Monthly Archives: April 2023

books, Historical Fantasy, Reviews

The Last Heir to Blackwood Library by Hester Fox

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Stars: 2 out of 5.

DNF at 75%.

This was going to be a solid 4 or 5 stars book until about 50% into the story. The setup was wonderful. Old manor that used to be an abbey, the moors and the fog, the cold and unwelcoming servants, and a mysterious library… What is there not to like about this?

Unfortunately, things go downhill from there. And not in small part because of the protagonist’s actions. For someone who constantly says that she doesn’t need anyone to take care of her, because she was doing that just fine on her own, thank you very much, she sure makes a lot of stupid decisions. Like not heeding the warnings of her staff about the library, or about associating with certain people. Like trusting a man who she doesn’t really know from Adam, just because he was nice to her and likes talking about books. Like accepting his marriage proposal after barely knowing him a few weeks and going on a couple dates. Especially when even she notices his unhealthy fixation on her library… just because she is lonely and feels unappreciated. Strong independent woman, yeah right. 

That’s the major problem with this book. No matter how much the author tries to show Ivy taking some action, and making some decisions, like organizing a book lending club, she isn’t an active player in this story. She doesn’t push the story forward. None of her actions progress anything. Things happen to her. In essence, she has no agency in this story at all. I understand that it was supposed to convey her dismay and confusion at progressively loosing her memories, but it misses the mark here, in my opinion. She comes across and pathetic and helpless, yet also stubborn and pigheaded when she shouldn’t be. She gives up all resistance the moment she encounters any difficulty.

For example, when she finds her journals shredded, she immediately abandons the idea of keeping a diary of her days. I would immediately create another diary and keep it on my person at all times, and yes, continue to write down everything that happens. She just sweeps all the evidence into the fire and doesn’t even confront her staff about this… or go to town and call her friend Susan, or do anything but continue to flounder in bewilderment. 

This might work for some readers, but this passivity made the book more and more boring to me. To the point that I started skimming ahead to see if Ivy would even try to fight for he freedom and sanity, but by 75% of the book she was just as pathetic – a prisoner in her own home… And I didn’t care to find out what would happen in the end. So I gave up.

PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

books, Reviews, Urban fantasy

Dirty Magic (Prospero’s War 1) by Jaye Wells

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Stars: 4 out of 5.

This is everything the first book in a series should be. It has an engaging heroine, an interesting story that manages to get personal for said heroine. There is just enough worldbuilding to introduce the world and the main players, but we aren’t bashed in the head with infodumps. 

The city of Babylon has a problem – a dirty magic problem. Think about the war on drugs and multiply it by ten, because the effects of dirty magic potions are mostly well-documented, but if a new one pops on the market, they can be quite unpredictable and even deadly. As Kate Prospero finds out one night on patrol when she has to confront what looks like a literal werewolf. But there are no such things as werewolves, right? Correct. It’s a new potion called Gray Wolf, and it’s a nasty one.

I really liked Kate as a character. And I loved her backstory. I can understand her hatred for dirty potions and those who cook them. She was one of them. She loved doing it to, discovering new recipes, letting others try them. And the consequences and side effects were somebody else’s problem… until those consequences hit very close to home. I understand her desire to cut herself from magic altogether, because she is afraid of relapsing into cooking again. And even though it complicates her life a lot in this book, and I really wanted to shout at her a few times because she was being pigheaded about it and putting the life of her loved ones in danger, I still understood her motives. That’s what I like about my protagonists – I don’t have to necessarily like them, but I have to understand what makes them tick. 

I also liked that Kate isn’t a lone wolf or a woman-hater, like a lot of urban fantasy protagonists tend to be. She has a solid support system and a good female friend in Pam. And while her life is difficult, because with the same last name is a notorious coven leader and crime lord it’s hard to make an honest living, she tries to make the best of the hand she’d been dealt.

My only issue with this book is the main villain’s motivation. I understand what the original plan was and even what Bane wanted to gain by creating Gray Wolf. What I don’t understand is why he thought attacking Abe’s flesh and blood (and I’m not talking about Kate here) would be a good idea. I also don’t understand Abe’s motivation for going along with this. Surely, revenge wasn’t the only reason… I’m hoping to find out more in the next book in the series. 

All in all though, I’m glad I finally gave this book a chance. I crossed another book off my TBR list and discovered another interesting urban fantasy series I wouldn’t mind continuing.

books, Fantasy, Reviews, Urban fantasy

The City Beneath the Hidden Stars by Sonya Kudei

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Stars: 1 out of 5

DNF at 40%.

Well, this was a disappointment. I love discovering new authors. I also love exploring settings set up in cities other than the usual London/New York/another well-known English-speaking city. So I was very excited about this story set in Zagreb. I hoped to learn some new lore and get familiar with a city with so much history. Unfortunately, the result is less than stellar.

I get what the author tried to do. The writing is supposed to be edgy and witty, and the sarcastic commentary that breaks the third wall is supposed to illicit a chuckle from the reader now and then. And it absolutely would… if it’s well done, which is not the case here. The overwrote language, never-ending descriptions and constant “winks” from the omniscient narrator to the readers get pretty boring very quickly. 

I don’t a detailed description of every single item crammed into the stairwell of a hoarder’s house. I don’t need a three page walkthrough of the market square. What I need is an engaging story and interesting characters I can follow. The rest is just setting. If I wanted to visit Zagreb remotely, I’d buy a tourist guide with pictures.

As it stands, I am not even sure, 40% in, what the story is supposed to be about. The Black Queen is returning? Cool cool… only she didn’t DO anything particularly horrendous so far, or even driven the narrative much. As far as the main villain of the story, she simply doesn’t pull the weight. As for the protagonists, they are simply blah.

There is also an overabundance of secondary characters that appear for a few pages, never to be heard of again, but are described in painstaking detail nevertheless. This overdescription of everything makes for a boring and tedious read, and since there isn’t really a good story to back it up, I don’t feel like investing more of my time into this 400 page book.

PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

books, Dark fantasy, Fantasy, Reviews

The Beholden by Cassandra Rose Clarke

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Stars: 3 out of 5

It is sad when you say something like “It was okay,” when you try to describe a book. Unfortunately, this is exactly what this book was. Just okay. The story was okay and moved swiftly enough to keep me interested. The characters were okay, though I question the need for some of them. The worldbuilding was… lacking, honestly. 

There are some aspects that I liked about this book. The relationship between the two sisters being one of them. It felt very real. It wasn’t saccharine sweet. They bickered, they resented each other, they didn’t see eye to eye on some things. But they always cared about each other, even when mad and fighting. 

The sisters were also pretty fleshed out as characters, with distinct motivations and character flaws, so it was easy to empathize and root for them. Though Celestia’s stubborn belief that Lindon would help them and do as she asks “because he is her husband” became a little bit grating overtime. Especially after their first encounter when he proved that no, he wouldn’t do as she asked or even listen to her.

Unfortunately, I cannot say the same about Ico. Honestly, I’m still not sure what purpose he played in this book. He had no motivation for going on this quest (apart from being forced into it for no fault of his own), and he is never a driving force in this story. He is more of a complaining sidekick that the sisters drag along. We could have cut his character out of the book completely and not lost any of the story. The sisters could have hired the help of a nameless boat captain or guide and he would have fulfilled the same role.

I loved the jungle and the valley of the Seraphine river. It is so well described that I could feel the humid heat and smell the sweet and rotting stench of the river. I was less entranced with the other locations in this book, because we spent a lot less time in them, and most of the time spent was indoors, so I couldn’t really picture them in my head.

And speaking of locations, some of them were completely unnecessary. For example, what was the point of the whole visit to the Emperor’s palace? It didn’t move the plot whatsoever. They learned nothing new there. It was just a detour before continuing the story. And it felt shoe-horned into the story as an afterthought.

Finally, I’m still not sure how the magic of this world works, and it’s never really explained. So we have aetheric magic, and the magic of each Airiana is different, but then also you have the Starless mages, and oh wait, the magic in the city of Bloodwine is also different, and there is alchemy… It’s a confusing mess. Don’t get me wrong. I’m more then happy to believe in a complex magical system, if I understand the rules. Here, the author doesn’t even bother explaining them, so that’s frustrating.

Also, I’m not sure I am onboard with the ending. Are we forgetting that the Emperor of the Seraphine had forbidden them to go after Decay? That he kept them as hostages in his palace to prevent them from doing that? That they basically committed treason? And killed a few of his guards escaping the palace? Yet Celestia returns to Cross Winds, like nothing happened. Is she not afraid that Starless Mages will come for her in the night? For her son? The Lady of the Seraphine even told her that those are human affairs that don’t concern her. Yet Celestia seems to continue her life, like nothing happened. 

I am also not particularly sure how I feel about the romance between Celestia and Omaira (spelling). It felt completely unnatural to the story. Probably because it wasn’t woven organically into the story to begin with. Celestia was so focused on finding Decay and preventing her husband from dying that any hint of romance simply wasn’t there (or I missed it). So it was shocking to me to see them so sweet on each other days after her husband died. This as not needed. They could just have been really good friends brought together by pain and loss and the hard times they experienced together. Whatever grew out of that friendship could have been a story for another book.

PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

books, Reviews, science fiction

The End of Sleep by Vyvyan Evans

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Stars: 1.5 out of 5

I didn’t mesh with this book at all, unfortunately. Part of it was because the ARC was horrendously formatted, making it almost impossible to read and follow the story. But my biggest problem was with the protagonist.

I hated Lilith from the first pages of the book until the very end. She has no redeeming qualities. She is self-centered to the extreme. She is cruel and disparaging to anyone she feels is below her in social status (spoil alert, it’s everyone in her eyes). She hates all men, and she even repeats that several times during the book. Mind you, she doesn’t have a much better opinion of women either. I mean just look at the way she treats her one night stand in the first chapter of the book. It’s cruel, it’s shameful, and it’s uncalled for.

Add to that the fact that Lilith is a half-alien with superpowers, and we get the typical trope of the Chosen one that can do no wrong. When she acquires those powers, there is no learning curve, no mess-ups, no time to get used to them. She knows how to use them from the start and does it with frightening efficiency. Unfortunately, that also kills the tension in the book. Why worry about the characters if Lilith can make all the problems go away with a wave of her hand? She is literally like a Terminator against a mob of medieval peasants with pitchforks by the end of the book – overpowered to the extreme. Which makes the end of the book boring as fish.

My other issue is that Lilith says several times that she is only attracted to women and that hates all men after a certain traumatic event that happened in her past. So the insta-love, or should I say insta-lust, between her and her partner comes across as forced and unnatural. Also, why? This love line wasn’t needed in this book.

Oh, and this book could have been at least 100 pages shorter without loosing any of the story. The first 15% of the book is basically an infodump with Lilith talking to various unimportant people about things that should be self-explanatory in their world, but since the reader doesn’t know them, they have to be spelled out. Which makes the other characters look dumb and Lilith sound pedantic and condescending. This is also rookie author mistake 101. 

PS: I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

books, Fantasy, Reviews, Urban fantasy

Fire and Hemlock by Diana Wynne Jones

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Stars: 3.5 out of 5

This book has been languishing on my TBR list since 2013, and even though I own the book, I never got around to reading it. So thank you for the Cleaning out your TBR challenge for finally giving me the push I needed to tackle it.

All in all, I actually liked the story. It has that magical realism that I love in Neil Gaiman and Garth Nix’s books, where the characters live in a seemingly perfectly normal and mundane world, but sometimes elements of the supernatural infringe upon their existence. Or blend with it, like it happened for most of this book.

I also loved Polly. She is an excellent main character. She is complex and fleshed-out, and really likeable. I can understand why she would be so taken by Mr Lynn – he is the only adult, apart from Granny, that showed her the least bit of care and interest. The more you learn about her home life, the more you realize just how horrible and self-centered her parents are. To them, having a child is an obstacle to their happiness. And the culmination of that is when her mother sends her packing to live with her father… who didn’t even have the courage to tell his new wife that Polly was coming to stay for good. And what kind of father just leaves their daughter at the train station without making sure she has a ticket and enough money for a snack, or actually seeing her off on that train?

Polly was a neglected child who craved for someone who would care about her, so she clung to Mr Lynn who had shown her a little kindness, but most importantly, who listened to her and cheered for her accomplishments, no matter how big or small they were.

So yes, I liked this book, but there is one factor that I simply can’t overlook. That’s the fact that Mr Lynn used her. An adult purposefully befriended a ten year old child and continuously insinuated himself into her life over the years. Yes, you could argue that he had a magical reason for this, and was hoping that she would save him from the fairy queen he was indentured to, but the fact stays – he was grooming her. He knew exactly what he was doing, and it’s not like Polly could give her consent to this. Not when she was a child. And that’s something that I simply can’t overlook. It makes my skin crawl. So I am taking 1 star off my score here.

However, I am glad I finally got around to reading this book, and I will check out other books by this author.

books, Dystopian, Reviews

Curfew by Jayne Cowie

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Stars: 1.5 out of 5.

This is the case where the blurb is more interesting than the actual book. Or where the author had a wonderful idea, but lacked the skill to realize it well. It could have been a wonderful dystopian novel and a great social commentary. Instead, it turned into a frustrating slog that I only finished out of frustration.

As I said, the premise had so much potential – after a wave of violent crimes against women perpetrated by men, a resolution was passed to put all the male population under a curfew from 7pm to 7am each night. And supposedly, things got better for women after that… for 16 years. Until a woman if found clearly murdered in a park overnight, when all men should be indoors. So who killed her? 

I got excited to see how this society, where women are effectively in charge, would work. How is the curfew enforced? Are those ankle monitors removable? Can they be fooled? How did men consent to this clear violation of their freedom? I was also looking forward to the murder mystery and the investigation. Unfortunately, the inherent flaws of this book sabotaged my enjoyment in the end. 

This book is told in several different POVs, which in itself isn’t usually a problem for me. The problem this time is that all of the characters we follow are extremely unlikeable. They are self-centered and react emotionally to anything and everything happening to and around them. What happened to logical thinking? What happened to compassion? 

This makes this whole women-ran society a nightmarish place to be. Which would be okay if this was a subtitle social commentary about vilifying the other genre and critique of normal genre role. But it’s not…

Second problem is that there are no shades of gray in this book. All men, without exceptions, are bad, bad, bad, BAD! Seriously? Being a survivor of abuse myself, I can understand the impulse to vilify those who hurt you, but this is taken to the extreme. What about the fact that the toxic image of masculinity that is so prevalent in the Western countries hurts men just as much as it hurts women? Neither sex is born bad or good, they are made so by their upbringing and their circumstances. It’s nature versus nurture.

Also, this world is very binary. So all women are free, and all men are locked up at night (and BAD people thinking/doing bad things). What about gay men? What about gender fluid people? What about trans men and women? How do these rules apply to them? Or do they simply not exist in this world?

The murder investigation itself was also very badly handled in my opinion. This whole mystery of who was the murder victim was dragged out way too long. I would have preferred to discover their identity earlier and then try to find out what events resulted in their murder, than following several people who could be the potential murder victim and guessing who it was. I guess the author wanted to create a connection with the victim by having us following their life before the murder. Well, since all of them were unlikeable, I didn’t particularly care.

PS: I received an advanced copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

books, Horror, Reviews, science fiction, Space opera

The Immortality Thief (The Kystrom Chronicles 1) by Taran Hunt

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Stars: 3.5 out of 5.

Surprisingly, this book pulled at all of my heartstrings. Even though it’s monster horror in space, it made me care about the characters. Well, at least the main ones. 

I mean, you can’t help but feel sorry for Sean, who survived the destruction of his whole city and saw his family and everyone he knew lying dead at the hands of the Ministers. I understand why he clings so desperately to Benny, even though they have absolutely nothing in common apart from that tragedy that defined their childhood. It’s not a healthy relationship and clinging to it is slowly destroying both of them.

I was also impressed by the sheer capacity for compassion Sean has, even after everything he went through. Or maybe because of it? He saw so many people die that now he tries to do everything in his power to help other in need, because he doesn’t want any more deaths. And once he is stuck on the ship full of monsters with two people who, in his eyes, are responsible for the Kystrom massacre, he doesn’t immediately classify them as enemies. He has the moral strength to overcome that anger and see them for what they are – people.

I also liked Tamara and Indigo and how we progressively got to know more of them and get glimpses of humanity from the emotionless Minister and the battle-hardened soldier. They have to collaborate to survive long enough to recover data that is vital for both their races survival. In the case of the Ministers, that meaning is very literal.

The setting itself is the stuff nightmares are made of – a derelict ship left by a dying star. So vast, so dark and silent… and full of monsters that are very very hard to kill, because the scientists who created them were experimenting with immortality. And now those monsters are angry with their creators. For creating them in the first place, for the horrors they were subjected to during that creation, and for abandoning them to die on this ship without a second thought. It reminded me a bit of the video game Dead Space, which I never could finish because I’m a chicken.

There is a lot to love about this book, but there are a few flaws as well. The flashbacks, even though they serve a purpose of explaining Sean’s frame of mind, get annoying after a while. I wish the author could have found other means of passing the information to the reader. The characters other than our main trio are two-dimensional at best, and Benny was so devoid of redeeming qualities it was almost caricatural. 

The story also started dragging towards the end. It was like the author kept putting away the resolution and throwing more and more obstacles in our characters’ way. They had already been through so much though, that I experienced danger fatigue. I just wanted them to be done with this ship one way or another.

All in all though, I really loved this first book in a new series and I will check out the next one, especially considering the twist at the end.

PS: I received a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

books, Dark fantasy, Fantasy, Reviews

To Ride a Rathorn (Kencyrath 4) by PC Hodgell

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Stars: 5 out of 5

I continue to be impressed with this series. The complexity of the worldbuilding is staggering. Every book adds a new piece of the puzzle to the bigger picture of creation. I am fascinated and I want to know more.

I also really like Jame as a character, and I think that she grew and evolved a lot since the first book where we saw her emerge out of the Haunted Lands. She is finding her stride and her own worth in this world. She is finally making peace with her powers and her destiny, even though, in true Jame fashion, she will follow that destiny on her own terms. I think she is beginning to realize that family isn’t only blood. That it’s also the connections you create or the creatures you bind to yourself (either intentionally or not). And that you are responsible for that family. Speaking of that, I am not happy with how she treats Graykin in this book. Hopefully, she realizes that and course corrects in the next book.

It’s also interesting to see that Jame is already performing her function as Nemesis, albeit in a small way. She is like a hot knife puncturing old abscesses everywhere she goes. Things hidden for decades come to light, horrible crimes committed in the past have repercussions in the present. And Jame is in the middle of it, whether she wants it or not.

Speaking of old crimes. The more we find out about what happened 60 years ago with Jame’s family, the more I feel for both Jame and Torisen. No wonder they are so broken, coming from so much pain, misery and death. No wonder their father went mad. Sounds like his life had been horrific. 

As I said, I think Jame had a lot of character growth in this story and became a better, and more stable, person. My complaint is that Torisen didn’t get that chance. He seems stuck in his soulscape, constantly listening to the poisonous words of his dead father, doubting himself and his sister. He needs to open that door and face what’s behind it, the sooner the better. He can’t afford not to, if he wants to remain the Highlord and save his people from the moral corruption that seems to have infected the Kencyrath. 

I also loved Jame’s dreamlike travels through Rathillien’s countryside and her interactions with the local Gods, Mother Raga especially. And I’m glad that her and the rathorn colt didn’t kill each other. 

I will definitely continue with this series because I want to know more about this complex world and I want Jame and Tori to finally vanquish their demons and become the twins they were destined to be.

books, Fantasy, Reviews, Urban fantasy, YA

The Archived (The Archived 1) by Victoria Schwab

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Stars: 4 out of 5

Another book scratched off my oh so long TBR list. This one has been languishing on it since 2014. 

I really liked it. The world is interesting. The existence of an Archive where all the memories of people who die are kept is fascinating. Though I would like to know who created it and for what purpose. Since technically, the Histories just kind of stay there and should never “wake up”, and should never escape into the Outer world. Yet they do, and they go bad every single time. I wonder why? 

And I definitely could relate to Mac’s pain and her struggle to come to terms with Ben’s death. I understand that she blames herself, no matter how absurd that is. I think for her the grief of loosing her little brother compounded with the grief of loosing her grandfather, with whom she was a lot closer than with her parents. Grief can make you do some stupid things. I also understand how having to keep her job as a Keeper secret isn’t exactly conductive to creating strong friendships. Honestly, I don’t envy Mac her life. It’s lonely, having to lie to everyone all the time. Having to put on a mask for others and never ever show them your real self. 

All in all, I was also pretty okay with our protagonist, though I question her grandfather’s decision to pass his mantle of Keeper to an 11 year old child. This is not just irresponsible, its downright cruel. Not to mention that a child, at least in  normal family, would not have the freedom of movement necessary to do this job. Are you seriously telling me that Mac’s been sneaking out of the house at all kinds of hours of day and night and coming home with cuts and bruises, and nobody noticed? Her parents didn’t sound the alarm? Her teachers didn’t suspect child abuse and call child protective services?

I understand that they might pay less attention to Mac after the tragedy that struck them with Ben, locked in their own grief as they are, but she’s been a Keeper for 4 years before then. Are you telling me that her parents never called her on her lies? Never questioned why she is hurt so often? That was the thing that was the hardest to suspend my disbelief on.

This book also suffers from the usual YA trope where the characters simply don’t talk to each other about important things. A lot of the problems Mac had to deal with were created or made worse by her unwillingness to confide in others. She could have told Wesley about what’s happening in the Archives. He isn’t stupid. He’d figured out that the uptick in woken Histories wasn’t normal. She could have told him about Owen and asked for his help. Instead, she chose to lie and stubbornly try to deal with the situation on her own. Well, we know how that turned out.

We also have the incompetent adults trope that made me roll my eyes a couple times while reading this book. It’s so old and tired that it gives me the hives now. It would honestly make for a much better story if the adults and young adults worked together. Then again, we might not even have a story, because if Mac’s parents paid enough attention to her, she wouldn’t be a Keeper, because she would have been grounded the first time she’d snuck out at night and came back with bruises and knife marks. Oh, and in therapy.

But all in all, I actually really enjoyed the story while I read it, and all those questions didn’t really bother me until AFTER I had finished the book and started thinking about it. And I will definitely read the next book in the series to see if we get more answers about the Archives.