» paranormal romance author

Kresley Cole… ‘We’re Not Worthy, We’re Not Worthy’

K.C. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 05:12:20 +0000

Kresley Cole is by far one of my favorite paranormal authors. She has it all, witty dialogue, strong female leads, interesting and unique plot lines, and an uncanny ability to maintain continuity in her stories. (I’m practically gushing).

Ms. Cole’s Immortal After Dark Series makes it to the top of my must read paranormal romance list, she has set the stage to be able to write about so many different ‘otherworld’ species. The premise for her series surrounds all species of the lore; vampires, Valkyrie, Witches, Lykae, Demons, Wraiths and so on; all co-existing within our world. Every couple hundred years the immortals must all come to battle in what is termed an ascension, essentially mother nature’s way of ‘culling’ the immortal heard. Currently, her series starts right at the cusp of this ascension and so far the ascension is in the not so distant future.

Her latest installment in the series Kiss of the Demon King was a sizzler! I have to admit the Demon brother (Cade) and the Lykae (Bowen) happen to be my favorite characters. The dialogue is always witty and fun. She has a way of writing male leads that are interesting and sexy without being overly masculine or feminized. Too many authors suffer from what I like to refer to as ‘over-alphamisim.” Where the men turn into raging cave-like beasts who’s sole purpose is to make the women submit to them (ehem, Ms. Lora Leigh). I enjoy this fantasy as much as the next woman, but it can be a bit repetitive, hence why I enjoy Kresley Cole, as she has a way of making her male leads believable even if they are demons or vampires.

My favorite books in her series so far: A Hunger Like No Other (1st full book – she has a short story Playing Easy to Get), Wicked Deeds on a Wicked Night, and Dark Desires After Dusk. To quote my favorite show The Office, “Well, you always left me satisfied and smiling.”

If you’ve read Kresely Cole’s IAD series let us know what you think!

P.S. You just have to love someone that quotes the movie Aliens, only the best movie ever.

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She’s Baaaack: J.R. Ward’s Lover Avenged 4 1/2 Smokinhot Stars

K.C. — Tue, 26 May 2009 01:20:29 +0000

This book was all kinds of awesomeness! J.R. Ward’s 7th installment of Black Dagger Brotherhood series is a roller coaster ride leaving me, as always, wanting more. A quick confession, I absolutely love her as a writer, but her previous 3 releases in this series were not as good as her first 3 books. This book reads a lot like her 3rd book Lover Awakened, which is one of my all time favs. All I have to say is Ward still got it. I could not put this book down had to stay up all night just to finish it.

This is the story of Rehevenge, full time drug lord, pimp, and half sympath. You think you won’t, but you will fall in love with him. Because he’s part sympath, his identity needs to be kept secret- the revelation of which will result in his banishment to a colony for sociopaths aka the Sympath Colony. Ward does such a great job with this character and what he has to do for survival. The love tension with Ehlena, a vampire untainted by corruption, somehow works the opposites attract angle. Rehevenge will risk everything for the people he loves, even it means banishment to the crazy Sympath colony. Ward, again takes you into a whole other world of the Brothers and now the Sympaths.

Spoiler Alert

If you’ve been on any of the forums you might have run across some comments regarding Rehv’s sympath half sister’s intimate relationship with Rehv. His half sister is blackmailing him and as part of his payment he has to have creepy sex with her. This sounds a lot worse then when you actually read it. It really is not a pivotal shock scene (I’ve read worse thanks to Kate Douglas this is NOTHING). It helps to understand his compassion, loyalty and why he would be attracted to Ehelna, a wholesome woman with a good head on her shoulders. I think the Vicious book had way darker undertones that shocked me more.

Things I liked about the book

Rehev’scharacter, you think you won’t, but you will fall in love with him

Action, Action, Action

Major Appearances by John Matthew and Xhex, Wrath

The Symphath Colony

Ehlena rescuing Rhev from the scorpions (this is probably one of the best written action scenes I’ve come across all year)

Things That Could Have Been Better

the focus on the main characters Ehlena and Rehvenge took a back seat to the side characters

The Final Sex Scene: Her main characters had a lot of almost there sexy moments, but the final “act” he has this *ahem barb (cough cough much like Lora Leigh’s Breed Series), it was almost like she blew over it. Blink and you might have missed the sentence all together. I think she needed to expand on this or remove it completely. It was such a pivotalpart as to why he could not be fully intimate with Ehlena, Ward didn’t really offer any explanation or detail, it seemed odd.

This is a small problem throughout her books, she has a hard time keeping “in character” for her extras (characters) mentioned in previous books ex: Mary,(I think she has like 5 sentences with all 7 books combined), Beth, Rhage, Phury, and Vicious. It kind of bugs me when these characters are mentioned they read really 1 dimensional. Her spotlight characters and main supporting characters are always well written. Authors that kick ass keeping their characters in character are Sherrilyn Kenyon and Kresley Cole.

We give this one 4 1/2 Smokinhot stars. A great read filled with sexy moments, great dialogue, and gritty scenes. Sigh, now we have to wait until Oct 09 in order to get our hand on her next series Covet, it’s about angles. Pay close attention to a certain call girl in Rehevenge’s story, she may be the focal point for Covet (unconfirmed).

If you’ve read the book let us know what you thought!

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Newish, Breakout Series From Known Author Nalini Singh

K.C. — Sat, 23 May 2009 22:06:00 +0000

Nalini Singh’s new Angel’s Blood series is for lack of a better phrase deliciously fantastic. (I’m channeling Bravo’s New Jersey housewives series when I say delicious, my super-secret fav series, a dieter’s chocolate cake). Back to Ms. Singh, for those who have not read her she is most known for her Psy-changling series a hybrid of paranormal and futuristic, urban-fantasy.

I must say I was so pleasantly surprised with this new series. It’s not often that an author can switch tactics and not be predictable. This new series is gritty, dark and is reminiscent of Gotham city, only run by mob-esque angels who manage to market immortality through a contract of indentured servitude. The angles are given a ‘territory’ of earth to run and are bloodthirsty, emotionless socio-paths. –a nice twist from the ethereal do-gooders of Christian dogma. Four stars for a new creative storyline for vampire making!!!

Our main character Elena is your typical acidic cop archetype that hunts vampires who have tried to escape their 100 year contract of service to the angels. She meets Raphael when he needs help tracking down a rogue vampire who has turned into a raging serial killer. (*scenes filled with gore and mutilation, yes!) The interactions between Raphael and Elena are interesting and lively, I won’t go into too much detail, but I loved the juxtaposition of her humanity vs. his cold socio-path tendencies. Apparently, we don’t want to live forever. The descriptions of the Angels are what really hit a home run for me. They are so interesting and who doesn’t want to read about people who can fly!

Overall, great plot, good characters, gritty violence and action, steamy sex scenes and a feeling of wanting to read more of the series.

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