else is capable...uh-huh.

The characters reactions were forced and they were all a little too superficial for being so old, they didn’t care about the right things, only who was going to the next party and what they should wear.

The name dropping was atrocious and the wrong things were described. I’m sorry but I don’t care about what the nuts at the table looked like. Sure New York is pretty, but I’m not an architect, and I don’t care about the swirling on a fence that has nothing to do with anything.

But is this the next Twilight? Because even now as I describe all the wrongness, I want to go back, yet I don’t know why. Maybe I’m hoping Schuyler will die.

Others in this Series:
Masquerade
Revelations
The Van Allen Legacy
Misguided Angel

Book Review: A Season of Eden by J.M Warwick

Review: A Season of Eden
Author: J.M Warwick
No of Pages: 234
Release Date: 20 October 2008

HE’S MY TEACHER. I SHOULDN’T BE ALONE WITH HIM. BUT I CAN’T HELP THAT HE’S IRRESISTIBLE.

I let the door silently close at my back. He stared at me, and a taut quiet stretched between us.

"I like hearing you play," I said, moving toward him.

He turned, in sync with my slow approach. He looked up at me but didn't say anything. I rested my clammy hand on the cold, slick body of the baby grand. "May I?"

The muscles in his throat shifted, then he swallowed. "Eden."

My knees weakened, like a soft tickling kiss had just been blown against the backs of them. "Is it okay?" I asked.

His gaze held mine like two hands joined. He understood what I was really asking.

"Let me stay," I said. "Please."

"You're going to get me in trouble," he said.

My Thoughts:

A Season of Eden is fluff, about as significant as the fluff on Leesa’s head

We follow the story of Eden, a senior in her last year of high school. Taking music class because it is an “Easy A” she doesn’t expect there to be a last minute change in teachers. Replacing the old teacher is Mr. Christian a vibrant, passionate, young man who brings the love for music back into the music group.

The first time Eden sees Mr. Christian she falls for him, not in the normal “crush” way, but in what she thinks is love. That there is understandable, what’s not is Mr. James Christian’s reaction, after working so hard during school, taking extra classes so he could get into college sooner, pushing away everything in his life to focus on getting to where he wants to be, he literally throws it all away for some chick he just met by meeting up with her for coffee. I’m sorry, but that just isn’t believable.

Eden as a character I liked. She wasn’t an exceptional stand-out but she was higher up on the maturity scale than some. She’s had hardship, losing her mother, subsequently losing her father to another woman in his own grief, the depression that followed that. But for all the hardship that Eden seems to have gone through, she hasn’t become a better person because of it.

James as a character I liked because of the hotness factor, but that is about it. For being a teacher, he is extremely immature, even more immature than his students. Not only did he put his job on the line by seeing one of his students, when he was around Eden, he acted like a child. The killer for me was when he blamed their age difference for their problems.

Uh, excuse me, 4 years isn’t a difference, if you had paid attention in Physical Development you’d know that she is technically as old in the brain as you are. Only immature people blame age and it really annoyed me that he would use an excuse like that, just because he realised too late that he was in over his head.

There was no growth in any of the characters, a relationship never blossomed between the mains in my opinion, it was just a lot of sneaking around and frustrating arguments. Eden didn’t grow even when she had the chance, she was still as nasty to Leesa as before, even after finding out that Leesa was sick again, she still didn’t care. Her “best friend” was a backstabber, latching on to Eden’s ex and then after catching him cheating, still falling all over herself to be noticed by him.

Whilst enjoying the writing (even though the excessive use of the word “retard” grated on my nerves) and the story during the time that I was reading A Season of Eden, I came out of it extremely unfulfilled and empty. While I refuse to give spoilers...the ending was crap, following in the footsteps of the entire plot, nothing happened. There was no closure, and it was disappointing.

Book Review: Sweet Dreams, Miss England by Iris Blobel

Review: Sweet Dreams, Miss England
Author: Iris Blobel
No. Of Pages: 203
Release Date: 1st January 2010

This book was sent to me by the author in exchange for my honest review.

She could still hear Daniel's grandmother saying, 'Sometimes we meet people but not to share the rest of our lives with them, but merely for them to guide us onto a different path'.

Set in London and Dublin we follow the life of Nicky, a young mother of two who is married to Shane, an actor whose work requires him to be in Los Angeles. When Nicky meets Daniel, a fun-loving, spontaneous man from Ireland, she realises how much joy and passion are missing from her marriage, and consequently her life. Nicky is torn between her marriage to Shane and her love for this Irish charmer.

My Thoughts:

Sweet Dreams, Miss England was interesting, but slow.

SDME follows the story of Nicky, a mother of two living in London with a husband who lives in America. Whilst on a trip to Dublin, Nicky meets Daniel, a handsome Irish DJ who immediately catches her eye. Nicky being a neglected house wife falls into the arms of this man and a love affair ensues.

Nicky was a likeable enough character, if a little flawed. Her flaws were realistic, if sometimes a bit annoying. Although personally I don’t condone cheating, I would prefer that if you are unhappy in your relationship, walk away before starting something else. So the fact that Nicky had an affair with Daniel grated on my nerves a little bit. It is understandable however why Nicky did it.

As a young person Nicky fell head over heels for Shane, her husband, without ever experiencing anything else, so when Daniel came along and she felt a spark, she explored it. Of course it doesn’t help that Shane doesn’t take the slightest bit of interest in her or her children’s lives.

Although I can understand where Nicky might be coming from, I still didn’t like how she went about getting what she wanted. That may be my personal opinion, but for me, I wouldn’t be able to leave my (future) children just go have sex in another country. I wouldn’t lie to everyone around me because I knew that what I was doing was wrong. Nicky at times came across as selfish and whiny. It was a little too much about her.

Daniel was naturally the most likeable character in the entire story. He was charming, thoughtful and kind. He knew Nicky was married, but wanted to share his life with her anyway, knowing that she might walk away. Daniel was nice to her kids when he eventually met them and was just completely down to earth. Not much fazed him and he was willing to do anything for a friend.

Jamie was supposed to be the “best-friend” to Nicky, not that she was a very good one. I didn’t like Jamie; she was nasty, judgemental and too pass-remarkable. Which is how we are meant to feel about her. Although Jamie was destined to be “the bad guy”, she had a point. Nicky threw away her entire life for a guy she barely knew, and the first thing that ran through my mind was, if you’re going to do this to the man you’re supposed to love, what’s going to happen to this guy when you get sick of him.

Vonnie was cute, likeable and really friendly. She plays the part of the cool new Irish best-friend. She was a little unrealistic though. She encouraged the affair and Nicky going to Ireland so much, she was all about living in the moment, but for people who are in their 30s and 40s you would think that they would have learnt by now that not everything is about them.

SDME was written fairly well, the characters were nicely fleshed out and we got to see inside Nicky’s brain making it easy for us to see where she’s coming from. The characters felt a little too in their roles though. Shane was painted as a massive bad guy, everything was an ulterior motive and nothing was truly sincere. Jamie was supposed to be nice but because she wanted Nicky to stay in England she then became a bad guy. Vonnie and Daniel were such nice people, it’s almost hard to believe that such beings could exist and Nicky was the hard done by working wife. 

It took a while for me to really get into SDME; there is a lot of back story in the first few chapters. The romance was enjoyable and not rushed, but the story behind which Nicky and Daniel meet was a little weak. There were some unrealistic parts but overall SDME was an enjoyable read that I probably wouldn’t have picked up had it not been brought to my attention by Mrs. Blobel.

Book Review: Embers by Laura Bickle

Review: Embers

Series: Embers – Book 1

Author: Laura Bickle

No. Of Pages: 359

Release Date: 30 March 2010

TRUTH BURNS.

Unemployment, despair, anger – visible and invisible unrest feed the undercurrent of Detroit’s unease. A city increasingly invaded by phantoms now faces a malevolent force that further stokes fear and chaos throughout the city.

Anya Kalinczyk spends her days as an arson investigator with the Detroit Fire Department, and her nights pursuing malicious spirits with a team of eccentric ghost hunters. Anya – who is the rarest type of psychic medium, a Lantern – suspects a supernatural arsonist is setting blazes to summon a fiery ancient entity that will leave the city in cinders. By Devil’s Night, the spell will be complete, unless Anya – with the help of her salamander familiar and the paranormal investigating team – can stop it.

Anya’s accustomed to danger and believes herself inured to loneliness and loss. But this time she’s risking everything: her city, her soul, and a man who sees and accepts her for everything she is. Keeping all three safe will be the biggest challenge she’s ever faced.

My Thoughts:

Embers wasn’t what it could have been.

After an interesting start things started happening that were just plain odd, and not in a good way.

The storyline about a fire investigator was intriguing, it’s just a pity that we had about two chapters of investigative work and the rest was filler.

Anya presents as an interesting character, she is intelligent, quick-witted and gutsy. Anya is a Lantern, a fire elemental, and I just wish in one book involving powers that someone would actually be inquisitive enough to explore what they can do and be completely ignorant of them until halfway through the middle of the story. It became quite boring seeing how much Drake, the evil guy who is also a Lantern could do that Anya couldn’t.

My favourite character would have to be Sparky, which would be inevitable for most people as he is a funny little creature who is like a playful puppy. Sparky is a salamander with a taste for electrical currents and a love for his plastic glow worm.

The other secondary characters didn’t really fit in with the story, some were meant to, but others just didn’t work.

Ciro was excellent, smart and dependable. Jules was annoying because he was an overbearing bible basher that took everyone around him for granted, he was too narrow minded to really fit in with what he was supposed to be doing. Max was a pointless character who caused too much trouble, not in a funny way though, in a what the hell are you doing kind of way. Max didn’t bring anything interesting to the table at all. Katie is a witch, but I kept getting the feeling that she was fake, for all of the magical beings around her she just didn’t square up with her massages and salt throwing, and yet she relied upon for her “talents”. She just didn’t really work as a character.

Brian goes both ways for me; he’s almost a nerdy version of tall, dark and handsome. He also seems too good for Anya, and he was. He fell into a coma early into the novel, and it seemed like that was just so Bickle could get him out of the way while Anya consorted with other men whilst trying to convince herself she was in love with Brian.

The sex scene was kind of pointless, and I’m a person who likes a bit of smut in her novels, but the fact that the love scene was lacking the love interest and was just a one-night stand with some dude was completely irrelevant.

I have been taught when writing that if it doesn’t attribute to character development or the storyline, it’s not worth putting in. Bickle has obviously never heard this saying.

I know I went on a lot about the characters, but they are what stood out to me this story. There was no storyline, it fizzled out in the first four chapters, it was all Anya, and it was boring.

If I manage to snag a free copy of Sparks, from a sale or a contest, I will read it, but I’m not going to go out and buy it based on Embers.

Others in this Series:
Sparks

Available at:
Amazon
Book Depository

Book Review: My Love Lies Bleeding (AKA Hearts at Stake) by Alyxandra Harvey

Review: My Love Lies Bleeding

AKA: Hearts at Stake

Series: Drake Chronicles – Book 1

Author: Alyxandra Harvey

No. Of Pages: 248

Release Date: 7 January 2010

“They’re close,” she murmured. “Watching.”

“Run?” I suggested. “Like right now?”

She shook her head.

“If we act like prey, they will act like predators,”

Solange has always known she was a vampire. And as the only female vampire ever born, not initiated, she is surrounded by danger on all sides – from other vampire tribes who want to take her blood into their lineage, and from the bounty hunters who are set on destroying her and her family.

When she is kidnapped, it’s up to her elder brother, Nicholas, and best friend, Lucy, to save her.

But can Lucy save herself from Nicholas, who tempts her with every look – what will be her own fate if she surrenders her heart to a vampire?

My Thoughts:

What is it with synopsises and lying lately. This sounded like a really promising action packed and suspenseful book from what you just read right?

It’s a complete tease, it’s like looking at a mouth watering buffet after not eating for a week then tucking in and realising that everything is only half cooked. It fills you up sure enough, but you’re left completely unsatisfied.

It’s like we read through 250 pages and nothing much happens, yes it’s about vampire’s yes she is a chick who was born a vampire who is being hunted. And yes her best friend and brother try and save her. That is the entire story summed up. Notice I said try well they tried, and funnily enough being sixteen year old failed miserably. It was her parents that cleaned up the mess.

It’s so promising to read about potential banter between Lucy and Nicholas, and it’s there a bit and it’s funny. But it’s extremely repetitive the only thing they do is call each other Nicky and Lucky. Wow.

There is so much potential in this budding romance, which goes from the same thing throughout the entire book: “Hmmm, I think I like him, eww, that’s gross it’s Nicholas.” To right at the end when they think they’re about to die so she tries to sneak a peek at him getting changed. Then all of sudden he calls her his girlfriend and kisses her. Big Whoop.

So much potential in these fight scenes with all of these hunters. There’s three, and the entire time whichever protagonist we’re reading the POV of is thinking about themselves and the fact that they are too weak to fight.

Which brings me to the changing POV’s, that’s all well and good and it was pulled off. But I still didn’t like it, because there was a change every chapter except for right at the end.

The two POV’s we read through are Solange (the Vampire) and Lucy (the best friend).

Lucy causes all the trouble and Solange whinges through it. Yes they are strong characters, but they are also stupid. They are in essence teenagers who think they know best and it causes a lot of problems. Which is fair and realistic, but annoying.

I was morbidly interested in what happened though, I will say that the story does have a way of keeping us hooked which is very clever.

I don’t agree with the whole vampires being born crap though, I think that Harvey could have picked a different supernatural creature to play with, in my opinion she went with vampires because everyone else did, that’s all.

There is a second book in this series that I know of to date. I will read it, because I do want to know what happens, although I know it will probably put me in a foul mood like the last one did because of the sheer stupidity. One thing I won’t be doing though is buying the next book (like I did this one), I will be getting it out at the library or borrowing it from a friend.

I think others might like it, might. So this book is a take it or leave it, if you are stuck for something to read it wouldn’t hurt because it is a pretty good storyline.

2/5

Book Review: Hush: An Irish Princess' Tale by Donna Jo Napoli

Review: Hush: An Irish Princess’ Tale

Author: Donna Jo Napoli

No. Of Pages: 340

Release Date: 21 October 2008

A SILENT GIRL. AN AWESOME POWER.

Melkorka is an Irish Princess, the first daughter of a magnificent kingdom – but this all changes the day she is kidnapped and taken aboard a marauding slave ship. Trapped in a world both unfamiliar and cruel, Melkorka finds that her powerlessness gives her clarity. That she is master of what she says. Choosing to take a vow of silence, Melkorka becomes an object of fascination to her captors. And then she realizes that any power, no matter how little, can make a difference.

My Thoughts:

The synopsis promises such an adventurous tale. It lied.

Hush is based on a Scandinavian story about a slave who wouldn’t talk, when she was finally overheard speaking Gaelic to her two year old son one day and asked of her story she told her master that she was an Irish princess before her captor, this is where Hush stems from, her journey into slavery.

I’m still having mixed feelings about Hush. Melkorka isn’t a strong character at all, she is a brat in my opinion. Her eight year old sister Brigid was a better character, pity she only stayed for the first half.

The book was made up of three parts, part one was in Ireland or Eire as the book refers to it, the second is on the boat of her first captor, the third on the boat of the man who buys her.

There is a clear difference in the quality of the story during the three parts. The first part of the story I was completely disappointed in, the writing was poor and disjointed. The timeline wasn’t clearly expressed so we were jumping erratic periods of time with no notice, it was only until you had to re-read and work out that you were a month or a week ahead.

The second part of the story was better written, like the author walked away for a few years and came back after writing more novels so had a bit more of a grip on her writing. By the time we got to the third part, which I had to force myself to get to, the story picked up and completely engrossed me because I had to know what happened.

Melkorka like I said was portrayed as a weak brat. She’s a fifteen year old princess (which is considered old enough for the time) who doesn’t have a brain in her head. Her eight year old sister was a wonderful character for the time she spent in the pages of the book, Brigid was smart, compassionate, quick-witted and resourceful. Melkorka on the other hand is the complete opposite, she really isn’t a likeable character. It took her until the third part of the book until she accepted being a slave and started acting like one, instead of a princess. Fair enough that she grew up as a princess but letting the other slaves wash you on a ship? That’s a bit much in my opinion.

Even the Hush bit, the whole point of the story wasn’t her idea, it was Brigid’s, and when Brigid left the story it was another slave that told her to keep her mouth shut.

This story didn’t take me on a journey which I thought might happen, because I adore novels about the old sailing ships of which this novel was primarily set on.

It was the other characters that made this story for me. Brigid in particular, if there were a story about Brigid I would definitely read it. Maeve, one of the slaves was another interesting character, she is a mystery, she knows so much about all of the countries they go to and is quick witted. Gilli, or Clay Man as Melkorka refers to him, is another good character, he is the one who originally kidnaps her, and it is interesting to read about his suspicions of Melkorka.

So overall when I sum up the story in my head, it isn’t a memorable one, but the secondary characters make it interesting and worth the read.

2/5