Tag: reviews

Posted in Spicy Romance

Zodiac Hybrids

Posted on by Little Bee

By Leann Belle

Rating 5 Stars

I received an advanced review copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I have read Leann Belle before and I really enjoyed her writing. I was happy to read this mix of paranormal/shifters/zodiac/astrology story and I look forward to reading the other books as they come out. For the record, this is supposed to be a dark academy romance, but I missed some of the darkness I guess LOL. I am sure it will come. I liked each of the dynamics and I enjoyed seeing the first two men get kind of sucked in to Lila’s orbit.

I can’t wait to find out what Lila is and for her to find out also. I like her naivety in this sense and I will enjoy watching her become stronger, because I know she will. These characters are older even though it is an academy story. Lila is 22, Marcus is 26, and Adrian is 34. I am not sure how old Ceto is, but we only got a small introduction to him and I look forward to seeing him more.

Definitely check your triggers, as there are elements that people may not enjoy. This story ends on a cliffhanger, and definitely leaves you wanting for more. There were only a couple of spicy scenes in this story, but they were nice and spicy so they were not out of place. There was good world building and setting the lines of the story.

My only real confusion is the nature of Marcus and Adrian’s feud. I wont give any spoilers away, but it seems trivial, and I didn’t quite understand why Marcus is intent on Adrian losing control. I know Lila is supposed to be a pawn, but with the way it is shaping up, it looks like the guys are the ones in trouble here.

Posted in Spicy Romance

In the Care of Magic

Posted on by Little Bee

By Robin Jo Margaret

Rated 4 out of 5 Stars

I received a copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

This is a short story, 111 pages. It is a no angst, easy read, with lots of spice. It follows a witch named Jillian. She lives with humans and they often take advantage of her. One day she breaks down and runs off for a period of time to get away and refresh herself. While at her childhood home, she summoned a sex demon, named Lyle. At first, it was to help her relax and fulfill needs she has not fulfilled in a while. Over time, Lyle came back to Jillian each night, and eventually Lyle started coming during the day as well. They began spending more and more time. Eventually, Jillian offered Lyle to be in her life however Lyle saw fit. Sex demons are aromantic, so Lyle could not give Jillian a relationship, but they could enjoy each other’s company.

This really is the whole story. There is a lot of banter between Jillian and Lyle. I do like that Lyle got to stick around and even went to work with Jillian once she went back to her little human town and her shop. Lyle is gender neutral, and can form his body to meet the needs of the summoner. Throughout the book, the pronouns xe/xem/xyrs was used for Lyle. These pronouns are newer for me, so I had a hard time with their pronunciation and it took me a little longer to read the story.

Overall, it was a sweet book. It was really just spicy times, while they got to know each other and developed a friendship as well. I wouldn’t say there is an HEA, just that Lyle got to stick around in Jillian’s life to provide that need for each other. I would say there is a lot of growth individually for the two as well. Again, there is no angst. Just a nice spicy read. I also wish the type of “toy” Jillian spelled together for Lyle was real and we could all have one as well LOL.

Posted in YA Book Reviews

Bite Me

Posted on by Little Bee

Bite Me by Louise Cypress. Narrated by Reba Buhr and Alexander Cendese

Rating: 5 Stars

 

I received a copy of this audiobook from the author in exchange for my honest review.

Bite Me is about a high school senior named Morgan. Her mother is dating a classmate’s father and one night while she was at their home for a family dinner together, she was bitten by a young child who was being tended to by a nun. Turns out, this young child was a vampire and passed on vampiritis to Morgan. The classmate, whose name is Esma, and her father, Lucas, are called Puritans, meaning they do not feast on human blood and therefore age like a normal human and do not have the same kind of powers as vampires.

Van Xander is a descendant of Van Helsing. His family works for a council that slays vampires. His family was sent to the community where Morgan lived, but to monitor the local puritan coven when he discovers that Morgan is a vampire and she does not know it. As time goes on, he really begins to care for Morgan.

I really enjoyed listening to this book. I had been eyeballing reading it for a while, but with last year being so hectic for me, I just never picked it up to do so. When the opportunity to listen to it came about, I was very excited and jumped on it very quickly. I listened to this book in one day. That is right. I finished all 8 hours of it. I listened all day in every activity….working on the computer, doing chores around the house, feeding my son…I could not stop. The narrators really brought this story to life. I always feel narrators can make or break a story, and these narrators were fantastic.

I like the interesting twist to vampire lore that is out there. Cypress introduces that vampirism is like an illness and if you get treatment, you can live a normal life. In this case, if the infected person feasted on human blood, the disease took over and the person stopped aging and began having other vampiric superpowers. If a person did not feast on human blood, and stuck to a more paleo diet, then they lived a pretty normal, healthy, and happy life (they are known as Puritans). Having said that, they would still have the urge to feast on human blood. Morgan had a jump start to this though. Her stop mom, who is also one of these Puritan vampires, learned that something may happen to Morgan one day and began putting drops of medicine sort of like methadone, only it tones down the vampiric desires to feast on humans.

Overall, the story line was enjoyable. I am looking forward to the next book and am patiently waiting for its release on Audible. I have high hopes for the continuation of the series. If you want to listen to something with a fresh take on the same old vampire/human love story, this is a good one to go with!

I would like to thank the author for allowing me to review this audiobook for her! It was my pleasure and I greatly enjoyed listening!

Posted in Book Reviews

One Good Knight

Posted on by Little Bee

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One Good Knight by Mercedes Lackey, Narrated by Gabra Zackman

Goodreads Rating: 5 stars

Actual Rating: 4.5 

Narrator Rating: 5

 

One Good Knight is a retelling loosely following the Greek myth of Andromeda. Where Greek Lore indicates Andromeda to be beautiful, One Good Knight indicates she is “lesser” than most females and more homely than beautiful. One Good Knight is also loosely based from St. George and the Dragon, however, it is really in name only as this does not end in an entire town going through religious conversion.

In One Good Knight, Andromeda (Andi) is very book smart and she starts to notice some magical irregularities in her research for the Queen. During this time, the Queen had her consort conjure a dragon to wreck havoc on the villages. Andi is tasked to find out how to “rid” the kingdom of the dragon and discovers meaningful sacrifice would do so. A lottery is set up for virginal women, and each week a new name is drawn. After a while, the reader discovers prior to the cast, that this lottery is not by chance, but whenever a family displeases the Queen or speaks out against the Queen, their daughter is “selected” in the lottery and sent to die. During one such lottery, Princess Andi’s name is drawn and she is sent to be sacrificed, and so the adventure begins.

I really enjoyed the twists and turns this particular story had. As a reader, it is often times easy to get bored when books do as you expect. One Good Knight keeps readers entranced. Without giving away spoilers, the ending has been one of the best I have enjoyed. Much like in The Fairy Godmother, the Tradition had a mind of it’s own, only in One Good Knight I really enjoyed the way the Tradition worked for the characters.  I feel Andi was well written. She is portrayed as a confused, homely, child not to be taken seriously for most of time leading up to her being sacrificed. Queen Cassiopia is one to be despised. She is heartless and offers up her daughter happily to be killed.

The reason the actual rating is 4.5 stars is mainly because it was soooo slow to start out. Once the excitement of Princess Andi being sacrificed to the dragon occurs, things really start to speed up.

I really can’t say there is a particular character I didn’t like, aside from the villains of course, but I even enjoyed them. I thought each character in the book gave the book it’s personality it took on. Oh but the twists!!! It would be too many spoilers to explain the twists, and I want any potential reader to be as shocked as I was when I first came to the twists.

I am really glad I started this series, and I look forward to more Virgin chasing unicorns, fairy godmothers, and all of the other Traditional tales yet to be discovered.

Posted in YA Book Reviews

Darren Shan

Posted on by Little Bee

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Let’s do something different, instead of focusing on multiple books, I want to review an author that I have really grown to love and appreciate….Darren Shan.

My first encounter with Darren Shan was Cirque du Freak: A Living Nightmare a couple of years ago. I have since read a couple more books in this series, and each one is a little reminder of how much I really love Shan’s style of writing. Even though they are considered “YA” (and I would say YA to the max in some points), they are so beautifully written.

Shan has a variety of book series, and I find myself wanting to read them all. I recently started Zom-B. I figured hey, another “zombie” book is on the market…but…it is Shan, so I felt more inclination to read it. This particular book is absolutely amazing in it’s own right. Shan pushes the boundaries. This book is so much more than zombies, but beyond that. It incorporates intolerance, racism, and how by not standing up for something unjust is just as bad as the intolerance itself. Sure, it still has zombies, but it is so much more than that.

I believe that the messages Shan includes in his stories are so much deeper, that you almost don’t realize they are there (except for Zom-B). I believe that is what makes YA so amazing of a genre. Sometimes, young adults do not get to see positive influences. Hatred and intolerance is a learned pattern. I believe that Zom-B is one of those books that really could help a reader who may be in an abusive home, where a parent is full of intolerance and hate, yet they do not feel the same as their parent. B loves her father, yet hates him at the same time, who plays into the hatred just to stay on her father’s good side to deflect abuse. All of his book has some message, mixed in with the fantasy, humor, and, often times, gore to really captivate the reader.

I recently found another book by Darren Shan, The Thin Executioner, and I am pretty stoked at reading it. Series by Shan tend to be a couple hundred pages a book. The Thin Executioner appears to be a full on novel. With his series, each book tends to be left with a cliffhanger (bah!).

If you want to try something new, that you might not have given the chance before, I would suggest any of Shan’s books. I haven’t read all of his series, but it is my goal. I enjoy his writing enough to say that he can’t write anything bad!