Cherry Mischievous: September 2024

Saturday 14 September 2024

SANCTUARY

Sanctuary by Ilona Andrews
Narrated by Chris Brinkley
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Sanctuary:

It’s not easy serving the Chernobog, the God of Destruction, Darkness and Death…especially during the holidays; and especially when you’re out of eggnog and one of your pesky, freeloading mythic creatures has eaten your last cookie.

Roman would like nothing more than to be left alone, but when a wounded boy stumbles into his yard and begs for sanctuary, Roman takes him in. Now elite mercenaries are camped out on his property, combat mages are dousing the house with fire, and strange priests are unleashing arcane magic. They thought Roman was easy pickings, just a hermit in the woods, but they chose the wrong dark priest to annoy. For while Roman might be patient, he is the Black Volhv, filled with the love of his terrible god. For his adversaries, it's a fight to the death, but for him, it's just another day in the neighborhood.

Source: Info in the "About Sanctuary" was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/211202747-sanctuary on 12/04/2024.

Buy Link(s):

My Thoughts:

I've known Roman for a while. Of course, I have! I am an old Kate Daniels fan. What I am not expecting is a Roman angle to the Kate Daniels world! But of course, this is Ilona Andrews were talking about here. So, they make that, not only work, but come out beautiful too! What can I say? And because I am an old die-hard fan of this author duo, I would probably just be fan-girling in this review.

Wonderful and relateable character development! Compelling story telling quality! The world building has been established with the first Kate Daniels book about ten or so years ago, which of course, is beautiful!

Art By: Beardy

Can't wait for the next Roman book to come out!

My only complaint? This book was too short! It was an incredibly short read.

This is my first Chris Brinkley audiobook listen and I would buy his audiobooks again.

Quantitative Evaluation:

Story telling quality = 5
Character development = 5
Story itself = 4
Writing Style = 4.5
Ending = 4.5
World building = 5
Cover art = 4.5
Pace = (4 hrs and 27 mins listening time)
Plot = 4
Narration = 5

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 cherries

Meet The Author

About Ilona Andrews:

Ilona Andrews is the pseudonym for a husband-and-wife writing team. Ilona is a native-born Russian and Gordon is a former communications sergeant in the U.S. Army. Contrary to popular belief, Gordon was never an intelligence officer with a license to kill, and Ilona was never the mysterious Russian spy who seduced him. They met in college, in English Composition 101, where Ilona got a better grade. (Gordon is still sore about that.)

Gordon and Ilona currently reside in Oregon with their two children, three dogs and a cat. They have co-authored two series, the bestselling urban fantasy of Kate Daniels and romantic urban fantasy of The Edge.

www.ilona-andrews.com | twitter | facebook | amazon | goodreads

The Narrator

About Chris Brinkley:

Chris is a narrator, voice actor, writer, producer, NCAA Division I broadcaster, radio personality, and emcee. Brinkley penned the recently released My Story of Us book and audio series. He is also known as the voice of Penny Reid’s Winston Brothers Series, narrating and voicing all six brothers in the popular audiobook collection. Brinkley narrates Reid’s Handcrafted Mystery Series and the Smartypants Romance Green Valley Chronicles. Chris portrays Eliot in the critically acclaimed Audible Original Sweet Talk. He is currently one of the top narrators on Kevin Costner’s HearHere travel app and is heard weekly on the Curio audio journalism app. As the voice of several documentaries seen on the History Channel (D-Day in HD) and PBS, he brings a trustworthiness and credibility to his delivery that captures the essence of the filmmaker’s vision. He co-produced, wrote, and hosted two nationally syndicated radio shows heard on stations throughout the US. With a varied communications background and extensive vocal repertoire, Chris possesses unparalleled experience and unique, vocal versatility.

www.chrisbrinkleystoryteller.com | facebook | instagram | goodreads

FTC Disclosure:
The ebook and audiobook were bought with private funds.
No money received for this review.

Saturday 7 September 2024

THE PREACHER

The Preacher by Nathan Burrows
Book 1 in The Preacher series
Narrated by Bradford Hastings
Genre: crime fiction
Format: ebook & audiobook

About The Preacher:

Who is The Preacher?

Dawn. The English Channel. A small boat arrives crammed with exhausted migrants, not all of whom will make land.

Some of the shattered occupants have already paid for their journeys. Others have arrived with a debt still to be paid. One of the migrants isn't fleeing anything. He's not from Europe, or Africa, or the East. He's from Texas, and he's wearing a robe.

When the traffickers take some of their passengers to pay for their journey, they also take the man in the robe. That was their first mistake.

As the full horror of how the debt is to be repaid emerges, so does the gang's second mistake.

The man in the robe is much more than a preacher.

And this isn't his first rodeo.

Source: Info in the "About The Preacher" was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/126836454-the-preacher on 13/02/2024/2024.

Buy Link(s):

My Thoughts:

I like the supernatural element in the book even if it is just a very tiny bit of the story.

This is my first Nathan Burrows read and I'm glad that I've found him. Will be reading more of his work. Already bought the second book in this series. Although I am not very fond of his writing style where he presents the scene first and then tell the backstory of it later. That means that the first time a reader encounters the "scene", it does not make a lot of sense. It is only later on that it makes sense when the backstory is told. To do this once or twice is fine. But to do this repeatedly is annoying. When I encounter a scene like this, it discourages me from reading on because it does not make a lot of sense to me. Like why would Caleb just let Aleksander rape and even murder Katya if he is supposed to be a kick-ass good guy? That made me stop reading/listening for a while until I forgot my annoyance and picked the book up again. This slowed the reading pace of this book down despite the convenience of the audiobook format.

This is also my first Bradford Hastings audiobook and will be listening to him again.

The audiobook has a bonus novella at the end which is not in the ebook. It is the story of how Caleb started on his journey as a Preacher. I am just wondering if the authorities would put Tommy's death down as a gang rivalry or would they look for some other causes?

Quantitative Evaluation:

Story telling quality = 4.5
Character development = 4.5
Story itself = 4.5
Writing Style = 3
Ending = 3.5
World building = 5
Cover art = 4
Pace = (14 hrs and 41 mins listening time)
Plot = 4
Narration = 5

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5 cherries

Books In The Preacher Series:

Meet The Author

About Nathan Burrows:

Nathan Burrows is a writer based in Norfolk in the east of the United Kingdom.

Primarily a thriller writer, he enjoys writing character based books where the people in them are the most important things. His latest series is The Preacher series featuring a unique hero (or is he an anti-hero?) called Caleb who wanders the world — dressed in a robe.

Nathan has worked in some pretty interesting places over the past twenty-five years including Afghanistan, Iraq, Sierra Leone, Bosnia, and Eastern Europe and is still proud to serve. His travels and adventures have helped with writing many of his books, such as the British Military Thriller series, but you’ll have to work out what’s fact and what’s fiction for yourself!

Writing as N.D. Burrows, he's also the author of a dark comedy trilogy. The first in the series is 'The Butcher', a deliciously funny story about — amongst other things — sausages. The second in the series is 'The Baker', which features Norfolk's most useless cult. And finally, 'The Candlestick Maker' is about a fitness instructor with a difference.

Nathan's a keen reader as well as a writer. He occasionally runs marathons, has a Norwich City football club season ticket, and is the proud part-owner of a Daschund puppy called Bertie.

The Narrator

About Bradford Hastings:

Multi-award-winning audiobook narrator/voice-over artist with more than 20 years of experience in the industry.

With a mother who is a professional public speaker, and a storytelling father, it would be difficult for Bradford not to inherit the storytelling gene. Growing up on the imagination and stories of his father, every night it was a different amazing story before bed, or on long car trips his father would weave improvised tales of monsters, and mysteries while Bradford and his two brothers would be swimming in rapt attention in the back seat. His mother was the grounding force, the confidence, ever searching for authenticity in how to tell the story, how to convey emotion, and always having a reason to speak.

FTC Disclosure:
The ebook and audiobook were bought with private funds.
No money received for this review.

Thursday 5 September 2024

THREE DOG KNIGHT

Three Dog Knight by Annabel Chase
Book 2 in the Midnight Empire: The Tower series
Narrated by Suzanne Elise Freeman
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Three Dog Knight:

I survived a job for royal vampires with my life and identity intact. That means I can return to my normal life as a knight, right?

Wrong.

When a group of werewolves goes berserk in our local pub, there’s a new threat in the city and the local pack hires me to find out what it is. Unfortunately that decision draws the attention of a certain vampire prince who likes to keep tabs on the most powerful pack in the city. Just when I thought I was free of the Demon of House Duncan, we’re embarking on a road trip together to investigate.

And what we discover changes everything — as well as each other.

Source: Info in the About Three Dog Knight was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/59535753-three-dog-knight on 13/05/2022.

Buy Link(s):

My Thoughts:

The opening volley is the death of somebody who shifted unwillingly because of some external forces and when he shifted back to human form and asked for help, he was killed instead! That broke my heart!!

At this point I can tell that the over-arching theme of this series is about power stones and finding them. If it keeps being like this, I'm afraid that it's going to get repetitive. So, hopefully, the author has some trick up her sleeve to liven things up. However, at this point, this book is still very interesting and even though it ended in a cliffhanger, it also ended the dilemma in the book. Points for the author!!

The plot... yes, there is a plot. Not twisty, but there is one.

I don't recommend reading this book as a starting point into the Midnight Empire world because the reader will almost likely get confused. The world building was done in book one and this book just follows through. So, a reader might get confused about the butterflies in this book.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 4
Story itself = 4
Writing Style = 4
Ending = 4
World building = 4
Cover art = 4
Pace = (7 hrs and 24 mins listening time)
Plot = 4
Narration = 4

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries

Books In The Midnight Empire: The Tower Series:

Amazon

Amazon

Meet The Author

About Annabel Chase:

Annabel Chase is the author of urban fantasy and cozy mystery novels. She would love to live in a magical town where she can shop at Ready-to-Were for the the perfect outfit, flirt with hot angels and vampires, and cook gourmet meals without exerting any effort.

The Narrator