Review: DARKNESS UNKNOWN

Darkness Unknown by Alexis Morgan
Book 5 of The Paladins series

Genre: adult urban fantasy

About Darkness Unknown:

Gwen Mosely's life changes forever when she stumbles across a handsome stranger, unconscious and left for dead in the woods behind her farm. Cut up and bleeding, he's barely survived a vicious battle, but the real shock is how quickly his wounds heal—a gift he shares with Gwen's teenaged half-brother Chase.

Jarvis Donahue can't keep his eyes—or his strong, capable hands—off the sexy redhead who rescued him. He finds warmth of Gwen's smile and the desire in her eyes are impossible to resist, but there's a problem. Jarvis immediately recognizes Chase as a fellow Paladin in the making, a warrior born to defend mankind in the relentless battle against the Others. Neither Gwen nor the boy know it yet, but Chase will need Jarvis's help coping with the compulsion to fight that is written in his blood and in his bones. Although Gwen may hate him for it, Jarvis is duty-bound to secretly introduce Chase to the dangerous fate they both share.

As the barrier between the two worlds weakens, the threat grows perilously close to Gwen's farm. Jarvis is torn between protecting his lover, but without revealing his true identity, or betraying his people's secret and risk losing her forever.

Source: Info in the About Darkness Unknown was taken from the author's website at http://www.alexismorgan.com/Darkness_Unknown.html on 28/02/2011.

Review:
This book can be read independently as a stand alone even if it's book 5 in the series. There is enough intel there to keep the reader in the loop.

I've read the previous books like 4 years ago so I've essentially forgotten what went on. I remember the world of the Paladins but almost forgotten the characters, never mind the events. I had a quick browse through book 4 before reading this book but book 4 was about a Seattle Paladin. This book is about a different state Paladin. So essentially a totally different set of characters in the same world of the Paladins. I seem to remember though that books 1 and 2 were very interesting. I might have to re-read them and do a retrospective review, if and when I get the chance. This book still retains Alexis Morgan's fantastic "author's voice". But for some reason the story telling quality does not seem to be as compelling as I remember the first 2 books were. Could it be that my memory has kinda editted what I remebered of it... or, my reading experiences was and/or is, being affected by my mood. Can't really tell you. Don't really know myself. But I do know that it feels like this book's story telling quality is not as compelling as books 1 & 2. I also don't like the way the model holds the sword in the cover. It tells me that his sword is blunt to be stupid enough to hold the naked blade like that. One other thing, there are no cute sidekicks. However, a lovely enough read that I would give it a 4 out of 5.

Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 4.5
Story itself = 4
Ending = 4
Cover art = 3.5
Pace = 4

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Series:

Currently Reading

WW28: GRAVE WITCH

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 book offering : Grave Witch by Kalayna Price
Page 28, 1st Sentence:

Now, are you coming to dinner?

Date? Romance? Or something totally different and unexpeced?

About Grave Witch:
Book 1 of the Alex Craft series

Grave witch Alex Craft can speak to the dead, but that doesn’t mean she likes what they have to say . . .

As a private investigator and consultant for the police, Alex Craft has seen a lot of dark magic. But even though she’s on good terms with Death himself—who happens to look fantastic in a pair of jeans—nothing has prepared her for her latest case. Alex is investigating a high profile murder when she’s attacked by the ‘shade’ she’s raising, which should be impossible. To top off her day, someone makes a serious attempt on her life, but Death saves her. Guess he likes having her around . . .

To solve this case Alex will have to team up with tough homicide detective Falin Andrews. Falin seems to be hiding something—though it’s certainly not his dislike of Alex—but Alex knows she needs his help to navigate the tangled webs of mortal and paranormal politics, and to track down a killer wielding a magic so malevolent, it may cost Alex her life . . . and her soul.

Source: Info in the About Grave Witch was taken from the author's website at http://www.kalayna.com/alexcraft.html on 26/12/2010.

Review: HIS DARK MATERIALS TRILOGY

His Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman:

Genre: YA, fantasy

Review:
I've read these books a long time ago so this is a retrospective review. The world building is incredible and masterfully woven. Pullman creates a world which is believable, beautiful and vivid. 5 out of 5. Character development is another 5 out of 5. Lyra and the gang are not just characters off the pages but people one can root for. Can empathize and sympathize with. The story itself is a nice twist in a congested genre. The story telling quality is superb. It takes you totally away to another place and reality so easily fades away. I would give this trilgoy a 5 out of 5.

I love this series so much that I chose Northern Lights as my book of choice to giveaway at the World Book Night event. Even though I did not meet a lot of enthusiasm during the WBN, I still think this series is a classic, a masterpiece!

Cherry's Rating: 5 out of 5 cherries

NORTHERN LIGHTS
Book 1 of the His Dark Materials Trilogy

About Northern Lights:

In a landmark epic of fantasy and storytelling, Philip Pullman invites readers into a world as convincing and thoroughly realized as Narnia, Earthsea, or Redwall. Here lives an orphaned ward named Lyra Belacqua, whose carefree life among the scholars at Oxford's Jordan College is shattered by the arrival of two powerful visitors. First, her fearsome uncle, Lord Asriel, appears with evidence of mystery and danger in the far North, including photographs of a mysterious celestial phenomenon called Dust and the dim outline of a city suspended in the Aurora Borealis that he suspects is part of an alternate universe. He leaves Lyra in the care of Mrs. Coulter, an enigmatic scholar and explorer who offers to give Lyra the attention her uncle has long refused her. In this multilayered narrative, however, nothing is as it seems. Lyra sets out for the top of the world in search of her kidnapped playmate, Roger, bearing a rare truth-telling instrument, the compass of the title. All around her children are disappearing, victims of so-called "Gobblers", and being used as subjects in terrible experiments that separate humans from their daemons, creatures that reflect each person's inner being. And somehow, both Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter are involved.

Source: Info in the About Northern Lights was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/119322 on 14/03/2011.

THE SUBTLE KNIFE
Book 2 of the His Dark Materials Trilogy

About The Subtle Knife:

With The Golden Compass Philip Pullman garnered every accolade under the sun. Critics lobbed around such superlatives as "elegant," "awe-inspiring," "grand," and "glittering," and used "magnificent" with gay abandon. Each reader had a favorite chapter--or, more likely, several--from the opening tour de force to Lyra's close call at Bolvangar to the great armored-bear battle. And Pullman was no less profligate when it came to intellectual firepower or singular characters. The dæmons alone grant him a place in world literature. Could the second installment of his trilogy keep up this pitch, or had his heroine and her too, too sullied parents consumed him? And what of the belief system that pervaded his alternate universe, not to mention the mystery of Dust? More revelations and an equal number of wonders and new players were definitely in order.
The Subtle Knife offers everything we could have wished for, and more. For a start, there's a young hero--from our world--who is a match for Lyra Silvertongue and whose destiny is every bit as shattering. Like Lyra, Will Parry has spent his childhood playing games. Unlike hers, though, his have been deadly serious. This 12-year-old long ago learned the art of invisibility: if he could erase himself, no one would discover his mother's increasing instability and separate them.

As the novel opens, Will's enemies will do anything for information about his missing father, a soldier and Arctic explorer who has been very much airbrushed from the official picture. Now Will must get his mother into safe seclusion and make his way toward Oxford, which may hold the key to John Parry's disappearance. But en route and on the lam from both the police and his family's tormentors, he comes upon a cat with more than a mouse on her mind: "She reached out a paw to pat something in the air in front of her, something quite invisible to Will." What seems to him a patch of everyday Oxford conceals far more: "The cat stepped forward and vanished." Will, too, scrambles through and into another oddly deserted landscape--one in which children rule and adults (and felines) are very much at risk. Here in this deathly silent city by the sea, he will soon have a dustup with a fierce, flinty little girl: "Her expression was a mixture of the very young--when she first tasted the cola--and a kind of deep, sad wariness." Soon Will and Lyra (and, of course, her dæmon, Pantalaimon) uneasily embark on a great adventure and head into greater tragedy.

As Pullman moves between his young warriors and the witch Serafina Pekkala, the magnetic, ever-manipulative Mrs. Coulter, and Lee Scoresby and his hare dæmon, Hester, there are clear signs of approaching war and earthly chaos. There are new faces as well. The author introduces Oxford dark-matter researcher Mary Malone; the Latvian witch queen Ruta Skadi, who "had trafficked with spirits, and it showed"; Stanislaus Grumman, a shaman in search of a weapon crucial to the cause of Lord Asriel, Lyra's father; and a serpentine old man whom Lyra and Pan can't quite place. Also on hand are the Specters, beings that make cliff-ghasts look like rank amateurs.

Throughout, Pullman is in absolute control of his several worlds, his plot and pace equal to his inspiration. Any number of astonishing scenes--small- and large-scale--will have readers on edge, and many are cause for tears. "You think things have to be possible," Will demands. "Things have to be true!" It is Philip Pullman's gift to turn what quotidian minds would term the impossible into a reality that is both heartbreaking and beautiful. --Kerry Fried

Source: Info in the About The Subtle Knife was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/119324 on 14/03/2011.

THE AMBER SPYGLASS

Book 3 of the His Dark Materials Trilogy

About The Amber Spyglass:

The Amber Spyglass brings the intrigue of The Golden Compass and The Subtle Knife to a heart-stopping end, marking the final volume of His Dark Materials as the most powerful of the trilogy.

Along with the return of Lyra, Will, Mrs. Coulter, Lord Asriel, Dr. Mary Malone, and Iorek Byrnison the armored bear, come a host of new characters: the Mulefa, mysterious wheeled creatures with the power to see Dust; Gallivespian Lord Roke, a hand-high spymaster to Lord Asriel; and Metatron, a fierce and mighty angel. So, too, come startling revelations: the painful price Lyra must pay to walk through the land of the dead, the haunting power of Dr. Malone's amber spyglass, and the names of who will live—and who will die—for love. And all the while, war rages with the Kingdom of Heaven, a brutal battle that—in its shocking outcome—will uncover the secret of Dust. Philip Pullman deftly brings the cliff-hangers and mysteries of His Dark Materials to an earthshattering conclusion—and confirms his fantasy trilogy as an undoubted and enduring classic.

Source: Info in the About The Amber Spyglass was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18122 on 14/03/2011.

Winner: Fool For Books Giveaway Hop

And the winner of our FOOL FOR BOOKS GIVEAWAY HOP is.....

~Enamored Soul~

Thank you to everyone who joined in the fun!!

To the winner: Check your inbox and reply to the "winner notification email" with the postal address where you want the book(s) to be sent to.

Please note that the winner has one week to reply. If no response is received after one week, a new winner will be picked.

WW28: A WILD LIGHT

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 book offering : A Wild Light by Marjorie Liu
Page 29, 1st Sentence:

I backed away from him, feeling cornered in that expansive room.

There was no page 28, so I picked the first sentence in page 29.

About A Wild Light:

For too long Maxine Kiss has felt an inexplicable darkness inside her-a force she channels into hunting the demons bent on destroying the human race. But when she finds herself covered in blood and crouched beside her grandfather’s dead body with no memory of what happened, Maxine begins to fear that the darkness has finally consumed her.

Source: Info in the About A Wild Light was taken from the author's website at http://marjoriemliu.com/index.php?/novels/details/a_wild_light/ on 20/09/2010.

Review: SASHA'S CALLING

Sasha's Calling by T.C. Archer

Genre: science fiction erotica

Format: ebook

About Sasha's Calling:

Nothing can stop freelance thief Sasha Smirnov from saving her planet -- except, Dirk, the gorgeous ambassador with polychrome eyes. Is it lust or designer pheromones? He is hot, too hot to resist -- or forget. A single, sizzling kiss burns him into her memory, and her body, but she can't afford to stop for passion, let alone love.

Sasha needs to get as far away from Dirk as possible and take the classified data she stole with her. So she stows away on a ship outward bound, only to discover Dirk's the pilot. Now she can't get away from him, or the system, but he will let her into his bed...

Source: Info in the About Sasha's Calling was taken from the publisher's site at http://www.loose-id.com/Sashas-Calling.aspx on 30/03/2011.

Review:
Sasha Smirnov is on a mission to save her planet and the people on it. Not only is the safety of Magnus 3 important but also the safety and sanity of her father. Working freelance and sneaking on to Centor, where she is stealing important information. Sasha is discovered and a chase ensues which leads Sasha to stumble upon the Warp Generator. This technology will save her planet. To get this information into the right hands (these hands do not include her boss's Orsans enchanced mauling hands) She must escape alive and avoid the Pinkertons who seem to know her every move. Before Sasha can escape Centor, she runs directly into Dirk Roscoepilot and in an attempt to hide from her persuers, she takes the initiative, plasters herself to Dirk in an explosive kiss. Fleeing to the nearest ship and determined to stowaway to safety, Sasha is having complex feelings about that kiss and the reaction she's having to it. What she doesn't expect is to encounter Dirk again, or that the ship she is hiding on is none other than his and he's determined to finish what she started.

I really enjoyed this book. It was fast paced, full of action with a few laugh out loud moments. Really, who wouldn't want some maxi-boob cream?? I'd actually prefer some boob-be-gone, and would love Dirk to rub some of that on me :) I loved the chemistry between Sasha and Dirk. It was an instant, hot attraction and Sasha was sure she was fighting some pheromone Dirk was wearing causing her feelings to go haywire because having such strong feelings for Dirk just seemed impossible. Dirk's character seemed somewhat questionable, I knew he had feelings for Sasha, but his motives were throwing me off. Sasha wasn't sure she could trust him. I knew these two needed to be together and as we gleamed more information about Dirk I was able to let my guard down with him as Sasha was doing the same. Overall, this was a really good read for me, the only thing that maybe bothered me a little, was all the terms. I've only read a few books that have been based in space and I would of loved to have a glossary to refer to, to some of the other planet names, or other species we encountered. It also threw me off at the end when Sasha acknowledged she loved Dirk and told him she loved him but he didn't say it back. I would have like to have heard Dirk say it as well. The story was told through Sasha's point of view and I knew how she was feeling, but I would of liked to have a glimpse into Dirk's feelings. Regardless, I still really enjoyed this and can't wait to see what else T.C. Archer puts out.

Buy Link:


Author Links:
www.tcarcher.com
blog
@TCArcher
MySpace

Acknowledgement(s): We would like to thank the sponsor for the review copy received.