Review: Goddess with a Blade (Goddess With A Blade Series Book 1) by Lauren Dane

Goddess with a Blade by Lauren Dane
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really love the main female character in this book, Rowan Summerthwaite. Rowan is a woman who has given her life up to the service of others. She is the vessel for the goddess Brigid, and as such serves during rituals and blessings. Raised from infancy by the First vampire she was taught with ruthless efficiency to be a perfect weapon and servant. Then she found out that her foster father had her parents killed. She was just a teenager and ran to Brigid’s Motherhouse for safety and became a hunter of vampires for revenge and in service once more the unaware human population.

I loved the world-building in this book. There is a careful treaty between vampires and hunters, where punishments are laid out on both sides and tribunals govern over disputes of actions taken by both parties. Hunters like Rowan are the blades that execute the vampires that go rogue. I love the idea of checks and balances between humanity and vampires.

Rowan covers Las Vegas and is returning after an absence of 8 months, during which she was being questioned by a series of tribunals and committees after killing the previous Scion of Las Vegas. She has returned to a new Scion who has taken a very deadly broom to the vampires left to him. He has got a ruthless grip on business for the Vampire Nation. The new Scion, Clive, is 500 years old and was born a vampire. He’s British and very proper, Rowan is not and when they meet sparks fly. Those sparks inevitably lead to them bumping uglies, despite themselves.

There is a series of brutal murders taking place in Las Vegas that have been brought to Rowan’s attention. Young women, junkies, are being murdered in a vicious manner and very obviously by a vampire. It’s up to Rowan to discover the murderer before vampires become exposed to the world, which breaks the Treaty.

This is a really enjoyable book with lots of wonderfully detailed world-building. There are also some really interesting characters that have depth and realism. This is a great first book in a series and introduces the world and the characters really well. I’ll definitely be reading the rest of this series.

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Review: Destiny Rising (Destiny Series Book 2) by CJ Cooke

Destiny Rising by C.J. Cooke
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Gripping Story

This book follows on immediately after the end of Book 1. The last part of the previous book was really good and this book definitely built on that. The story flies along at a great rate and is filled with emotion and passion.

The final scenes of the last book leave echoes of pain as the remnants of the student body and staff must find their way to safety. The only people capable of keeping them safe are Aria’s Elite, so they make their way to pack land in the hopes of evading the demons that destroyed the academy.

What they find isn’t as safe as they hoped with Pack politics making it an insecure place for Aria and her mates. Her magic is becoming stronger and more evident and the Pack Seer has information about who she is and where she needs to go to get more information. It seems Aria and her mates are going on a trip.

Now free of the academy structure this story comes to life. We are in the realms of an epic fantasy series as the protagonist goes on a quest through unknown lands to find the solution to the world’s problems.

There are plenty of battles, lots of passion and fascinating cultures. This book is a fantastic read and I can’t believe the cliffhanger! Thankfully the next book is already out.

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Review: Snow and the Shadows (Roteran Shadows Series Book 1) by Cara Carnes

Snow and the Shadows by Cara Carnes
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Not Enough Depth

I’d probably give this book 3.5 ⭐️ if I could.

I really wanted to like this book more than I did. It started with lots of promise. I really liked my initial introduction to Snow, a slave, born to another slave, who’s father was the king. Trapped on an old space ship, travelling around empty space for years at a time, with only a single caregiver and three guards. Of course, her guards trained her to fight, because what else were they going to do for years at a time floating through space.

One day their ship is boarded and everyone except her is killed. Her father and his new bride are there to make sure that she can’t access a well of power, which the Queen currently holds sole power over. Of course, Snow can, but she hides it, with the aid of seven Shadows. The Shadows are ruthless fighters from a neutral empire and Snow is surprised to find them in the employ of her step-mother. The Shadows take away Snow with orders to sell her at the slave market. Only they don’t do as they are told and in actual fact are there to rescue Snow because of her access to the Well.

This book had lots of ingredients that should have made it an excellent book. The general outline of the world-building, the magic system and the general outline of the characters and plot are all excellent until you dig down into it. I felt like this book sketched across what could have been really good, instead of layering the characters and plot with lots of interactions, they were skimmed over. This meant I didn’t really connect with the characters and the further into the book I got, the less I cared about them.

If you just look at the ingredients of this book it should have been 4-4.5 ⭐️, but when you actually read it, I can’t see it being more than 3.5 ⭐️ because there simply wasn’t enough depth to everything to make me care. I think if I hadn’t had such high hopes for this book I would have enjoyed it more, but because it didn’t fulfil the potential I am more annoyed than entertained and thus gave it a lower rating than if I’d not read any reviews and came into it cold. Part of me feels guilty for that, but not enough to give it more of a positive review, sorry Ms Carnes!

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Review: Destiny Awakened (Destiny Series Book 1) by CJ Cooke

Destiny Awakened by C.J. Cooke
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Great Start To A New Series

It’s always tough to start a series in a way that doesn’t overwhelm the reader with details but still allows the story to grow. This novel manages that, and what is even more impressive is that this is a debut novel, as well as a start to a series.

Aria is a 20-year-old college student, who sidelines as a cat burglar who’s work helps abused women get away from the men who abuse them. It’s a noble endeavour, that also pays her bills well and allows her to practice using her magic. Abandoned as a baby and slung into the system, she has been through a lot in her life, but she is happy with where she is now, helping other people, saving money, having fun challenging herself and helping out at the gym that helped her survive when she was young.

Her nice stable life, with enough excitement to contain her magic safely, is turned upside down when new legislation is passed enforcing all half breed magic users to leave the Earth realm and go to train with full supernaturals. No one has ever seen her kind of magic before and when she arrives at the academy she is still an outsider until she meets three gorgeous shifters who know she is something special.

This book has a lot going for it. It’s got a great strong main female character, who is confident and strong, with enough legitimate insecurities to make her relatable without being weak. I love that her magic is tied to her combat skills, which she has spent years honing. She has worked hard to achieve her strength and the magic just builds on that. She doesn’t go from ordinary human to crazy strong magic user with no foundation.

I also like the other characters, mainly the guys she meets, Kyle, the alpha of their small pack, Sykes and Liam. These three shifters are also strong but have their own flaws, though these don’t weaken them. I especially like Britt, the shifter who Aria protects and then trains. Britt is vulnerable because her society has deemed her a weak female that must be protected and controlled. Aria shows her another path that she grabs with both hands.

One of the things I wasn’t as keen on was the choice of using an academy and then half hearting it. There was very little structure to the academy and the teachers were very lax and more like friends than teachers. They were able to do pretty much what they wanted, when they wanted and Aria became a mentor, rather than receiving training herself. It felt like a plot device to get everyone together in one place, rather than a natural part of the story. I felt that the headmaster and Caleb the combat trainer were weak characters until they got outside the academy structure and then they became much more believable, because as teachers they weren’t. Once we were outside the ‘structure’ of the academy the story came to life for me.

This book is a great start for a new writer, and I love the characters so much that the plot wobbles didn’t bother me that much. I will definitely be continuing with the story because I really want to know what happens to them all next.

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Review: Wildflower (Cricket Kendall Series Book 2) by Willow Hadley

Wildflower by Willow Hadley
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sweet NA RH Paranormal Romance

This book continues immediately after the first book in the series and carries on being sweet to the max. All the characters are lovely, though there are some really caustic girls at the school who seem to really dislike all the attention Cricket’s getting.

Nothing much happens in this book except we get to see more of the characters and Cricket’s relationships with Theo, Hollis and Cas gets more heated and involved.

One thing that does happen is that Cricket makes more friends. She has expanded her social circle outside of her guys and the people she makes friends with are all quite interesting in different ways.

Everything is building up to her 18th birthday when everyone believes her mate marks will appear, swiftly followed by Mabon when she will have her ‘coming out’ celebration of achieving her powers.

I don’t know why I’m enjoying these books so much, probably because it reminds me of teenage high school drama books of yesteryear, however, there isn’t much drama between Cricket and her guys. It’s pretty soap-opera-like, but in the good sucking you in way.

I’m kind of annoyed the next book isn’t out yet, because I’m enjoying being in Cricket’s happy little world at the moment and don’t want to come out quite yet.

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