Month: February 2013

Author Interviews – What Does the Reader Want To Know?

I always read the author bios at the end of every book I read.  Why?  To get some understanding into the person who wrote the book I just read, hoping to get some information that tells me how that author was able to pull that fiction out of themselves and put it on the page.  It’s the same reason I read authors blogs and interviews.  More insight into the author and the process of writing a story.

When I read a Sarah Black story, I know that she is as familiar as her characters with the locations in her stories.  And if she is writing about Marines, it’s because she knows them intimately.  It is the same with Abigail Roux.  She travels to the places her characters will visit so that it is authentic right down to the streets and bars located on them.  Amy Lane knits and look at the knowledge that brought to her Knitting series, but just maybe that side passion instigated that series to begin with.  The authors pour themselves into their stories, we know that.  But how do they do it?  Do the characters whisper in their ears, fully born or do they form slowly as character bits swirl into place, one at a time.  How is a location chosen and why?

But RJ Scott lives in England and she has a wonderful feeling for locations she has never traveled to. And Charlie Cochrane?  Well, needless to say, I don’t think she has promenaded down a street in 1900’s Cambridge lately but you would never know it from the Cambridge Fellows Mysteries series.  In those books, England in the 1900’s seems as fresh as present day.  So how do they do it?  Research obviously but in such a way that it feels real and true instead of a visit to a library.  Do they visit museums?  Bribe their way into the inventories so they can touch and feel the clothes and artifacts of the era they are writing about? Hmmm, Charlie Cochrane, do you have a hidden list of  museum back entrances and docents able to do your bidding? Hmmmmm……

Characterizations will either make or break a story.  You can be a marvelous world builder and create a new universe or world full of inventive and wonderous minituae.  But if it is then filled with one dimensional characters who all talk and act alike, then your story will lie lifeless on the floor. Characters are the heart and passion of any story, regardless of whether they are human, alien, or something totally different. And it’s the manner in which each author creates the people in their stories that fascinates me.  An upcoming author interview with Sarah Black will talk about her process in building her characters.  I am sure each author has their own methods to make their creations so believable that  we lose ourselves in their lives and stories.  I want to know how, how do they bring these beings to life with such force that I still think about them months, perhaps years later.

So, tell me what questions you would ask these or any authors if you had the chance.  Is it about world building or characters or both?  Do you want to know what a character reads or what bars they visit?  How doe they chose what they name their characters? Does it help define the person when you know what music they listen to?  I know it does for me.

So gather your thoughts and send me your questions.  I will add them to mine in time for the next author spotlight.  I am hoping you will be there when the next author spotlight rolls out.

Review: Losing Better (Superpowered Love #4) by Katey Hawthorne

Rating: 4.75 stars

Losing Better coverFBI  Special Agent Gabriel Genêt is back in Hooperstown, North Carolina, a place he couldn’t wait to escape in his youth.   Agent Genet has been charged with a very special mission, one he is uniquely suited for as one of the superpowered beings.  Gabriel Genet is back in his hometown to collect evidence that will lead to the arrest of Andrew Wynne, a vigilante superpowered being operating in Hooperstown. Gabriel knows the real reason he was chosen for this job is the special connection he had in the past with Andrew Wynne.

Ten years ago when both men were boys their parents were having an affair with each other and Gabriel’s Dad had dragged him down to the lake for a summer for an extended visit with Andrew’s mother.  Gabriel and Andrew spent their time avoiding their parents, ragging on each other and ultimately hooking up as well.  So when Andrew’s name comes up as a suspect in several FBI cases, Gabe is expected to use their past and any means possible to get the evidence the FBI needs to lock up Andrew for his crimes.

At first, Gabriel doesn’t expect any problems.  Get close, get the evidence and get out. But once back in Hooperstown, old memories start bubbling to the surface when Gabe reconnects with Andrew and their sexual attraction flares as hot as it did in the past.  And the longer the case takes, the deeper the affection and attraction between the two men grows until  Gabriel starts to doubt not only his ability to complete the job but his entire future as a FBI agent.  Who will win and who will lose or is it just possible for two superpowered men at opposite ends to find middle ground before its too late for both of them.

Losing Better is the fourth book in the Superpowered Love series and I think it is the best yet.   I love Riot Boy and wondered how Katey Hawthorne was ever going to be able to supplant that book in my heart and then she writes Losing Better, one white hot tale of love and lust between two emotionally messed up and diametrically opposed men. I also think that the characters the author created for Losing Better are the most complex, difficult, and yet thoroughly human (albeit with super powers) people we have seen from her.

I fiind Gabriel Genet to be a masterpiece actually.  When we first  meet Gabe, he comes across as a supremely confident individual, almost rigid in his  black/white view of the world, one in which he is always the winner.  Sarcastic, superior and goal oriented, that’s Gabe.  And as it is told from Gabe’s pov, even in his thoughts on everything from the town to Andrew, he telegraphs to the reader as something of a consummate jerk.  I kept trying to find something to like about Gabe at the beginning and failing miserably.  It didn’t help that Gabe’s quarry is Andrew Wynne, a gorgeous “sheep dog” of a young man, with his puppy eyes and ferocious need to please and be loved. In Andrew Wynne Hawthorne has given us such an endearing, accessible person that we emotionally leap to his defense from the start.  Even as the reader listens to Gabe plotting against  Andrew, we are outraged on Andrew’s behalf and Gabriel’s cruelty towards Andrew almost derails any attempt at affinity we start to muster. Opposite forces are at work at all facets of this story and nothing is as it seems on the surface. But when the cracks in Gabe’s emotional veneer start to appear, then our view of him starts to morph as well.  And soon it is hard to remember our antipathy towards the hard, focused man we first meet because everything has changed.

I love the structure and narrative of this story.  We dislike the protagonist who is telling the story and root for the appealing, vulnerable man of his past who only has the best interests of the town at heart, or so it appears.  Katey Hawthorne gives us two men whose past and family interactions have served to mold them into two diametrically opposed forces each confident that their path is the only correct path.  Even their super powers are uniquely qualified to short each other out.  Gabe controls electricity so of course it flows that Andrew’s gift is that of water and the currents between the two are supercharged on every level.

And then the true complexities starts to reveal themselves as the story and Gabe’s investigation progresses.  Each man carries within him the same pain filled dysfunction that stems from the same family dynamics but the truth behind what that past has done to them as they grew into men escapes in spurts throughout the narrative until it explodes into view at the end.  The author gives us a surface that she slowly distorts and cracks until the real story she wants to tell is exposed before us as are the real Gabe and Andrew.

Of course, Hawthorne throws in some wonderful side characters, including that of Kieran, a friend whose sexual good nature includes a whopping helping of both men whenever he is in town.  Trust me, even if a menage is not your thing, it is hard to not love Kiernan.  He really is a friend to both men and while he may play with them sexually, it really doesn’t factor into their relationship except at the beginning when Gabe uses him as an emotional buffer between himself and Andrew.  It’s realistic, understandable, and very hot!  Luckily, Kieran is getting his own story so we will be seeing him again.

But the heart of this story is the relationship between Gabriel and Andrew and how families and our past can define what we become as adults.  The end is electric, rewarding, complex, and of course, perfect.  Just like the men themselves.  And Losing Better gets better with the second reading as the some of the subtleties the author puts into play becomes more transparent the second time around.  I cannot recommend this book or series enough.  You don’t have to read them in the order they were written as they can act as stand alone novels but I enjoy the compiled history I get reading them as a series.

Here they are in the order they were written:

Equilibrium (Superpowered Love, #1)

Jealousy: A Love Story (Superpowered Love, #1.1)

Best Gift Ever (Superpowered Love, #1.2)

Riot Boy (Superpowered Love, #2)

Nobody’s Hero (Superpowered Love, #3)

Losing Better (Superpowered Love, #4)

Cover Artist: P. L. Nunn.  Another wonderful cover by P.L. Nunn for the series.

Available at Loose id, Amazon, and All Romance.

Review: Brothers In Arms (The Recon Diaries #1) by Kendall McKenna

Rating: 4.5 stars

Brothers In ARms coverMarine Staff Sergeant Jonah Carver is a legend among the soldiers stationed in  Afghanistan and for good reason.  Jonah Carver is the Marine ideals personified, his past missions now part of Corp mystique. So Jonah is the natural choice when a high security mission arrives in Diyala Firm base, Diyala Province, Iraq.  A high level personage needs Bravo company for transportation and protection against the insurgents.  When that person is targeted and killed, a new mission is planned to hunt down the assassins and uncover the agents behind the  plot against the American military.

And that brings Jonah’s past back with the arrival of Kellan Reynolds in the task force created to investigate the assassination.  Kellan Reynolds is Jonah’s former Captain in Afghanistan.  They had one night of hot, unbelievable sex before Kellan left the Marines to become an advisor to the President and Jonah returned to his troop. Now the same attraction and sexual tension is back as though it never left.  But the joint mission requires their full attention and the resumption of their relationship takes a back seat to the investigation.

When Kellan is kidnapped by the insurgents, their mission is thrown into disarray.  Jonah and his company must risk everything to get Kellan back, not only for the mission but for their future together as well.

After reading Strength of the Pack, I had to go out and see what else Kendall McKenna had written.  The book I found, Brothers In Arms,  did not disappoint the high expectations left by Strength of the Pack.  Shorter in length, this book contains the same memorable characters and vivid descriptions of the locales that I marveled at in the previous book.  Really, this author has so many strengths I don’t know where to start.

Characterizations.  Absolute perfection.  McKenna creates these wonderful Marines, gritty, human, vulnerable and brave.  She gives them dialog to speak so believable that I swear I could hear them in my dreams and puts them through events so authentic, so real that I expected to see them appear on the nightly news.  How’s that for great writing.  These men reek of sweat, and dust, and the smell of gun oil.  They are tired, the heat is sweltering, and the enemy is everywhere.  I truly felt as though I was in the middle of the platoon in Diyala Province.

The romance is equally suited to the men involved.  Don’t expect any flowers, that ain’t happening.  But the emotions, however internalized, are as real as the men involved.  I really appreciated that.  I loved that non verbal communication thing that happened between them.  They knew each other so well that at some point, speech became unnecessary until they had the luxury of time to spend with each other, and then the sex is incendiary.

Narrative and exposition are as amazing and detailed as her characterizations.  I felt as though I was embedded in the company and knew these men as intimately as their Sergeant did.  It was both a pleasure and pain to meet and understand these men and women because McKenna made their situations as authentic as their real life counterparts.  I will say no more.

Why not 5 stars?  Primarily due to the story length.  I wish it and the resolution had been longer, I certainly wanted more.  If you are looking for just romance or erotica, this might not be the book for you.  But if you are looking for meticulous writing, beautifully articulated characters and as real a setting as any I have read recently, then please get this book and be prepared to meet a couple you won’t soon forget.  Lucky for us a sequel is on its way.  I can’ t wait, Neither should you.

Cover Art by Jared Rackler. Just as superb as the story contained within.  Loved it.

Kendall McKenna. Brothers in Arms. MLR Press LLC.

Review: Feeling His Steel by Brynn Paulin

Rating: 3.5 stars

feelinghissteel_9781419945113_msr-106x175Professor Tobias Woods leads a very quiet, closeted life as a professor in a conservative private college in Grand Rapids, Michigan. But behind his reserved demeanor lies a confused man tormented by dreams of a past life and little knowledge of his own history prior to his adoption as a teenager in England.  Toby turns all his energies into his dissertation and helping catalog the medieval collection of a nearby museum.  Then a knight appears before him and everything he knows about himself is shattered as his past comes back with the promise of an old love renewed.

It is the year 1340, England and Sir Alwyn is about to die having lost everything he loved.  Cast out, disgraced and now hunted by knights like himself, Wyn is haunted by the fate of his love, Tobias at the hands of the town elders and knows he is next.  Their crime? Loving each other, even the church calls out for his death.  But an angel interferes and he is reunited with a man  who he knows to be his own Tobias.

But Toby is consumed with fear.  The man before him says they were lovers hundreds of years ago and old memories start to resurface.  But Toby’s fear increases as do his nightmares.  Is time travel possible?  Have they been given another chance?  It is up to Toby to conquer his fears or let their last chance for happiness slip away forever.

This was a first book I have read by Brynn Paulin and I found much to like about her plot and characters.  Paulin gives us a tale of lovers lost and reunited centuries later and combines it with tantalizing, sometimes horrific visions of past tortures for the crimes of sodomy.  Toby and Wyn are appearling characters, each with their own vulnerabilities and strengths.  Toby is especially somewhat frail emotionally, his past a total mystery as the only thing he can remember is being found by farmers in a field when he was a teenager.  We only get a small part of Sir Alwyn’s life in 1340 before he is transported to present day Michigan.

The story zips along at a quick pace but it is the tone that I found myself having problems with.  At some sections of her story, Paulin pulls up the drama and angst inherent in Wyn and Toby’s situation and makes us feel their uncertainty and pain over their current situation.  But just as you are losing yourself in the story, Paulin changes gear and a measure of almost slapdash humor that breaks up the momentum of the story and breaks the connection between the reader and the characters.  For example, the angel who continues to appear throughout the story is first seen as a glowing, figure of mercy.  She has a serious countenance and manner which fits in which her actions and the events that are happening. Then halfway through the story, the angel reappears and she starts channeling Cyndi Lauper:

” She rubbed her nails on her sleeve then looked at them. “I’m just that good. Have fun, kids, but wait ’til I leave. I’m supposed to be pure and stuff.” She pointed up. “The big guy gets irritated when I play outside the corral.” She made a square with her fingers. “But He’s all-loving and believes in all love, if you know what I mean. So cut out the ‘it’s a test’ theories, kid. You don’t want to get struck by lightning.”

Now we have gone through many, many  passages and now her character totally changes?  That unevenness in narrative is displayed throughout the story.  We get an awful but authentic scene ripped from the history pages and then Paulin presents us with a knight who has no problems with all the gadgets and societal changes of the modern era.  What no pulling of swords when he first sees an automobile? Or plane?  It’s as though the author can’t make up her mind whether this is a comedy with its tongue firmly in cheek or a fantastical tale of love through the ages so  she gives us both to the detriment of the story.

There were just enough elements for me to give this story a 3.5 rating.  Yes, there were parts where I sniffed, true.  And the specific torture used at that time for those committing sodomy is in the news right now as the bones of Richard III were recently dug up in a parking lot in England.  One of the facts revealed by his autopsy?  He suffered the same fate as King Edward, although for Richard it was a knife and not a hot poker that was used.  I also appreciated the emotional growth that Toby had to achieve in order for them to have their HEA, another lovely touch.  But such nice facets of this story are weighed down by misplaced odd humor and just jarring bits of narrative that stop the flow of the story enough that it makes it hard to recapture the emotions the author just pulled out of you moments before.

So I will be on the lookout for more stories by this author because of the promise I see within this one.  Should you read it?  Sure, it’s flawed but entertaining.  But don’t set the bar of your expectations too high, it will be easier to appreciate the fine points of the story and two lovely characters who I think deserved a better fate.

Cover design by Dar Albert.

Book released by Ellora’s Cave on February 13th.

Review: Lessons In Seduction (Cambridge Fellows #6) by Charlie Cochrane

Rating: 4.25 stars

Lessons In Seduction cover1907 England.  Lady Jennifer Johnson, former mistress to the King of England, had been found dead in a fashionable hotel and already the whispers have started as to the cause of death.  The King wants answers and who better to investigate than the increasingly famous sleuths, Drs. Coppersmith and Stewart.  The need to proceed with utmost care for protocol and subtlety, Jonty and Orlando decide that some  undercover work is  required.  The hotel where Lady Johnson died has a group of professional dancers on call to dance with the hotel’s guests and give dance lessons. Given Jonty’s famous family and his easy access to many of the people they will need to question, it is decided that Orlando will go undercover as a dance partner, while Jonty and his father check into the hotel under their real names to pursue the investigation with assistance from the local constabulary.

The clues as to her death are hard to find, and as the investigation drags on, Jonty and Orlando are finding it hard to be apart.  But then anonymous letters are slipped under Jonty’s door, warning them away from the case or suffer the consequences.  When a second body is found, Jonty and Orlando must face the idea that their investigation has caused a second murder and hasten to find the person responsible before more people die and their relationship exposed.

With Lessons in Seduction,  Cochrane gives our boys from Cambridge a little bit of a breather from the angst of the last book.  Here she sets them down with a puzzling mystery to solve – the case of the King’s mistress, or one of them at least.  The Lady Jennfier Johnson was an agreeable, lovely woman, far different from his other more well known mistress Lily Langtry *, and the King was very fond of her as is mostly everyone Jonty and Orlando talk to.  I love all the little minutiae Charlie  Cochrane adds to her stories. It’s that additional bit of depth and layering that brings the era her stories vividly to life.  We see society going about its business at every level, from dowager duchess to paid companion and it is just a delight to be able to settle down and watch Jonty and Orlando prove their mettle as sleuths even as we eavesdrop in on their relationship.

Charlie Cochrane’s dialog is just amazing.  It flows so naturally from character to character, rippling from frothy conversations to confessions of the heart with such ease that it is just astounding.  Sometimes as Jonty and Orlando banter back and forth, I hear the echoes of The Thin Man most lighthearted couple, Nick and Nora Charles (yes, yes, I know, different eras).  The conversation is witty, lighthearted, downright frivolous and yet still the love and affection each man feels for the other is inescapable.

Here is an example:

He turned Orlando’s face towards his own. “This face, the Jonty Stewart fizzog, it’s a case of once seen never forgotten, isn’t it?

Orlando looked at his lover’s fine profile as if seeing it for the first time. The bright blue eyes were as stunning and unnerving as when they’d first met, the nose perfectly formed and the mouth full of promise. He snorted. “It’s a face getting too big for its own flannel if you ask me.”

It’s all captured in just a few sentences.  The terminology gives us the era and the words each man speaks tells us volumes about their relationship.  We can tell how easy they are with each other, their affection and love flowing out even as Orlando covers his emotions behind a small cut.  You know Jonty never believes it for a minute nor does Orlando expect him to.  Just lovely pin-sized portrait of their relationship and Charlie Cochrane makes it look so easy to achieve. Trust me, its not.

it’s not just colloquialisms and historical facts that make a story sing, its their mixture along with characterizations of people who seem as large as life.  That is here as well.  Miss Peters from St. Bride’s is back and her story moves forward in a startling manner I was not expecting but it is the people you meet during the investigation that stick with you as well, with their human dramas that capture you attention as much as the main mystery does.  I loved the character of Mrs. Coppersmith, Orlando’s grandmother and her revelations about Orlando’s family that explain so much about the character.  Much like the rest of this story, the revelations come gently as with the tide, rolling out over the course of an evening.

As I said earlier, the author gives Jonty and Orlando a break from any major angst producing events such as occurred in the last story.  Think of this mystery as certainly more of the relaxed armchair variety.  Even with the reported deaths, it plays out almost gently, lacking the high drama points of previous cases.  It’s as though Cochrane decided her boys needed a breather and gave them one.  Enjoy this book for what it is, a lovely mid level case and mini vacation for our Cambridge dons.  We visit a lovely vacation spot, see Orlando glide about a ballroom exquisitely clothed, while Jonty fumes and his father enjoys the picture.  It’s a wonderful moment before they return to Hyacinth Cottage and more heart wrenching times to come.

I love this series and have certainly dragged my feet as the end of the series got closer.  That’s my only excuse for not finishing this series in 2012. I just didn’t want it to end.  We have 3 more books to go.  Start piling away the tissues now for perilous times are almost upon Jonty and Orlando. Next up is Lessons in Trust (Cambridge Fellows Mysteries #7).  Stay with me and let’s finish this up together.  If this is your first introduction to our couple, go back to the beginning and see how it all starts.  You won’t be sorry either way.  Jonty and Orlando are a couple to be reckoned with, so it their creator.  I can’t wait to see what she has in store for us all next.

*Lillie Langtry, usually spelled Lily Langtry when she was in the U.S

Here are the books in the series in the order they were written and should be read:

Lessons in Love, Cambridge Fellows #1 my review here.

Lessons in Desire, Cambridge Fellows #2 – read my review here

Lessons in Discovery, Cambridge Fellows #3 – read my review here

Lessons in Power, Cambridge Fellows #4 – read my review here

Lessons in Temptation, Cambridge Fellows #5

Lessons in Seduction, Cambridge Fellows #6

Lessons in Trust, Cambridge Fellows #7 – review coming

All Lessons Learned, Cambridge Fellows #8 – review coming

Lessons for Survivors, Cambridge Fellows #9 (book released from Cheyenne Publishing)

Cover:  Lovely cover by Scott Carpenter, works perfectly for the book and the series.

Dreaming of Spring while Singing the Flues Blues and the Week Ahead in Reviews

Maryland seems to have dodged another major “storm of the century” that is still leaving its impact on New England and the NE corridor from Philly to Maine is coated with the white stuff.  While those unfortunate fellows are digging out from under several feet of snow, we had to deal with wind and rain and little else.

Unless you count the flu.   Yes, that’s right, the flu. Or maybe you have the norovirus, that’s going around too.  Either way, like myself, you are probably feeling less than stellar.  I did gather all the right stuff around me as the symptoms hit. Hot tea? Check.  Loads of tissue? Check.  Blankets to huddle under?  Check. Every over the counter cold drug you could buy? Check. Reading material and knitting projects? Check.  So what is missing?  My ability to focus and stay awake.  I have no energy.  Sigh.  So while I have a schedule for this week, it might be touch and go to stay by it.  Let’s see what happens in between doctors appointments, shall we?

Here are the reviews planned:

Monday, Feb. 11:              Lessons in Seduction by Charlie Cochrane

Tuesday, Feb. 12:             Feeling His Steel by Brynn Paulin

Wed,, Feb. 13:                   Brothers in Arms by Kendall McKenna

Thurs., Feb. 14:                 Superpowered Love: Losing Better by Katey Hawthorne

Friday, Feb. 15:                 The God Hunters by Mark Reed

Saturday, Feb. 16:             Reader Questions.  If you could talk to an author, what would you ask them?

Meanwhile here is a vid making the rounds that cheered me up.  Love the reaction of the older sister.  These kids rock.

Review: Wesley (Leopard Spots #8) by Bailey Bradford

Rating: 4.25  stars

Wesley Leopard SpotsWhen Wes Ward’s older brother Sully left home for college, Wes felt like he had lost the only friend he ever had.  Painfully shy as a child, Wes depended upon Sully for everything and Wes was unable to fill the void Sully left behind him.  Then Sully found his mate and forgot about his little brother completely.  In pain and full of bitterness, Wes turned to drugs and alcohol and his addiction almost cost him his leopard spirit.  When his parents catch him using, they send him to San Antonio and to Sully who lives there with his mate Bobby and Wes must confront his true feelings and see if he can heal the bitterness within.

It’s been two years since the vicious sexual assault Armando suffered in the club owned by Bobby and the wounds have not healed.  Armando now works at a Center for Homeless GLBT youth, helping others who were thrown out of their home like he was.  The center is his life as he cannot bear to even think about dating or getting close to another man since his rape.  Then Armando sees Wes when Wes starts to volunteer at the shelter.  Wes is almost a twin to Sully in their looks and his presence brings conflicting emotions to the surface in Wes.  Wes has hated Bobby and Sully for two years and seeing Wes makes all those memories Armando has tried to bury come out.  Equally shocking, he also finds himself attracted to Wes, an attraction Wes returns.

Both men have problems in their past they must face before either can go forward with their lives.  Wes is sure he has found his mate in Armando but can Armando put aside his hatred for Wes’ brother to see Wes for himself or will Wes be an way to revenge himself on Sully and Bobby.

This is one of the most tightly knit and well written books of the series.  Bradford’s focus is two badly damaged people and she treats both the characters and their issues with sensitivity and care.  Wes and Armando are also two of the best characters Bradford has written in a while, each having more depth and dimension than those in the past book, namely Sully and Bobby, who return here.  Wes is facing issues rare in shifters, that of drug and alcohol addiction.  Normally, shifters can’t get drunk or stoned due to their metabolism but Wes learned that certain combinations and amounts of drugs will see him either intoxicated or high.  With Wes, she paints a portrait of a young man whose poor self esteem and debilitating shyness make Wes unable to cope once his support in Sully is removed.

Given the treatment of Armando in the last book (Sullivan), I was unsure what would happen to him here but Bradford handled Armando and the trauma of his sexual assault with sensitivity and realism too.  Armando is stuck in the past, unable to go forward with his recovery for many reasons but one of the strongest is that he cannot be truthful with his therapist as to the exact nature of the assault as the predator was a shifter. So we find him two years later still having nightmares and suffering flashbacks.  He has purposely gained weight to appear unattractive and wears loose clothes, all authentic markers of abuse.  Normally Bradford fills her books with pages of mate induced sex which includes biting, claws and bloodletting.  Thankfully, most of that has been left out of a book dealing with two traumatized souls and she treats their slow path to a sexual relationship with thoughtfulness and tact.

In fact, I find this is the best book of the series if you can discount the lack of any continuing threads the previous books have established.  I think that had a little more of the themes of the series been included, this would have gotten a much higher rating.  It seems as though we are heading away from the Leopard element and more towards the wolf pack with the next in the series which I find a little disappointing as the Snow/Amur Leopard theme seemed to be  central to the series.  But if Wesley is any indication of the future of this series, than it is very bright indeed.  I can only hope for more like this one to come next.

Cover art by Posh Gosh who has done a fantastic job with the series with rich covers that are treats for the eyes.

Here is the Leopard Spots series in the order they were written and should be read (mostly):

Levi (Leopards Spots #1)

Oscar (Leopards Spots #2) read my review here.

Timothy (Leopards Spots #3) read my review here

Isaiah (Leopards Spots #4) read my review here

Gilbert (Leopards Spots #5) read my review here

Esau (Leopards Spots #6)

Sullivan (Leopards Spots #7)

Wesley (Leopards Spots #8)

Review: Something New Under The Sun (Falling Sky #2) by L.A. Witt

Rating: 5 stars

Something New Under The SunLiam  Lansing is a genetically modified vampire who makes his living as a contract killer but once lived as a favored scion in his wealthy family’s compound in The Sky.  Daniel Harding, heir to  Cybernetix, hated the modifications his father’s corporation built and loved one person, Liam.  Their relationship cost Liam everything as his family disowned him for loving Harding and cast him into The Gutter.  Daniel remained behind working surreptiously to bring his father down, imprisoned in an ivory tower and thinking his former lover was dead.

Former lovers and antagonists, Liam Lansing and Daniel Harding have been reunited and resumed their relationship under the most traumatic events.  Daniel’s father, head of Cybernetix a modification empire, hired Liam to kill his son but had  laid a trap for Liam as well. But the father’s plans backfired when the men united to escape into The Gutter where they schemed to destroy Daniel’s father and his corporation along with him.  But there are more things at stake than Liam is aware of.  Hidden secrets hold the key to the destruction of their plans and the future of their relationship. Can Liam and Daniel put aside the past to maneuver through the obstacles looming before them?  Or will the forces combining against them bring them down once and for all?

Something New Under The Sun picks up right after the events in A Chip In His Shoulder.  I loved reading one book right after the other and felt that it maximized my enjoyment of this intense, suspenseful series. Not necessary but it satisfied my impatience to more forward after the events that occurred in the first book.  Over twice as long, this second book achieves everything L.A. Witt set out to accomplish with her first story.  We are back in The Gutter, that distempered landscape of grimy factories and downtrodden workers, the unholy existing along side the broken. It is a hellish place that L.A. Witt brings to life and where we meet up with Liam and Daniel once more.

In a neat twist, the pov switches from Daniel Harding to Liam Lansing at the beginning of the story and more of Liam’s back history is revealed to the readers. Witt outlines enough of her previous book that any reader fresh to the series is not totally confused by the events of this story.  From the beginning, the author starts to build the suspense and reader anticipation as we watch Liam and David weave together their plans for retribution and the destruction of Cybernetix.  As they cobble together the plans and equipment, more of The Gutter and its inhabitants are revealed.  We traverse the filty, narrow alleys and meet up with Gizmo, a modifications wizard who has been helping Liam, for a price of course, with his own “enhancements”.  Gizmo is quite a wonderful character and I could see him so clearly in my mind, from his dialog to his physical form.  Gizmo made such an impact on me that I hope to see more of him in the coming installments.

And this brings me back to the marvelous characters that L.A. Witt creates for her stories.  Daniel and Liam, larger than life in the first story, have been given additional depth and dimension here in the second.  We learn more about what drove Daniel to take the actions that set in motion Liam’s fall from grace and his own isolation.  And even more of Liam’s past seeps out to tease the reader further about those first years of survival in The Gutter.  I cannot help but think that more will be forthcoming in future stories to flesh this out this part of Liam’s past.  Even though we still have gray areas with respect to their backgrounds, these are beautifully realized people, flawed and determined to regain what was once theirs.  I loved them more as I discovered the basis for the hurt and pain their past has cost them.

The author, after establishing characters that grasp at our hearts and minds, proceeds to set the reader on a thriller of a ride when Daniel and Liam actually set their plans in motion.  Quickly upping the suspense and anxiety we feel for our heros, Witt moves the action along at a fast pace as they set out for The Sky and the Cybernetix building.  Really, the events escalate so rapidly that it is breathtaking.  We barely get through one nasty surprise, then another is quickly upon us. And neither the reader and the two men we have come to care are allowed a moments rest.  This is a A Ticket white knuckle ride and I loved every hair raising minute of it.

The dystopian society L.A.Witt has created for her Falling Sky series is a vividly realized world populated with people I cannot get enough of.  The ending came a little too soon and perhaps too easily for me but I am greedy like that.  I would have wished for a more drawn out resolution to Liam’s family issues.  Perhaps that is coming in the next books in the series and I still want to hear more of Gizmo, he deserves his own story within this remarkable framework.

After finishing this book, I immediately wanted more, a testament to the author’s power to create a world easy to escape into and dwell for a while.  I absolutely recommend Something New Under The Sun.  Buy it and settle down for a wild ride of action, adventure and romance as lovers reunite in the Gutter and aim high for The Sky.

Cover art by LC Chase is lovely with its easy to read titles and dark towers behind the model.  Again I only wished that there had been a way to put some of the physical modifications on the model that are so important to the plot.

Books in the Falling Sky series:

A Chip In His Shoulder (Falling Sky #1)

Something New Under The Sun (Falling Sky#2)