WW28: DEATH BLOWS

WW28 book offering: Death Blows by DD Barant

Saladin Acquitaine was more than just a geologist with a talent for finding diamonds - he was one of the Bravo Brigade.

Mysteries slowly unfolding but sprouting more questions than answers for our sassy FBI crazy profiler, or was that profiler for crazies...

About Death Blows:

FBI profiler Jace Valchek was pulled into this parallel realm to hunt for Aristotle Stoker, a human serial killer who preys on vampires and werewolves. Now she works for the National Security Agency of the Unnatural States of America - and her boss is a vampire.

At a bizarre crime scene, Jace finds a bloodsucker murdered by magic, fried to the bone and dressed in the costume of the comic book hero the Flash - a character who isn't supposed to exist here. Comic books have been outlawed for their powers, including crossover spells like the one that transported Jace to this world. Soon, she's following a trail of dead bodies into the sinister underworld of black-market comics - where a deranged madman gives new meaning to the term "super-villain."

Source: Info in the About Death Blows was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6781162-death-blows on 26/10/2012.

WW28
A chance to showcase your favourite!

• First you grab our Wicked Wednesday pic.
• Then you grab a book. Turn to page 28. Take the first sentence. And then you post it in your site with a link back to WW28.
• Come back to Cherry Mischievous - WW28 and give us the url of your post (in a comment at a WW28 post) so that other WW28 readers can find your WW28 offering.

WW28: DYING BITES

WW28 book offering: Dying Bites by DD Barant

Okay, Scary New World - here I come.

That is our sassy heroine...

About Dying Bites:

Her job description is the “tracking and apprehension of mentally-fractured killers.” What this really means in FBI profiler Jace Valchek’s brave new world — one in which only one percent of the population is human — is that a woman’s work is never done. And real is getting stranger every day…

Jace has been ripped from her reality by David Cassius, the vampire head of the NSA. He knows that she’s the best there in the business, and David needs her help in solving a series of gruesome murders of vampires and werewolves. David’s world — one that also includes lycanthropes and golems — is one with little knowledge of mental illness. An insane serial killer is a threat the NSA has no experience with. But Jace does. Stranded in a reality where Bela Lugosi is a bigger box office draw than Bruce Willis and every full moon is Mardi Gras, Jace must now hunt down a fellow human before he brings the entire planet to the brink of madness. Or she may never see her own world again…

Source: Info in the About Dying Bites was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6295913-dying-bites on 07/01/2013.

WW28
A chance to showcase your favourite!

• First you grab our Wicked Wednesday pic.
• Then you grab a book. Turn to page 28. Take the first sentence. And then you post it in your site with a link back to WW28.
• Come back to Cherry Mischievous - WW28 and give us the url of your post (in a comment at a WW28 post) so that other WW28 readers can find your WW28 offering.

Review: DEATH BLOWS

Death Blows by DD Barant
Read by Johanna Parker
Book 2 of The Bloodhound Files series
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: paperback & audiobook

About Death Blows:

FBI profiler Jace Valchek was pulled into this parallel realm to hunt for Aristotle Stoker, a human serial killer who preys on vampires and werewolves. Now she works for the National Security Agency of the Unnatural States of America - and her boss is a vampire.

At a bizarre crime scene, Jace finds a bloodsucker murdered by magic, fried to the bone and dressed in the costume of the comic book hero the Flash - a character who isn't supposed to exist here. Comic books have been outlawed for their powers, including crossover spells like the one that transported Jace to this world. Soon, she's following a trail of dead bodies into the sinister underworld of black-market comics - where a deranged madman gives new meaning to the term "super-villain."

Source: Info in the About Death Blows was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6781162-death-blows on 26/10/2012.

Review:

Okey, so in Book 1, the main protagonist, Jace, had the tendency to be too stupid to live (TSTL) but I hadn't expected it to be compounded a million times over in this book. I guess I was being too optimistic. The TSTL was annoying like hell! So much so that I had to have breaks from it or I'll throw the damned book against the wall. Which made the pace of this book quite slow even with the convenience of the audiobook edition. Maybe for those readers with a whole lot more patience than I have will read this book quicker. And maybe for those audiobook listeners who does not read the paperback at the same time would find this book a little faster than I did. Maybe... The plot depended on Jace being stupid to create a story. Safe to say I wasn't terribly impressed. However, if you learn to ignore that fact, it did have a story where the main protagonist managed to save the world against all odds.

I like Johanna Parker's narration though. And would continue to buy audiobooks by her. I am obviously an old fan of hers, so that opinion might be more than a little biased.

Anyway, at the end of it, I am a fan of vampires and shapeshifters and this world have those in spades, but I don't think I would be buying any books in this series or of this author. If ever, I would borrow it from the library.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 2
Character development = 1
Story itself = 1
Ending = 3
World building = 3
Cover art = 4
Pace = 1 (9 hours of listening time)
Plot = 1
Narrator = 5

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 cherries

Review: DYING BITES

Dying Bites by DD Barant
Read by Johanna Parker
Book 1 of The Bloodhound Files series
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: paperback & audiobook

About Dying Bites:

Her job description is the “tracking and apprehension of mentally-fractured killers.” What this really means in FBI profiler Jace Valchek’s brave new world—one in which only one percent of the population is human—is that a woman’s work is never done. And real is getting stranger every day…

Jace has been ripped from her reality by David Cassius, the vampire head of the NSA. He knows that she’s the best there in the business, and David needs her help in solving a series of gruesome murders of vampires and werewolves. David’s world—one that also includes lycanthropes and golems—is one with little knowledge of mental illness. An insane serial killer is a threat the NSA has no experience with. But Jace does. Stranded in a reality where Bela Lugosi is a bigger box office draw than Bruce Willis and every full moon is Mardi Gras, Jace must now hunt down a fellow human before he brings the entire planet to the brink of madness. Or she may never see her own world again…

Source: Info in the About Dying Bites was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6295913-dying-bites on 26/09/2012.

Narrative Evaluation:

I decided to pick this series up just because I won Book 3 from a blog contest and thus sits in my TBR shelf occupying space I am fast running out of. But me being me, I cannot read a series by jumping to Book 3. I have to start from Book 1, thus this book got read. Plus the fact that I am an old Johanna Parker fan, so when I learned that she is the narrator for this audiobook, it got bought. This would also be the first Johanna Parker audiobook I've listened to which is not a Sookie Stackhouse book. And after listening to 11 Sookie Stackhouse books, Johanna Parker's voice is now associated with Sookie in my head. So much so that when I first listened to this audiobook I had a bit of a disorientation and Sookie's world merged for a time with Jace's world that DD Barant has created. Or maybe it is just a warning telling me maybe I ought to ease up on the urban fantasy books... Nah!!! Anyway the world building is wonderful and I would love to see more of this alternate universe of lycanthropes and pires!

It was interesting in the beginning and I was excited to listen to it. Then it kind of slowed down a bit in the middle and didn't pick up again until the very end. If I was reading this paperback without listening to the audiobook format, I would say that it was alright, but wasn't very fast.

At the end of it, I enjoyed this book and have the next book on request at the library already. So I would say, it's a good start to a promising series!

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 4
Story itself = 4
Ending = 4
World building = 4
Cover art = 4.5
Pace = 3 (9 hours of listening time)
Plot = 3.5
Narrator = 5

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries


Thank you to the RCT Library for letting me borrow this book!!

FTC Disclosure:
The audiobook format was purchased with personal funds. The paperback was borrowed from the library. No money received for this review.

IN THE MAIL: KILLING ROCKS & BLACK WINGS

What I found waiting for me when I got home today:

I would like to thank Suzanne Johnson of Preternatura for hosting the Twists on Urban Fantasy Heroes (& Win an ARC of DD Barant's new KILLING ROCKS) contest which made it possible for me to win Killing Rocks by DD Barant!

Killing Rocks by DD Barant

About Killing Rocks:
Book 3 of the Bloodhound Files

FBI profiler Jace Valchek's ticket home from the twisted parallel universe where she's been called to duty hinges on the capture of series killer Aristotle Stoker - and an alliance with a sorcerer known as Asher. The problem: Asher has joined forces with some of the most dangerous creatures Jace has ever encountered. The solution: There is none, without Asher's help. Jace's goal seems simple enough - to get her man, like always. But just hours after she arrives in Vegas, she's abducted...and she isn't even sure who the real enemy is. Now Jace has to wonder if she's the predator or the prey in a very dangerous game that could change not only her fate, but the world's...Meanwhile, a serial killer is still on the loose. And time has already run out...

Source: Info in the About Killing Rocks was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7964129-killing-rocks on 10/01/2011.

I would also like to thank Dear Author for hosting the contest 2010 Winter ACE/ROC Giveaway which made it possible for me to win Black Wings by Christina Henry!!
Black Wings by Christina Henry

About Black Wings:

Escorting souls into the afterlife leaves Maddy little time for socializing-until devilishly handsome Gabriel Angeloscuro agrees to rent the empty apartment in her building. But when demons start appearing on Maddy’s front lawn, she realizes there’s more to her new tenant than meets the eye.

Source: Info in the About Black Wings was taken from the author's website at http://www.christinahenry.net/?page_id=43 on 10/01/2011.