Month: January 2012

Midnight Reckoning

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

Midnight Reckoning by Kendra Leigh Castle is something to read when you want a paranormal romance that takes all the standard elements and throws them in a blender! The mix that pours out makes for a very enjoyable read, while adding a few interesting twists to the usual recipe.

We met both the hero and heroine of Midnight Reckoning in the first book of Castle’s Dark Dynasties series, Dark Awakening (reviewed here). And when they met, they pissed each other off.

Lyra Black is a member of the Thorn, a werewolf pack. But Lyra is much more than just a member of the pack, she’s the Alpha’s daughter. And she’s an only child. Lyra wants what’s best for the Thorn, and she knows that her cousin Eric isn’t it. But the wolves have always chosen their Alphas through a physical contest, based on who is the strongest, fastest and cleverest. Females may be fast and clever, but they just aren’t as strong as the males. Traditionally, they don’t fight to become Alpha. But Lyra believes that Eric is so tradition-bound that he will lead the Thorn back to the human-enslaving dark ages, and in the 21st century, those days are long gone. Lyra has declared herself as a challenger for the right to become the Alpha’s Second, her father’s named successor. Being her father’s daughter will not help her. Her father wants her to mate with someone strong enough to fight in her place.

Wolves mate for life, and all that is required for the mating bond is sex. It doesn’t even have to be willing sex. Rape will cause the mating bond to lock into place. Lyra is being hunted.

Jaden Harrison threw Lyra Black out of a vampire sanctuary the first time he met her. Not so much because she was a werewolf, although there is that whole vamp/werewolf rivalry thing, but because he wanted her. Bad. And because there was no way he should feel that much desire for a wolf. Any wolf. He wanted her as far away from himself as possible, so he threw her out of the sanctuary. But he never forgot her.

So when he found her in his clan’s territory again, but this time threatened with rape, he helped her kill her would-be rapists. But he didn’t expect Lyra’s gratitude. He expected what he got. She took his head off. But only verbally. And only after stumbling into him and revealing, just for a second, that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Even if it was inappropriate. And impossible.

She left behind a necklace, a talisman, under the body of one of the wolves that Jaden had killed. Since she had been protecting the talisman, Jaden chose to go into Thorn territory to return it.

Why? Because he was delaying decisions about his own future. His newly-formed vampire clan, the Lilim, wanted him to become Chief of Security. He wasn’t sure he was ready to become an officer, when he had so recently been a slave of the Ptolemy clan of highborns.

But when he returned the necklace to Lyra, he was faced with another, and much more tempting offer. Teach Lyra to fight wolves, so she could take her own place in the Alpha challenge.

Why would a werewolf ask a vampire to teach his werewolf daughter to fight other werewolves? And what temptations will Jaden and Lyra face as teacher and student? And what is really going on within the werewolf pack? So many questions, and so little time to find the answers when threats come from all sides.

Escape Rating B: The action in this was even more fast and furious than in Dark Awakening. But I think the story probably works better if you’ve read both books, although that’s far from a hardship. I liked Dark Awakening, and I would recommend for paranormal romance fans. Midnight Reckoning a fun and very fast read.

I am really starting to want some more information about the Shadows. They are clearly moving events and people behind the scenes, and their motivations are murky to say the least. I hope more of that is in the next book. Since the next book is titled Shadow Rising (July 2012) maybe I’m going to get my wish!

Brilliance Audio, Amazon, and the Great Un-downloading

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Amazon> audiobooks> libraries

On January 4, OverDrive sent an email to all of its libraries with a bombshell announcement, (quoted here from Infodocket)

“Effective January 31, 2012, as instructed by the publisher, BrillianceAudio will suspend the availability of all download audiobook titles for library purchase across all vendors. This change does not affect any titles currently in your library’s catalog. You will not, however, be able to add any additional copies.”

Compared to the Harper Collins 26 checkout limit or the Penguin/Kindle “will they/won’t they” drama, the Brilliance withdrawal notice has generated only a few ripples in the pond. The tree fell in the forest, and there were surprisingly few people around to hear it.

And the voices that have spoken up have cried out against OverDrive. Before we “shoot the messenger”, let’s take a look at the message again.

The loss of Brilliance audiobook downloads is bad news for OverDrive. They license a lot of Brilliance audiobooks, and some are definitely going to be missed from library collections. J.D. Robb, Nora Roberts, Nevada Barr, Tom Clancy, Robert Crais, W.E.B. Griffin, Dean Koontz, Jayne Ann Krentz, the list goes on. These are all authors where my LPOW had long hold queues on OverDrive and licensed multiple copies, up to our maximum. And we bought physical audiobooks, and print books, and ebooks if available and every other format imaginable. OverDrive is going to miss their slices of that revenue pie. This Brilliance withdrawal is not in their interest.

So who benefits? Amazon owns Brilliance Audio. Amazon also owns Audible, which sells downloadable audio direct to consumers. (Full disclosure: Reading Reality is both an Amazon Affiliate and an Audible Affiliate)

Amazon has a track record of cutting out intermediaries wherever they can. They are offering self-published authors terrific deals in order to get agents out of the picture. They have become a traditional publisher as well, with several imprints under their banner ranging from romance (Montlake Romance) to mystery (Thomas & Mercer) to science fiction (47North) to international (AmazonCrossing).

This holiday season, Amazon tried to directly cut out local bookstores (not that they haven’t been doing an indirect job of that all along) by encouraging customers to take the Amazon “price check” app into their local bookstore and then compare the local price to the Amazon price for a $5 discount off the Amazon price. Ecosalon called this out as one of their “Most Offensive Ad Campaigns of 2011”

Last but not least in the list of Amazon’s effort to remove obstacles between themselves and the direct consumer, there’s the Kindle Lending Library. Which attempts to eliminate libraries. Amazon Prime members can borrow one book per month, as long as they buy everything else.

So, if Amazon owns Brilliance, which makes audiobooks, and Amazon owns Audible, which sells downloadable audiobooks, who would be responsible for the decision to stop letting OverDrive and all other library vendors (Ingram, Baker & Taylor, 3M) license Brilliance downloadable audiobooks to the library market?

 

Amazon.

What can we do about it?

Attacking OverDrive will not help.  Amazon is a 900 lb. gorilla, if not bigger. There are very, very few entities that have been able to successfully negotiate with Amazon and come away winners. The one time I can think of is when the publishers managed to break Amazon’s lock on Kindle book pricing by withholding content. But the publishers had something that Amazon wanted, bestselling author content.

What do we have that Amazon wants? Can we use our image of “mom and apple pie” and how much we do for the public good to make Amazon see reason?

The Brilliance audio download tree fell in the forest. It’s up to libraries to make Amazon hear our message.

 

 

The First Rule of Ten

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | A Reviews> book reviews

The First Rule of Ten by Gay Hendricks and Tinker Lindsay is a surprise. It is surprisingly good. There are a lot of things about this mystery that are unconventional, including the detective it introduces, but I was hooked from the first page.

Tenzing Norbu (“Ten” for short) grew up wanting to become a modern-day Sherlock Holmes. The ambition would not have been that far out of the ordinary, if it weren’t for the location where Ten did that growing up. Ten spent his formative years in a Buddhist monastery in Dharamshala, India, where his father expected him to become a monk, just as he was. The fact that Ten was the product of his father’s impulsive middle-age marriage to an American college dropout attempting (and failing) to “find herself” on a trip through India (and Europe) didn’t seem to matter to his father’s plans. Nor did his father understand what role Ten’s mother’s wanderlust, or her influence, might have had in his makeup.

Not to mention, eight-year-old boys are lousy at obeying mindless rules, never mind teenagers. Ten just wasn’t cut out to be a monk. He wanted to be a detective, even if he had no real clue what that meant. But he tried to please his father.

An intervention from a lama when Ten turned 18 sent him to the Buddhist Cultural Center in Los Angeles on an exchange program. From there, his journey took him to a GED program, US Citizenship, and eventually, the LAPD.

But several years after making detective in the police department, Ten is no longer satisfied. He still enjoys police work, what he hates is paperwork, meetings and rules. Most of the same things he disliked in the monastery.

As The First Rule of Ten opens, Ten is wounded while trying to intervene in a domestic disturbance. For Ten, it is the last in a series of signs that tell him it is time to resign from the LAPD and become a private investigator. So he turns in his paperwork and does just that. Ten tells his partner Bill that the incident was a case of his “cosmic alarm clock” telling him it was time for his “job karma” to change. While this wouldn’t work for most people, Bill’s “job karma” is part of the reason that Ten is making the switch. Bill and his wife have recently had twins, and Bill wants to move into an administrative job and off the street. Their partnership is breaking up whether Ten leaves or not.

As a private investigator, Ten’s first case arrives before he has even hung out his “shingle”. A woman comes to his door, looking for the previous owner of his house. She’s not looking to hire him, she just wants Zimmy’s whereabouts, because she’s Zimmy’s first ex-wife. But Zimmy used to be a big rock-and-roller before he got clean and sober and left LA, and Ten doesn’t provide a forwarding address. He can tell the woman is hiding something, maybe a lot of somethings. But when she turns up dead the next morning — and not just dead, but tortured before she died — Ten feels like he owes her for not listening to what was wrong. He didn’t want to get involved, and now he’s involved. He has a case, even if no one is paying.

Ten believes that if he investigates, someone will eventually pay. And someone does, in more ways than one.

And if you’re wondering what the The First Rule of Ten actually is, it’s “Don’t ignore intuitive tickles, lest they reappear as sledgehammers.” Words to live by. Or die by.

Escape Rating A-: I started this one night, and re-surfaced over 100 pages into it. I was amazed at how fast I got sucked into Ten’s world and his point of view. He’s a fascinating character to follow. He retains just enough of his “outsider” perspective to make his perspective and internal voice different from the run-of-the-mill private eye. His choices work for him, but they wouldn’t for another detective. His screw-ups are definitely his own, too.

There’s a teaser for The Second Rule of Ten in the back of the book. I don’t want just a teaser. I want the whole book!

 

The House of Silk

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | B Reviews> book reviews

The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz is a new/old Sherlock Holmes story. And I’m an absolute sucker for Sherlock Holmes stories.

Why do I call it a new/old Holmes story? On the one hand, it is written in the style of the Conan Doyle canon. Watson is writing up one of Holmes’ cases. On very much the other hand, the case he is writing up is about a subject that proper Victorian gentlemen did not discuss. There are, after all, much worse things than prostitution.

So we come to the case of the House of Silk. This is purported to be a case that Watson is writing up very late in his own life, after Holmes has died in Sussex. It is written in the tone of a man reflecting back, and sometimes you can hear the nostalgia, and of knowledge of later times impinging on the then-present.  In “Watson’s” preface to the story, he states that the case was too shocking to appear in print and too close to the halls of power to appear during wartime. He purportedly left the manuscript with his private papers, with instructions to his solicitors to have the manuscript published in a century.

And so we have the adventures of The Man in the Flat Cap and The House of the Silk.

The story itself takes place in 1890, a year before that infamous affair at Reichenbach Falls. Watson is still married to his first wife, Mary Morstan that was, but she has just left to nurse one of her former charges through a bout of influenza, and Watson has taken up his bachelor quarters with Holmes at 221B Baker Street for the duration.

An art dealer named Edmund Carstairs engages Holmes (and by association, Watson) to investigate the man in the flat cap who is terrorizing him. It should be an open-and-shut case. Carstairs returned from America a year ago. While he was there, he agreed to sell four impressionist masterpieces to a collector in Boston. The sale would have made his gallery a fortune. The paintings arrived in the States, but, the four Turner paintings just happened to be caught in the middle of a train robbery that went horribly wrong, and were burned to ash. Insurance covered the loss, but the buyer in Boston decided to go after the robbers. The gang, known as the Flat Cap Gang, were killed by the Boston police. All except one. Carstairs believes that the one remaining member of the gang, Keelan O’Donaghue, has followed him to London and is now following him around, leaving messages and generally terrorizing him. The question is, “to what purpose?” Not to mention, “why wait a year to follow?”

Holmes is intrigued by those questions. He is on the trail of a case that is, as usual, more than it appears. But in the process of finding the man who is trailing Carstairs, Holmes employs his “Baker Street Irregulars”, the band of street orphans that he hires to watch out when he cannot be everywhere at once. A new boy, Ross, finds not just the man in the flat-cap, but something to his own advantage, or so he thinks. After he collects his guinea from Holmes, he tries a bit of blackmail of his own, and is not just killed for his trouble, but tortured first. And his body left for Holmes to find with a bit of white silk ribbon tied to wrist as a message.

Holmes takes the message to heart and the investigation takes a more personal turn. When Mycroft comes to 221B in person to warn Holmes off, the younger Holmes delves even deeper, because he knows he is on the trail of something that someone does not want him to find. And that’s when the situation becomes truly dangerous, possibly even for Sherlock Holmes.

Escape Rating B+:I enjoyed this visit with Holmes and Watson, but it didn’t quite fit for me. For one, I figured it out before the end. For another, the non-Conan Doyle version of Holmes that now lives in my mind is Laurie R. King’s, so any variant that has Holmes deceased, especially without Mary Russell, just sounds wrong to me. And the only time Watson survives Holmes is after Reichenbach, and we all know how that turned out.

It’s always NetGalley Month!

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | NetGalley> NetGalley Month

December was NetGalley Month at Books, Biscuits and Tea. I have 9 reviews listed, because that’s what I posted to NetGalley last month. It looks like anything I post in January goes on the next month.

Speaking of the next month, January is NetGalley Month at Red House Books. And I absolutely declare myself to be a part of it. Or a party to it. Or a participant in it. Or all of the above. Yes!

I’ve figured something out. I was one of the winners from NetGalley October. (Thank you again, Emily!) Winning means that you get books from the Book Depository. Which, of course, you can’t use for NetGalley month. This is sort of like the winners of the Super Bowl getting the last pick in next year’s draft, isn’t it? Without the cheerleaders.

I currently have 43 active requests on NetGalley. (Yes, I know. I’m a very bad girl) Finding stuff to read for the read-a-thon will not be a problem. Finding time to write the reviews might be another story. Speaking of stories, I’m in the middle of two really good ones. And guess what? I got them both from NetGalley!

Cast in Ruin

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | A Reviews> book reviews

Cast in Ruin is the 7th book in Michelle Sagara’s Chronicles of Elantra. Saying that I enjoyed this series doesn’t even come close. I became so enthralled with Kaylin and her crew that I put the whole Elantra series on my “Best of 2011” list. Now I get to tell you why.

It’s a little hard to categorize this series. It reads like an urban fantasy. Complete with snark. There’s a very high snark quotient, and it’s definitely of the “snicker, snicker, snort” persuasion. It’s also very dry humor, and very situational. What made me chuckle was based on the personalities, rather than because something was funny per se. And it made things damn hard to explain to my husband, who wanted to know what my chortles were all about.

Like so much of urban fantasy, a lot of the humor is gallows humor. The city of Elantra has as much crime as any big city, magical or otherwise. In addition, there’s the more unusual and magical sort of crime. Investigating the seamier side of human (and other-human) nature seems to require a taste for gallows humor in whoever (or whatever) does that investigating. Whether that investigator has skin, fangs, fur, feathers, or scales.

But if the Chronicles of Elantra are urban fantasy, complete with detectives, they are not just urban fantasy. The city of Elantra does not appear to be on Earth, or in any history that includes our Earth, at least not so far. Elantra, in this reviewer’s mind, is a high-fantasy world. The human characters that we identify with at first, Kaylin and later Severn, are part of a race that is not native to Elantra. The native races are the immortals, the Dragons and the Barrani. Then there are the mortal native races, the Leontines and the Aerians.  Plus another mortal race who somehow came later to Elantra, the Tha’alani.

And into this polyglot steps Kaylin Nera. Kaylin is a child of the fiefs. In other words, she grew up outside the edge of the city, outside of the laws of the Dragon Emperor, and was poorer than poor. But for no reason that anyone has ever been able to determine, magic interfered with her life. Runes of ancient script became written on her skin just before her 13th birthday. Because of those runes, other girls died in an attempt to awaken some power that Kaylin did not and still does not want.

But Kaylin has magic whether she wants it or not. And because she does, she has become involved with people that she never would have imagined when she was begging on the streets in the fief of Nightshade.

By the time of Cast in Ruin, Kaylin is in her 20s. She has come a long way from the 13 year old waif who first came to the Halls of Law and attempted to assassinate the Hawklord. She should have been executed for her crime. Instead, the Hawks adopted her as a mascot. And when she was old enough, she became one of them. A ground Hawk, an investigator of crimes against the Dragon Emperor’s laws.

Seven identical women have been found dead in Tiamaris’ fief. But in the fiefs, the Dragon Emperor’s laws don’t apply, even if Tiamaris was a member of the Emperor’s court until just a few short days ago. But Tiamaris has also allowed the new race of giants who had come through the mysterious “ways” to settle in his fief. And the giants have angered the “Shadows” at the fief borders, the “Shadows” that threatens the stability of all the magic that underpins Elantra. And those seven identical dead women, well, number eight shows up with a message, then dies. But when number nine comes to call, let’s just say that everyone’s assumptions about everything are about to come unglued. Along with a few dragons.

Escape Rating A+: This was fantastic, stupendous, wonderful. I wish I could take Kaylin out for drinks because I love her brand of snark. But she’s also one of the most complicated characters I’ve met in a long time. She grows and changes and knows she’s growing up. She has so much stuff in her head and she doesn’t believe in herself but she keeps trying anyway. And she has so much to forgive herself for, but not as much as she thinks she does. Give yourself a really, really gigantic treat. Take the time to start with Cast in Moonlight (in Hunter’s Moon) the novella that starts it all, then dive straight into to Cast in Shadow and don’t look back.

Ebook Review Central for Samhain Publishing for November 2011

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Ebook Review Central

Happy New Year everyone! But even if it is 2012 in the rest of the world, it is still 2011 at Ebook Review Central for a few more weeks, at least until the rest of the November and December titles cycle through.

This week it’s Samhain Publishing’s November 2011 turn at bat. We’re here to take a look at the 33 titles Samhain released just a few short weeks ago.

There are a few interesting things to note. Samhain’s list is bigger than any of the other publishers that ERC covers. 33 titles compared to Dreamspinner’s 22 or Carina’s 19.  It’s a chunk. Samhain has also added straight-up horror to their line.  So far, the reactions have been mixed. The review sources are different, and a couple of titles (Dead of Winter, Borealis) have received some excellent reviews.

But it’s starting to look like the Samhain titles get reviewed during the first month of publication, but not so much after that. Except for “Best of the Year” lists. the September and October lists didn’t receive very many updates. We’ll see if the trend continues.

On to the featured books for this month. Wow, was I blown away by the reviews for a few of these titles. The reviews for certain books usually tell me which books should be featured, either by the sheer number of reviews, by the quality of the ratings, or both. But this month, these titles really jumped off the page.

Once Upon a Winter’s Eve by Tessa Dare is book 1.5 in Dare’s popular new Spindle Cove series. This 99 cent novella is sandwiched in between A Night to Surrender (August 2011) and A Week to be Wicked (March 2012). And this is also a Christmas story, and was released just in time to capture the holiday reading spirit. Tessa Dare is a terrific and popular author; every one of her books has received at least a 4/4.5 rating at RT Book Reviews. This particular story is reviewed as a fantastic introduction to her work, and a standalone introduction to her new series. And it was short and very, very inexpensive. Is it any wonder that Once Upon a Winter’s Eve received 18 reviews this month?

Rocky Mountain Heat by Vivian Arend generated a lot of reviewing heat all on its own. With 19 reviews, this is clearly a book that people are not just reading, but also talking about. Rocky Mountain Heat is the first book in Vivian Arend’s Six Pack Ranch series. This is a contemporary western romance of the very hot and steamy variety. That so many reviewers felt strongly enough to write a review says that this is a book that will be requested and read. And it’s the first book of six in a series. Everyone is eagerly awaiting the next book, which will generate even more interest in the first book.

Demon Bait by Moira Rogers is also the first book in a series. Rogers’ series is titled, Children of the Undying, and it is billed as Post-Apocalyptic/Cyberpunk, so this is probably as far from the family dynamic in Rocky Mountain Heat as it can get. On the other hand, for readers who like their hot paranormal/futuristic romance with a mixture of angels, demons and what sound a lot like computer hackers, this one looks like a real winner. Eleven reviews, including a “2011 Favorites” from MinnChica at The Book Pushers, pushed Demon Bait into the third featured slot for this month.

That’s a wrap for this week. See you next Monday with our last post from way back in November 2011, covering Amber Quill, Astraea, Liquid Silver and Riptide.

What’s on my (mostly virtual) nightstand? New Year’s Day 2012

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | Virtual Nightstand

Happy New Year!  2012. Wow! I still want George Jetson’s car. The one that folded up into his briefcase when he parked. When will someone develop one of those? The future is not quite what it was cracked up to be. Transporters should be under development at the very least. I guess we’ll just have to settle for iPads. Cool enough beans for now.

I seem to have given myself a New Year’s reprieve. I’m not sure how that happened. There is only one new book being dropped on the pile next week. For once, I actually seem to have been thinking.

The Canvas Thief by Patricia Kirby looks like a paranormal romance. A comic book artist sees demons, and draws fictionalized versions of them into her comic books. The only problem is that either her comic book characters have come to life, or the world she has been drawing all these years is even more real than she imagined. This sounded really cool when I got it from NetGalley.

So, if there are no new books, what about the recap?

I’m doing better with this week than last week. If figures.

I finished The First Rule of Ten, and I’m really glad there’s going to be a Second Rule of Ten (no date set but the first couple of chapters were in the back of the first book). First Rule was good! This concept shouldn’t work, but does. Ten is a former Buddhist monk, and former LAPD cop, who becomes a private investigator. He’s not really good at obeying meaningless rules, which got him in trouble at the monastery, and bored him as a cop, but makes him a very interesting PI. Review this week.

I’m maybe a third of the way through Midnight Reckoning. And vampire politics are as convoluted as ever. This picked up where Castle’s Dark Awakening (reviewed here) left off, and so far, so good.

I finally finished Michelle Sagara’s Cast in Ruin, which completes the Chronicles of Elantra until Cast in Peril comes out. Ruin has been in my NetGalley backlog since September, so I’m both glad and sorry. I loved Elantra so much I put the entire series on my Best of 2011 list. I’ll miss Kaylin and Company until Peril. I have hopes for September 2012, but no certainty. Review this week, of course.

I still haven’t found the box with my copy of Demi-Monde: Winter in it. This is the problem with print books. They hide themselves.  Whatever it is you’re looking for, it’s always in the last place you look. Of course, that’s because you stop looking as soon as you find it!

Tomorrow will be Ebook Review Central with Samhain Publishing’s November 2011 books.

Next week we’ll be back with the post-holiday doldrums. And another edition of the Nightstand.

 

 

 

Kissing my TBR Pile Goodbye

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | reading challenges

Bookish has a Reading Challenge that is tailor-made for me. Fulfillment may be an issue.

I’m talking about the TBR Pile Challenge. The challenge is to get stuff out of my TBR Pile. Since I keep moving my TBR Pile from house to house, this seemed like a no-brainer to me, at least in the sense of signing up for it. How I’ll actually do on it is anybody’s guess.

I am signing up at the 21-30 book level, which is “A Sweet Kiss”. As in, I’m going to kiss 21+ books in my TBR Pile goodbye. Hopefully more.

Wish we luck on this one. I’m going to need it!

 

Get Greased: Steampunk Reading Challenge

Posted on by Marlene Harris | Author : | reading challenges

The goal of the Steampunk Reading Challenge at Dark Faerie Tales is to read 24 steampunk novels in 2012. That’s the “Get Greased” level.

I’m not quite that ambitious. I do love steampunk, but I’m not so sure about devoting 24 of my 400 books this year to it.

There are other levels. Of course there are. The “Gaslight” level of 6 books is too low for me. I’m signing up for the “Gears” level of 12 books. I might make the 18 book “Gadget” level, but that will depend a lot on what comes up in reviews. There is a level for the truly steampunk obsessed. 30+ books makes you “Steamed”. Indeed.

It also depends on how many of my “books for fun” I get to. Gail Carriger’s Heartless and Timeless are both very definitely steampunk. I didn’t quite get to Heartless in 2011, and Timeless is due in February.