I have had the pleasure of getting an advanced reader copy of Fantastic Hope, the new paranormal anthology that was released on April 7, 2020. This arc was provided via Netgalley, the best place for reviewers and avid readers to get and review new books. This anthology is a great way to be introduced to a wide variety of authors and writing styles. You may just buy it for one author and find a whole new library to read during this uncertain time. With a wide variety of bestselling authors this anthology has a lot of bang for your buck. While I could go crazy with this book review and write pages upon pages and bury you in paper, time is at a premium. This anthology is a great way to get acquainted with a number of authors and their writing styles. You may buy it for the latest in one series and end up with a new series to read, to love, and maybe even obsess about. These authors each have unique backgrounds and those backgrounds inform each story with details that will delight readers, . Rather than going through each story and providing spoilers that might make longtime fans and new readers alike angry, I will cede this space to a part of the Foreword and the words of the editors. “It’s a place where the hero wins, the bad guy is punished, and the monsters are only real while you’re reading the story. You can close the covers and be safe. Unlike the real terrors of the world online and in the news lately…welcome to a collection of stories where you can find hope, happy endings, loyalty, freedom, love, all the positive things that make the best of us. Welcome to thrilling adventures and a modern take on two-fisted adventure stories…Have faith in yourself, in the people who love you, in magic, in religion, in Deity, in science, and in things harder to label with just one word. Believe that there will be smiles after the tears, joy after the pain, and that it will all work out, that good will triumph and evil will not win forever…You’re holding people’s dreams in your hands, dreams made real for you to read and share. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I did.” Laurell K Hamilton “Laurell is a big proponent of people doing their therapy and working through their shit. We sat over lunch and talked about the depressing stories that seemed to be everywhere, in the news and in fiction, and lamented that there weren’t more uplifting stories… Laurell and I are both survivors and we know that the world is not all unicorns, rainbows, and glitter. but we also know that there is light at the end of the tunnel and that the darkness can be pushed back, even if it starts with a spark….I hope that in this book you find a story that speaks to you that reminds you that tomorrow is a new day with new opportunities.” William McCaskey Believe again. Dream again. Know that you have the power to do the impossible and conquer your demons. Start a new relationship with favorite authors and new voices. Start here.
“… you had to own your feelings, all of them. You didn’t have to act on them, but you had to acknowledge them. Buried feelings always found a way to uncover themselves. You could do it voluntarily and have some control over it, or you could stuff them down into the darkest part of your psyche and give your inner demons new ammunition to use against you. I was really trying not to do that anymore.”
Laurell K Hamilton, Serpentine
“We were badly outnumbered if this spread, and the only way for me to help lower the numbers was to risk hurting people badly. I was too small and too female not to fight to put people down as quickly and violently as possible. Sometimes you could scare people with what you were willing to do, and the fight would end just because the price wasn’t worth it to them. Police didn’t scare that easily.”
“… you had to own your feelings, all of them. You didn’t have to act on them, but you had to acknowledge them. Buried feelings always found a way to uncover themselves. You could do it voluntarily and have some control over it, or you could stuff them down into the darkest part of your psyche and give your inner demons new ammunition to use against you. I was really trying not to do that anymore.”
Laurell K Hamilton, Serpentine
“We were badly outnumbered if this spread, and the only way for me to help lower the numbers was to risk hurting people badly. I was too small and too female not to fight to put people down as quickly and violently as possible. Sometimes you could scare people with what you were willing to do, and the fight would end just because the price wasn’t worth it to them. Police didn’t scare that easily.”
A couple of days ago, I warned that my posts might seem to be a little surreal because I was starting Jeaniene Frost‘s Night Prince which was the fourth and final installment in the that series. The reason that required a caveat was that Vlad is the hero int that series and he has a stepson and blood nephew named Mircea. Given that most of my posts revolve around the Cassandra Palmer and the Dorina Basarab series in which Mircea is a hero and Vlad a villain. I have to admit that it was difficult even within my own mind to make the switch. Eventually, though, my brain successfully made the switch and I came to really enjoy the return to the Night Huntress world. I have to give Jeaniene Frost some mad props. Mencheres plays a large role in the book and they throw in a stay at Kat and Bones cabin. What amazes me about this is that Jeaniene Frost is able to successfully end each series and then start another tangential story, one for which the foundations were laid in the process of telling this hero/heroine story. This means that when the next series, which will revolve around Ian, starts we know that some of our old friends will play a part and, in a way, each successive series is a continuation of the one before.
I also greatly enjoyed the Sweetest Burn, the second story in the Broken Destiny series. This series is truly unrelated to the other world. This series revolves around a battle between good in the form of Archons (Angel like beings) and Demons. These Demons have realms that are just a slight bit misaligned with reality and the heroine, Ivy has long been able to see glimpses of these realms and has a long history of psychiatric treatment due to this ability. When her sister disappears and her adoptive parents are killed while investigating the disappearance, Ivy decides she will fin and rescue her sister or die in the effort. This leads to a discovery of the Demons, their realms, minions (humans enlisted by both Archons and Demons to do their will on Earth since there are agreements in place limiting what can be done by the demons and Archons) and the fact that there is something quite special about Ivy. Ivy is the last descendant who has the blood of David from the biblical story of David and Goliath. The Archon who informs Ivy of all this brings someone to hep her Adrian, a man who was brought up in the demon realms and switched sides and who also has an illustrious ancestor as well-Jude, the man who betrayed Christ for 30 pieces of silver and who is prophesied to betray Ivy as well. Apparently there are 3 artifacts that can only be wielded by one of David’s descendants and have become necessary as the walls between the realms are weakening. Anyways, this second book revolves around a search for a magical staff, the one that Moses used. When Ivy used the slingshot at the end of the first novel, it became a tattoo embedded in Ivy’s skin and it comes as a great surprise when she learns that it can still be used although not to the same effect as before. This installment shows Adrian and Ivy’s partnership going to the next level, with a number of ramifications that, of course, only become apparent AFTER the events have occurred.
I look forward to discussing all of this with fellow fans at my site bestbooklover.net and at the Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/BestBookLover/
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I have long been a fan of Karen Chance’s body of work. I am a loyal fan and have remained undaunted in the face of all the machinations of the publisher and publishing machine. Karen Chance has long kept the faith with her readers. She often offers free stories that add to her published works to create a more complex, multifaceted and fulfilling world in which all her novels take place. Readers who only read the novels from the publishing house lose a lot of the details and the joy of seeing the characters in multiple lights. All that being said, Karen Chance’s Cassandra Palmer novel Ride the Storm has been one of the most anticipated novels in my memory. This is not the fault of Karen Chance and that cannot be said firmly enough. The publishing house has been moving dates on this novel for over a year with little to no explanation.
The previous book, Reap the Wind was judged too long by the publisher when submitted by the author. This led to a quick rewrite and the split of the book almost in half. This also left an unfulfilled feeling at the end of Reap the Wind. Many plotlines were left hanging, which left some readers unhappy and the continuous manipulation by the publishers with moving dates and little communication lost even more of the fan base. Ride the Storm is the second half of the previous book with a little bit of newer information which furthers the plot of the Cassandra Palmer novels.
I was recently asked by a friend to explain the Cassie Palmer novels and I drew a bit of a blank—how do you explain such a complicated and multifaceted storyline as the one Karen Chance has created? I told her she just needs to read it and we will talk about it once she has. To say that all of the Cassie Palmer novels are fast paced is kind of like saying a quadruple shot espresso is a little bit energizing. These books move along at a frenetic pace and always have plot twists that are unexpected to say the least. It is impossible to have predicted where the main characters end up at the beginning of this book, let alone at the end of the book.
So much happens in this book to move the plot along that after reading it 3 times, I am still finding new details to enjoy. This is not a book to start when you have a deadline coming up or really anything planned. Depending on your reading speed and availability, you should plan to be unavailable until you can finish the book. This is not one you are going to want to put down as there are no really good stopping places. My recommendation is to start it on a Friday so you can have the weekend to take a break from reality and a trip into the Cassandra Palmer universe.
This book brings resolution to a lot of the ongoing plot lines that readers have been gnashing their teeth to know. We find out why MIrcea is so interested in Pythias. We get to see Pritkin rescued. We get to see Cassie find her feet and establish her own space independent of all the forces tearing at her. We learn more about Cassie’s parents. Dorina and Cassie finally meet. We go careening through the story and learn so much along the way that it’s hard to even begin to summarize it so I am not going to even try. Despite this, there is a seeming resolution to the love triangle between Cassie, Mircea and Pritkin but it is open ended enough that I see it more as an affirmation of the fact that Cassie has complicated emotions and feelings for both men.
This book is a solid addition to the Cassandra Palmer world and yet leaves a lot of storylines open for more exploration. It is my sincere hope that Karen Chance continues to publish Cassandra Palmer books for a very long time. In order for that to happen, fans have to not only buy this book, but review it. Talk about it with friends and build it up so that the publishers contract with Karen Chance for more Cassie Palmer books.
In the interest of full disclosure, I received an ARC ebook in return for this review.
Ride the Storm
Cassandra Palmer
Karen Chance
Paranormal
Berkeley
August 1, 2017
606
The New York Times bestselling author of Reap the Wind returns to the “fascinating world”* of Cassie Palmer. Ever since being stuck with the job of pythia, the chief seer of the supernatural world, Cassie Palmer has been playing catch up. Catch up to the lifetime's worth of training she missed being raised by a psychotic vampire instead of at the fabled pythian court. Catch up to the powerful, and sometimes seductive, forces trying to mold her to their will. It's been a trial by fire that has left her more than a little burned. But now she realizes that all that was the just the warm up for the real race. Ancient forces that once terrorized the world are trying to return, and Cassie is the only one who can stop them...
I’m usually a big Kenyon fan. I looked forward to this release because it promised more information about the Hellchasers and Thorn. We’ve seen glimpses of them in other books, but this was supposed to explain things a little more clearly. It really didn’t. We had a lot of new character introduced who were given a second chance after being damned and some new species to learn about.
These creatures fight the worst of the worst out of the sight of humans. But, the romance between the two main characters fell flat and there just wasn’t enough to keep interest in the story. It was complicated by an ex wife who was the sister of the main heroine, who is also the ship. It was an ok read. I give it 3 out of 5 stars since it really disappointed.
@bestbooklover
Once he is healed enough to actually take control of the sex he is still not willing to let Cassie in at all. Cassie trusts him to not kill her but he doesn’t and he doesn’t want to get any more vulnerable to Cassie and so he limits it to oral sex and her orgasm.
Yeah good point. While Rosier’s prohibition was still in effect, that applies to demon sex, so he was held back more by his own figurative demons I think. It also highlights that Cassie and Pritkin never really make a conscious decision (about being intimate) that they commit to. Without external pressure, neither of them would initiate it.
@windsurfingthroughhell said:
Idk, I just have weird and particular ideas about consent and autonomy. I don’t like people making choices for Cassie, especially as regards her body, but this particular instance of it bothers me less than say, that Mircass scene in TtD, because Pritkin didn’t compromise her ability to consent, Rosier did, and he also apologised for it later
As @bestbooklover mentions, Cassie consented to the process at the start. What I’m curious about is why we’re all focusing on Cassie, when she was a deliberate, initiative-taking active party in the whole ordeal. It was Pritkin who was unconscious, who had his body intimately handled without his awareness or prior consent. He didn’t ask Cassie for sexual help, even though he could have; he would have never touched her in any of the scenes if not for Cassie’s demands/actions to ensure that he does.
And even when he does yield to her, he is clearly very conflicted. He is torn and upset, more so than Cassie ever was about any of her sexual encounters. It is him, not Cassie, who is broken and guilt-ridden and angry and catatonically traumatized in the shower, it’s not Cassie who needs comfort, it’s Pritkin. And Cassie has just forced him to relive his worst nightmare and do things he hates and shuns on his own volition.
I did make a satire post about this around April to illustrate double standards and biases, but since nobody addressed Pritkin’s consent, it proves that this topic might be worth a more serious post. I’m not sure whether it’s actually the books or the fandom that focuses so much on Cassie’s more minor experiences and ignores far more traumatic events for other characters, but consent should be a non-gendered topic, just like physical violence (the trivialization of which Cassie also does in the books).
Yay! I love it when we all start talking!
@freespeechfandom has some valid points. As we move through the books, there are some issues regarding Pritkin’s consent. However, if we waited for Pritkin to agree to be healed through his incubus side by Cassie-he would have died first. Pritkin definitely has a hero complex and has consistently maintained that Cassie would be better off letting him go. I agree that consent is a two sided issue and would love to see a well adjusted Pritkin so we could discuss his consent without his suicidal starving of his incubus and his outright denial of his feelings for Cassie.
As for why I keep talking about Cassie-in my opinion the whole series is about Cassie. So I am cassie-centric in my thoughts and posts.
I think Cassie supports Pritkin in the shower. I think she tries as hard as she can to be his friend. Now admittedly Cassie jumped into the deep end of friend and love interactions from the time she first comes to the Senate against her will. Cassie has never had a friend or a lover or even a real bodyguard other than Billie Joe and a hell raising, card cheating ghost from the 1800′s isnt exactly the best template for friendship.
I will be the first to admit that within the books there are boundary issues all around and there is more than enough for everyone!
I’m doing my review for both chapters (a) because I’m lazy and behind on my posts and (b) because I usually read these two chapters together anyway and I have trouble separating them in my mind.
Chapter 26 is is kind of a strange chapter, because you have such a contrast between what is happening and why it is happening. Cassie and Pritkin have sex, and it’s very intimate, but the reason for it is because it’s the only way to save Pritkin’s life. The contrast heightens the tension exponentially. The whole chapter feels on edge – will this actually save Pritkin? Will he go too far and kill Cassie by accident? Will Caleb interfere?
And to make an already awful situation even more difficult, Rosier shows up and puts a compulsion on Cassie. It’s kind of squicky, and he doesn’t help anything by saying “Let Daddy help”, but I appreciate that he wants to save his son. It gets the job done, and that’s honestly the focus of both Cassie and Rosier at this point.
Okay, I admit – I am shipper trash enough to squee over Cassie and Pritkin having a sexual encounter. But Chapter 27 moves us from the hot-but-dangerous sex to the emotional fallout. And, oh man. There is some serious fallout.
This is the chapter of emotional intimacy, and KC does not pull her punches. I’m talking, of course, about the one and only shower hug scene.
*deep breath*
I don’t think there has been another scene with the emotional weight of this one. KC has written dozens of other scenes that make me feel all the feelings, but this is the one that catches my attention before any of the others.
Cassie and Pritkin are kind of literally and emotionally naked with each other, and KC shows us this with almost no dialogue. In a few short paragraphs, we clearly see how much they care about each other and depend on each other, and not just in the saving-each-other way. The depth of their trust in each other is so obvious here. Both of them tend to repress a lot, but they don’t tend to hide from each other. It’s a gorgeous scene, and one that I love to reread often.
The whole thing about Caleb being there has always been vaguely squicky to me but a lot of Casskin sex scenes do have this discomforting edge to them? This dubcon element that’s not really either character’s fault, but which makes me uneasy when reading them, no matter how sexy the scene might be – it’s so tragic really, that they never get to be with each other just for the sake of being with each other. Well, so far.
A side note though – Pritkin is aware that Cassie isn’t in a position to give informed consent and he tries really hard to avoid doing anything that might feel like a violation to her later (it doesn’t but I think Cassie is more okay with having her body used by other people than I would be). I’m not sure whether he could safely have waited for the influence to wear off, but the key thing for me is that he apologises later. Cassie may not feel that he did anything wrong, and he was forced into a situation where he had to make that choice, but I think, and I suspect Pritkin also thinks, that it’s still a choice he didn’t have the right to make. Idk, I just have weird and particular ideas about consent and autonomy. I don’t like people making choices for Cassie, especially as regards her body, but this particular instance of it bothers me less than say, that Mircass scene in TtD, because Pritkin didn’t compromise her ability to consent, Rosier did, and he also apologised for it later – he acknowledged that it wasn’t a good situation, even if it wasn’t his fault. (of course Pritkin isn’t always perfect when it comes to consent – his 18th century self had some Issues in that regard that I wanted to talk about in EtN but then I missed those chapters, so I’ll probably bring it up in RtW when it becomes relevant).
I also appreciate that they get to have some serious fall out from this uncomfortable (albeit sexy) scene? They get to talk about their feelings, reaffirm an emotional connection, and they comfort each other. It’s wonderful.
Anyway, I 100% agree about The Shower Hug. It’s emotional destruction on an epic scale. And you know what? I never picked up on the symbolism of them being naked (or mostly naked, in Cassie’s case). Pritkin’s at his most vulnerable physically and emotionally. Damn it!
OK, So standard disclaimers apply…and you all know all of them 🙂 So, yes this is a really uncomfortable scene. You have got Pritkin unconscious and dying, war mages wanting to try magic and Cassie losing her everloving shit. For the first time ever the war mages actually listen to Cassie and let Caleb drive a dying Pritkin and wounded Cassie away. Rossier being there to help out yeah it’s squicky but given the state Pritkin is in and the state Cassie is in I’m glad Rossier stepped in. Yes it adds complications because Cassie’s consent is iffy, but in my opinion Cassie give’s consent when she starts the whole ball of wax arolling, so later consent is not really needed. She wanted to save Pritkin and by g-d she was saving his ass come hell or high water! Caleb’s freak out is annoying as hell but we need Caleb to know about Pritkin later so it works for me. I’m a little disappointed in Pritkin here. (cue screaming from others on Tumblr) Once he is healed enough to actually take control of the sex he is still not willing to let Cassie in at all. Cassie trusts him to not kill her but he doesn’t and he doesn’t want to get any more vulnerable to Cassie and so he limits it to oral sex and her orgasm. I love the fact that Karen Chance doesn’t allow Pritkin to withdraw and distance. I love the fact that after the life and death sex or die Cassie is able to be Pritkins’s emotional support in the shower. That’s more important than the sex in some ways. cassie is not letting Pritkin distance himself from her and withdraw or take the fault for this…Cassie is not going to let him make this a reason to withdraw further or add it to his noble reasons to withdraw from the field. I think this whole thing shows Cassie growing into her power. making the war mages do what she wants, making Caleb listen, bossing Rossier and Pritkin around and still declaring her independence from Mircea (don’t forget that all of this started with the rebellion and pizza)…as an aside to that given that Pritkin just told Cassie in their comical conversation over pizza there will be no more sexual healing slip ups leads to the most sexual of their healing slip ups…can anyone say irony? I am tired and my brain is stalling so this will be my two cents for a while…Please feel free to argue with me, as all of our perspectives make the reread all the more fun
“evil didn’t pick and choose who to corrupt. It took root like an insidious weed that sought to destroy whatever garden it could find succor in, no matter who, what, or where that garden originated from. Evil was never picky about its host. That was why it was so important to rip it out and toss it off before it could spread and rot the garden from the inside out. Take over and destroy the beauty that made the garden whole and healthy.” Deadmen Walking, Sherrilyn Kenyon
Deadmen Walking
Sherrilyn Kenyon
Fiction
Tor Books
May 9, 2017
384
#1 New York Times bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon debuts a sweeping new epic saga sure to appeal to her millions of fans! Deadmen tell their tales . . . To catch evil, it takes evil. Enter Devyl Bane—an ancient dark warlord returned to the human realm as one of the most notorious pirates in the New World. A man of many secrets, Bane makes a pact with Thorn—an immortal charged with securing the worst creations the ancient gods ever released into our world. Those powers have been imprisoned for eons behind enchanted gates . . . gates that are beginning to buckle. At Thorn’s behest, Bane takes command of a crew of Deadmen and, together, they are humanity’s last hope to restore the gates and return the damned to their hell realms. But things are never so simple. And one of Bane’s biggest problems is the ship they sail upon. For the Sea Witch isn’t just a vessel, she’s also a woman born of an ancient people he wronged and who in turn wronged him during a centuries long war between their two races—a woman who is also sister to their primary target. Now Marcelina, the Sea Witch, must choose. Either she remains loyal to her evil sister and almost extinct race against Bane and his cause, and watches humanity fall, or she puts faith in an enemy who has already betrayed her. Her people over the totality of humanity—let’s hope Bane can sway her favor. Deadmen Walking is the first historical fantasy title in New York Times bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Deadman’s Cross series. It is a tale of passion and loss, emotions that wound and heal...and ultimate redemption
Mircea has a daughter! That’s who Cassandra saw in the photos in the “Cassandra Palmer” series. Dori Basarab is quite the rebel. She drinks beer and smokes weed, in part to quiet down the negative side effects that come with being a Dhamphir. Dhamphir’s are susceptible to blackouts and uncontrollable rage. In the book, her best friend goes missing. Along with a friend of Mircea, she sets out to find that friend and do her father a favor that can cost her, her life. Another great K.C. novel.
