The Queen's Line (Inheritance of the Hunger #1) by Kathryn Moon

The Queen's Line by Kathryn Moon
My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Synopsis (written by me): Bryony is the next in line to become the queen of Kimmery. All the queens of this magical land have had something called the Hunger, a ravenous sexual appetite that is supposed to bring prosperity to the kingdom and its people. Unfortunately, Bryony is five years past the age of majority and still hasn't felt any stirrings of the Hunger yet. If she can't manage to find it within herself, her grandmother and younger sister are more than ready to take over and rule with an iron fist, to the detriment of the common people. So she picks a small group of men and retreats to the royal family's decrepit Winter Palace in the north, where she learns what is really going on outside the capital while trying to figure out how to keep her crown.

I'm not the biggest fan of fantasy or reverse harem, but Kathryn Moon writes in a way that makes me enjoy both. For her books, I ignore my general rule of no more than two sex scenes per book because she writes them well. Each male has a distinct place among Bryony's Chosen and they don't come across as interchangeable. As for the fantasy, Moon didn't make the world, the magic system, or the names so complicated that I got confused (something that often turns me away from fantasy and sci-fi). She also has the ability to write a story where I care about what happens outside the romance. I really am interested in seeing how Bryony saves the kingdom helps her people, so I can't wait to read the next book.

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Bitterburn by Ann Aguirre

Bitterburn by Ann Aguirre
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Read as part of my Kindle Unlimited subscription

Part 1 of the Gothic Fairy Tales series

Finished 13 Dec 2020

Synopsis (from Goodreads): 

Amarrah Brewer is desperate and grief-stricken.
For ages, the town of Bitterburn has sent tribute to the Keep at the End of the World, but a harsh winter leaves them unable to pay the toll that keeps the Beast at bay. Amarrah volunteers to brave what no one has before—to end the threat or die trying.

The Beast of Bitterburn has lost all hope.
One way or another, Njål has been a prisoner for his entire life. A monstrous evil has left him trapped and lonely, and he believes that will never change. There is only darkness in his endless exile, never light. Never warmth. Until she arrives.

It's a tale as old as time... where Beauty goes to confront the Beast and falls in love instead.

The tone of the book was more sinister than what I usually read, but Ann Aguirre has a way with words that made it enjoyable. Her prose had a lilting fairy tale quality that made me want to read the words out loud. This was totally different from the other Aguirre book that I read -- Strange Love -- but it was fitting for this type of story. It helped me keep going because, outside the hero and heroine, the nicest characters in this book were the goats. Njal's caretakers were awful and Amarrah's father and stepmother were indifferent, which can be its own kind of awful.

Although some would say this is a romance, to me the hero Njal wasn’t fleshed out enough to put it in that category. The real story for me was about Amarrah throwing off the shackles of her previous life and coming into her own power. This was underscored by the fact that the entire book was written in the third person from Amarrah's point of view. I know this was to maintain some of the mystery that is expected in a gothic-style novel, but I have become so accustomed to romances where the point of view alternates between the hero and the heroine that I felt like I was missing something by only getting Amarrah's side. 

The love scenes in this book are "open door" but the writing isn't as explicit as many novels I've read. Aguirre makes it plain as far as who put what where -- no flowering buds like in 1980s romances -- but they weren't exactly working their way through The Joy of Sex. I think I could hand it to my adult daughter or a maiden aunt without blushing.

I would recommend this book to my fantasy-loving friends who think romance gets in the way of a good story because it does take a back seat here. This story is the Disney version's goth cousin, so be aware of that, as well.

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A Rational Arrangement by L. Rowyn

A Rational Arrangement by L. Rowyn
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book 1 of the Arranging Paradise series
Read 10 Dec 2020

Synopsis (from Goodreads): Wisteria Vasilver does wish to marry. Truly. But though she lives in Paradise, arranging a match is full of traps and pitfalls for the unwary ... or perhaps just for her.

Nikola Striker, Lord of Fireholt, expects he'll wed -- someday. But not now, and never to a rich icicle of a woman like Miss Vasilver. No matter how much his parents might want the match, or his house might need her dowry. Besides, he has his own problems -- most of them people who need his help as a mind-healer.

Lord Justin Comfrey, Viscount of Comfrey, would be more than happy to help Striker with his financial troubles, and not just to ensure that Miss Vasilver's dowry doesn't tempt Striker into marriage. If only he could find some way to make his proud, stubborn friend accept the money!

Can three people of such different temperaments ever find their way to a more perfect Paradise?

The synopsis above did not give me a full idea of what I was letting myself in for with this book. At first, I thought it was set in Regency England, but it is actually set in an imaginary world called Paradise that has a similar social structure to the Regency and Victorian periods with fantastical elements added. The main ones are Blessings and greatcats. In this world, certain people have been given Blessings for either healing or working with natural objects. This is where greatcats came from: a person with the Blessing of mind-healing many years ago went into a regular cat's mind and unblocked the parts that would allow them to talk and reason like humans. Although the author didn't mention it, the healer must have  unlocked something else, too, because the great cats are as large as horses.

Speaking of leaving stuff out, Rowyn didn't leave much out of this book. She created an interesting world, but the book was far too long for my taste. It was 642 pages and I felt every one! I found myself skimming a lot of the explanations of how the world works and the descriptions of the buildings and the clothing. There weren't any of the problems with grammatical errors or poor word choice that I often come across in indie books, but another pass by an editor to cut down the page count wouldn't have gone amiss.

This was shelved by 27 readers on Goodreads as a romance, and by 26 readers as fantasy. I would definitely side with those labeling it as fantasy (I labeled it as paranormal because I'm too lazy to create a fantasy shelf). There are explicit sex scenes and a happily-ever-after, but the parties in question spend more time apart than together. I think if all the sex and romance was taken out and the author had made them all friends, I would have enjoyed it just as well -- provided she reduced that word count by about 400 pages!

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Radiance by Grace Draven

Radiance by Grace Draven
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Book 1 of the Wraith Kings series
Read: 12 Mar 2019

I sought out this book at my library solely on the recommendation of a YouTuber and Goodreads member who goes by Fangirl Musings. Although I don't read much medieval-style fantasy these days, she gave this book such a glowing review that I decided to check it out mainly for the romance. Thankfully I wasn't disappointed.

Radiance is the story of Ildiko, a low-ranked member of Gauri royalty and Brishen is the brother of the Kai heir apparent, commonly known as the "spare heir". They were joined in a contract marriage designed to strengthen an alliance between the Gauri (a human race) and the Kai (a humanoid race with razor-sharp teeth and talons and grey skin). The Gauri and the Kai find each other repulsive physically, but Ildiko and Brishen were able to look past that right away to find personality traits that they vibed with. Furthermore, there were none of the tedious misunderstandings between the couple that are present in other romances. The drama came from the heroine Ildiko learning to adjust to being the only human living among her husband's people as well as the political tensions.

If you are a fan of the slow-burn romance, this is for you. As I mentioned, the two races do not find each other attractive physically, and that extends to the hero and heroine, Brishen and Ildiko. They enjoyed bantering with each from the very first day, however, and this along with their mutual respect slowly changes the way they view each other physically.

As much as I enjoyed this book, I don't know if I will continue with the series. The second book, Eidolon, seems to put the battle between the races at the forefront, and I'm really just here for the romance. However, the love story in this book was enjoyable enough that I don't think I will miss continuing on.

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A Man of Character by Margaret Locke

A Man of Character by Margaret Locke
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Book 1 of the Magic of Love trilogy
Read: 26 Nov 2018

Synopsis (written by me): Catherine has never taken time out for romance because her failing bookstore is her life. Then suddenly she is being asked out left and right by men who bear an eerie resemblance to characters from stories she wrote as a teenager. Suddenly she is forced to confront what her current idea of Mr. Right is.

I felt that this story dragged a bit. There was a lot about why Catherine wasn't looking for romance and how she was still pretty much grieving over the loss of her father. Romance is my primary genre, so I am accustomed to knowing who the heroine is going to end up with from page five. It is what happens between the beginning and the end that makes a romance worth reading and this one didn't feel like it had much. It took a while to get to the point where our heroine Catherine finally realized that she had a magical gift.  The book was all setup with very little payoff.

The other two books in the trilogy appear to deal with time travel more than this one did. Since Locke's writing is decent, I would be willing to give one of those books a try. I just hope that the pacing is a bit faster.

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The Tennessee Waltz trilogy by Bella Street

Read: 02 Jan - 06 Jan 2019

I read this trilogy when I was nearing the end of my time-travel phase. As of this writing all three books are still available on Kindle Unlimited. These are supposed to be standalone novels but I couldn't really sort out my feelings about the books individually, so I thought I should write a review of the trilogy as a whole.

The first book in the trilogy is Kiss Me, I'm Irish. It features a girl named Emily in England during the Regency era who get transported to modern-day Tennessee. The second book, Kiss Me, I'm Yours, is about a modern-day yoga instructor named Sophie who is flung back to the post-Civil War era. The third book, Kiss Me, I'm Home, wraps up the story with Morgan, a travel agent who has never really gotten along with those around her and can't figure out why.

I am the type of person who has difficulty giving up on a TV show or movie, even if it is something corny like an episode of The Brady Bunch. I just have to see how it is going to end, and Bella Street's writing activated that part of my brain. In Kiss Me, I'm Irish, Street keeps everything just vague enough that I felt like I had to push through the book even when I wasn't sure if I was enjoying it. There was no clue as to why the hero Liam was so moody, and the relationship between him and his sister Tinker seemed strange. By the time the situation is made clear and I started to enjoy the characters and wanted to spend more time with them, the book was over.

Kiss Me, I'm Yours was particularly tough for me to get through because the bulk of it was set in a miserable period of time. Some people may enjoy reading books where characters go through a struggle, but I read for escapism. I didn't enjoy spending time with characters who were dirt poor in a one-room shack and had no friends at all in the surrounding area. "Bleak" would be my word for 90% of this book, but it does have necessary threads that connect the trilogy.

One good thing that can be said about Kiss Me, I'm Yours is that it was more straightforward than the first book. However, the vagueness came back in the third book, Kiss Me, I'm Home. Perhaps I am unaccustomed to writing like this because I read books where the reader usually knows up front who has a secret identity or magic powers or whatever. I will say that by the end of this book, everything from the first two books has been resolved.

Overall, I think this trilogy satisfied my time-travel itch, especially the first book. The aspect that draws me to time-travel novels is reading about people from the past dealing with modern society and there was plenty of that in Kiss Me, I'm Irish. If I were to recommend only one book out of the trilogy, it would be the first one.

Cocktails in Camelot by Marianne Mancusi

Cocktails in Camelot by Marianne Mancusi
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Book 1 of 3 in the Timeless Hearts series
Read: 20 Jan 2019

Synopsis (written by me): Katherine Jones, who goes by Kat, is an editor for a New York fashion magazine but she is pretty low on the ranking list, so she is sent out to a renaissance fair because medieval styles are supposedly the next fashion trend. She has no desire to be there and is not enjoying herself, so when she gots knocked back to the actual 12th century, she is miserable and tries to find her way back home without altering history too much.

I picked this up on Kindle Unlimited because I was looking for a light time travel romance. Unfortunately, this one was a little too light for even my tastes. It is basically a retelling of Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court but not as much fun. I ended up skimming large chunks of it, only to find that it ends in a cliffhanger, but I am not interested enough in the outcome to wade through the second book.

The first thing to hit me was the pop culture references. There were so many of them that I couldn't help but think that they will make the book feel dated in no time. In fact, a couple of them made me wonder about the age of the author. For instance, the heroine Kat is supposed to be in her 20s but she makes a reference to the old TV show Dance Fever. I am in my 50s and I barely remember that show (which ended in 1987); I can't imagine that my 20-something kids or any of their friends have even heard of it.

Secondly, this is supposed to be a romance but I didn't feel any chemistry between the hero Lancelot and the heroine Kat. When Lancelot gave this big speech about how he is attracted to all the goodness in Kat, I couldn't figure out where he got that from because it didn't show on the page. Kat had spent the entire time up to that point complaining.

Despite the book's faults, I got the feeling that the author has enough skill to write a decent book in a different genre. For instance, all the pop culture references probably wouldn't feel as jarring in a YA book. I did a small amount of research and found that author currently writes middle-grade and YA fantasy under the name Mari Mancusi, which is probably a better fit for her style.

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The Time Keeper by Mitch Albom

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Genre: Fantasy
Format: Digital audio book borrowed from library
Publication date: 2012

My 3-star rating of this book is an average of what I would rate it for myself (2 stars) and what I would rate it for everyone else (4 stars). Rating a book on a five-star scale is not the easiest thing to do, especially when it is in a genre I don't usually read. I recognize that Mitch Albom is a good writer and that most people would be moved by this fable about living in the present, but the lessons it sought to teach felt obvious to me.

As I said, The Time Keeper is a fable. It starts off with the story of Dor, the first man to discover how to track time. Dor is consumed with knowing things like when the sun will come up and when the full moon will come again. He conducts his experiments and finally creates the first clock. Dor is punished for the audacity to quantify days and is banished to a cave for 6,000 years, after which he is given a mission to find two people and teach them what time is really worth.

The minimal amount of dialogue was one thing that made it difficult for me to get through this book. The majority of the book was filled with the somber tone of the narrator telling me the stories of Dor and the two people he chose for his mission, an elderly man named Victor and a teenage girl named Sarah. Victor is at the end of his life and obsessed with the idea of cheating death while Sarah is an overweight teenager who can't find anything good about her life.  Even with so much time spent learning about their lives, I didn't feel much of a connection to any of them.

There didn't feel like there was much action, either, for most of the book. Although the lesson was obvious to me before I finished listening to the prologue, I still kept wondering where the book was going. Why am I learning about the lives of these three characters? It wasn't until 3/4 of the way through the book when all three of their lives intersect that my interest picked up, but even then the lessons that Dor taught Victor and Sarah and the ones he learned himself were very obvious.

One of the best things about the book for me was the narrator, Dan Stevens. His English accent went a long way in helping me get through this. Also, the audio book is only five hours, so if you are interested in sampling Albom's writing, it is fairly short.

Here are a few lines from the book that Albom used to shove the lesson in the reader's face, albeit gently:

Sometimes, when you are not getting the love you want, giving makes you think you will.

We all yearn for what we have lost. But sometimes, we forget what we have.

When you are measuring life, you are not living it.

Despite the melancholy vibe, the ending wasn't as much of a downer as I expected. Overall the book reminded me of those stories that circulate on Facebook about how people who don't realize how good their lives were until it was too late. If I were to recommend it, I would say that it might appeal to the readers of books like the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, if they can get through the first half of the book.

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"The Time-Traveling Fashionista" by Biana Turetsky

The Time-Traveling Fashionista by Bianca Turetsky
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Genre: middle-school fiction, paranormal
Book 1 of a new series
On my TBR list?  No



Summary:
Louise Lambert is a 12-year-old girl with a thing for vintage. She loves old movies and all the fashion and glamour that go with them, and her life seems dull in comparison. Then one day she receives an invitation to a vintage fashion sale that starts her on an adventure that transcends time.

The one persistent thought I had while reading The Time-Traveling Fashionista was that if it had been published about 10 years ago, my daughters would have moved on to this after reading The Magic Tree House series. Although the blurb on the back of the book makes it sound like a juicy YA novel -- "Louise relishes the glamour of this opulent age and slips into a life of secrets, drama, and decadence" -- it is much more innocent than that. After all, our heroine is only 12, a fact that I missed because I skipped the blurb on the inside flap and only read the back. There were three separate incidences where people have to be reminded not to offer her alcohol, so it definitely isn't in the vein of other YA books where sex and drugs are front and center.

I think the author did a smart thing by including full-color illustrations of many of the dresses mentioned in the story. My kids appreciated picture books even when they were in middle school, and all four of them are fans of graphic novels now. The pictures in the book were done not just by an artist but a proper fashion illustrator (Sandra Suy). It gave me the feeling that the author and the artist both really understood fashion.

The only quibble I have with this book is the depiction of Louise's modern life. The author makes her existence as a middle-school student seem so drab that it isn't quite believable to me when she says she wants to go back to it. I haven't seen a summary of the second book's plot, but I am hoping that Turetsky sticks with Louise and shows the reader more of what she enjoys about her modern life.

There is a trend of adult readers picking up YA books, but I think that some books are strictly for kids. The Time-Traveling Fashionista falls into that category for me. The tone reminds me of PBS shows my kids used to watch like Wishbone and The Time Warp Trio -- supernatural adventure with a history lesson thrown in. This is the book you hand to the quirky young girl in your life who enjoys black-and-white movies and shopping at thrift stores. Don't be surprised if you see her doing a little fashion research at the computer after reading it.

"Soulless" by Gail Carriger

Soulless by Gail Carriger

Genre: romance, light steampunk, fantasy
On my TBR list?: Yes, since Nov 2009

Book #1 of The Parasol Protectorate, 3 books published so far

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Summary, from Goodreads:

Without a morsel of exaggeration, its publisher describes this debut novel as "a comedy of manners set in Victorian London full of werewolves, vampires, dirigibles, and tea-drinking." At the center of Soulless's "parasol protectorate" is Miss Alexia Tarabotti, a young woman who lacks not only a suitor but also a soul. And those are not her only problems: When she accidentally kills a vampire, it begins a series of events that she must set out to resolve without the help of any proper authorities.

It has been quite a while since a book grabbed my attention from the very first page, but Soulless managed to do exactly that. It is a charming mix of 19th-century romance and the supernatural, with just enough steampunk thrown in to spice up the story without boring less science-inclined readers like me. This sense of balance is exhibited in several ways throughout the book.

The first example of Carriger's balanced writing style is our heroine, Alexia Tarabotti. She is feisty enough to appeal to a modern reader, yet none of her behavior steps so far outside the parameters of her 19th-century setting as to be unbelievable. Carriger also did an excellent job of writing the lovemaking scenes in a manner that does not jolt the reader out of the story. I've read more than one book that goes "literature, literature, literature, PORN, literature, literature"; the sex scenes were so shocking that they seemed to have been lifted from a different manuscript. In the case of Soulless, the author manages to construct the amorous passages in the same lilting style of the rest of the story, with a well-placed nudge and a wink.

All in all, I would say that this is a first-rate showing, especially for a debut novel. If you follow me on Goodreads, then you know that my 18-year old is already clamoring to read it. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone younger than that because the love scenes, while tastefully written, are still explicit enough that I would feel uncomfortable handing the book to my 14-year-old daughters. This book may be a tad too romantic for the hardcore steampunk or supernatural fans, but I think it could appeal to the readers who don't mind a touch of those fantastical elements in their romance stories.





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"Eighth Grade Bites" by Heather Brewer

Eighth Grade Bites by Heather Brewer

On my TBR list?: No
Genre: supernatural fiction, middle school

Book 1 of an ongoing series

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Summary, from Goodreads:

Junior high really sucks for thirteen-year-old Vladimir Tod. Bullies harass him, the principal is dogging him, and the girl he likes prefers his best friend. Oh, and Vlad has a secret: his mother was human, but his father was a vampire. With no idea of the extent of his powers, Vlad struggles daily with his blood cravings and his enlarged fangs. When a substitute teacher begins to question him a little too closely, Vlad worries that his cover is about to be blown. But then he faces a much bigger problem: he's being hunted by a vampire killer.

Eight Grade Bites came home with me from the library because C2 asked for it. Apparently, it is popular at the middle school; her twin C1 called it "witty and exciting". I wasn't going to read it myself until I ran across an article that attempted to put the fear of God into parents about the evil that lurks behind the covers of YA novels. It made me realize that I had fallen down a bit on my book screening duties, so I put on my Good Parent hat and read it.

Unfair though it may be, my brain immediately made comparisons to the Harry Potter series. This series deals with the supernatural and is set up where each book covers an entire school year, but I think that is where the comparison should end. Brewer isn't as verbose as Rowling, which can be seen as a good or bad thing. The books are shorter and easier for a reluctant reader like C2 to get through. The downside is that many of the characters surrounding Vlad aren't as fleshed-out as Ron, Hermione, and Draco in the Rowling series.

Brewer takes a little too long to set up the "big bad" for the series, but otherwise the book was enjoyable. I found the descriptions of how the main character works blood into his diet without biting anyone to particularly inventive. Also, I appreciated the fact that Brewer doesn't shy away from the fact that vampires do bite people and those people sometimes die. It is a testament to her skill that she does it in a way that isn't too gory for the average middle-school kid.


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"Laced with Magic" by Barbara Bretton

Laced with Magic by Barbara Bretton

Genre: romance, mystery, paranormal
On my TBR list?: no

Book 2 of a series (release date for book 3 unknown)

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Synopsis from Goodreads:

Knit shop owner and sorcerer’s daughter Chloe Hobbs felt the Fates finally got it right when she met Luke MacKenzie. And no one could have convinced her otherwise—including the trolls, selkies, or spirits who also call Sugar Maple, Vermont, home. But then out of nowhere Luke’s ex-wife suddenly shows up, claiming to see the spirit of their daughter, Steffie—a daughter Chloe knows nothing about.

This novel is the follow-up to Barbara Bretton's Casting Spells and it has more "meat" to it. Since the business of getting the boy and girl together was taken care of in the first book, we could move on to throwing a few troubles their way and seeing how they handle them. Although I classified this as a romance, there are elements of the fantasy and cozy mystery genres mixed in.

The tone reminds me of the TV show Bewitched. The danger that Chloe faces doesn't feel as threatening as what you would find in a Sookie Stackhouse novel or even the last installment of the Harry Potter series. Chloe's neighbors are all kooky characters that mix the supernatural with the suburban and I would love to spend more time with them in another book or a TV series.

Fair warning for those like me who hate to wait: this book has a cliffhanger ending, and as of 24 Apr 2010 I couldn't find any information about a release date for the next book in the series.

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"The Wizard, the Witch, and Two Girls from Jersey" by Lisa Papademetriou

The Wizard, the Witch, and Two Girls from Jersey by Lisa Papademetriou

Genre: YA, fiction, fantasy
On my TBR list?: Yes

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Brief description: Two girls who are total opposites get zapped into the fantasy book that they are studying for English class, changing the plot and themselves in the process.

I checked this out of the library for myself, but my 12-year-old daughter got to it first. She devoured it in two days and proclaimed that I had to read it. Her enthusiasm was the only thing that got me through this predictable book.

To be fair, the one-dimensional characters probably wouldn't be so predictable to a middle schooler who hasn't been exposed to as much television and film as I have. You have the nerdy girl and the rich airhead, the less handsome guy who turns out to be a better person than the buff hotties, and the wisecracking talking animal thrown in for comic relief. I knew before the end of the first chapter what lesson each girl needed to learn. This would be the perfect set-up for a Saturday night movie on Disney Channel, so I wasn't surprised to find out that the author has written novelizations of Disney series like "Lizzie McGuire" and "That's So Raven".

Not only was the book predictable but it also had an identity crisis. There were a couple dark secrets thrown in that didn't fit the otherwise light tone of the book -- not too dark for a 12-year-old to handle, but dark enough to make you wonder which direction the book is going in. If I had a choice, I would have gone with the more serious tone and get rid of the lame jokes that sound cute coming out the mouths of Disney's young ingenues, but fall flat on the page.

Bottom line: although many YA novels appeal to adults, this is not one of them. Save it for your kids.

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"Dead Until Dark" by Charlaine Harris

Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

Genre: fiction, supernatural, vampires
From my TBR list?: Yes

Book #1 of an ongoing series (10 books so far)

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Dead Until Dark, the first book in the Southern Vampire series, introduces the readers to a world in which vampires are recognized as citizens. Their advanced age is explained away by a "virus" that makes them appear dead but that hasn't helped them become accepted by the general population. However, the main character Sookie Stackhouse is fascinated by vampires, probably because she also has a supernatural ability herself. All of this surrounds a murder mystery that the officials seem eager to blame on Bill, a new vampire that's just moved to town.

Honestly, I didn't expect to like this book as much as I did. When a book has a lot of hype surrounding it, I tend to view it more critically than other books. However, the story charmed me right out of my inclination to be negative about it. I especially enjoyed Sookie's willingness to be open to new experiences. One aspect I did have to overcome was Sookie's naivete. It was difficult for me to imagine a 25-year-old in the modern world being as innocent as she seemed to be.

There is a bit of sex in this book; not as much as I've heard is in the TV adaptation, but still more than I want in a book that I hand to my teenager (yes, I'm a protective mom). I don't think the sex is graphic enough to offend an adult, though. I would say that if you were a fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Charmed and haven't had a supernatural fix since they went off the air, this might be the series for you.

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Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy

Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Harry Potter series made it difficult for me to pick up any other books about magic. Every one that I picked up seemed to pale in comparison. I'm glad that I've finally gotten over that mental block; otherwise, I would have missed out on a great story in Skulduggery Pleasant. It is about a 12-year-old girl named Stephanie who discovers a magical underworld in her city when her uncle dies. She is led on a tour of this underground community by her uncle's best friend, who happens to be an undead skeleton called Skulduggery Pleasant.

The author did a good job creating a new universe for his novel that didn't make me compare it to other book in the genre. The explanations of how magic worked in that universe and who the bad guys were was The banter between Stephanie and Skulduggery made my 12-year-old and 16-year-old giggle. As for the ending, it was just right. It made me want to read the next book without resorting to a cliffhanger.

The only hesitation I have about recommending this book is that there is more death than I expected in a kids' book. I would say that if your child can handle The Graveyard Book or the final Harry Potter book, then she can handle this one.






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Time to Tackle the Indies

A few weeks' ago, I had an idea of making May a sort of "indie sweeps week" on my blogs. Several of my online friends are creative people. They write novels, record podcasts on a variety of subjects, and create video web series. I'm not in a position to contribute monetarily to their efforts, so I thought that I could help them by putting out the word. I've never seen book bloggers mention podcast novels (also known as Podiobooks) so I'm not sure that the two worlds even cross. My plan for this blog was to do several posts about some of these books throughout the month of May to bring more attention to them.

Well, you know what they say about the best-laid plans. I've been working so much overtime that I've barely been reading, never mind writing. However, May isn't over yet, so who says I can't start in the middle of the month?

The book I'm spotlighting today is one of my 16-year-old daughter's favorites, Nina Kimberly the Merciless. M has corresponded with the author, Christiana Ellis, several times and even dressed as the main character for a school project. If you have a teenage daughter who is into fantasy, this book would be a great choice.

Nina Kimberly the Merciless is a comic fantasy novel about the daughter of a barbarian horde leader. At the start of the book, we find that Nina's father was killed 10 years' ago and she was left in the care of the royal family of a neighboring kingdom. Nina is now a teenager who is ready to fulfill her destiny as an adventurer. However, she is living in a quiet back-water kingdom where nothing ever happens. So she decides to leave the kingdom and find a quest to fulfill and a handsome hero to stand by her side. However, due to circumstances explained in the book, Nina is stuck bringing Lewis, the doltish teenaged king who has grown up with her and thinks that they are in love with each other.

Indie authors usually offer several ways for you to get a taste of their work before you buy, and Ellis is no exception. The story was originally released in serial form as a podcast, complete with music and sound effects. This is the way my daughter and I listened to it. On 15 May 2009, the story was released in print and offered on Amazon (although as of this posting, there is a glitch in Amazon's system that says the book is out of print). You can also try the new audio version that is more like a traditional audiobook (no music or sound effects) or even download a PDF version of the text. If you go to Ellis' page about the book, you will find links to the different options.

"The Time Traveler's Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger

My rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Part of a series?: No
Genre: Literary romance
Format: Paperback borrowed from library

Disclosure: “Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission.”

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger is a story about waiting. It tells the tale of Henry and Clare. Henry is a librarian with a punk-rock sensibility and Clare is a beautiful art student. Clare has known that she was going to marry Henry practically all her life, despite the fact that Henry doesn't meet her until he is 28. That's because Henry has been traveling from their future to meet with her since she was six. Since Clare has a sense of what is to come, she spends most of her life waiting for it. There is the excitement that comes with anticipation, but there is also sadness.

The title would suggest that it is science fiction, but it is more of a romance novel than a sci-fi one. Very few pages are spent on the mechanics of how Henry is able to travel through time. The true heart of the story is how it feels to be separated from your loved ones or to be the one always left behind. This is not the type of book where there is a problem presented in the beginning and you keep reading to find out how the hero solves it in the end. This novel is more like a scrapbook showing stages of Henry and Clare's lives, apart and together.

How did I like the book? About two-thirds of the way through, I knew that I wasn't going to be happy with the ending but I felt compelled to keep reading. I tend to shy away from books that are suffused with such an air of melancholy. However, there were beautiful moments in between the sad ones that were my reward for sticking with it. Every woman needs to read a weeper once in a while, and I would put this one at the top of the list.