Category: Less Than Three Press

A MelanieM Review: Dragon Dilemma (Supernatural Consultant #3) by Mell Eight

Rating: 4.25 stars out of 5

dragon-dilemma-by-mell-eightDane doesn’t get along with his parents. He hasn’t spoken with his mother in years and he’s never met his father. Somehow his mother finds out about Mercury and the kits anyway, and it’s difficult to throw one’s mother out when she happens to be a powerful, dangerous witch.

She isn’t the only uninvited guest either, and these ones are even less likely to take no for an answer—and much more likely to leave everyone dead if they don’t get what they want.

Mell Eight’s Dragon family and its growing pains and mysteries is back in Dragon Dilemma, the third  in the Supernatural Consultant series.  Half god/half..well we aren’t exactly sure Dane (Dragon Consultant), his spouse Mercury, an investigative agent and their adopted group of dragon kits have had another  year of relative peace but that comes to an end when a letter from  Dane’s mother arrives, the powerful Isle Crone.  She’s come to make the acquaintance of her “grand kids” and her son in law and Dane is filled with trepidation.

But also arriving fast behind her is another mystery, one that will be another thread in the long running underplot, that of who has been kidnapping and experimenting on dragons and their kits?

I have always loved how Mell Eight has contrasted the family element here with the horrific scientific experimental one.  One light-hearted and full of love, the other dark and full of nightmares.  In Dragon Dilemma, the story is more heavily family oriented and I’m just fine with that.  I love the family dynamics here.  The children’s powers and personalities continue to grow and manifest themselves in various ways, whether its through daily chores or confronting evil at its worst.  So does  Dane’ and Mercury’s happy partnership/marriage.  It strengthens, surviving even the appearance of Dane’s imperious and powerful mother.

With each new story, the author adds to her world building, the circle of associates and friends that surround Dane, Mercury and their kits, and the bigger mystery of the evil behind the abduction and experimentation on the dragon children.  Eight both satisfies our needs to rediscover and enjoy meeting this family again but prods us towards the next in the series with a curiosity born a little out of fear for some of our favorite characters.  Its a perfect balancing act and one she accomplishes in a fairly  quick read.

Love dragons? Wizards, magic, and a big old mystery, romance and more?  Grab up the Supernatural Consultant series by Mell Eight.  Start at the beginning and work your way through.  I’m on my way to book four, Dragon Detective (Supernatural Consultant #4).  Watch for that review shortly. I highly recommend them all.

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Cover  art by Alisha Akeju has elements from the story on it and matches with the others from the series.

Sales Links

Less Than Three Press

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Book Details:

ebook, 88 pages
Published June 1st 2016 by Less Than Three Press

A MelanieM Review: Wriggle & Sparkle by Megan Derr

Rating: 4.25 stars out of 5

wriggle-and-sparkleLynn is a kraken shifter in every way: detailed, tenacious, resilient, and hard-working. Also possessive, vain, arrogant, and demanding. It makes him an excellent agent for the Federal Bureau of Paranormal Security and Investigation—and impossible to work with, as the long list of partners who have transferred away from him will attest.

His newest partner is a unicorn, possibly the worst type of paranormal for work that often turns ugly and violent. Everyone knows unicorns are too delicate for such things. Then Anderson proves to be a unicorn like no other, the kind of partner Lynn has always wanted—the kind of partner he wishes was more. But if there’s one thing he’s learned, it’s that the only thing harder to keep than a partner is a lover.

Warning: Contains tentacle porn

I’ve read many different types of stories from Megan Derr but never a love story between a unicorn and a kraken. So Wriggle & Sparkle was a definite first.  But as expected Megan Derr delivers not only a wonderful offbeat romance but several unusual cases for these partners at the Federal Bureau of Paranormal Security and Investigation to solve.

Its all about the Wriggle and the Sparkle, as in Lynn the kraken and Anderson the unicorn.  Neither will fit your idea of what a typical kraken or unicorn should be,  In fact they don’t fit most of the paranormal world’s idea either.  Lynn is a gender shifter, sharp dressing, detail oriented crack detective…who can’t keep a partner for longer than a flick of a tentacle.  His newest matchup?  Anderson…a slutty, sparkly unicorn who goes against what most unicorns (and the paranormal world) think unicorns should be.  He’s also snarky, intelligent, and appreciates the finer points of the kraken in front of him.  Things start to spark and sizzle immediately between the two, but peculiar cases both pull them together while pushing them emotionally apart.

This is a collection of cases so it doesn’t always flow as naturally as I wanted it too from chapter to chapter but as I have a tendency to like that format it didn’t bother me as it might others.

I loved the natural history that Derr created for her kraken species.  Its fascinating and Lynn comes with a sibling who has an important role in his life and in this story. The fluidity and naturalness which with Derr folds her background and world building works so well here that I found myself believing in her krakens and unicorns wholeheartedly.  Even down to the tentacle sex.

This is not my first story with tentacle sex.  The way Derr handles it feels exactly right to the species involved and the body type they are in at the moment.  Yes, these are shapechangers with all that entails.  I have to admit most of the time with such disparate species I tend to roll my eyes a bit.  Not here.  Derr more than makes her case for interspecies love and then seals it with a resounding “hell yes”.

Along with layered characters, as I said there are some interesting paranormal cases to solve.  Some weird, some heartbreaking…but all will command your interest.  I easily could have had several more to read about.  But then again I feel that about about almost all of Megan Derr’s stories.

The reason why is here on display.  Its her attention to detail.  In compiling a natural history for her kraken, very little is left out, right down to offspring and incubation.  I loved that.  It pulled me in and let me connect emotionally to the couple and the events as they occur.  From the dialog to the clothes to the very hot sexy scenes, Lynn and Anderson were a couple I found I could fall in love with and root for.  Which I did all the way to the end of the page.

I think you will do the same.

I highly recommend Wriggle & Sparkle by Megan Derr.  Its romantic, suspenseful, intriguing and fun.  And of course, sexy.  Check it out for yourself.

Cover art by Aisha Akeju works for the character of Lynn and the story.

Sales Links

Less Than Three Press

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Book Details:

ebook, 260 pages
Published August 10th 2016 by Less Than Three Press (first published January 2014)
Original TitleWriggle & Sparkle
ISBN139781620048221
Edition LanguageEnglish

A MelanieM Review: Magnified (Magnified #1) by Mell Eight

Rating: 4 stars out of 5

Magnified by Mell EightOn her deathbed, Yani’s Great Grandmother reveals she has one last story from her past to tell: that of his Great Uncle Yakov, who helped her survive the Nazis. It’s a story of vampires and werewolves he can scarcely believe—and in the wake of his Great Grandmother’s death, Yani realizes the story is far from over.

The world of vampires and werewolves isn’t a safe place for a human, even one with Yani’s unusual family history. With danger at his door, the smart thing would be to run, but much like his Great Grandmother Yani has never been very good at running away—especially with his loved ones and the whole world at stake.

Magnified is the first in a new series by Mell Eight and a most unusual series its starting out to be.  A supernatural tale, it has all the typical elements one expects to find such as vampires, werewolves, succubi and more but one of its main characters and an important secondary character are Eastern European Jews, one of whom barely escaped the trains and gas chambers of WWII.  How they did it and their Jewish traditions they carry with them always as part of who they are is a central element to this story and I expect of this series.

I found this whole aspect of the story a wonderful layer not often found in my stories (see Astrid Amara’s Carol of the Bellskis (Bellskis, #1) among others). Not only does Mell Eight use Yani’s contemporary family’s religious celebrations as part of her important need for us to understand how strong this family is and their ties to each other and their faith but later on starts to pull in other threads that deepens the religious element when a mage with links to Kabbalah appears.

We start off the story as Yani’s great grandmother is telling the story of her childhood. Its the 1940’s and the swift move by the Nazis is occurring as they round up Jews and move them to the internments camps and the ovens.  We are propelled into these awful times and a heartrending if sometimes confusing narrative, one that quickly becomes clearer by the page.

The timeline moves along quickly as Yani ages from a young boy to a young man of college age.  The jumps in time are handled easily and are necessary to get to the action required by the meat of the story.

That’s the introduction of the world of vampires, werewolves etc to our young student.  Its an explosive one and one that was my only main issue here.  I would have expected a much larger reaction from Yani.  His reaction felt almost anti-climatic after all he went through. And it continued to bother me throughout the rest of the story.

There is a lot that the author is packing in here.  There are two main couples that are intended to flow into the next story and carry on the series.  It was almost too much for this book to handle.  We really didn’t get a background on the secondary couple, perhaps that’s coming in the next book.  But they had such an important part to play here that they came off less substantial without that background.

There is a very scary villain here, a true monster. One I can’t wait to see taken down.  I wonder how many books its going to take?  I will be there for every one.

Mell Eight packed a lot into this first story.  Religion, family, romance, mystery, horror…its a writer’s cornucopia and it almost exploded the seams of the story on element overload.  So much here to absorb that it got confusing at times. But in the end, Mell Eight pulled it off…sort of as there is a HFN ending.   I recommend this unusual story, its quite a ride even though I’m not quite sure where we’re going yet.

Cover by Aisha Akeju‘s cover contains relevant objects to the story.  I’m just not a fan of these simplified covers, just they don’t draw me in.

Sales Links   – Pre Order (others will follow)

Less Than Three Press

Book Details:

ebook
Expected publication: September 7th 2016 by Less Than Three Press
ISBN13 9781620048535
Edition Language English