Elizabeth Drakes's Site

Fantasy Romance

Book Review

Book Review: Romancing the Duke

by

RomancingtheDuke
Romancing the Duke by Tessa Dare

As said by one of the greats, and quoted often:

“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.”
― Stephen King

But as a writer, I need to do more than just consume fiction. Consuming it is easy. But much like watching great movies doesn’t make me a screenwriter, I also need to do more than read great books. I need think about what makes them great. To understand what I liked about them, and even what I dislikes about them. But more than that, I need to think about the how and why the author does what they do.

Tessa Dare is an amazing author, so I decided to really think through one of her books. I just finished this one, and it is was a nice read. I started it on Friday night and finished it on Saturday morning.

As a said, it’s a solid read, and I would recommend it.

As I think through it, here are a few things she did particularly well I can learn from:

  • She doesn’t reveal things too quickly. Why is the heroine afraid of the dark? You’ll find out, but not too quickly. And when you do, it moves the romance along. She does this repeatedly, seeding story points early and bringing them to fruition later.

 

  • Her characters are not perfect. The heroine isn’t insurmountably beautiful. The hero is scarred. Literally. And blind. She uses this to build tension naturally. There are very few external events, which is perfect.

 

  • She uses these flaws to create tension. The characters do talk to each other, and sometimes they say mean things. But this fits with the flaws. Never too much to make them irredeemable, but you can see them working through their pain and flaws to earn their happily-ever-after.

 

  • Her characters all have agency. Each one chooses their path. They act with self-interest as well. Sometimes blatantly, but never maliciously so you still love them.

 

  • Her steamy scenes are concise but impactful.

 

Reading the work of a master always helps with your own work. Building a world. Crafting a story. I am particularly mindful of how she builds those character flaws and allows them to guide the story.

Something more for me to ponder.

Book Review: Uprooted

by

Book: Uprooted

Author: Namoi Novik

Recommendation: Do not start this book until you have a whole day to devote to finishing it

Uprooted.png
Uprooted

 

This book was recommended to me as a fantasy romance. It is NOT. It is still a fabulous book.

It’s so amazing, I stayed up until 3am trying to finish it. I couldn’t. I barely slept as the characters danced through my dreams, and once I woke up Saturday morning, I sat down and finished it.

There’s a grown-up in me somewhere, but she hides when I sink into a book this good.

The book is intense. The author hooks you in the beginning and never once gives you a spot to put a bookmark. It’s a heck of a ride.

 

Characters

I love the characters. They are rich and varied. The story is told in first person, and you really get a feel for the heroine. She’s not always brave, or beautiful, or cultured. I love that. She isn’t perfect. No one in the story is.

  • The prince slays a chimera, acts like an entitled jerk, and yet is still the 8 year-old-boy who lost his mother and is willing to sacrifice anything to get her back.
  • The powerful wizard who can’t connect to anyone or anything.
  • The best friend who was supposed to be perfect but then isn’t chosen and both resents not being chosen and is relieved she isn’t.

There is so much here it’s amazing. People are flawed, and those flaws have prices to themselves and those around them.

The only part I disliked was the some side characters I wanted to see live died. This is not a romance novel, but it’s not Game of Thrones, either.

 

Plot

The plot is intense. It grips you in the beginning, and what I thought was going to be the climactic rescue ends up being just another plot point about a quarter of the way through the story. Seriously intense.

But you get your ending, and it’s a good one.

 

 World Building

Truly spectacular. This is one of the strongest points of the book, and it has so many of them. Enough of the familiar mixed with the new that she creates something fresh but still wholly relatable.

 

Are there any bad things about the book? The only downside for me was I was looking for a comfortable fantasy romance. Instead, I got sucked into a hard core fantasy novel with all of the sadness and pain that they’re known to inflict on their characters.

There’s a reason I’m a romance reader and writer! I like the other stuff, and this was truly spectacular, but I felt so wrung out when it was over that I decided to clean the house! You know how much I love doing that.

If true fantasy is your genre, I’d say pick it up and give it a read. Days later, the plot and characters are still teasing around in my head so much they’re making my own writing difficult. I truly loved the story. It is powerful, riveting, and moving. But it also take a lot out of you.

 

Book Review: A Talent for Trickery

by

Book: A Talent for Trickery

Author: Alissa Johnson

Recommendation: Solid Read

TalentTrickery
Fun, sassy book

I was looking for a fun book to pass a cold and rainy evening. This book checked a lot of boxes for me, and it didn’t disappoint in the execution.

Characters

I thoroughly enjoyed the characters.

Owen, the hero, was a white knight. He was not your typical alpha male, always knowing best. He stumbled, made mistakes, but at his core, he was always good and trying to do what was best. He was competent, smart, but not invincible. You also understood why he struggled not to always take charge.

Lottie, the heroine, was smart and savvy. She had a hard upbringing with a criminal father involving his children in his schemes. She’s come a long way, but trust doesn’t come easily for her. I also loved her relationship with her siblings

All of the supporting characters are excellent. Owen’s two men I’m sure will feature in future stories. Esther, Lottie’s sister, is a complex and developed character. More than that, the author focuses on the sisters’ relationship. How they argue, keep secrets, and try to protect each other. Esther is not just tacked on for a bridge into a sequel. No fighting over a man, either, thank goodness!

I really enjoyed the playful banter as well. The characters laughed and teased, even in some of the tense scenes as Lottie comes to terms with her past (as real people do).

Plot

The romantic plot was solid. Lottie might have forgiven the hero over past wrongs a tad easily, but I also applaud the author for not dragging it out interminably. And the reasoning behind the forgiveness did not require me to suspend disbelief.

This is a mystery romance, and the mystery seemed solid to me. I was surprised by the villain at the the end, but not unduly so, and all of the clues leading up to it kept me turning the pages.

Steamy Scenes

This was by far the weakest bit. There was one, it wasn’t bad, but it was pretty forgettable.

 

All in, well worth the read. It gave me the happily-ever-after I demand, and it was sweet without sending me into sugar shock. I liked the characters, and it featured a white knight hero. All in, a good read.

 

Book Review: Promise of Fire

by

Book: Promise of Fire

Author: Amanda Bouchet

Recommendation: Buy this book when you have time to read it in one sitting.

PromiseofFire.PNG
Book is as awesome as the cover.

You know I don’t always give glowing reviews, so when I do, the book deserves it.

I will start out with I was a little turned off that the author wrote in first person present tense. It’s jarring, but after the first few pages, I didn’t care.

This is also a trilogy. I didn’t read the first book until the whole set was out.

 

Blurb

KINGDOMS WILL RISE AND FALL FOR HER…
BUT NOT IF SHE CAN HELP IT

Catalia “Cat” Fisa lives disguised as a soothsayer in a traveling circus. She is perfectly content avoiding the danger and destiny the Gods-and her homicidal mother-have saddled her with. That is, until Griffin, an ambitious warlord from the magic-deprived south, fixes her with his steely gaze and upsets her illusion of safety forever.

Griffin knows Cat is the Kingmaker, the woman who divines the truth through lies. He wants her as a powerful weapon for his newly conquered realm-until he realizes he wants her for much more than her magic. Cat fights him at every turn, but Griffin’s fairness, loyalty, and smoldering advances make him increasingly hard to resist and leave her wondering if life really does have to be short, and lived alone.

 

Spoiler Free Review

Characters

Cat, the main character, makes the story. She’s strong yet vulnerable in all the right ways. Looking for family. Looking for happiness, and not sure she can have either after a horrible childhood. Her camaraderie with the other characters really shines through as the story progresses.

The hero, Griffin, is a lot more your generic alpha male lead, but the story isn’t about him. We always see him through Cat’s eyes, so I think that makes it much tougher to develop him. This doesn’t mean he’s cardboard flat, he’s just not as awesome as Cat.

 

Plot

As this is a trilogy, I have a feeling the plot will get more developed in the next books. At the moment, the plot was simply for Griffin to round up some Magoi to help him and his family that have recently staged a coup and taken the throne from a tyrant. They’re now trying to figure out how to lead a nation after leading warrior tribes.

 

World Building

This is pretty spectacular. The world is based on the Greek mythology. Basically, Zeus makes the world for one of his children. That child is then murdered by his three children, and the world is divided into three kingdoms.

You have the traditional pantheon of the gods, Zeus, Poseidon, Hades etc. and a few more interesting characters. Magic has a huge role in the world, with the magic and the magic users being strongest in the frozen north, closest to Mt. Olympus.

 

All in, this book was so good that once I started it, I got yelled at by my family to put it down because I had tuned all of them out as I read. I also found the characters doing cartwheels through my own thoughts and making it difficult for me to write my own stuff. That’s a good book.

4 Reasons Why I Write Book Reviews

by

I know, it’s terribly unpopular for authors to write book reviews right now, particularly if the review isn’t favorable.

open old book, a rose in a vase and a feather
Except if you’re an author.

I’ve chosen to write a few reviews anyway, and here are four reasons why.

 

1. I Accept my Limitations

A no point am I going to claim to be an expert. I don’t assign stars, because I don’t feel qualified to do that. I will also not be like Gottlieb at the New York Times reviewing books I don’t love in a genre I don’t love.

I love romance novels, sci fiction and fantasy novels, and books with strong female leads. Because I love them, I feel like I try to give them all a fair shake within the confines of what one expects from the genre.

I don’t review horror books or thrillers or a slew of others because I, personally, don’t love them.

 

2. Validity of Review Process

If I only ever write good things in book reviews, you won’t trust me. My goal is to give a balance interpretation through the lens of my experience. Your interpretation could always vary.  For example, the book North of Need had a few triggers for me. The set-up for the story had the feel of a horror novel to me (being trapped in a snowstorm with a stranger who is much bigger and stronger). Others, didn’t find this triggering. If you didn’t, you might like it more than me.

fairbookreviewmeme
Emphasis on fair.

 

3.  I Learn Something When I Write Them

Sometimes it’s something about myself. Like, I have stranger danger even as an adult. Sometimes, I learn more about story structure.

I love Lisa Kleypas as a romance author. There’s a reason why she’s one of the top names in historical romance. Her characters actually have character (something you don’t always find in romance). She lets women be friends, and sisters be sisters. It’s not all convoluted jealousy that I see too often. Her steamy scenes are very good, and her descriptions are amazing without using tired cliches. Like I said, she’s one of the best. By reading her and studying what I like, I learn a little more. Both for my own work, but also what to look for when selecting a new book.

Same is true of books I don’t like. I can learn a lot about plot and character development by figuring out why I don’t like something. After reading Lisa Kleypas, picking up another author that had every woman jealous of every other woman really brought to light how much I dislike that.

 

4. I Never Post to Amazon

As a fellow author, I don’t post my reviews on Amazon. Partly, because this is against Amazon’s terms and conditions, but more because I don’t ever want a review to be taken as an “attack” against another author.

bad-book-review-meme
A reason to not give a bad review. Unless you’re a certain kind of romance writer.

Honestly, there are times I wish I could call some of the authors and tell them I like their work, but I’d love it if they could fix a few things. Do they want me to beta read for them?

Hubris, clearly, but in my opinion, book like the Queen of Swords could’ve been spectacular instead of just good with a bit of revision. This takes me back to Point 3. I learned a lot by reading Queen of Swords. More than I learned reading all of Lisa Kleypas’s books, probably because she makes it look so effortless.

 

How about you? Do you write book reviews on Amazon, knowing writers need them to succeed? Do you only ever write positive reviews?

Book Review: Queen of Swords

by

Book: Queen of Swords

Author: Katee Roberts

Recommendation: Worth a Read

QueenofSwords

Not sure I’m any more qualified than the next person to leave a review, but I’ll try to give it a shot with a book I recently finished.

No-Spoilers

All in, this sci-fi romance was a decent read.

World-Building

The world-building is spectacular. Seriously, this is by far the best part of the book. The world, the religions, the people. The aliens are truly alien. For example, I love how you can tell one alien’s feelings from how his fur shifts. These are not humans with pointed ears.

The author uses a Tarot deck throughout, and she seems to have really studied up on it. I also love how the force acting through the cars is simply the Lady. You decide if she’s a goddess or Lady Luck.

Sanctify makes a fabulous villain, and the torture techniques they use to “purify” are truly gruesome. Seriously bad villain.

 

Hero and Heroine

The hero and heroine have chemistry. The steamy scenes aren’t memorable, but they’re pretty good.

He’s been through hell and back, though he’s still clearly your protective alpha male. I liked him much more than I thought I would.

The heroine is not a damsel in distress. She is strong, competent, and feisty. Hellcat is used to describe her. More than this, I like the fact she’s comfortable with her sexuality, knows what she wants, and takes it.

 

Story

The plot intrigued me once we got over some plot holes large enough to drive car through trying to get the characters in a situation where they’re stuck together, but I was ready for the author to get on with it around the three-quarter mark. I felt like some of the middle was go-nowhere-filler as we ramped up for the climactic showdown between the hero and his half-brother.

The writing is a bit clumsy at points, particularly in the beginning as the author sets up the entire story line and gets the hero and heroine stuck being together. Sadly, this extends to the smack-upside-the-head way that the author introduces that the heroine is pregnant. Other parts, such as the heroine being able to hack a com terminal, should have been discussed before she actually hacks it.

This is all the more strange as other times the author makes a big deal out of things like sharp sticks being used in the heroine’s hair that never have any purpose.

I was disappointed with the end. I was expecting so much more. The big climactic ending. The heroine and hero standing up and defeating impossible odds together. While we got a happily-ever-after, I didn’t feel that fist pump moment when the hero and heroine win.

As a matter-of-fact, I was really disappointed with how easy the whole ending was and how little the heroine figured into it. I still don’t understand why the hero didn’t do what he did years ago and end the threat his brother posed back then.

The ending also left certain things unresolved. Either the author didn’t tie up loose ends, or she left them loose for the next book in the series. That seriously irritates me. Still, this is a romance, so the hero and heroine do get together.