Category: Book Review
Spinning Gold by Vivi Andrews
(Cover picture courtesy of NetGalley.)
No princes need apply.
Juliana Ravel will do anything to save her innocent brother from the executioner, but what the supposedly charming prince demands is impossible. Spinning straw into gold? He might as well ask her to fly. Her only hope is a family heirloom – a gold medallion rumored to be the magic prison of one of the fabled golden fae.
Trapped inside the medallion for hundreds of years, Rue isn’t fool enough to trust Juliana, but he can’t help but be tempted by the feisty beauty. Even though she is the spitting image of the witch who betrayed and imprisoned him, Rue agrees to help her. For a price.
Entranced by the exotic, golden-skinned man, Juliana agrees to his terms, believing her worries are at an end. But when the tyrannical prince finds her surrounded by riches, he isn’t about to let her walk away – instead holding her prisoner within the corrupt court. Juliana’s only freedom is her nights with Rue, where their negotiations turn to seduction, and together they construct a desperate plot to escape a life where they must keep spinning gold… or die.
[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]
I’m generally suspicious of fairytale retellings, especially Rumpelstiltskin ones, but the blurb for Spinning Gold was irresistible. It sounded like a wonderfully unique retelling that was well-written with great world-building. For once my impressions from the blurb were right! Spinning Gold is a great Rumpelstiltskin retelling and it even explains how we got our ugly little man idea from the ‘real story’.
Unlike so many female main characters in fairytale retellings, Juliana is an amazingly strong narrator that carries the whole book on her shoulders. She’s not passive when her brother is accused of being a traitor and instead bargains with what is essentially her own life with the evil prince to save him. When she promises that she can spin straw into gold, she knows she may be only buying herself and her brother a trip to the executioner, but that night in her cell she discovers something amazing: her family amulet. When she cries on it, Rue springs forth and almost kills her, believing her to be her great-grandmother, the woman who trapped him inside it in the first place. Not exactly a great start to a relationship but they eventually work things out and Rue spins gold for Juliana, which brings her more trouble than she bargained for as now the evil prince wants to marry her.
Still, despite the threat to her life from being at court, she is drawn to Rue in her dreams and finds herself slowly falling in love with the mysterious man. At the same time, she tries to continue what her brother started with the rebellion to overthrow the prince. But being the prince’s fiance doesn’t make that easy in the slightest. So you can see why Juliana is one of my favourite narrators: she doesn’t just sit by. Rue is also one of my favourite love interests because he’s tortured and untrusting of Juliana but it’s actually for a good reason. As he slowly warms up to her, the romance between them explodes but remains believable.
The world-building in this is fantastic! I don’t want to spoil too much by saying that Rue’s bargain with Juliana is nothing like the Rumpelstiltskin story we know, but does actually resemble it in some aspects. So where did the Rumpelstiltskin legend we know today come about? Well, let’s just say that the un-charming prince and his adviser Torlemain were excellent spin doctors and leave it at that. As for how Rue is able to spin straw into gold, that’s also part of Vivi Andrews’ amazing world-building in her fantasy world.
The plot isn’t frantically paced, but rather slowly speeds up as the book goes along. For a short book that’s awesome and none of the character development or world-building is sacrificed in the process. At the same time, you won’t be able to put Spinning Gold down. The romance between Rue and Juliana is sizzling and there are so many plot twists your head will be left spinning by the end. Yet the plot twists still make sense and I love how Vivi Andrews hinted at them a little but not enough to spoil the fun at the end.
So to recap: Spinning Gold is a great fairytale retelling with believable characters, awesome world-building and a fast-paced plot that will keep you reading into the early morning hours.
I give this book 5/5 stars.
Slumber by Tamara Blake
(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)
Once upon a time, Ruby believed in magic…
When Ruby volunteers to take her mother’s housecleaning shift at the gothic Cottingley Heights mansion, she thinks it’s going to be business as usual. Clean out the fridge, scrub toilets, nothing too unusual. But nothing could prepare her for the decadent squalor she finds within. Rich people with more money than sense trashing their beautiful clothes and home just because they can. After the handsome Tam discovers her cleaning up after him and his rich friends, Ruby has never felt more like a character from her sister’s book of fairy tales.
Tam sees beyond Ruby’s job and ratty clothes, and sweeps her off her feet, treating her like a real princess, but Ruby is sure this beautiful boy is too good to be true. And as one tragedy after another befalls Ruby and her family, Ruby painfully learns that magic is all too real, and it always comes with a price.
[Full disclosure: I received a free ARC ebook through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]
I decided to request Slumber through NetGalley despite my misgivings about it being a typical Cinderella fairytale romance where fairies are only said to be vicious but are actually pretty tame. Boy, was I wrong.
Tamara Blake’s fairies go back to the roots of their legends and are really, truly vicious bordering on sadistic. Well, maybe passing into sadistic quite frequently rather than just bordering on it. They live a spoiled party life and have exactly zero morals or qualms about treating humans like dirt for their own amusement. It doesn’t take Ruby long to figure this out and although she slips down to their level a couple of times she actually comes out of the story with her human values intact. Trust me, considering she lived with the fae in Cottingley for a while, that is an enormous accomplishment.
Ruby was an awesome narrator. She falls in love with Tam slowly but never, ever puts her love for him ahead of her family. When her family gets in trouble and she learns that living with him at Cottingley is her only choice, she does. And although she loses sight of her goal through something not entirely her own fault, she remains loyal to her family in the end. As I said, she still retains her values by the end and I was incredibly impressed with that. So many narrators in YA books lose sight of their old lives when they’re swept up into a magical world of parties and riches, but not Ruby! She was truly amazing and carried the story on her shoulders.
At the same time the plot was actually quite fast-paced without leaving out character development. There is no sort of middle bloat as the middle is actually where Ruby discovers that she’s the cause of her mother’s illness and that there’s only one way to save her life. And just when you think things have settled down at the end, Tamara Blake threw a huge twist into the happy ending that leaves me with no doubt there’s a sequel coming. Tam and Ruby’s story isn’t finished and I can’t wait for the sequel, even though Slumber was technically just published three days ago.
I give this book 5/5 stars.
*Only available as an ebook.
Shadows by J. Dorothy
(Cover picture courtesy of Authors to Watch.)
An intimate, gripping Fantasy Romance you will want to savor even as you race through the pages to find out what is really going on.
Jo is about to marry James.
He is standing outside, waiting for her to come down for the ceremony to begin. She can see him through the window. Jo’s brother, Spencer, is there too, talking and joking with James to calm his nerves.
Then Jo’s sorceress aunt, Rowellyn, appears and informs Jo she will never marry James. She must go back in time and undo everything that has happened between them.
Whatever Jo does, her life will be unbearable, but if she does exactly as Rowellyn asks, the lives of her friends and family will be spared. If, however, she refuses to go back, or tells anyone what is happening, James will die.
Jo has no choice. She takes one last longing look at James through the window. She will now have to arrange for James to fall in love with someone else – the vengeful Rowellyn demands it.
But, as Jo will soon discover, in the land of illusion, nothing is certain.
If you enjoy ‘Shadows’, you might also enjoy the prequel, ‘Reflections’, the story of how Jo and James fell in love and of Jo’s first encounters with Rowellyn’s dark magic.
[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook from J. Dorothy in exchange for an honest review.]
Sorcery? Time travel? A realistic romance? Shadows had pretty much everything going for it in terms of what I like to see in fantasy, but it fell flat in some respects.
That’s not to say that I didn’t enjoy it overall. I loved how even though Jo was broken-hearted at being sent back to the past to break up her relationship with James, the man she was going to marry, she stayed pretty strong. Jo was a great character in that despite her best efforts, she could not let go of the man she loved. That’s loyalty right there! And her desperate attempts to defeat Rowellyn definitely made me cheer for her every single step of the way. Along with other three dimensional characters like James, Spencer and Beth, Jo really gave it her all and it was such an enjoyable story for that reason alone.
I liked the whole time travel aspect, but I felt it wasn’t adequately explained at all. How did Rowellyn come by these powers? What on Earth does the curse do to make someone a sorceress and why does it always isolate the other sister? What’s the history behind making sorceresses? Is there some sort of reason the other sister has to suffer as well? These were all touched on, but definitely were not explained to my satisfaction. I felt that there was so much more potential for world-building and giving Rowellyn depth here that J. Dorothy missed out on. At the same time, the things that were explained like sorceress’ time travel powers were fascinating and felt like a glimpse of the potential of the novel.
For the most part, the pacing was awesome. We still got to see Jo suffer and develop as a character but the plot did move on fairly constantly. There was enough action to keep me interested, but not so much that the character development suffered. However, when it came to the climax J. Dorothy seemed to be rushed to finish the book because after the reasonable pace of the rest of the book the frantic pace of the end was a let-down. Of course the climax should be faster, but I still don’t fully understand the ending. I would have loved for a little more explanation of well, everything.
Overall, Shadows was good but maybe it would have been a good idea for me to read Reflections (the prequel) first or for J. Dorothy to explain a little more.
I give this book 3/5 stars.
*Only available as a Kindle ebook
Reign of Blood by Alexia Purdy
(Cover picture courtesy of Alexia Purdy’s Blog.)
“Never tease anything that wants to eat you. My name is April Tate and my blood is the new gold. Vampires and hybrids have overrun my world, once vibrant with life, but now a graveyard of death shrouded in shadows. I fight to survive; I fight for my mother and brother. The journey is full of turns that I am quite unprepared for. And I’m just hoping to make it to the next Vegas sunrise…”
In a post-apocalyptic world, a viral epidemic has wiped out most of the earth’s population, leaving behind few humans but untold numbers of mutated vampires. April is a seventeen-year-old girl who lives in the remains of Las Vegas one year after the outbreak. She has become a ferocious vampire killer and after her family is abducted, she goes searching for them. What she finds is a new breed of vampire, unlike any she has seen before. Unsure of whom she can trust, she discovers that her view of the world is not as black and white as she once thought, and she’s willing to bend the rules to rescue her family. But in trying to save them, she may only succeed in bringing her fragile world crashing down around her.
[Full disclosure: I was sent a free ebook by Alexia Purdy in exchange for an honest review.]
With the vampire over-saturation of only a couple of years ago, it’s difficult to write about vampires. What’s even harder in general is reading about vampires as I love vampires that are portrayed as stone cold killing machines. Most YA vampires at not like that at all.
However, I was pleasantly surprised by Alexia Purdy’s vampires. There are rabids, which are stone cold killing machines with few emotions or thoughts and then there are vampires as we’ve come to know them: sophisticated, intelligent and strong, but still undeniably human. Both types of vampires drink blood, but with humans in short supply how they adapt is fascinating. The thinking vampires also have a few more traits I found interesting but won’t really get into because they’re spoilers.
What I liked the most about Reign of Blood was April herself. In the beginning, she sees the world in black and white: humans good, vampires evil. Simple, right? Obviously by the end this viewpoint has changed drastically but I love how she changes over a longer period of time. April doesn’t wake up one day and think “Hey, vampires are okay”. No, she gradually comes to befriend some of them and learns that maybe she isn’t entirely innocent herself in this world.
Characters like Blake and Rye were interesting and just when I was getting ready to cringe (two males, one female = love triangle), Alexia Purdy spared me. She even sort of inverted the love triangle trope by the end, but I’m not going to get into that. Either way, Reign of Blood was action-packed but still slow enough that character development and world-building were present. My only complaint about the book is that the dialogue can be quite stiff at times. I don’t know any seventeen-year-old, let alone one that lives with only her mother and baby brother with no human contact, that speaks like that. But the dialogue problem was minor compared to the world-building, character development and pacing.
I give this book 4/5 stars.
Catnip by Valerie Tate
(Cover picture courtesy of The BunsyDawg Diary.)
What can go wrong when an elderly matriarch leaves the family fortune to her cat? Just about everything, including ‘catnapping’ and murder! CATNIP is a mystery set in the picturesque town of Dunbarton, Ontario, and tells the story of what befalls the dysfunctional Dunbar family, and the chaos that ensues, when the matriarch of the clan leaves the family fortune to her cat. That formidable feline proves to be more than a match for the humans in his life, until one fateful night when, caught unawares, he is stuffed in a sack and carried away. A nosy neighbor with a nasty, suspicious mind points the finger of suspicion at the Dunbars and Christopher Mallory, the young attorney who is the trustee of the estate, and under the terms of the will, they face losing everything. When a murder occurs, Christopher finds himself confronting a ruthless killer who would do anything to conceal his or her identity, including to kill again.
[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook copy from Valerie Tate in exchange for an honest review.]
I’ll admit that I was more than a little skeptical about this book. I mean, mystery novels really aren’t my thing in general but such a cliché-sounding novel definitely didn’t sound like my thing. Still, I gave it a try because I’ll give practically any book a chance.
Imagine my surprise and delight when Catnip was nothing like I expected! Sure at first the Dunbar family seems like your typical dysfunctional rich family, but they do actually grow out of that mould. Alice, the constantly complaining but beautiful wife actually grows up a bit after Amanda Dunbar (the grandmother) dies and she’s allowed to be free. James Dunbar grows out of his role as the henpecked, spineless husband and takes charge in his business which until that point had been doing poorly. And Alicia stopped waiting for her prince charming, waking up from her daze.
Chris, the sort of main character, also changes quite a bit from his role as impersonal lawyer and executor of Amanda Dunbar’s estate. At first his relations with the Dunbar family were tense to say the least, but I was so happy to see him grow out of that role as he began to see things from their perspectives as well. Marmalade the cat behaves like a typical cat, leading me to believe that Valerie Tate either owns or used to own a cat (as much as one can ‘own’ a cat).
Not only did I get a kick out of the characters and how they all grew, I absolutely loved the plot. In the beginning I thought I would easily be able to predict the end because it sounded a lot like other catnapping mysteries having to do with inheritance. I was wrong! Thankfully, Valerie Tate mostly stayed away from clichés and put her own twists on the ones she did use. Trust me, it will be hard to predict the ending after the twists and turns she puts you through. Overall, Catnip was an unpredictable whirlwind and if you do pick it up (which I highly recommend) you won’t be able to put it down.
I give this book 5/5 stars.