ENDLESS KNIGHT

Endless Knight by Annabel Chase
Book 1 in the Midnight Empire: The Restoration series
Narrated by Jill Smith
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Endless Knight:

Return to the world of the Midnight Empire where darkness reigns and vampires rule.
New York is my prison.

Once a sought-after assassin, a single error in judgment landed me in servitude to House August, the most powerful vampire family in North America. Now I use my special brand of magic as a member of their security team, fighting monsters in the city and keeping the royal family’s many enemies at bay.

When the queen summons me for an assignment and offers my freedom in return, I want to jump at the chance — until she tells me what the assignment is.

Like a valiant knight, I am to escort her son from the family’s stronghold in Florida back to New York, which would be difficult enough without my messy romantic history with the rogue prince.

I accept the job because my freedom means more than my wounded pride.

Darkness and monsters stand between us and our destination. Thankfully I’ve never been afraid of either one.

I soon discover there’s more at stake than the return of the prodigal son. Even if we survive our enemies, I’m not sure I’ll survive the journey with the vampire who broke my heart.

Endless Knight, Midnight Empire: The Restoration, is the first book in a new urban fantasy trilogy set in the same world as Wild Knight, Midnight Empire: The Tower.

Source: Info in the About Endless Knight was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60434851-endless-knight on 09/05/2022.

Buy Link(s):

 

My Thoughts:

This is my first Annabel Chase read and at first it was hardgoing to get into the story! I first read the kindle ebook sample and that sample stewed in my knidle for like a couple of months before it got finally read. I just keep putting it down. Then when I was in the GP (General Practitioner or doctor's office) waiting room for like an hour and a half before I was seen, this book got dredged up and read little bit more. Then I decided to buy the audiobook version in the hopes that this book might go quicker with a narration. By that time I was past chapter one and the story has started to pick up.

There isn't much of a plot. But then again this is not a crime fiction book, so I can forgive that.

My first Jill Smith listen and I like he way she reads.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 4
Story itself = 3
Writing Style = 4
Ending = 4
World building = 4
Cover art = 4
Pace = (6 hrs and 57 mins listening time)
Plot = 2.5
Narration = 4.5

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Midnight Empire: The Restoration Series:

Amazon

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.

annabelchase.com | twitter | facebook | instagram | amazon | goodreads

The Narrator

About Jill Smith:

Hi! I’m Jill Smith, an Ohio-based voice actor specializing in audiobook work. I have a background in theater and creative writing, so I value collaboration and understand how exciting and important it is as an author to hear your project come to life in audio. I work with you to make sure you get the results you want! Please feel free to reach out with any questions or for more information at jillsmith.voice@gmail.com.

jillsmithvoice.com | goodreads

FTC Disclosure:
The ebook and audiobook copies of the book were purchased with private funds.
No money received for this review.

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, Wild Knight, 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

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.

annabelchase.com | twitter | facebook | instagram | amazon | goodreads

The Narrator

About Suzanne Elise Freeman:

Audiobook narrator and voiceover artist narrating books in multiple genres, including Sci-Fi/Fantasy, Young Adult, Mystery, and Romance.

www.suzannefreemanvoice.com | twitter | facebook | goodreads

FTC Disclosure:
The ebook and audiobook copies of the book were purchased with private funds.
No money received for this review.

DEAD TO THE WORLD

Dead To The World by Annabel Chase
Book 1 in the Crossroads Queen series
Narrated by Vivienne Leheny
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Dead To The World:

Lorelei Clay isn’t like other people.

She isn’t even like other supernaturals. Her specialties are the nightmares of the living, communication with the dead, and cooking bacon until it’s golden brown and perfectly crispy — no magic required.

Six months ago she moved to the ultimate fixer upper, a monstrosity from the Gilded Age that borders the local cemetery in the sleepy Pennsylvania town of Fairhaven. Lorelei is content to spend the next few years in solitude, renovating the house and avoiding humanity, until a missing young woman disrupts her plans. Lorelei’s search for the teenager means crossing paths with the residents she’s successfully avoided so far, including the human police chief, the coven, a cursed vampire, the assassins guild, the werewolf pack, and the mysterious and infuriatingly alluring owner of The Devil’s Playground, an elegant nightclub that caters to the local supernatural clientele.

Lorelei plans to find the girl quickly and return to the privacy of her castle walls before anyone learns her secrets, but you know what they say about the best laid plans…

Source: Info in the "About Dead To The World" was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/144085997-dead-to-the-world on 12/01/2024.

Buy Link(s):

 

My Thoughts:

So what does Fairhaven have that it is chuck full of supernaturals??

So, what exactly IS Lorelei?

What is that raven doing in the cover? Is that the black bird hanging around the Castle? What is it's story?

I do not like inconsistent plotting. She did her due deligence so she knew the way. That tells me that she did a recon (reconnaissance) so she knew the place before the meeting. But she does not know that the trail climbed? So what kind of recon did she do??

This is not my first Vivienne Leheny audiobook. Not even the second. Or third. With previous audiobooks, this narrator seemed ok. But for some reason in this one, Vivienne Leheny seems to pronounce words a little to quickly at times. Too "heavily"? Like, I thought she said "ha", instead of "hello". And I thought the character was being rude. But the ebook clearly says "hello" and not "ha". What was that all about??

Quantitative Evaluation:

Story telling quality = 3.5
Character development = 3.5
Story itself = 3.5
Writing Style = 4
Ending = 4
World building = 4
Cover art = 4
Pace = (7 hrs and 23 mins listening time)
Plot = 3.5
Narration = 4

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 cherries

Books In The Crossroads Queen Series:

 

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.

annabelchase.com | twitter | facebook | instagram | amazon | goodreads

The Narrator

About Vivienne Leheny:

For over two decades, Vivienne Leheny has worked professionally in New York City and Los Angeles as an actor, voiceover artist and writer. She’s appeared on Off-Broadway and regional theatre stages, been screened at numerous film festivals (including Sundance in the 2019 opening night film: AFTER THE WEDDING), toured the northeast doing stand-up, and her writing has been published in national publications.

Vivienne has built a successful audiobook narration business, reading under her own name as well as under the pseudonyms, “Nola Zandry” and “Lily Collingwood.” She has a home studio and records using punch & roll software. Currently narrating six ongoing series, she also has numerous stand-alone book narrations, all of which are doing brisk sales on Audible, Amazon and iTunes. She’s narrated titles for Harper Collins, Macmillan, Recorded Books, and Simon & Schuster, among other audiobook publishers.

Vivienne will soon be recording her 150th audiobook narration.

Her audiobook narration course, The Voice in their Ear, has been a sell-out Maine Media Workshops+College, where she’s also taught her Putting Your Voice to Work: Building a Career in Voiceover curriculum, while her Breaking Into Audiobooks seminar for the SAG Foundation fills up quickly and with long wait lists. She’s also taught audiobook narration at the Caymichael Patten Studio.

She’s recorded over a thousand promotions for NBC programming (Saturday Night Live, Nightly News, Days of our Lives, Late Night with Conan O’Brien), including over a decade with The Today Show. She’s also done promotional spots for HBO, Showtime, and Bravo. Vivienne has voiced numerous national commercial campaigns, including Coca Cola, Fruit of the Loom, Florida Orange Juice, Bristol Meyers Squibb, Maxwell House and Revlon.

Her narration work has run the gamut, from Chain Gang Girls on Oxygen to Charles and Di: Once Upon a Time on TLC, from Fine Living’s Esquire’s Man at His Best to the six-part series Killer Outbreaks on Animal Planet, where she was the voice of the Bubonic Plague and West Nile Virus. She’s also the voice for the mysterious and disturbing “Phoenix Project” in the popular video game Assassin’s Creed, Unity.

www.vivienneleheny.com | twitter | facebook | goodreads

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