Tag: Review

Hailey Turner-The Emperor’s Bone Palace

I’m not going to lie, I’ve been waiting for this book since I finished The Prince’s Poison Vow last years. Check out my review here. Today, we have the second book of the Infernal War series, The Emperor’s Bone Palace, and hoy howdy, it definitely lives up to the first book. And now, I’m probably going to have to wait another year to read it. I don’t know whether to curse Hailey Turner or not. Probably not.

OK, for those who are unfamiliar with the series, it is a high fantasy/sword and sorcery/steampunk epic. And I do very much mean epic. It spans several main characters, countries, and viewpoints. While there are a lot of POVs in the book, Hailey has given each character a distinct enough voice that you have no problem with distinguishing one voice from the next. This is also a very queer positive book. Of the 4 main couples, we have one FF, one MF, and two MM. The gender of partners doesn’t really matter to anyone, unless it comes to getting an heir, but I’m sure there are ways around that.

Quick refresher. This takes place in Maricol, and they worship star gods, who directly intervene in the lives of the people. In Maricol, there are revenants who are the walking dead, created by spores. The Wardens guard the borders and kill the revenants. They are tithed from all nations and become nameless when they go for training. If and when they survive their training, they get a new name.

Maricol is broken up into different kingdoms. Right now, Ashion is being ruled from Danjal by Eimarille, who was the heir to the Ashion throne, but when the Daijal ruling family destroyed the family in the Inferno, they took her for legitimacy. Then there is E’ridia, which is the mountains, and has air superiority through their airships. They also have a very Celtic feel. The last important country we have is Solaria, which is ruled by Emperor Vanya, who is one of our main characters. The others are Eimarille, Caris, Soren, Blaine, Honovi, Nathaniel, and Terilyn. The couples break down into Eimarille and Terilyn, Blaine and Honovi, Soren and Vanya, and Caris and Nathaniel.

This book starts out with Eimarille crowning herself. She is now officially the Queen of Daijal, and sort of Ashion. She has plans within plans, between plans, with backup plans, and plans on the side. She is going to take over all of Maricol, and be queen of it all. Eimarille has been planning this for literal decades, and has been moving pawns around on the board for almost as long. She is wily as fuck.

Caris, along with Blaine and Honovi, is on the run from Amari, the capital city of Ashion. She used starfire, which outed her as a royal. And now everyone either wants her to be the queen of Ashion or die. Caris, having been raised by a small noble family, just wants to go into the family business and be an engineer. But, that’s not her road.

Vanya has survived an assassination attempt by the rionetka, which are people who have had their hearts cut out and replaced with a clockwork heart and magic. They are basically meat puppets. Because of this attempt on his life and the attempted kidnapping of his daughter and heir, he sends her off with Soren, a warden with a secret. Soren is the only person Vanya trusts with his daughter.

There is so much intrigue going on here. Really, everything is all twisty. There are levels and layers and twists and turns and corkscrews. There are betrayals, unexpected loyalties, death, so much death, and intense love.

I think, at the heart of this series, even with all the intrigue, betrayals, and planning, is love. It’s all about love of country, love of a partner, love of a family, so on and so forth. We really see that in our prime couples and in the things that they do. There aren’t a whole lot of sex scenes, and they are used to good effect, but there are a lot of those deeply intimate love scenes where you get to see exactly how much the characters love each other and what they are willing to do for their loved one. Sometimes it seems to be eavesdropping to read the scenes. The marriage torc scene was one of those for me.

The book is also intense. There were a couple of times when I had to go search ahead for a character to make sure that they made it through the end of the book in more or less one piece. I also had to put it down a couple of times and do something else because I just felt sooooooo much. And I will fully admit to crying more than once while reading.

Anyway, if you love adventuring, fantasy, steampunk, magic, fantastic character development, great world building, and epic storytelling, you definitely need to go pick this one up.

I know it seems like I haven’t said a lot about the fully story, but if I were to talk too much about it, it would totally spoil everything.

Skye Warren-3 to Get Ready

Today’s offering is the last book in the Hughes set of books by Skye Warren. Three to Get Ready is the finale of Eva and Finn’s story. While they are their own story, they are also part of the Morelli world. You don’t have to have read the other Morelli books to know what’s going on with Eva and Finn, you just have to have read the other two books in this group. There are likely to be spoilers because each book picks up right where the last one ended up, so if you want to avoid spoilers, skip this post until you go read the book and then come back.

Eva and Finn are currently dealing with all of Finn’s secrets coming out. His dad showed up at the office at a very inopportune time. When he showed up, his dementia was in full force, so all of the C-suite people found out that he was not all there. That, of course, sent the business into a tailspin. At the same time, the information that Eva is pregnant leaked so they’re dealing with all kinds of crises at once.

The Morellis are in one place trying to deal with the fallout, their answer is basically tell everybody no comment and fuck them all. Finn is elsewhere trying to figure out what to do for his business, and he’s being pushed to do all kinds of PR about it. Frankly, I think that Eva has the better idea. She’s just going to brazen it all out. Luckily, Finn and Eva get together and have a discussion about what to do and they come to an agreement.

Of course, the second they come to the agreement other things happen. Those events change Finn’s perspective, and he decides he’s going to handle the rest of his life in a very different manner than his father did and in a different way than what his father made him promise to do.

I still really like Eva. I think that she is an incredibly strong character. She has been handed all of this stuff, and yet she manages to gracefully handle it. Of course it helps that she’s been managing Morelli scandals for years, and this is relatively minor compared to some of the other stuff, but it is still a big deal. I think that makes sense. At least, it made sense in my head. I think there are a few times where she is a little overly optimistic about what’s to come and what’s going to happen. But, I kind of don’t blame her for that, I think I would behave the same and think the same in her situation so there’s that.

Finn has frustrated me on and off through this whole series. His fatalistic attitude kind of made me want to smack him sometimes. Don’t get me wrong, I understand where that fatalism is coming from, but it’s annoying. But, it does get better in this book and he’s not quite as fatalistic.

This was an interesting trio, and I really did like Eva and Finn. So, go check out the book. Happy reading!

E. J. Frost-Capricorn

Okay, so yeah, I said that I would update once a week at least, but I didn’t last week. That’s because I was doing special projects for work, and that took up all of my puny brain power. On the other hand, it meant I made more money, so you know, priorities. Then we had three storms in 6 days, which meant 20 plus inches of snow in those six days, and now we’re gearing up for some really cold weather for Friday and Saturday. Now, I live in the Great White North of the US, so I am used to cold weather, but my house is heated by a heat pump, which it doesn’t work as well when you get down to 10°, and we’re looking at -20 Fahrenheit which for you civilized people is -28. That’s not counting the wind chill, which is supposed to get down into the negative 50s, which again for civilized people, is- 45. So yeah, it’s going to be cold and I have chili that I’ll be making in the Crock-Pot and ham and beans that will be making in the other Crock-Pot, and stew at some point. But none of that is really pertinent to today’s book.

Today’s book is Capricorn, by E. J. Frost. Now this book has an interesting position. It is part of the Masters of the Zodiac series, which is a shared world series. It is also a spin-off/continuation/sequel/something, to the Teddy’s Boys books. I am not 100% sure on how to classify it. It does contain all the the main characters from the Teddy books, but they aren’t the main focus. The Mr Black, Evan Lord, from the book is, along with his baby girl Rachel. But, you know how Teddy and her boys are, they do push their way in quite well. There will be some possible spoilers for Teddy’s books in this, so be aware.

Capricorn starts 7 years after Quaternion. Evan is in wizarding jail, for something he may or may not have done. Evan was Rachel’s Daddy, but he released her when he was in prison. However, that hasn’t stopped her from writing him letters. On this particular day, Evan gets called into the warden’s office where a Fae prince is waiting for him. It turns out that Evan is now being released.

When Evan gets released, he ends up going to the Capricorns. It is a special club for those people who were born in the Capricorn star sign. The Capricorns are in charge of protecting the ley lines. Problem is, several members of the Capricorn have been murdered. When Evan gets there, it turns out he is now the leader of the Capricorns, and has to figure out who did the killing. So yeah he’s going to be busy. He ends up staying in fairy with Teddy, her three husbands, their children, and Rachel. And oh yeah, the king occasionally shows up, and for occasionally understand all the time. Evan tries to either forget that he was Rachel’s Daddy or try and become her Daddy again. While Rachel wants it, she is also now a fairy Knight, with a sword and all. She has also become a bit bratty.

So, Evan and Rachel go out to figure out what the problem is. They, of course, run into a lot of issues. And Evan gets to watch Rachel fight and enjoy how good she is at that. They also manage to work through their issues and get their relationship back on track.

This is as far as I’m going to go and describing the book, because if I go much further I will be getting into the meat of everything. There are so many things I like about this book though.

I like the place where Rachel is. She has undergone a lot of stuff since we met her at Bevington, and most of that she did, not quite on her own, but without the rock that Evan had become for her. She always had Teddy, they have become really sisters. But that is different from having her Daddy with her. But she has really grown, and become stronger, physically, emotionally, and mentally. She knows exactly what she wants and she will go out and get it.

I think that Evan starts out on the back foot. As far as I can tell the book takes place in current year. So he’s gone from let’s say 2015 to all of a sudden 2022. Imagine how much difference we’ve seen in 7 years, and all of a sudden he gets all of that. There are a few lines in the book about people wearing masks all the time, so you know, plague. But even without the plague, there have been a lot of changes going on, including Rachel transitioning from a young woman to a fully fledged and realized adult. It takes him a minute to figure out everything. And he’s got this new leadership of the Capricorns and all these murders that he has to figure out all at once. So, it’s no wonder why he’s a little confused sometimes.

But, even with saying all of that, he catches up to everything fairly quickly, and figures out what he needs to do. Of course, it does take some help from everyone, but he is more than willing to take that help.

The climax of the book really got to me. I was impressed with what happened, and saddened by it. And I think that I will carry parts of that along with me for a while.

Okay, that is all for this one. I recommend that you go check it out. You can probably enjoy it without having read Teddy’s Boys, but you will enjoy it better if you have. Happy reading!

E. J. Frost-Quaternion

Okay, I know I said I would be back on Wednesday. You know what helps to be able to come back on Wednesday? Knowing what day it is. The holidays have thrown me off quite badly, and this week I haven’t been sure what day is which. But, I’m back now, and I have E J Frost’s last book from Teddy’s Boys. Quaternion picks up from right where the last one left off, so there are going to be spoilers. I will try to not spoil as much as possible, but we all know that’s just the nature of the Beast. Everything is on Amazon, so you can go read it before you read this blog post if you want. You have been warned.

When we last saw Teddy, she and her boys were drawing a lot of magic through her. While this may have seemed like a good idea, it really wasn’t. It threw Teddy forward in time to the timeline she’s been visiting. Not only that, it appears to have burned out her magic, so she’s stuck. She may be stuck in the future with her husbands, but she still trying to get back to the past to her own time and to her boys there. She is doing a lot of studying and research and gets to see a lot of old friends, but she still is having issues. When she finally manages to make it back, thinking that she’s going to see Charlie, Gabe, and Darwin, it doesn’t turn out that way.

The only person there when Teddy gets back is Charlie. Gabe should be there, but isn’t. And Darwin isn’t quite bonded into their quaternion yet. Teddy gets really angry because the one thing she asked is that if something happened to her that Gabe not abandoned Charlie, but he appears to have done that. Especially since he’s currently in Darwin’s room. Which earns Darwin a black eye. Let’s just say that there is a lot of pain and anguish on everybody’s part right now.

Eventually, as the title suggests, the four of them get together and seal their bond. That’s pretty cool, and it gives them a lot of power. All that power is useful for trying to figure out who committed the murder. That looks like it’s going to be harder and harder, especially when Fate gets in the way.

I like Teddy. I just do. I have liked her throughout this whole series. Of course, that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have her faults, because she does. She jumps to conclusions quickly and doesn’t always get all the information before she acts. Some of that is just the fact that she is still fairly young, and she still needs time to mature. I think she’s like 19 or 20 in this. But, Teddy does have a very definite sense of what is right and wrong, and she is determined to make things right. She is also very loving, even though she’d like to come off as tougher than she is. She has a marshmallow inside.

We get to see Charlie start to come into his own in this. He has spent a lot of time just going along to get along. I don’t think that he has been unhappy, I just think that he is very mellow, and there has been a lot of drama with Gabe and Darwin. But, with the two of them gone at the beginning of the book, we get to see Charlie. We also get more about his feelings than we have before.

I understand why Gabe did what he did. It kind of made me mad, and it kind of made me sad. Gabe has a gentle nature, and sometimes it gets the better of him. I don’t think he’s fragile, per se, but Darwin did a number on him when he took Gabe away from Teddy. And he just hasn’t really bounced back yet. So, like I said, I understand why he made the choices he did.

I absolutely did not like Darwin at the beginning of the series. I wanted to punch him out myself. But EJ did manage to save him and actually make him likable. Does that mean he’s not still an asshole? Yeah, he’s still an asshole. But now he knows that he’s an ass, and he’s working to not be as much of an ass. He does have a lot of trauma in his history, and we’d learn about some of that. I had some of that, really I don’t blame him for it, it would upset me. In fact, it did upset me as I read it. And I read it twice. What’s as EJ sent it to me and then again in the book. Luckily, Teddy is pretty bound and determined to have her way about everything, and Darwin now has her on his side.

I really enjoyed the series. I got really invested in Teddy and her boys. I’ve also enjoyed reading Capricorn, which I will blog about next week. We get to see some really interesting things in that book.

So, that’s all for today. I’m losing my voice, so dictating is turning hard. Go check out this entire series and see what I liked it so much. Happy reading!

Amelia Wilde & Skye Warren-Natural Disaster

Just as a warning, my keyboard is dying. My h, y, u, and m keys sometimes work and sometimes don’t. My two spellchecks usually catch them, but not always. If you spot a missing letter, please forgive me.

So, this is the second book in the ladies’ Deserted Island books. Natural Disaster is all about the further adventures of Carter, Theo, and June. There are likely to be spoilers, since the last book ended on a cliffhanger, but as always, I’ll try to keep them to a minimum.

So, June is gone, Carter is nearly feral, and Theo is torn. There is a lot going on in Theo’s head. Carter sure tries to knock it all out of there for him. Finally, the two men stop with all the testosterone and try to figure out where June has been taken, and what they can do to find her. Turns out that there is another island not too far away, and that is the most likely place for her to be. So, off they go to swim to the island.

Meanwhile, June is being kept captive by some bad guys. They don’t want her for her, they want her so that they can torture her in front of Carter to get answers from him. She doesn’t really want that to happen, so she’s going to try to get away. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily work the way she wants, but that’s OK, Theo and Carter are there now.

I kind of feel like there is something missing in this story, and I don’t know what it is. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the story, but there is just this nagging feeling that something is missing.

We get a lot of Theo’s back story in this one, and it really does explain a lot of his actions in the books. I don’t like his mom though. I get that she has trauma, but that doesn’t excuse her actions.

Carter has all kinds of epiphanies going on in this book. I think that’s a good thing. He’s learning things he needs.

I thought that June was kind of a throwaway character here. She didn’t really advance the story all that much. She was just there for the boys to fuck.

I am looking forward to the next one.

OK, that’s all for this one. Go check it out. Happy Reading!

Measha Stone-Ravaged Innocence

Today we have a new Measha stone Russian mob story. It’s the 3rd book in her Innocent Bride series. Ravaged Innocence is the story of Avery and Luka. This one does happen at the same time as other books, but other than a brief mention, it isn’t really an issue. You can totally read it as a standalone if that’s what you want.

So, Avery is a college student trying to get a degree to become a medical assistant. She’s also working 3 jobs because she has to pay for school, food, and rent somehow. (BTDT, got the ratty t-shirt) One night, when she’s working at the ratty dive bar, some Russian mobsters walk in. One of them, Luka, takes Avery back into the kitchen to stay safe. Only Avery isn’t all that sure that she’s safe with him. The very next thing that Luka knows, Avery is dashing out the door and into the back of a passing yellow cab. Avery thinks that she is well away, at least until Luka comes pounding on her door and makes his way inside.

Luka is in town from Moscow to do a job. When that job takes him to a dive bar, he meets Avery, and it’s possessiveness at first sight. He finds out where Avery lives, and plans to go to her house to discuss with her why running away wasn’t a good thing. Which he does, with the palm of his hand swiftly applied to her hind end.

I love how fiesty Avery is. She doesn’t go down without a fight. She works really hard at not letting Luka get away with not telling her everything. Of course it doesn’t always work, but she tries. I really like that strong, rebellious, and fiesty streak in her.

I mostly like Luka. I think that he’s a little high handed, but that’s how characters in this kind of book tend to be, so overall, it’s expected.

Amo Jones-Wicked

We’re back with a new Amo Jones book. Amo’s books are all dark, and very twisty. Seriously twisty. I mean, think about the twistiest thing ever, and double it. Wicked is no different. This book is sometimes so twisty that it ends up going straight. This book does take place in the same world as Antichrist, which I reviewed here, and Sicko, which I did not.

Wicked is the story of Wicked (yes, that’s his name) and Ruby. She is a Mafia princess, he is a guy from the wrong side of the tracks who just killed his father after the man killed his mother. Wicked just wanted to make sure his beloved younger sister, Poppy, is safe.

Shortly after Wicked pulls the trigger on his father, an unknown man in a suit shows up with cops. He tells Wicked and Poppy to pack a bag and come with him. He ended up taking them to his house, where he introduces Ruby to Wicked and Poppy. Ruby and wicked are both 17, Poppy is 14. Papa leaves, after warning Wicked away from Ruby, which, how well do you think that’s going to work?

So, Papa takes Wicked away for a little while, so that he can get into La Famiglia. When Wicked comes back, Ruby notices that he is different. They had had an explosive interlude before he left, but he’s not the same guy now. And he’s put in charge of her security. Instead of a gala, Ruby ditches him and runs off to the family’s lake house for a party, where Poppy is too. But then, something happens, and Poppy disappears. Wicked shows up, and he takes Ruby with him to try to find Poppy.

I like Ruby. She has a lot going on. She might look and act like the perfect Mafia Princess, but she is a lot smarter than people give her credit for, I think. She’s also a bit more ruthless than other people think she is. She is strong and she owns herself and her power. She will also do whatever she needs to do to protect her family, and frankly, I wouldn’t want to get in her way.

Wicked. Hmmmm. Sometimes I hated him, sometimes I didn’t. He is a very interesting character, no matter how I feel about him. He is very cagy. He would be a great chess player, I think. He would probably know all the moves from all the games you might play with him at any point.

There was a lot happening in this book, and yeah, it was good and it did keep me interested, so that’s all good. Go check it out. Happy reading!

K Webster-Teacher of Nothing

K is back and she has brought us one of her delightfully filthy age gap, teacher/student stories. Teacher of Nothing introduces us to a new family, and I expect that we’ll be seeing more of this family in the future, but for right now, it’s all Callum and Willa.

Callum is a high school teacher. A big part of why he is a teacher is to spite his dad. Callum’s family basically owns the town that they live in, and all of his siblings have done what Daddy Dearest wanted with their lives. But there are a lot of reasons why Callum wants to spite his dad. The biggest one being that Dear Old Dad fucked Callum’s HS girlfriend, got her pregnant, and married her. In fact, Callum’s twin half-sibs are now students at his school. He seems to get along with them well enough. His nephew is also a student at the school, and the kids are all good friends.

Then there is Willa. She is a student in Callum’s stats class. She is really smart, but nearly invisible, except to her asshole step-brother who is a huge fucking creep, and I mean, huge. He bullies her at school, he bullies her at home. But Willa only has eyes for her teacher. And he only has eyes for her.

Callum can’t get Willa off his mind. He stares at her during class, he does what he can to make her life easier. The problem is that he doesn’t want to be like his dad, and screw an 18 year old like his dad did. But he is just drawn to Willa and nothing seems to distract him from her.

I get Callum being mad at his dad, but I kinda feel like it’s been nearly 20 years, maybe it’s time to just let it go. I mean, there are a lot of other reasons he’s angry with his dad, and I totally get those, but the whole fucking Callum’s girlfriend deal shouldn’t really be one of them. At least in my opinion.

I think Willa is doing the absolute best that she can. Until Callum came along, she really had no one on her side. Her step-father is a monster, her mother is a druggie, and her step-brother is weirdly fascinated with her. She’s been on her own for too long. Callum’s younger relatives take her under their wings, which helps her just as much as Callum being into her did. It was good for her to have people her age around her, and they helped in many ways.

Skye Warren-Two for the Show

Skye has given us the second book in Eva and Finn’s series with Two for the Show. This is part of the larger Morelli/Constantine series. There is also a connection to the book I reviewed last week by Skye and Amelia Wilde because Carter, the MMC in that book, is Eva’s brother. It’s a small world in this universe.

As a quick refresher, Eva is a Morelli, and she keeps her family running well. Her mother wants to worry her off, Eva doesn’t want it. Finn comes to a party where Eva is and is being badgered by her mom. Finn talks Eva into running away with him. Eventually, they end up faking an engagement to get people off her back. Finn isn’t worried because he’s never getting married due to the family curse.

OK, from here is stuff about this one. There will probably be some spoilers, but as usual, I will try to keep the spoilers down. I make no guarantees though, so if you are interested in this but you haven’t read the first one yet, then be careful. You have been warned.

So, Finn has just basically eviscerated Eva, and she feels like her heart has been ripped out of her chest. She’s holding it together, but not well. Plus, she found out some really interesting news right after Finn told her to sling her hooks. There’s just so much going on, and she isn’t sure how to deal with it, so she’s focusing on her sister’s wedding, which of course, Eva planned. It’s going well when all of a sudden, Finn walks in, and the world basically crashes down.

Finn is dealing with his own reactions to his actions. He keeps trying to tell himself that he did the right thing, and every time he sees his dad, he’s just more and more convinced that he did the right thing. No matter how horrible he feels about it. Then he walks into a wedding reception and everything changes.

I feel like Eva has so much on her shoulders. She takes on so much, and she really does hold all the Morelli offspring together, I think. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but other people in her family should step up too. Although Leo is always there for her, threatening to kill any men who upset her. I like that she really isn’t a damsel in distress. While having Finn rush in to rescue her from her mother isn’t a bad thing, it isn’t a necessary thing. She really can hold her own. At least in public, most of the time. I also like that she calls Finn on his bullshit. Which is good, because he needs someone to do that.

I mostly like Finn. I think that he is a good man. He really does have the weight of the world on his shoulders, and while his little brother does try to help, Finn is hiding the secret so hard that it is just impossible to do much else. I do feel sorry for him that he has to deal with this so much. I am angry at him about some things though. I think he’s just so fatalistic about what is coming that he sees it as a foregone conclusion and isn’t willing to fight it for himself. I think that he should get all the testing, evaluations, imaging, whatever he can have done. He’s superrich, and he can afford to have it all done.

OK, that’s all for this one. Go check it out! Happy reading!

Amelia Wilde & Skye Warren-Force of Nature

So, Force of Nature is the next part of the series after The Crash, which is a prequel novella. If you haven’t read The Crash, don’t worry, it’s included in this. And I have one very important thing to say about this book and that is that I hope that Skye and Amelia are working really hard on the next book and that it will be out soon, because damn.

So, Carter and June have crashed on the deserted island, and there is someone after them. Carter pulls June into the jungle before the bad guys come, because they are coming. But when he runs out to get supplies from the crashed plane, someone shows up, and Carter ends up doing what he does best.

Carter is developing feelings for June, even though he knows that he shouldn’t. She’s too sweet, innocent, and naive to be part of his world, and she’s not in the mission parameters, but there’s still something about her.

What Carter doesn’t tell June immediately is that they aren’t the only people on the island. They’ve been following trails, manmade trails. Carter doesn’t know what to think about that.

Theo’s mom left the world many years ago and brought her son to this deserted island so that he wasn’t ruined by the outside world. He’s supposed to wait for the cities of men to burn and then help repopulate the world with pure people.

Carter is interesting. I think that he thinks that he is more evil than he really is. I mean, he’s a Morelli, so there is some evilness there, but I think that he has a worse view of himself than is really there. He is very determined and a little obsessive, I think. And able to lie to himself convincingly.

I like June. For all that she looks all sweet and innocent, she really isn’t. She has a lot of guts and determination. She isn’t going to let Carter down, and she isn’t going to complain, even when her feet are cut open and bleeding. I have some mad respect for her.

I don’t have much of an opinion on Theo yet. I mean, yeah, we get to see him interact with Carter and June, but I feel like he’s still a bit of a blank slate.

Anyway, that’s all for this one. Go check it out! Happy reading!

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