Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Book Review: Howling for my Baby

Product Description

Romeo and Juliet never had to worry about being skinned alive.

Sydney Skeller’s father is spitting bullets over her reluctance to join the family business as a shifter hunter. The last thing Daddy needs to know is why—she yearns for a lover who’s man enough for a relationship but animal enough to give her the wild ride of her dreams. After a treadmill mishap lands her in a tangled heap with Jason Cannon, she wonders if she’s finally found her beast, er, man. One session in bed and one bite later, she’s sure. Now if only she can keep her father from mounting Jason’s head on a wall…

Jason is all man on the surface, but wolf shifter down to the bone. He’s more than ready to stop “playing the pack” and find his one true mate, and Sydney of the luscious curves is the woman of his dreams. Finding out that she comes from a family sworn to eradicate his kind isn’t a deal-breaker. But her outrageous plan for him to masquerade as the wolf in hunter’s clothing, right under her father’s very nose, could be asking more than he ever expected to give.

This book was previously published in ebook form only under the title Kissin’ in the Moonlight, and has been revised from its original release.

Warning: Readers, be aware of stranger side effects. These side effects may include but aren’t limited to the following: biting strangers, asking furry strangers to bite you, purposely falling off treadmills to collide with handsome strangers, enjoying hot sex with wild strangers, and baying at the moon to meet other moon-influenced strangers. If you notice any of these side effects, contact the author immediately. You may be the heroine of her next book!  (from amazon.com)


Review

Where to begin? I guess I’ll just jump right in and say I probably shouldn’t have spent time reading this when I should have been spending it working on 2 essays that are due in 2 days. Working on essays for grad school would have been more fun than reading this book, sadly.

The only characters I really liked were Madame Medusala and the mom. The hero and heroine had very little to bring to the story and that is sad, because there was really a lot of potential.  The story felt contrived, the dialogue forced and unfunny.  I could tell the author was going for breezy, funny, romantic banter but it just didn’t work, and neither did the sex scenes. I’m far from a prude, it wasn’t the biting that made me not like them (referring to the warning in the product description), it was more that there was very little build up, it happened the same day the hero and heroine met.  The romantic/sexual tension that I prefer in books was simply lacking.  The hero and heroine were too easily manipulated by outside forces (her father and Max). 

I don’t know how much this version of the book changed from the original, but this book should have been a short story or a novella instead of a novel. 

I got the book when it was free from amazon so I don’t have buyer’s remorse; I didn’t hate the book but I would only recommend this with reservations. Also, if I had been in a sillier mood when I read it, it might have worked (giving the benefit of the doubt).

Sensuality: a few sex scenes

Rating: 2 stars

Monday, November 7, 2011

Series Review: Deadtown


From Publishers Weekly
In Holzner's fast-paced urban fantasy debut, shape-shifter Victory Vaughn fights demons in an alternate present-day Boston, where a few thousand people have been mysteriously zombified and are now confined to the neighborhood of Deadtown along with vampires, werewolves, and other Paranormal Americans. Vicky's sometime boyfriend, Kane, a werewolf, lawyer, and PA rights advocate, gets some competition from human detective Daniel; teen zombie sidekick Tina occasionally wreaks unintentional havoc; and Vicky's sister, Gwen, an inactive shape-shifter and suburban wife and mother, argues with Vicky over their life choices and attitudes toward shape-shifting in the most fully realized and emotionally compelling parts of the book. By comparison, the reveal of the big villain comes off as both predictable and a little cardboardy. This fun and facile tale would be a great beach read if it weren't coming out in the middle of the winter. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review
What a breath of fresh air!  I’m always on the lookout for new authors and a new spin on Urban Fantasy and this book did not  disappoint at all! We have Vicky, Gwen, her sister, Kane, Daniel, Aunt Mab and Tina, the teenage zombie (excuse me, Previously Deceased Human—PDH). All are fantastic characters  and  they only get better as the series progresses (up to 3 now, I’ll insert links to all for your purchasing ease—from Amazon, not me).
Vicky is a tough heroine with a strong sense of justice and family.  She can shapeshift three times a month into whichever form she chooses and boy does she come up with some doozies in just the first three books! 
I love Aunt Mab!  If you think Vicky is tough as nails, just wait until books 2 and 3 give us a lot of Aunt Mab page time.
Tina, the PDH, is alternatively entertaining and infuriating (much like most teenagers, no matter how much you love them).
Deadtown I would only rate 4 stars because Nancy Holzner is setting the stage, building Vicky’s world, setting up political dramas—yes, the books have some political undertones to them, but they are well-done and thought-provoking, not a beat-you-over-the-head kind of politics.  There’s not much worse than being preached at about various political/social topics when reading for pleasure (even if I agree with the author).  Books 2 and 3 I give 5 stars each.  I can’t wait until the next one comes out.
If you like Ilona Andrews’ Kate Daniels series, you should try this one out.
Sensuality: a few kisses and references to sex, safe for teens.
Rating: 4 stars, 5 stars

Whoa Nelly!

 

I’ve been reading quite a lot lately, even though the posts haven’t been regular!  I decided it was way past time to put my fingertips to the keyboard and tell you about them!  Right now I have around 20 books I need to show you of various genres, mostly Urban Fantasy, but a few Regency, a steampunk here and there, some modern romances. Most of them were worth reading, some worth re-reading.

As some of you may know, I started librarian school a few months ago so even though I squeeze in time to read for fun, I don’t always have time to sit down immediately and share about the book I just read (sorry!  I’ll try to do better about that!).  I’m an eighth of the way through the program and am enjoying it very much.  So far it seems like a really great fit for me, much more so than my last educational adventure.  I’m going to group several of the books into one post, complete with the amazon.com product description, a rating and general impressions about each one.