Book Review - A Shining in the Shadows

Not a bad little setup, if I do say so myself. :D I love my little reading nook.

Currently drinking...what?  It's a book about vampires.  This is the obvious choice. ;)

Star Rating: 5/5
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Buy the book: Amazon

***SPOILER ALERT FOR BOOK 1, The Making of Gabriel Davenport***  It's pretty much impossible to do a review for the second book in a series without some spoilers for the first one.  If you don't want book 1 spoiled for you before you read it, follow these instructions: Go buy a copy of The Making of Gabriel Davenport if you haven't already.  Read it immediately.  All better. :)  I also recommend you repeat steps 1 and 2 with A Shining in the Shadows.  No spoilers below for that one, though. ;)  Okay, everyone ready now?  Great.  Let's go!

Synopsis (summarized from Amazon): Gabriel Davenport has been remade from darkness. Now, he must adapt to survive.  In a small seaside town, Gabriel's maker unwittingly takes his wards into the throes of a deadly new game. There are rumblings on The Bloodvyne, the mental web of linked vampire consciousness. Whispers about a cleansing, about the ruling council hunting vampires with impure blood.  Gaze long into the darkness, and you'll find old vampire foes out for revenge, new ones with their own agenda, and a witch who holds the key.

Allow me to begin by saying this book is the kind I wish I could forget so that I can experience the joy of reading it for the first time over and over again.  I enjoy Beverly Lee's* writing so much!  I know I'm probably starting to sound like a super fangirl, but it's just so enjoyable!

*Side note: she is one of the sweetest people on Instagram.  If you're not following her on there - @theconstantvoice - you really should start.

Let's talk about feelings.  So many feels.  Firstly, I feel so sad for Gabriel.  He never really got to know his mother and now he's never going to get to be an adult.  And he's stuck in an situation without the best support at first.  Survival is the number one priority, and that doesn't leave much time for grieving.  Oh, honey!  That's one thing this book does so well.  It communicates emotion so well.  It's almost tangible.  One of my new favorite characters is a guy called D'Grey.  All I will tell you is that he gives you a visceral reaction; his personality rolls off of him in waves as you read about him.  Writing magic.  That's what that is right there.

Along those same lines, we do get a really interesting mix of voices in this book.  Some of it is told from the omniscient POV of the third person narrator.  Some of it, though, is from the first person POV of Gabriel.  That was really interesting to me because Gabriel's voice is way different from the omniscient narrator's.  I loved it.  It shook up the story a little bit, gave it some different dimension.

The characters, too, all had their own personalities and voices.  And abilities, which I thought created a really well rounded world.  They all felt very distinct.  I am loving Olivia more and more as I get to know her.  The pacing was fantastic, always pulling you along without going too fast that you felt like you've missed something.  There's also a pig named Bacon, which, to me personally, will never not be funny.

I didn't read through this book as quickly as some others - I'm like a puppy dog with squirrels, except in this case the squirrels are books I want to read - but a really good sign was that I kept on coming back to it as one of my primary interests**.

**It's basketball playoff season at the moment, which means basketball games are on in my house every night.  I usually complain more about this, but I've been devouring so many books lately, it hasn't bothered me nearly as much.  Thus, A Shining in the Shadows was finished in bed one night while the hubs complained at the TV in the next room about all the dumb decisions Joe McBasketball-Pants was making as his team played the Terebithian Sportballers.

Some people have said they can't read this book at night because it's too scary.  Maybe they just need a fabulously fuzzy blanket like mine?

One more thing that I enjoyed about the book: the relationships.  They're very sweet and everything I hope for with people in my life.  I just want to hug them all!  Of course, I'm not talking about the evil, I'm-going-to-really-enjoy-killing-you ones, though those are great too.  I love to love these bad guys.  Not that I'd agree to get a drink with them or anything.  No, thank you.  No telling what dark hole I'd end up in...

And now the part where I talk about stuff I didn't like...erm.  Hang on.  Let me check my notes.  Well, this is awkward.  I got nothing.  I know!  That sounds totally biased and not objective at all, but I legitimately have no complaints.  You can tell Beverly Lee takes a lot of care to polish her books.  For instance, I see a lot of technical errors in indie books - punctuation, spelling, typos, etc. - but I didn't see any of that here.  I'm tempted to inquire with her as to her process because that's the kind of quality I aspire to in my own writing.  Let me know what you think by hitting me up on social media - @danafraedrich .  I'll be posting this review all over.

Thanks for reading!

Book Review - Stella's Awakening

I started the book one sunny afternoon...

And finished around 4am that night/next morning.  That gives you an idea of how this review is about to go, ;)

Star Rating: 5/5
Genre: Contemporary, Romance, Erotica
Buy the book: Amazon

Synopsis (from Amazon): A painful past. A forbidden romance. Will she choose love and make the ultimate sacrifice?  For Stella Welsch, buying a home and starting her own business has already pushed the boundaries of her strict upbringing. When she meets the sexy and powerful executive, Conrad Adams, Stella knows he’s off limits, but can't help daydream about forbidden romance. As sparks begin to fly, Stella reveals that the relationship could have her cut off from her family and life as she knows it.

If I had to describe this book in three words, I would say, "Very sexy fairytale."  And I am an absolute sucker for fairytales, so I mean that as a huge compliment.  It ticks all the right boxes for me, plus a few extras that I didn't expect.  You've got the handsome romantic interest, check.  Engaging and enjoyable female lead, check.  Ridiculously unrealistic and wholly enjoyable fantasy element in the form of Conrad's wealth, double check.  Honestly, this man could probably buy a small country and rule as king if he wanted to.  Okay, that last one is actually true for a small fraction of people in the world, but for plebs like me, it's a fantasy. :)

And then there's the pacing.  Man!  It pushes you along at just the right pace.  I think that's actually one of the things that impressed me the most.  Like, a transitionary bit would come along where it's building up to more exciting, plot-progressing stuff, but little promises for the future were dropped in to keep you reading through the transition points.  And those points (which I think are a challenge for any author) were made really interesting - little glimpses into the sweet side of Stella's life with her family, which really spoke to me on a personal level because her family in the kitchen sounds a lot like mine: carefully controlled chaos. XD

Warning: there is one bit that is very sad and brought me, the not-cryer (seriously, go about your business and stop looking at me I'm totally not crying) to tears.  It's so hard but sooooooo good.

So all those basic elements are fantastic.  Here's what I didn't expect and really appreciated.  So I was annoyed with Conrad at first because he is a bit bossy and obviously used to getting his way.  I got a little defensive for Stella because I was worried the relationship would be unhealthy and one-sided and maybe even potentially dangerous.  When it came down to it, though, he asked her if she was sure, making sure he had her consent, making sure she felt safe.  This.  Is.  So important!  And I cannot express how much I appreciate that RK did this.  Yes, fiction is an escape and it's not realistic all the time (which is part of what makes reading so fun), but this is one of those things I think is an immutable necessity.  I won't get into all the reasons here because it is a long, complicated, incredibly nuanced, multi-faceted conversation.  Suffice to say, consent and feeling safe is necessary.  So bonus points for making that an important feature.  At least, I definitely didn't see it as being glossed over in any way.

Now, there is one bone I have to pick.  Fair warning, this might get a little hippie-dippy-Kumbaya-soapboxy...I dislike the position Conrad takes with Stella's religious beliefs, specifically the fact that he calls them "weird".  Not the most respectful way to describe someone else's faith.  Now, I admit that I have a bit of a personal vendetta against this word, weird.  I've heard people use it my entire life to describe things different from them, as if being different is somehow wrong.  The world is full of different beliefs.  One of my good friends is Muslim, I am a Christian, and my twin sister is Wiccan.  Our beliefs vary widely.  We respectfully disagree about the way we believe the world works, but I would not call either of their beliefs weird.  I don't think they would do that to me either.  So that does bother me, but I didn't deduct points (why do I always rate books like a game show?) because different characters have to have varied opinions and viewpoints to make them diverse and three-dimensional and realistic.  Doesn't mean it doesn't still irk me, but it is good character creation.

So there you have it!  Will I be reading the next book in the series.  Oh!  It seems to have already fallen into my Kindle library.  Imagine that. 0:) Yes, I fully enjoyed it, and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to take an emotionally complex, steamy rollercoaster ride.  Just be sure your calendar is clear because you will not want to put it down!

Thanks for reading!

Book Review - Pegasus

Just a reminder, if you haven't signed up for the VIP newsletter on the main page, you really should.  The first one is coming out soon!

Princesses, pegasi, magic!  What could go wrong?  Dang...

Currently drinking: Honeybush tea because that totally sounds like something a pegasus would drink.

Star Rating: 2/5
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Buy the book: Amazon

*Deep breath*  Okay, guys, if you've been following me for a while, you know that I am a huge Robin McKinley fan.  I adore her writing.  Her gift with painting pictures with words is enviable.  Her romances make me swoon.  Sunshine, Deerskin, and Chalice are among my favorites, but really I've never read anything by her that I didn't like...until now.  Ugh, I feel so bad saying this...really and truly.  I was not that enthused by Pegasus.  When I told the hubs this, he was shocked.  "But she's your favorite" he said to me.  Yeah, I know.  Before I get into all that, though, here's a little info on the book.

From Amazon: Because of a thousand-year-old alliance between humans and pegasi, Princess Sylviianel is ceremonially bound to Ebon, her own pegasus, on her twelfth birthday. The two species coexist peacefully, despite the language barriers separating them. Humans and pegasi both rely on specially trained Speaker magicians as the only means of real communication.  But it's different for Sylvi and Ebon. They can understand each other. They quickly grow close--so close that their bond becomes a threat to the status quo-and possibly to the future safety of their two nations.

First, the good stuff.  McKinley's is, as always, a master of description and world building.  The way she paints scenes and settings, they just flow around you without you even realizing it's happening.  The pictures rise up in your mind, unbidden, giving the backdrop depth.  She also did a really interesting thing with some of the dialogue.  In the book, the pegasi speak a different language, and it sounds very different from English because they have horse mouths and not human mouths.  It's handled really simply with dashes and repeated letters to give the reader much more of a feel of the words rather than the words themselves, and I found it to be really effective.  Aaaaaaand that's about it.

*Sigh*  Well, I think the best word I can use to describe the book is slow.  I just could not get into it.  It took me years to get through.  That's not an exaggeration, actual years.  I'd pick it up, read a bit, put it back down, and wouldn't open it again for a couple of months.  I understand it's part of a series, so I think the next one will likely move a lot faster, but even still.  Did we really need Sylvi's entire life/backstory?  To me it seems like a whole lot of nothing happens in the first half of the book.

I can't say for certain whether I'll read the next in the series.  I don't know that I care about the characters that much, to be totally honest.  There's another one from her, Shadows, which I will read, however...probably once my book buying ban is over.

Thanks for reading!

Book Review - Caraval

That cover is gorgeous, no?  The picture really doesn't do it justice.  It's so shiny and sparkly!  I'm glad I've got the book now because I understand it's already becoming a movie and I hate movie covers.

Currently drinking: a gingered dark chocolate mocha because something dark and complicated and spicy really goes well with this book.  You can find my recipe for gingered dark chocolate syrup in a recent post here.

Star Rating: 3/5
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Buy the book: Amazon

If you're at all involved in the Bookstagram or Booklr community, you've heard of this book.  It's everywhere right now!  I'm on a self-imposed book buying ban at the moment, but I took part in a GoodReads read-along, soooooo LOOPHOLE!  XD

First, what I liked about it: the writing is gorgeous!  As someone who adores but really struggles with writing vivid descriptions, this book was like a drug.  I could tell as I worked on my own writing I was being more aware of small details.  Additionally, the main character Scarlet has something about her that sounds a bit like some form of synesthesia.  In her case, she sees colors when she feels strong emotions, and that was really interesting to me.  Fear was often shades of yellow, for instance.  It was something that gave the story a unique twist and served a practical purpose once.  That's probably the strongest part of the book, to me.  The story too, IMHO, was also pretty good...until the end.  More on that later.  Pieces were assembled well for the first 90% of the book.  Things that were mentioned in passing earlier came back up later, and there was a good twist at the end.

As for the not-so-great-stuff...the ending.  As this is a spoiler free review, I can't really say why I felt this way.  Instead, let me just say that...
-1) I thought it was too easy.
-2) I was so angry with the main character, due to some of my own personality traits, at the end because I thought she made a really stupid move.
-3) I was even angrier with one of the secondary characters.  I wanted to punch that character...a lot.
-4) The character motivations didn't really work for me.

Even saying all of that, I will probably read the next one.  I do want to know what happens (though I am really, really hoping it ends with the second book).  And, despite how I felt about the ending, I did enjoy the process of reading this book.  Who knows, maybe the next one will redeem the characters for me a bit.

Have you read the book?  If you have, feel free to let me know what you think in the comments below.  Thanks for reading!

Book Review - Hell's Teeth

Did I pair my socks with the cover of James Fahy's Hell's Teeth?  Yes.  Yes, I did. :D  And I really rather like it!  Is that not an eerily gorgeous cover?  I usually hate models on covers because I want to imagine the characters myself, but I think this works.

Currently drinking: some really lovely hot cocoa, which I think Phoebe Harkness would appreciate. :)  I don't know that she would like that I gingered it up, though.  Recipe for my dark chocolate and ginger syrup is at the end of today's review.

Star Rating: 4.5/5
Genre: Paranormal, Science Fiction & Fantasy
Buy the book: Amazon

Fun fact: I don't like post-apocalyptic stories.  Maybe it's because I just came across a glut of them a few years back, or maybe a certain series - naming no games of hunger - put me off of them... -.-  << That's my unimpressed/annoyed face for anyone who doesn't know.  Anyhoodles, futuristic, yep, totally cool.  As soon as a book says, "There was the war, and it destroyed the whole world!" I'm kind of out.  Maybe it's all the woe and wailing and misery.  I dunno; still trying to figure out why I have such a distaste for anything that falls into that realm.  That being the case, ***teeny spoiler alert*** it speaks volumes for James Fahy's Hell's Teeth that I like it so much, because it takes place in, you guessed it, a post-apocalyptic society.  ***End spoiler alert.***

The list of what I liked about it is big.  Really big.  You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is.  Look at that, a segue into the first thing on the list: references!!!  Maybe it's just me, but I loved all the references the Phoebe, the main character and narrator, makes.  The best one IMHO?  Captain Kathryn Janeway, folks!  The oft-overlooked badass of this quadrant, the Delta Quadrant, or any other quadrant you wanna name!  Sorry, my Trekkie love got really strong just there.  I also liked, though I don't know if this one was intentional, the use of the surname Trevelyan, because that is the name of the human Inquisitor from one of my most favorite video games: Dragon Age Inquisition.  Right, so lots of fun references!  What's next?  The sass!  Phoebe has such a great voice in this book, full of sarcasm and dry wit.  She's so enjoyable to read.  After that comes the great turns of the book.  There's one in the first chapter, which I think works especially well if you read the description on Amazon, which is a pretty safe bet to take.  More than once whilst reading this book I was pleasantly surprised by a shift or trick in the plot, most of which left me thinking, "Oh...snap.  That's gonna suck."  *GRIN!*  Aren't we readers sadistic sometimes in how we enjoy a character's misery?  >:D  Here's something else interesting.  Fahy does something that I think is rare with a lot of books and only works sometimes, but he pulled it off really well.  Parts of this book read like a movie because the descriptions were so...visual.  The picture painted for us as readers is vibrant and powerful, and that pulled me along in the story, making it one of those tales that was effortless to read through and provided proper deep enjoyment.  Finally, Hell's Teeth does something else that I think fantasy and sci-fi stories can do in such a subtle but efficacious way.  People who are different from us are dangerous, a threat to what we hold dear is such a common mindset in our world, and I appreciate it when stories can provide an objective look at an issue like this and discuss both sides, which this one does.

Well, that was quite a lot of praise and truly well deserved, I think.  So why the half star deduction?  It's a little bit of a technical issue actually.  There's always going to be a typo or two in any book.  Finding one is a game I like to play, but I found a couple bigger ones in Hell's Teeth that I felt like really should have been caught by the editor or someone in the process*.  Yes, I know I sound like a teacher grading papers, but a few of them were actually distracting.

*For the record, I don't count comma use.  That is the wild west of the punctuation world.

All in all, I think it's pretty clear that I absolutely loved the experience of reading this book.  I've already bought the second one in the series, and I heard there's a third one coming out soon.  Eh?  *Waggles eyebrows*.  I'll be keeping an eye out for that one too.  Thanks for reading!

As promised, here's a fun new recipe!

Gingered Dark Chocolate Syrup
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1/8 of a teaspoon salt
1/2 ounce ginger root, grated or sliced very thinly
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Drop all the ingredients except the vanilla extract into a small pot.  Stir occasionally and cook over medium heat until it starts to bubble.  This shouldn't take more than about five or ten minutes.  Make sure all the sugar is dissolved and then remove from the heat.  Let sit for fifteen to twenty minutes to allow the flavor of the ginger to really infuse into the syrup.  Then add vanilla extract and stir to combine.  You can strain the mixture now if you want, but I leave my ginger bits in so that they can continue to give off flavor.  You'll just have to either avoid or deal with ginger bits down the road if you do this.  You can then use the syrup to flavor your coffee, make hot chocolate, drizzle over ice cream, eat it off the spoon...hey, no judgement.  What you do with your syrup is your business.  And it can be stored in a glass jar in the fridge for a couple of weeks.  Enjoy!