meganbmoore: (ever after: books)
This was a somewhat awkward book, primarily because it's the book that marks the end of part one of the series, and also because it's the book that marks the series switching over to hardcover format. There's a character list at the beginning and a narrative prologue in the form of (IIRC) Barabas writing a journal entry to catch people up, but the book is burdened down not only by having to wrap up most of the plots that were building up to this point, but also having to explain what's going on to people who picked it up in hardcover but hadn't read the previous ones. So it's good, but awkward and/or clunky in places.

spoilers )

For a bit of amusement, I was looking at Amazon reviews earlier and there was a reviewer very put out because she hadn't know Andrews was a husband/wife team and declared it "subterfuge" because it hadn't been spelled out in previous books. Except that it was officially declared after...what, the third book? And has been part of the author bio everywhere (including Amazon) since then. And it wasn't exactly a secret before then, it just wasn't official.

And I get not knowing if you don't go to author websites and blogs and online review sited and haven't read other reviews (because quite a
few have mentioned it over the years). I mean, it's a bit of a stretch for me, but, I mean, SUBTERFUGE. I wonder if they get put out every time they learn an author's name is a penname, and not the author's real one. (And if they realize how many authors have written under more than one name, and how many pennames are for collaborations.)
meganbmoore: (ever after: books)


What are you currently reading

I've started reading the manhwa Abosolute Witch, set in a medieval-lite fantasy setting in which a young woman journey's to her husband's hometown after he goes missing, only to learn that no one has ever heard of him. There's also politics, a grumpy alchemist, a talking frog, a shape-changing lizard, retired pirates who run an inn, an eyepatchwearing seeress, an elderly lady who is the shrewdest merchant alive and a supposedly extinct race of witches. so far, I'm enjoying it considerably.

What did you recently finish reading?

Magic Rises by Ilona Andrews.The 6th Kate Daniels book (I don't count Gunmetal Magic in the series. Mostly because I pretend it doesn't exist.) and one that takes most of the protagonists to the Adriatic in hopes of acquiring a drug that will help more shapeshifter children survive adolescence. There was some annoying relationship drama that unnecessary (and the revelation of why it was there didn't make it seem any less unnecessary) but other than that, I liked it more than the last few books I've read by the authors. i will admit to being amused by Curran's temper tantrum, and people's reactions to it.

I finished reading Legend of the White-Haired Demoness, but don't have much substantial to add to what I've said before, aside from being amused when characters from the two sequels, Qijian Xia Tianshan and Saiwai Qixia Zhuan (which Tsui Hark merged into the 2004 Seven Swordsmen TV series) started showing up as children, and one of the adult characters changed his name and became the master of several characters from the sequel. I knew Seven Swordsmen was based on two Liang Yusheng novels, but didn't realize that they were sequels to Legend of the White-Haired Demoness. (And I'd been thinking that Lian Ni Shang and Fei Hongjin from Seven Swordsmen were similar but not put much actual thought into the similarity, and then I realized than Lian Ni Shang was Fei Hongjin's master and it made perfect sense. Amusingly, Ada Choi has played both characters in TV adaptations.)

Now if only I could find a (non-vikii, because it always gives me trouble) subtitled version of the 2012 TV series with Ma Su and Nicky Wu, and English translations of Qijian Xia Tianshan and Saiwai Qixia Zhuan. (Or any other Liang Yusheng novels, but particularly those.)

A bunch of Claymore, which I posted on separately.


What do you think you'll read next?

More Absolute Witch, and the library has the latest "October Daye" book for me, as well as the next-for-me "Kitty Norville" book.
meganbmoore: (too many books)

What are you currently reading
Legend of the White-Haired Demoness by Liang Yusheng, ch 14. I think it's been about a month since 7 Seeds completely took over my kindle time, so I'm still playing catch up and trying to remember who all these secondary characters running around are.

What did you recently finish reading?

Finished Georgette Heyer's The Black Moth. Slow start but entertaining overall, though it's more a case of you can see the elements that eventually became Heyer's strengths than that it's really good on its own. I doubt I'll be reading These Old Shades, as "redeem the rapist" plots don't appeal to me. (And while it may have been a failed rape attempt in this book, not only was the intent still there, but he was obviously successful more than once in the past.) I'm curious, though, to see if we start getting some adaptations of Heyers books over the next few years, as they start entering the public domain.

Caught up with 7 Seeds, which I posted on separately.

The Last Dragon by Jane Yolen and Rebecca Guay. Graphic novel set in a medieval-lite world in which a dragon is born 200 years after the last of the dragons were supposedly chased away. When a dragon begins attacking a town, several young men are sent out to find a "hero" to fight the dragon, and instead return with a braggart more familar with spinning stories than fighting. Meanwhile, the local healer's youngest daughter comes up with plans of her own to beat the dragon. It's simple and straightforward and relies more on wit and creative thinking than flashy heroics, and is more concerned with how the dragon affects people's daily lives than with the dragon itself. Very nice little book.

Steel's Edge by Ilona Andrews. Fourth book in Andrews's "The Edge" series. I liked it more than the last 2 books in the series, but less than I do most of the Kate Daniels books. The first half is pretty much the protagonists setting out to destroy every human trafficker they can find, and it later branches out to wrap up most of the threads from previous books. I think it's supposed to be the last book in the series, but if so, I suspect it'll get revisited once or twice later down the road to focus on the teen characters as adults. My favorite part was when the heroine would invert healing magic to make her enemies sick, as I've always wondered why people with healing magic in fantasy worlds aren't able to do that more. (Sadly, the book didn't go where I wanted with that. Oh well.)

Black Bird Vol 1-3 by Sakurakoji Kanako. I read a little bit of this when it first came out, and couldn't quite remember if I disliked it or wasn't quite grabbed by it when I saw that the library had the first 10 copies, so I checked out the first 3. I feel like i need to read about 30 columes of good manga to make up for this.

The heroine, Misao, has blood that is superduper extra yummy blood that makes demons stronger. Her One True Love is a tengu named Kyo who was her childhood friend, and is now a teacher at her school. His saliva can cure wounds. Naturally, Misao is constantly bleeding. (I will pause a moment to ponder what Clamp and/or Kaori Yuki would do with this idea. Whatever it was, it'd be better than this.) The healing is frequently over Misao's protests, and often staged to look like sexual assault. This is aside from Kyo's regular sexual assaults (often at school) that are ok because they're in love and she's his destined bride. Kyo is also fond of deliberately terrifying Misao to teach her that she has to rely on his body for protection, and Misao thinking that there's no reason to refuse Kyo's sexual advances if he loves her, and that it's touching when he's cruel to her because he's trying to teach her to rely on him out of lurve. There is, I think, an average of about 1.3 rape attempts (not including anything from Kyo) per volume. All by people Kyo has warned Misao to avoid. In fact, I think every person Kyo has told Misao not to talk to (which is everyone but his servants) has tried to rape and/or murder Misao. She has to learn her lesson about never having an independent thought or decision of her own somehow, amirite?

Brain bleach required. Very glad I only grabbed a few volumes, because I probably would have felt to read the rest if I'd grabbed them.

After the Golden Age by Carrie Vaughn. This is kind of like reading Astro City in prose form. That's not a criticism. Celia West is the non-superpowered daughter of her city's (the world's?) superheroes. At 17 she became emancipated and ran away to college, and is now a forensic accountant who does her very best to avoid her parents' superhero lifestyle. Unfortunately, her parents' secret identities were exposed when she was a teenager, and she's been kidnapped so many times that it's become boring, and the prosecutor trying her father's archnemesis for tax fraud has decided that it'd be good publicity to have her hepling on the case. There are elements of a parody in there and a pretty strong critique of superhero/vigilante culture and romanticism (one that appears to have made some Amazon and Goodreads reviewers cry in agony at the book daring to resist), and the general feel is of Silver Age surperheroes giving way to more modern superhero through the eyes of someone on the outskirts. While I haven't read superhero comics in probably 5-6 years, I read enough in the 15 years before that to see a lot of the twists coming, but that didn't affect my enjoyment.

The Adventures of Sir Balin the Ill-Fated by Gerald Morris. Part of Morris's irreverent "The Knights' Tales" series of children's books (not to be confused with his YA series, "The Squire's Tales," which can also be irreverent depending on Morris's opinion of whatever tale he's adapting at the time, but is another beast entirely). If you're familiar with the tale of Balin and Balan, you're probably going "but how do you make that a children's book?" The answer is "by relentlessly mocking obsession with fate and destiny." Light fluff, but entertaining and funny, and a quick read.

Rasetsu Vol 1-9 (complete) by Shiomi Chika. I read and enjoyed the first couple volumes of this when Viz first started publishing it a few years ago, then wasn't able to continue buying it because of finances, but the library now has the volumes I didn't, so I finally read all of it. Rasetsu is about a 18-year-old psychic named Rasetsu who was cursed by a demon when she was 15, with the demon claiming that he'd claim her for his own if she didn't find her "true love" by her 20th birthday. Thankfully, while the "find your true love" element isn't completely shelved, there isn't much of a focus on it more often than not (it's there and not something she can exactly forget, but there are other things going on) and most of the focus is on Rasetsu and her coworkers fighting malevolent ghosts and demons. There's a romantic plotline and something of a triangle, but it's generally well done (I say "generally" because I wasn't fond of the third party or his behavior, but it fits the overall plotline) and I liked the actual romance more than expected. My only real beef with it is that, as usual, Shiomi tends to surround her heroine with several men, and no other major female characters. It's connected to Shiomi's other series that was released by Viz, Yurara, in that Rasetsu's love interest, Yako, was in Yurara, and both heroines are psychics, but you don't need to read Yurara to read this.

What do you think you'll read next?

I have Natsuo Kirino's The Goddess Chronicle and the latest Kate Daniels book, and since I've read a bunch of Carrie Vaughn's standalone books, I went ahead and checked out the first couple books in her urban fantasy series. I also have the ATLA tie-in books that my library has, as I recall some listies liking them. I was going to say "I should back off a bit from manga for a while before I OD," but then I was at the Library's main branch this morning after a doctor's appointment and they had just acquired a lot of manga i haven't read yet, so that might not be happening. I also still have Kelley Armstrong's Omens to read.
meganbmoore: (lucy loves this book)
Some things I've read recently-ish but keep forgetting to post on:

Manga:

Blank Slate Vol 1-2 (complete series): This is a short series by Aya Kanno, the creator of Otomen, and it's about an amnesiac, sociopathic, evil assassin. In one of the sidebars, Kanno said she set out to do a series about a villain and, well, did. It's an interesting experiment, but it's too short to develop the characterization it needs to really work and still have the plot it wants, and the plot isn't strong enough to pull it off without strong characterization. The most impressive thing about it is the amazement at it coming from the same brain as the adorable genderbending fluff that is Otomen.

xxxHolic
Vol 16-19 (end of series): This remains one of the most beautifully illustrated manga I've read (despite Clamp's refusal to actually give people bones) but I was never able to recover interest in it after the change in status quo that took place a little bit before these volumes. Strangely, I recall spending a fair bit of the early volumes wishing the series focused less on the individual customers and more on the meta plot, and then these final volumes were mostly about the metaplot, but that had changed to something that interested me significantly less by then. (And I half-think that one day Clamp just decided the next chapter would be the last, and it was.) Still, I remain fond of the series, and would be so regardless simply because it was my gateway drug into Clamp.

Wallflower Vol 22-27: I...cannot believe I've read 27 volumes of a manga in which there is only the merest hint of an ongoing plot and character growth and relationship evolution both move at a snail's pace, and where the timeline is actually on repeat. Yet, I do not regret it at all. (Well, I could do with unreading some chapters along the way, but that's true of most things that last a while.) I generally enjoy the chapters with Sunako's aunt and/or Noi-chan and the ones where random supernatural things may or may not appear (particularly possessions) best, and the ones where people try to force conformity least. (Though those always end up going terribly for the ones trying to force conformity.) But this series never fails to make me laugh a lot, even if the laughter is sometimes of the more horrified "what--..." variety. When/If this series ever ends (though for all I know, it actually has in Japan) I hope Hayakawa actually has a final arc that resolves things instead of just stopping.

Books:

A Dance With Dragons by George R. R. Martin: Rambling, repetitive, boring. I'm not entirely sure how much is taste changing/GRRM either not caring or needing a firmer guiding hand, and how much had to do with it mostly being about plots/characters I'm either disinterested in or outright dislike, and adding a lot of POVs that weren't needed, but I feel this book would have been far more effective at about 1/4 the length. I also simply outright disliked most plot "twists," and can't help but feel that GRRM was developing it to not follow fandom expectations, as opposed to writing what he had always planned to write. It just frequently felt random and "HA HA GOTCHA!" Like, I almost think he'll make Robert be Jon's father just because everyone thinks it's Rhaegar. (Yes, I joke about how hair color makes it a valid theory but I am largely joking because GRRM has used hair color for major paterinty-centric plot developments before. Though I actually have accidentally predicted paternity reveals based on hair color and style more than once, and I think I did once write out a fanwank for how it could work based on the Arthurian themes in Jon's plot, but I've forgotten half of that now. But I digress.) I...will probably skim future books (should they ever come out...I'm not sure he's interested in writing this anymore) to see what happens with Dany, Sansa and Brienne, but this book pretty effectively killed my interest in the property as a whole.


The Mortal Bone by Marjorie M. Liu: Actually, my feelings for this one are very positive but I kept not thinking of anything to say about it that wasn't spoilery from the first word. (Well, aside from the fact that similarities to Top Cow's The Darkness seemed to increase some.) In other series, I'd be a bit leery of some of the plot developments, but as Liu has avoided the plot elements associated with the elements that would usually make me leery so far, I'm largely anticipating them instead.

Pretty Little Liars series by Sara Shepard: Yet another case of my suffering Stockholm Syndrome when it comes to awful, trainwrecky YA. I don't think I'll be complaining as much about the guys and romances in the TV series when I get back to it because what I've seen of the series is way way better on that front. Actually, I'm kind of amazed that the TV series has mostly positive relationships between women because pretty much every female/female relationship in the books is negative at some point, and ends up tense at best, and I think Jenna is the only character I liked. (I suppose this is how some people feels about the Vampire Diaries books, except unlike the VD books, the PLL books can't claim to be 1001% better when it comes to rape culture and violence against women, and way more comfortable with female sexuality. Whereas the PLL books are way way worse than the show when it comes to those factors.) I do think the resolution ofthe "who killed Ali?" plot rightly captured the feel of the 90s YA mystery ala Christopher Pike that it wanted, but while I think Shepard knew how she was going to resolv "Who killed Ali?" I think she was making up how she got there as she went along. And I'm not sure I've read anything else where in 8 books I don't think any of the main characters made a single smart decision. And I don't mean "are uninformed when making the choices" or "believe they're acting on information from a source they think they can trust" but always act on the bad information of someone they know is out to get them and who has tricked/hurt them before.

The Road to Avalon by Joan Wolf: A largely interesting Arthuriana set in post-Roman Britain and heavy on the politics and much more focused on Arthur than most Arthuriana I've read, it succeeded in making Arthur more interesting than most versions are for me (a lot of that, I think, had to do with the fact that it was written that most of Arthur's good traits and the aspects of his personality that made him a strong leader came from Ygraine. I actually think the Camelot series was trying to do this with Arthur's more douchy moments being attributed to acting like his father and his better moments being when he was showing more of Ygraine and her influence. The show was just terrible.) and Arthur and Lancelot (in his earlier incarnation as Bedwyr) more likable than usual for me until around the page 200 mark where I abruptly stopped liking both within a few pages of each other (if you read it, you can probably guess what bit for each.) Ultimately, while I found the plot interesting and engaging and liked most aspects of the take (There are some obvious MZB influences, but I didn't feel obnoxiously so, and this is almost purely historical fiction as opposed to fantasy.), Gwenhwyfar (Guenevere) and Mordered were the only characters I found to be particularly sympathetic, and it had 2 of my big pet peeves in modern Arthuriana: Ygraine/Uther is portrayed as True Love, and Morguase and Morgan are not Ygraine's daughters, but her sisters (in Morgan's case, they have different mothers and Morgan is Arthur's age.) For me, making Morguase and/or Morgan not be Ygraine's daughters completely alters some of the most interesting aspects of their roles, but that may be a YMMV thing.

Fate's Edge by Ilona Andrews: A lot better than the second Edge book, but not as good as the Kate Daniels books. I liked the caper plot a lot and liked Audrey and though the adolescent tagalongs and their issues worked well. I...did not dislike the hero, Kaldar, but I think I was supposed to not mind all his chauvinism since he got called on it, but, well, just because you get called on your attitude it doesn't erase the attitude, much less make it charming. I think I remember reading that some fans thought there wasn't enough romance in this one as compared to the others, but I didn't notice the decrease. Actually, I think I may have preferred that it had a bit less focus on the romance than what it had.
meganbmoore: (vd: dark lady)

This is the fifth of Andrews' Kate Daniels books, and book 5 is when I'm used to even the good fantasy series to start heading south. Thankfully, that is not the case with these books. I suspect a large part of it is that, unlike other books in the urban fantasy genre (well, this isn't technically urban fantasy, as it's a semi-post-apocalyptic Atlanta, but it has all the right trappings) Kate's life hasn't turned into having half a dozen romantic interests running around, making knowing remarks and fighting over her, with her non-romantic personal story popping up between those scenes, and instead remains squarely focused on Kate herself, with only one romantic interest. The books also remember that if you have to have a bossy alpha male used to giving orders as a romantic interest, the best way to do that is to have the heroine be more alpha than he is and unphased by his pushiness, not to mention is the more powerful of the two. (Probably the best example of Kate and Curran's relationship is a scene in this book where Curran tries to give Kate an order and she taps him on the nose, goes "bad cat," and proceeds to do whatever she wants and he basically sighs and goes about his business.)

spoilers )
meganbmoore: (magic)
The fourth Kate Daniels book has a bit much action on the action:plot ratio for my taste at times (though, thankfully, the action doesn’t get in the way of the snappy one-liners) but also resolves and addresses a lot of plotpoints that would have been drug out forever in other series. In addition, it’s one of the few pieces of fiction I’ve read that directly addresses the subject of female-centric myths being changed to male centric over the years.

spoilers )
meganbmoore: (fantasy heroine)
In Rose Drayton’s world, there’s the Weird, a seemingly feudal world of magic, and the Broken, the mundane world we live in. Between them is the Edge, a strip of land where people drive trucks and shop at Wal-Mart, but where magic exists. Rose is an Edger, and the first Edger in decades to be able to Flash white, an ability typically only found in bluebloods from the Weird.

In addition to most of her adult life being spent protecting herself from bluebloods who want her to give them babies that can Flash (and the people who would happily sell her to them) both of Rose’s parents are gone, and she works an off-the-books job to support her two younger brothers, one of whom is a necromancer, and the other, a shapeshifter. Into this comes Declan, seemingly yet another blueblood who wants her to give him special babies, and another blueblood who may end destroying the Edge.

Like Andrews’s Kate Daniel books, On the Edge features a tough woman, her alpha male love interest with responsibilities, and her Cute Young Accessories. You can’t even really say the resemblances end there, however, because the characters bear no real resemblances to each other. Kate’s world is post-apocalyptic and fantastical and she worries about things like werewolf mobs or something. Rose’s world is mundane and familiar, and she worries about things like one of her brothers developing a complex because he only got a bottle of bubbles when the other brother got new shoes.

On the Edge isn’t quite urban fantasy as we tend to think of it these days (your first clue is that the cover featured Rose with a head, fully clothed, and not wearing leather) but more along the lines of the modern fantasy from a while back that eventually morphed into urban fantasy. It’s more directly romantic than Andrews’ other books, and seems to be pretty self-contained with no glaringly-dangling plot threads to be followed up on later, though there’s room for sequels. I didn’t find it quite as energetic and entertaining as I do the Kate Daniels books, but I liked it a lot.

meganbmoore: (sorata and arashi)

This is the third book in Ilona Andrews’s Kate Daniel series. Unlike most urban fantasy which starts strong for me and then gets increasingly irritating with subsequent books, these books get better and better with each subsequent book. (Ok, objectively speaking, book 3 may be a bit early to make that claim, but…) But…how shall I put this? The average urban fantasy cover features the (typically miniskirt) clad leather butt of the heroine, with some leg and back. If she’s facing you and has a head, she’s temptingly posed and still half dressed in skintight leather. Unless lean, slightly muscular female arms are an incredible turn on for you, the cover of Magic Strikes features a rather desexualized, sneering, bruised woman with a sword. And a lion.

Which is a good way to summarize the differences between these books and the average urban fantasy book. The only leather Kate owns is for defensive purposes. I doubt she owns a miniskirt. There are no sexy vampires lounging around. Actually, the vampires are creepy. Kate doesn’t really have time for a love triangle or a complicated love life, much less to dwell on one, and she’s more than able to stand up to her single love interest. This, however, does not mean that Kate doesn’t have a number of important relationships with representatives of both genders.*

Still dealing with the fallout from the magic flare in Magic Burns, Kate gets a call from her teenaged werewolf sidekick, Derek, and ends up owing a favor to Saiman, a shapeshifter no one wants to owe a favor to. Derek, it seems, is investigating an underground gladiator ring called the Midnight Games, which Saiman is connected to. Except that Atlanta’s weres are strictly forbidden to have anything at all to do with the games, and breaking that rule will royal annoy Curran, the head of the weres. Annoying Curran isn’t much different from asking to be maimed. Curran also wants to date Kate.

Around the same time, she goes to investigate a dead body and finds her way blocked by Jim, her occasional partner, who’s also one of Curran’s top men. Except that Jim and his team are trying to keep the death of a were secret from Curran. This is also very high on the list of things you don’t do that could result in Curran doing very unpleasant things to you. Did I mention Curran wants to date Kate? Really, I mean that he wants her to be his mate, which makes me think that he really loves alpha battles.

Most of the plot beyond that point is incredibly spoilery, so I won’t get into it much. But Kate’s voice is even sharper, funnier, and more biting than before, as is her sarcasm, and we get the backgrounds of several characters. A number of the relationships also have interesting developments, though I’m starting to think that the idea of Kate and Curran is something that I like only as long as it doesn’t happen without some attitude adjustment. (Normally, I probably wouldn’t care for Curran at all, but since he focuses his attention on someone who can handle it-and him-and will injure him in sensitive places if he steps over the line, I end up liking him.) I wish, though, that the romantic relationships weren’t all so focused on the man pursuing the woman, though I suppose it make sense with the heavy were focus. It’d just be nice if one or two had a reversal.

*Important question! Does Kate and Julie’s relationship remind anyone else of Wolverine and Jubilee’s? For the comic book fans, I mean.
meganbmoore: (stargate-teyla)
I have to confess: I don’t actually recall the events of the first Kate Daniels book that well. I remember that I really liked it, that it had a kickass heroine, a pretty cool post-apocalyptic fantasy setting, a bit of a fun noirish feel, that it had all sorts of weres(not just werewolves) non-romantic pseudo-goth vampires, great worldbuilding, and touched on various mythologies, but seemed to have a bit of a fondness for celtic. Uhm…basically, I remembered all the cool bits, but none of the details. It happens. (If you’re me.) I also remember thinking that the book felt like it was supposed to be a lot longer, and got crammed into a smaller package, which is probably why the details didn’t stick.

Thankfully, the second book doesn’t have that problem, and feels like it was just the length it was supposed to be. This time around, Kate finds herself taking care of a 13-year-old girl named Julie, whose mother is part of a coven that has disappeared, and who has the ability to sense magic. Not helping things are the fact that the Flare (see below) is in full swing, allowing all sorts of Celtic beasties to come through, including Bran, an immortal Celtic “hero” who styles himself quite the trickster and ladies man. Bran, of course decides that it will be fun to mess with the people in town you least want to mess with and plays games with the Pack, who approaches Kate for help tracking him down. Kate has serious not-having-sex-yet issues with their leader, Curran. Not only that, but David, a 18-year-old were who was briefly (non-sexually, thankyouverymuch) bonded to Kate before is out to prove himself and invites himself along. Kate is very wise to the wisdom of a free babysitter who can rip out throats when taking care of a 13-year-old everyone wants.

I am going to take a moment to just steal a paragraph from the Dear Author review of the book to explain the setting, because I’m lazy that way:

For those readers new to the series, the Kate Daniels books take place in a futuristic Atlanta suffering from an advanced state of urban decay. In this world, magic batters the earth in waves, eating technology. When tech is up, spells fail and magical constructs lose their power. When magic is up, cars cease functioning and planes fall from the sky. But every seven years the waves increase in intensity until they culminate in a magical tsunami called a flare. During flares, magic is so powerful that even gods can walk the earth. 

(Go read the review.)


Ahm…It is a good book and you should all go read it. 
meganbmoore: (Default)
I have to confess: I don’t actually recall the events of the first Kate Daniels book that well. I remember that I really liked it, that it had a kickass heroine, a pretty cool post-apocalyptic fantasy setting, a bit of a fun noirish feel, that it had all sorts of weres(not just werewolves) non-romantic pseudo-goth vampires, great worldbuilding, and touched on various mythologies, but seemed to have a bit of a fondness for celtic. Uhm…basically, I remembered all the cool bits, but none of the details. It happens. (If you’re me.) I also remember thinking that the book felt like it was supposed to be a lot longer, and got crammed into a smaller package, which is probably why the details didn’t stick.

Thankfully, the second book doesn’t have that problem, and feels like it was just the length it was supposed to be. This time around, Kate finds herself taking care of a 13-year-old girl named Julie, whose mother is part of a coven that has disappeared, and who has the ability to sense magic. Not helping things are the fact that the Flare (see below) is in full swing, allowing all sorts of Celtic beasties to come through, including Bran, an immortal Celtic “hero” who styles himself quite the trickster and ladies man. Bran, of course decides that it will be fun to mess with the people in town you least want to mess with and plays games with the Pack, who approaches Kate for help tracking him down. Kate has serious not-having-sex-yet issues with their leader, Curran. Not only that, but David, a 18-year-old were who was briefly (non-sexually, thankyouverymuch) bonded to Kate before is out to prove himself and invites himself along. Kate is very wise to the wisdom of a free babysitter who can rip out throats when taking care of a 13-year-old everyone wants.

I am going to take a moment to just steal a paragraph from the Dear Author review of the book to explain the setting, because I’m lazy that way:

For those readers new to the series, the Kate Daniels books take place in a futuristic Atlanta suffering from an advanced state of urban decay. In this world, magic batters the earth in waves, eating technology. When tech is up, spells fail and magical constructs lose their power. When magic is up, cars cease functioning and planes fall from the sky. But every seven years the waves increase in intensity until they culminate in a magical tsunami called a flare. During flares, magic is so powerful that even gods can walk the earth. 

(Go read the review.)


Ahm…It is a good book and you should all go read it. 
meganbmoore: (oz-hikaru reading)
novels )

manga )

note: part of the reason for the brevity of a lot of that is that I'm TERRIBLE with names and don't feel like going "girl with glasses" or "other guy" "best friend" etc...which is why I usually do these posts at home so I can refer to the books, unless A) there's a good, easily navigatable guide for me to refer to or B) I've read enough of a series or it made enough of an impact for it to stand out for me above the rest.  Also, without the books, if it's any kind of series, events in past books tend to start blurring "what happened in which" for me.


meganbmoore: (Default)
novels )

manga )

note: part of the reason for the brevity of a lot of that is that I'm TERRIBLE with names and don't feel like going "girl with glasses" or "other guy" "best friend" etc...which is why I usually do these posts at home so I can refer to the books, unless A) there's a good, easily navigatable guide for me to refer to or B) I've read enough of a series or it made enough of an impact for it to stand out for me above the rest.  Also, without the books, if it's any kind of series, events in past books tend to start blurring "what happened in which" for me.


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meganbmoore

July 2020

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