Category: Fantasy

An Alisa Audiobook Review: The Necromancer’s Dance (The Beacon Hill Sorcerer #1) by S.J. Himes and Joel Leslie (Narrator)

Rating: 3.5 out of  5 stars
In a world where magic is real and evil walks amongst humanity, a young sorcerer is beset upon by enemies, both old and new. Angelus Salvatore is the only necromancer in all of Boston, and his name is whispered warily by the undead and fellow sorcerers alike. He and his brother Isaac are the lone survivors of an attack by an army of the undead, in which Angel used a spell so powerful it forever marked his place in history. Now, years later, Angel struggles to balance his career as a teacher of the higher magical arts, his role as big brother, and a tenuous relationship with an Elder vampire from the local clan. When his brother’s boyfriend is used as a pawn in a mysterious plot to draw Angel out, Angel is once again pulled back into the old hostilities that fueled the Blood Wars and led to his family’s death.

Leaning on others for help is something Angel cannot do, and while he searches for clues into who may be targeting him and his brother, Angel finds his heart steadily growing occupied with Simeon, Elder and vampire. Dealing with death magic and vampires on a daily basis may leave Angel jaded when it comes to life and staying that way, but the more time he spends fending off the ancient vampire’s attention and affections, the more he realizes he wants to give in.

Can Angel find out who wants him dead, and keep his heart safe in the process? How can he fall for a vampire, when his whole family was torn apart by an army of the undead?

Death stalks the streets of Boston’s historic Beacon Hill….and there is no one more suited to battle against death than a necromancer.
This was a new author for me and I was pleased with this.  It is a urban fantasy type story with an interesting world.  I felt the author did a nice job setting the stage of this world without overwhelming the reader with too many details.  The story revolves around someone trying to kill Angel and his search for who the bad guy is.  A portion of the story is about the romance between Angel and Simeon, one of the local vampire leaders.
At first the romance seemed a bit abrupt because while they’d known each other for a few years prior to the start of the story.  It almost felt like the romance just happens out of the blue.  As the story goes on we’re given an explanation as to why that happened the way it did.  That is probably my only complaint with the story.  I would have liked to have seen the romance build and grow on page, not just be told about their prior feelings.
The overall plot was fast paced and entertaining and I enjoyed all the various supernaturals that we saw.  I liked both of the MC’s and Angel in particular was entertaining for me.  I love grumpy MC’s that are totally opposed to falling in love but do so anyways.  Angel was especially grumpy which made the tender scenes even more touching. I was happy for them in the end when they got their hea.  
This audiobook was narrated by Joel Leslie and I felt he did a very good job.  He did a Boston accent (where the story was set) for Angel and an Irish one for Simeon.  Both were distinct and I always knew who was talking.  There were a number of side characters in this story and they were all also done quite well.  
Overall I enjoyed this story.  I felt it was a solid start for a new paranormal series and as soon as I finished this one I downloaded book two.  I thought the narration was well done, also making this a good audiobook option.
The cover was done by Book Cover by Design.  I liked this and felt it was a good representation of the story.  My only thought is that it’s very dark and you have to really look at it to take in all the details.  
Sales Links
Audiobook Details:
Listening Length: 8 hours and 8 minutes
Audible Audio, 9 pages
Published March 21st 2017 by SJ Himes (first published February 25th 2016)
ASINB06XPNZSWS
Edition LanguageEnglish
SeriesThe Beacon Hill Sorcerer #1

A MelanieM Review: Wytch & Prinze by Kassandra Lea

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

Medium Jacob Wytch lives in the forest with his fluffy dog Gruff and his ghostly fairy godmother Amelie. When he gets a call from his friend Renwick Prinze, he panics. Jacob has been pining for Renwick longer than he cares to admit. Instead of admitting, however, he listens to Amelie and begins to sabotage Renwick’s beds in hopes of inviting his dashing friend to sleep with him.

Wytch & Prinze by Kassandra Lea is a retelling of the Princess and the Pea fairytale turned M/M romance and it’s a fun one. Successful medium Jacob Wytch and his dog Gruff live alone in the forest, an outcast in town due to the nature of his gifts and his name which is of no comfort at all to his superstitious townspeople.  His best friend, living that is?  Renwick, a chef gaining favor and success, due in part to Jacob’s help.  But there’s more to it, Jacob’s fallen in love with Renwick but is too scared to change the status quo of their current friends relationship.

In a cute turn, Lea has his fairy godmother be a ghost, Amelie, a young girl killed during a fire at a Rave.  I really loved the character of Amelie.  She’s quirky, determined and I honestly wanted to know so much more about her.  I could actually see an entire series built around Amelie and the people she decided to help.

Which brings me the reason why a story I found so charming wasn’t rated higher.  I loved the premise, the setting, the dog, and absolutely adored Amelie.  Jacob Wytch, who was a wreck when we meet him, I liked him too.  Not adored, liked.  Ditto Renwick.  I wish I had more of a feeling of them together, their friendship prior and who they really were as people.  As characters, the author didn’t give me enough of a connection to them as I would have liked to have had.

There are some missed opportunities to do just that here.  The author brings the characters together, but the readers only get a few scenes (not talking of sex but connectivity) to see any chemistry.  Instead it’s more conversations with Amelie or internal arguments with themselves, which would work if the story itself had been much longer.  Which it isn’t.

Those are the places where I feel the author missed the mark.  Overall, the story is a sweet, cute, romantic fairy tale.  I enjoyed it and wish the author would revisit the characters and universe again to give us an update on them and of course, Amelie!

Cover artist Natasha Snow: Cover art tells us immediately we’re in fairy-tale land.  I liked it.

Sales Links

Less Than Three Press LLC

Book Details:

ebook, 10,000 words, 20 pages plus
Published April 19th 2017 by Less Than Three Press
ISBN139781620049969
Edition LanguageEnglish

A Caryn Review: Goodnight My Angel (Angel Enterprises #2) by Sue Brown

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

AAUGHHH!!  CLIFFHANGER!!!!

OK, I always know that’s a possibility when reading a series, but really???  Ms. Brown, did you really hold out on the bad guy reveal at THE VERY LAST MOMENT???

OK, rant over!  It has been 6 months since I read book one, Morning My Angel, and since I was so careful in my review of that book not to give any spoilers, I had to go back and reread it instead of just reading the blurb or my review.  Why?  Because this book jumped right into the problems between Josh Cooper – now working for the Agency instead of CDR – and Callum Ross – now working for CDR instead of the Agency.  Eh, all these spooks and their bosses were running together in my mind anyway, so I just let that one go.  In this series, it really seems to be a very incestuous group.  I thought at the end of book one that Josh and Callum were together, but apparently I was a bit premature – they kept their relationship mainly in the cyber arena for 6 months between books one and two, and in this one they are almost starting over.

OK, so I really didn’t get the purpose of that, but maybe I’ll figure out why that was important in the next book.  Really, the entire first chapter was a bit of a question mark for me, I am still not sure how it related to the overall plot, but I have a feeling the relevance of that bit of story will become clear in the next book.

Anyway, this time Callum has decided that he is absolutely going to be with Josh, one way or another, so he leaves Seattle to move to London, where Josh is currently working a variety of cases for the Agency, and as usual, loving his work.  Moving their relationship into the day to day world isn’t easy for these two alpha males who live for the job, and a lot of the tension comes from the two of them learning how to prioritize differently now that they are a couple, and learning to be more open and honest with each other.  When your career is keeping secrets as an undercover operative, it’s hard to change.  Making it harder is the fact that employees of the Agency, and their family members, are being murdered left and right, seemingly at random, so Josh and Callum once again team up to discover who the bad guy is and stop him.  All of the characters from book one are back, as well as the enigmatic “She” who runs the Agency.  Secrets continue to abound, and like their previous case, no one is willing to show all their cards, even to the investigators.  (I figured out who the bad guy was before Josh and Callum did, but the secret identity was NOT revealed, and I’m not sure about that yet, though I have my theories).

The action wasn’t as fast paced as it was in book one, because there was as much focus on the relationship between Josh and Callum as there was on the case, and those portions of the book were slower.  The focus also shifted from Josh to Callum as the main protagonist.  Callum may be more complicated, but I personally found Josh more interesting (and certainly more fun).  Josh’ personality was a little different in this book – maybe because it’s a different point of view, maybe because he is finally maturing – and I missed the old Josh.

I will definitely read the next in the series, despite the cliffhanger ending.  I still want to unravel all the threads that are connecting these two outfits, and I want to see Josh and Callum grow as a couple now that they’ve committed.  I will just have to have faith that all of the loose ends will be connected, and all of the mysteries revealed, and that all the secondary characters I’ve come to like will still be alive.

The cover art by Meredith Russell is similar to that of book one, but the model is much closer to how I imagined Callum.  Still not a cover that grips me though.

Sales Links

Amazon US: http://amzn.to/2npoGT3

Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/2ohyCCg

Book Details:

Kindle Edition, 249 pages
Published March 30th 2017 by Sue Brown’s Stories
ASIN B06XY7X2G2
Edition Language English
Series Angel Enterprises #2

Fierce by Rob Rosen 2 week blog tour

Fierce Banner

Title: Fierce
Author: Rob Rosen
Release Date: March 25th 2017
Genre: MM Romance, Comedy

34441697

BLURB

Lucas has a typical life — apart from being abandoned as a baby, raised by wolves, and having super powers. Still, inside, he feels like two people, both vying for control of himself. He’s a superhero and a nerdy college freshman. He’s both feral and tame. He wants to do good in the world and, at the same time, he wants to do nothing. And most of all, he wants to find his birth parents.

In this comedic tale of romance, mystery, and adventure, our hero is joined by his hunky boyfriend, his acerbic boss, an uptight college science professor, and his ex-boyfriend/once crime-fighting partner — not to mention a whole pack of wolves — to help foil his nemesis and uncover the secrets of his past to save his future.

Find Fierce on Goodreads

Purchase: Amazon US | Amazon UK | JMS Books | iBooks

EXCERPT

As a baby, I was raised by wolves in the mountainous wilds of Montana.

I have super powers. Like, seriously super.

I catch bad guys for a living. For free! Minus, of course, the well-merited and desperately sought-after publicity.

But, you ask, raised by wolves? Come on now, Fierce, really? Does that actually happen? Wolves eat babies, don’t they? I mean dingoes do— or so I’ve heard, a la one Miss Meryl Streep— so it stands to reason that wolves do, too. Though not these wolves. These were tame wolves. Well, tameish. They were zoo wolves, hand-raised by humans. Except, they escaped during a freak storm, back to the wilds from whence their ancestors came, never to be seen again.

I saw them right off the bat, though. Well, sawish. I mean, I was a baby at the time, my eyesight not what it is today— which is freakishly strong, by the way. And yes, toot, toot, my horn doth bloweth, yet again. Gabriel in the heavens up above turns green with envy at my tooting abilities. Oh, and in case you hadn’t already surmised it, superhero, at least in my case, equates to super ego. Freud missed out big time on the likes of yours truly.

But I digress. Back to the wolves.

Best I could figure it— seeing as, again, I was just a baby at the time— the initial wolf pack consisted of ten wolves that once inhabited a small zoo on the outskirts of Billings, Montana. One fateful day, a tornado hit. A big one. Huge even! Dorothy would’ve shit her panties it was so friggin’ massive. Anyway, from what I’ve read, the storm struck quite suddenly, too suddenly for the folks at the zoo to be able to corral all the animals beforehand, so, when the fencing to the wolves’ enclosure twisted and uprooted, out they sped. The zoo figured they died in the storm, except, well, duh, they didn’t. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be hearing this account right now, right? Then help! would’ve been lost to the cosmos. A truly sad thought, I know.

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About the Author

Rob profile

Rob Rosen is the author of the critically acclaimed novels, Sparkle: The Queerest Book You’ll Ever Love, the Lambda Literary Award Nominated Divas Las Vegas, which was the winner of the 2010 TLA Gaybies for Best Gay Fiction, Hot Lava, Southern Fried, the Lambda Literary Award Nominated Queerwolf, Vamp, Queens of the Apocalypse, Creature Comfort, Fate, which was the winner of the 2016 TRR Readers’ Choice Award for Best Gay Romantic Comedy as well as a 2016 Rainbow Awards Finalist for Best Gay Romantic Comedy, Midlife Crisis, and Fierce. His short stories have appeared in more than 200 anthologies. You can find 20 of them in his erotic romance anthology, Good & Hot. He is also the editor of Lust in Time: Erotic Romance Through the Ages, Men of the Manor, Best Gay Erotica 2015 and Best Gay Erotica of the Year, Volumes 1 and 2 and 3.

Links: Website | Facebook | Goodreads | Amazon

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A MelanieM Recent Release Review: Fierce by Rob Rosen

Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5

Lucas has a typical life — apart from being abandoned as a baby, raised by wolves, and having super powers. Still, inside, he feels like two people, both vying for control of himself. He’s a superhero and a nerdy college freshman. He’s both feral and tame. He wants to do good in the world and, at the same time, he wants to do nothing. And most of all, he wants to find his birth parents.

In this comedic tale of romance, mystery, and adventure, our hero is joined by his hunky boyfriend, his acerbic boss, an uptight college science professor, and his ex-boyfriend/once crime-fighting partner — not to mention a whole pack of wolves — to help foil his nemesis and uncover the secrets of his past to save his future.

I absolutely love Rob Rosen’s humor. I doesn’t matter whether he’s writing about teenage superheroes or drag queens fighting zombies or anything in between, he always manages to make me laugh out loud while throwing in a genuine sniffle or two.  Its that ability to mix pathos with laughter that I’ve always found to be a hallmark of his and it works once more here in Fierce.

Of course, I loved that he opened with famous (and favorite ones of mine) first lines and then had his main character say he topped them all his his simple one of “Help”. From there the reader sets off on a wild adventure with a superhero teenager with typical snarky, ego centric characteristics combined with the abilities of a superbeing who’s in the middle of a mystery and doesn’t really know who to trust….yes, it’s a wild and bumpy for for us all.

But while we also have superheroes who were raised by wolves, as with Rob Rosen’s other stories, he always manages to make sure we are able to connect with the flawed, humans trying to reach whatever goals they have set, finding out who their parents are or finding love and keeping love in a zombie apocalypse.  He remembers to bring parts of his narrative down to an emotional level the reader can connect with while continuing to rampage through his comedic way in other threads.    Plus here there’s suspense over the evil villain and so many lovely twists and turns that my attention never wavered.

If you love teenage superheroes and a story full of humor, suspense and a touch of mystery and maybe something a little bit more, grab up Fierce and see what some Fierce in your life can do for you.

Cover art by Rob Rosen is adorable and eye catching.

Sales Links:

Book Details:

ebook, 225 pages
Published March 25th 2017 by JMS Books LLC admin@jms-books.com
ISBN139781634863599
Edition LanguageEnglish