Friday Feature: THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT by Shawna Romkey

The Devil Made Me Do It

By Shawna Romkey

Book two in the Speak of the Devil series

The demons strike back!

Lily is working with the angels to stifle the last of the demon outbreaks and to figure out how to stop the Silence of God, so life can get back to boring normality. But all hell breaks loose when she's stolen from school and brought face to face with the devil himself. Lily has to find her way back home to Luc, crack the prophecy that breaks the curse silencing God, and figure out how she and Luc can ever really be together; but Lucifer has other plans for her that don't include her ever getting out of Hell intact.

Romance | Paranormal | Teen | Young Adult | YA | Fantasy | Angels | Demons
| Devils | New Adult | NA

Buy Links

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1EZAGuZ

Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/1KuMxcr

Kobo: http://bit.ly/1HjMKJ8

iTunes: http://apple.co/1IVcFwq

About Shawna Romkey 

Shawna grew up around farms in the heart of Missouri but went to the University of Kansas, was raised in the US but now lives on the ocean in Nova Scotia with her husband, two sons, one rescue dog and one overgrown puppy from hell. She’s a non-conformist who follows her heart.

She’s taught English at the university and secondary levels for close to twenty years and can’t quite fathom how all of her students have grown up, yet she’s managed to stay the same.  She’s a huge geek and fan of Xena, Buffy and all kick ass women, and loves to write stories that have strong female characters.

Shawna's Links

Website  |  Facebook  |  Twitter  | Pinterest  |  Goodreads

Book #Review: LEGACY OF THE BLOOD by Callie Kanno

Legacy of the Blood, by Callie Kanno
Published November 2013

About the Book (from Goodreads):

Book 2 of The Threshold Trilogy:
Five years have passed since Adesina began on her path to lead her people, the L’avan, back to their true purpose. Her hopes for peace and prosperity are high until her husband, L’iam, is captured by an enemy bent on ultimate control. Adesina is willing to go to the end of the earth to save her husband, but as she travels deeper into unknown worlds she discovers that there is more at stake in this journey than she ever could have imagined.

MY TAKE:

LEGACY OF THE BLOOD is the second in a high fantasy series for young adults, written by Callie Kanno. The story picks up five years after the ending of the first book, THE THRESHOLD CHILD.

I enjoyed this book, but if you haven't read the first book in the series you won't understand what's going on. I read and reviewed THE THRESHOLD CHILD in February 2013 - you can find my review on this blog by clicking HERE. This is high fantasy with a ton of world building and back story. You can't just jump into it midstream. Think of it like The Lord of the Rings trilogy. You can't just start with The Two Towers, right?

On to my review.

It's been five years since our heroine Adesina embraced her vaya, or magic. She married L'iam and now rules by his side as Queen of the L'avan people, a race of magic users. When he is kidnapped while on a diplomatic mission, she must race to save him from the Shimat, the warrior sect where Adesina was raised.

Before she can mount a rescue, Adesina's Shimat instructor appears at the L'avan village to offer his services to aid in recovering L'iam. Although wary of Kendan's intentions, Adesina agrees to allow him to help. Together with two L'avan warriors and Kendan's tracker, they begin a journey to save not only L'iam but the fate of their world.

Adesina discovers that her lifelong Shimat enemy and rival, Basha, was the one to kidnap L'iam. She also discovers along the way that Kendan still harbors complicated feelings toward Adesina, feelings she no longer reciprocates.

There are many twists and turns as the group faces one obstacle after another. Along the way they make friends and alliances with the various people they meet, Adesina's innate goodness winning over hearts and minds even as they battle for their lives. The overarching myth of the Threshold Child haunts Adesina until she figures out the meaning of the prophecy. She also needs to overcome her inner doubts and fears about the strength of her own vaya, and learn to control it before it controls her.

There is a lot of history and back story that Adesina must learn in order to prevail in her quest. The Dream sequences she embarks on with her Guardian, Ravi, get to be a little much, and I think the author could have handled the information dump a little more creatively. The Dreams themselves tend to be slightly confusing as Adesina both observes the action in the dreams from the periphery and experiences them as the main characters from the history she is observing. If head hopping or abrupt POV changes bother you, this might not be a good fit for you as a reader.

If you enjoy high fantasy and sweeping, magical quests, immerse yourself in the world of Adesina and the L'avan. Unlike the first book, which had a strong and definitive HEA, the ending to the second book is abrupt. But never fear, a third book is in the works.

#SALE for Son of a Mermaid - $2.99 for a limited time!

To celebrate my book's first birthday this month, and the upcoming release of the second book in the series, my publisher has agreed to an ebook SALE! And who doesn't like a sale??

Buy SON OF A MERMAID for $2.99 on AMAZON today - and dive into the mysteries lurking beneath the surface of the Atlantic! Grab it now and get ready for summer reading!

Then you're ready for BLOOD OF A MERMAID, book 2 in the series - available on Kindle May 15th.

Ready? Set? Read!

Book Review: Another Pan (The Marlowe School #2) by Daniel & DIna Nayeri

Another Pan, by Daniel and Dina Nayeri
Published September 2010 by Candlewick Press
 
About the Book:

Sixteen-year-old Wendy Darling and her insecure freshman brother, John, are hitting the books at the Marlowe School. But one tome consumes their attention: THE BOOK OF GATES, a coveted Egyptian artifact that their professor father believes has magical powers. Soon Wendy and John discover that the legend is real—when they recite from its pages and descend into a snaking realm beneath the Manhattan school. As the hallways darken, and dead moths cake the floor, a charismatic new R.A. named Peter reveals that their actions have unleashed a terrible consequence: the underworld and all its evil is now seeping into Marlowe. Daniel Nayeri and Dina Nayeri return to reimagine Peter Pan as a twisty, atmospheric, and fast-paced fantasy about the perils of immortality.

My Take:

I hate to give any book a low rating - I know what it takes to actually finish a manuscript and get it through the process of becoming a book.

But.

I gave this book a one-star rating last week on Goodreads. (cringe!) (And I'm not sure it deserved one star.)




I want to warn anyone who picks this up thinking it'll be a cool retelling of the Peter Pan legend we all know and love. If you like/love/know-at-all the story of Peter Pan, you will be disappointed in this book and the characters Mr. Nayeri has turned them into.

I did read this whole book, and I kept waiting for it to redeem itself. It never did.

First let me say I didn't have a problem with the Egyptian curse twist to the storyline, or some of the added plot twists like Mrs. Darling having run off with a grad student. Or the modern day setting in an exclusive New York prep school. I had a little bit of a problem with the writing style itself as it seemed over-written and old fashioned.

My biggest problem with this story is that there isn't a single likeable character, and that Mr. Nayeri took well-loved, time-tested characters and totally ignored why they were likeable.

Wendy is supposed to be a strong, independent spirit, the embodiment of early girl power. The author has made her into a 16-year-old girl who doesn't know her own heart, who questions the motives and feelings of everyone around her as well as her own, and who is so self-absorbed in her own internal drama that she's totally unlikeable.

Her little brother John is smart, but also so totally self-absorbed and starved for "popularity" that he can't connect with anyone. His lame attempts at making friends with the cardboard cutouts of popular kids don't ring true in the slightest.

And Peter. He is painted as a selfish, bossy, dictatorial leader of a world-wide organization of miscreant "LBs" or Lost Boys - who steal, cheat, and create all kinds of major crime around the globe. He's an underworld crime lord with no redeeming qualities. He has no fun in his soul, nor any sparkle in his eye. And his sidekick, the feisty but unmagical "Tina" is an extremely poor stand-in for Tinkerbell.

I kept thinking, At least there will be redeeming romance. Nope. At least Peter will do the right thing in the end. Nope. At least someone will realize something that will change their life or their character. Another big nope.

There are other Peter Pan books out there that are better retellings. Find one of those. Or read the original. Save yourself the heartache of this disappointing story.