Tag Archives: werewolves

Bruja (by Aileen Erin)

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Young Adult (Vampires / Werewolves / Witches)

Despite escaping from her coven, Claudia remains blood-bound to Luciana, the coven’s leader. She, along with a small group of witches who left with her, has found sanctuary with the werewolves but Luciana can still invade her dreams and the blood-binding makes it possible for her to take Claudia’s power.

Desperate to break the binding, Claudia travels to Peru in search of a mysterious and possibly extinct group of white mages but she finds herself facing witches even more evil than Luciana.

I loved this book. The characters are wonderful and the story is great. It’s like Claudia reaches out of the book, grabs you by the scruff of the neck and drags you through the pages. Honestly, I don’t give up sleep for very many books but I just couldn’t put this one down.

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Many thanks to Ink Monster & Netgalley for providing me with this ARC Yellow,

Orange, Red. What it means:  red-orange-yellow-guide

Dark Heir (by Faith Hunter)

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Urban Fantasy

After a powerful vampire, one of the very first vampires, escapes from the sub-basement where he’s been kept prisoner serious carnage on the streets of New Orleans follows. With the residents up in arms and baying for vampire blood; the council of European vampires threatening war over the imprisonment of one of their own; and traitors working against the Master of New Orleans, it’s left to Jane to hunt down the rogue vampire and do it before seething animosities boil over.

 
Dark Heir is very much a transition book. It deals with a few things which have been bubbling away in the background of the last few books and sets the scene for the next in the Jane Yellowrock series. In that sense, it’s an important book but probably not as good as some of the other books in the series. It was entertaining, especially the climax but the stars of this series are Jane and Beast, and sadly Beast was mostly absent.

Here’s hoping the next in the series has Beast and Jane back to doing what they do best, hunting vampires together.

Screen Shot 2014-03-17 at 5.44.24 pmYellow, Orange, Red. What it means: red-orange-yellow-guide

Many thanks to Penguin Group and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC. 

Vision in Silver (by Anne Bishop)

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Fantasy

Vision in Silver is Book 3 in Anne Bishop’s The Others series and is not a stand-alone title.

As the Humans First and Last movement continue to play their dangerous cat and mouse game with the others, little do they realise the hornets nest they are stirring up. For their part, the terra indigene (Earth Natives: vampires, shifters, elementals) in the courtyard are all that stands between the human population of Thaisia and the deadlier creatures of the wild country.

As rebellion foments amongst the humans, Meg and Simon along with the other residents of the courtyard hunt down the leaders of the Humans First and Last movement in the hopes of preventing the extinction of human life in Thaisia.

I loved this book. I think I might have rated it 5 Stars but for the ending which was honestly like a slowly deflating balloon. Great book, but that ending left me unsatisfied and disappointed.

Screen Shot 2014-11-09 at 3.09.42 pmYellow, Orange, Red. What it means: red-orange-yellow-guide

Dead Heat (by Patricia Briggs)

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Urban Fantasy

When Anna and Charles fly to Arizona, it’s to visit with some of Charles’s old friends and buy a trail horse for Anna. But on arrival they quickly find themselves rushing to the home of the Arizona alpha’s grandson whose wife, Chelsea has been bewitched.  What they find is three frightened children and Chelsea covered in blood.

It soon becomes apparent that Chelsea was bewitched by a fae and the fae has been kidnapping and killing children. Charles and Anna join forces with the Arizona pack and local law enforcement to hunt down and kill the fae.  But even as they are hunting the fae, he is hunting them and this particular fae is one of the most powerful of all.

 

Dead Heat is a great book which had just a little too much going on. The main story, that of Charles and Anna hunting down the fae who was taking children was great, but there was a lot of time spent on Anna looking at and trying out horses which didn’t really seem to go anywhere and honestly was a bit of a distraction. That said the ending completely blew me away and made it all worthwhile.

Screen Shot 2014-02-27 at 9.12.41 pmMany thanks to Penguin and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC.

Yellow, Orange, Red. What it means:  red-orange-yellow-guide

Sleight of Hand (by Mark Henwick)

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Urban Fantasy

Amber is a private investigator. After discovering a drug and gun running operation in her client’s business she calls in the cops and turns the screws on Denver’s criminal underworld. Unfortunately for her, Denver PD have shut down the business while they investigate and her client is refusing to pay her.

With a serious cash flow problem, when Jennifer Kingslund shows up claiming one of her staff has been kidnapped and someone is trying to ruin her, Amber has little choice but to take on the job. She quickly discovers the job is much bigger than she first thought.

Adding to her problems, the vampire infection that has tainted her blood is taking over, and if she isn’t careful her government minders will throw her into a padded room where military scientists will control her every move.

 
Loved this book. It’s a bit of a cross between those great hard boiled detective novels of the 1930s and 1940s and more modern Urban Fantasy by authors like Jennifer Estep and Faith Hunter. Amber is a great heroine and this book is filled with secondary characters I can’t help but like. It took four or five books before Jennifer Estep’s Elemental Assassin series won me over. Not a problem with this one. I’m already hooked.

(There is a novella which precedes this book called Raw Deal. Well worth starting there to get some background on the characters.)

Screen Shot 2014-03-17 at 5.42.32 pmYellow, Orange, Red –– what it means: red-orange-yellow-guide-pdf

Avoiding Alpha (by Aileen Erin)

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Young Adult

Tessa who is both a witch and a werewolf is not having a very good day. Her best friend Meredith was cursed years earlier, a curse which trapped her werewolf and prevented her from shifting. Now she has suddenly fallen violently ill and as her life is slipping away, it is left to Tessa to save her. But saving her might only be possible if she makes a deal with the devil, the witch who cast the spell and is leader of a powerful coven of witches.

 

Avoiding Alpha is such a great book. It sits somewhere between a long novella and a short novel, but despite its length (or lack of it) it packs in a whole bunch of story. Aileen Erin has managed to deliver a book which sets the scene and introduces characters who will take the stage in Alpha Divided (due out in October),  but she has also given us a book which stands on its own merits. It never drags and is entertaining to the last page turn.

Screen Shot 2014-02-15 at 8.51.33 pmMany thanks to Ink Monster and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC.

Yellow / Orange / Red –– What it means. http://wp.me/P2B7b5-9l

Night Broken (by Patricia Briggs)

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Paranormal Romance

Christy, Adam’s ex-wife, shows up in pack territory after her latest lover turns seriously weird on her. Adam, a natural protector puts her up but she immediately starts subverting Mercy’s position in the pack. Then the crazy stalker guy shows up and the body count rises.

I read Moon Called, book one in the Mercy Thompson series a while ago, but despite enjoying the book a lot I walked away. The main reason was the price of the Kindle version is about 50% more than a paperback and it seemed a bit unfair paying more for something which essentially costs the publisher a fraction of the price. Anyway, that just goes to say I haven’t read any other books in the series except book 1.

This book is good. It’s great fun but it doesn’t quite work as a stand-alone. If you like paranormal romance…if you like books about vampires, werewolves, shifters and fae, this book is for you. But I think the series needs to be read in order and If spending something like $85.00 buying eight books makes you blanch, there are other much cheaper options. Faith Hunter’s Skinwalker series is every bit as good in my opinion and half the price.

Screen Shot 2014-03-17 at 5.44.24 pmYellow / Orange / Red –– What it means. http://wp.me/P2B7b5-9l

 

Becoming Alpha (by Aileen Erin)

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Young Adult / Paranormal Fantasy

Tessa has a gift, though she would call it a curse. When she touches people or objects people have used, she is bombarded with visions. She goes through life avoiding touching anything that has been handled by others. Labelled as a freak, her family takes her from California to Texas in the hopes of fresh start, but the town they have moved to is also home to a pack of werewolves.

After escaping a disastrous party, she gets her first kiss from Dastien, and then Dastien’s wolf decides to claim her with a bite. Suddenly all her problems are multiplied ten fold with pack politics piling on top of schoolwork and being a new werewolf, and as an alpha strong enough to rival the other alphas in the pack she is definitely causing a stir.

Becoming Alpha is pretty damned good. As you expect of a debut novel the author has thrown everything into it and that occasionally doesn’t work, but it’s done with such enthusiasm…almost approaching glee that it’s hard to hold it against her. It’s a good fun story about werewolves and witches with interesting characters.  It’s a lot of fun.

(I should note that while this book very much reads as young adult there is a bit of bad language which might make it unsuitable for younger teenagers.)

Many thanks to Ink Monster LLC and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC.

A Witch’s Handbook of Kisses and Curses (by Molly Harper)

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After the death of her grandmother, Nola becomes the head of her coven of witches. Her first duty is to travel from Ireland to Half Moon Hollow, Kentucky and retrieve four magical items –– talismans that contain the power to bind their arch rivals, a coven of witches who would use their powers for evil.

On arrival she literally runs into Jed, her enigmatic neighbor who goes to ridiculous lengths to avoid being outside when the moon is out. He’s hiding something but exactly what it is she can’t quite figure out.

Molly Harper returns to Half Moon Hollow, Kentucky for what I think must be the sixth or seventh novel. I honestly have no idea how she does it. This series should be getting tired but once again she manages to deliver a book that enthralls from beginning to end with a very healthy dose of Molly Harper’s trademark snark. She’s a favorite author and this book is a good example of why.

Many thanks to Edelweiss and Pocket Books for providing me with this ARC