Ash’s review of Night’s Cold Kiss by Tracey O’Hara
Urban Fantasy published by EOS 25 Aug 09

So, I haven’t read too many vampire books in the past few years, not as many as I used to. First I was bored with them all being alike, and then they all became so complicated just to be different. Night’s Cold Kiss is neither of those. The vampires are pretty straightforward, with the good and the bad, but the world around them is a little bit more complicated.

I was originally a little scared to read this book because it has a glossary, but it turns out I didn’t really need to use it. Tracey O’Hara makes the world pretty easy to slip into. The different branches of government organizations get confusing at times, but it’s easy to get past that. The different paranormal beings are the right amount of interesting, and there isn’t a hundred and one different species to deal with. The origin of the parahumans, as they are called, is a bit of a surprise that I am not sure really works for me, but it’s unique enough that I am open to it.

Sadly it is our heroine, Antoinette, that is my least favorite part of the story. She is one of the best venators, but I feel many of her actions and reactions are juvenile and it doesn’t mesh with who she is supposed to be.  She has more than her fair share of TSTL moments. Christian has a lot more patience with her than I would have. Night’s Cold Kiss is better for me when we are in Christian’s head. He happens to be my favorite character of the book, at least my favorite who is still alive at the end. Tracey O’Hara is not afraid to kill people off.

Looks like the next book has a new set of main characters, which I admit I am happy about. I’ve heard that there is hardly any Christian, which I am not happy about. As far as urban fantasies go, this isn’t the best I’ve read, but it’s far above the worst. I’d be happy to add this to my list of must-read series.

Grade: B

Summary:

The tension between the Aeternus, an ancient vampiric people, and humanity has been mounting for over a century. But when rogue vampires begin to drain humans in order to achieve an illegal blood-high, all bets are off.

After the death of her parents, Antoinette Petrescu devoted her life to becoming one of the top Venators, the elite hunters who destroy the rogue Necrodreniacs. Her kill count is legendary and her skills superb.

But now the serial killer who killed her parents has returned. And to stop him Antoinette must join forces not only with the Aeternus, but also their most legendary killer. One that is both dangerously attractive, and involved in buried secrets of her past. More dangerous still, a dark attraction grows between them–one that could doom both races.

Read an excerpt.

Other books in this series:

Gwen’s review of Black Magic Sanction (Rachel Morgan and The Hollows, Book 8 ) by Kim Harrison
Urban fantasy hardcover released by Eos 23 Feb 10, mass market paperback release 28 Dec 10

The Hollows series is a guilty pleasure for me.  Rachel Morgan’s life is such a hot mess, it never fails to make me feel better about mine. Plus, it’s entertaining as hell to read about Rachel pissing everyone off and still managing to make them like her. 

In this entry, Rachel is fighting the war for her life on so many fronts it’s a little difficult to keep track of all the players.  The coven is trying to kill her for what she knows. Trent Kalamack is trying to kill her for what she’s done to him. Her almost boyfriend Pierce appears to not be on her side. And Al, the demon, is just having fun with Rachel by threatening her and all the people she loves, while at the same time, teaching her about demon magic.  It’s a trip reading about Rachel’s world and wondering how embattled one witch can be and still survive.

This entry in the Rachel Morgan world is a very entertaining one. In earlier novels, the story would drag  at times – like when Rachel would have the never ending navel lint inspection regarding her relationship with Ivy (I always say “Get over it already!” – nobody listened). We’re carried along as Rachel is gutted emotionally by her own paranormal community and then finds out they weren’t really serious about it after all.

If you’re a fan of this series, I highly recommend reading this book.  It sets up some fun action in the next entry and is really very entertaining.  If you haven’t read the previous books, you may not want to start with this one – the story is pretty involved and understanding Rachel is not a simple thing.

But for you fans out there? Read it.  The mass market paperback of this hardcover is releasing in a few days.

Grade: A

Read other information on this series by following its tag here.

Summary:

In New York Times bestselling author Kim Harrison’s most complex and nuanced adventure yet, bounty hunter and witch Rachel Morgan fights a deadly battle—mind, body, and soul

Rachel Morgan has fought and hunted vampires, werewolves, banshees, demons, and other supernatural dangers as both witch and bounty hunter—and lived to tell the tale. But she’s never faced off against her own kind . . . until now.

Denounced and shunned for dealing with demons and black magic, her best hope is life imprisonment—at worst, a forced lobotomy and genetic slavery. Only her enemies are strong enough to help her win her freedom, but trust comes hard when it hinges on the unscrupulous tycoon Trent Kalamack, the demon Algaliarept, and an ex-boyfriend turned thief.

It takes a witch to catch a witch, but survival bears a heavy price.

Read an excerpt here.

Other books in the series, in reading order (all links for mass market paperback where available):

Connie’s Quick Quack review of Nightwalker (Dark Days, Book 1) by Jocelynn Drake
Urban fantasy released by Eos 29 Jul 08

Mira has been a vampire a long time. She is a bit of a rebel but enforces the rules in her little part of the world. She is different than other vampires as she has an elemental mastery over fire. Then a vampire hunter comes to town and he and Mira must make an uneasy pact to try to stop the naturi from breaking a seal and taking over. 

Mira must contact her old mentor and her maker to help defeat the naturi. No one is sure who to trust and no one is exactly what they seem.

You will find a few interesting characters but not necessarily one you will feel compelled to follow. I was compelled to finish the book after dragging along but would gladly follow the characters I liked by word of mouth.

Grade: D+

Summary:

For centuries Mira has been a nightwalker–an unstoppable enforcer for a mysterious organization that manipulates earth-shaking events from the darkest shadows. But elemental mastery over fire sets her apart from others of her night-prowling breed…and may be all that prevents her doom.The foe she now faces is human: the vampire hunter called Danaus, who has already destroyed so many undead. For Mira, the time has come to hunt…or be hunted.

But in a dimension just beyond the world’s boundaries, a banished race stirs dangerously, hungry for power, for domination, for vengeance. Already a protective seal has been breached: already blood flows like a river through the world’s great cities.

And only the collaboration of two sworn enemies can save humankind…and its feral brethren.

Read an excerpt.

I mean cover. This is sort of nifty.  It appeals to the control freak in me, no really.  Which cover you gonna vote for?  And who is Katherine Allred?

Liviania‘s review of The Touch of Twilight (Sign of the Zodiac Book 3) by Vicki Pettersson
Urban fantasy released by EOS 27 May 08

I first encountered Vicki Pettersson in the anthology Holidays are Hell which included her intriguing short story “Harvest.” I liked the protagonist and mythology presented and began to the Signs of the Zodiac series. In the third novel, The Touch of Twilight, a doppelganger is ripping apart the fabric of reality – and Joanna Archer may only be able to stop it with the help of her father.

The problem is her father is the leader of the Shadows. The third sign of the Zodiac predicts that her Shadow side will rise, but Joanna doesn’t believe she would switch sides. For one, the Tulpa’s top priority is still finding and killing her mother. Joanna is distracted from her fate and that of Las Vegas by her complicated love life. The Shadow Cancer Regan pursues her old boyfriend Ben. Hunter pursues Joanna, and works as an escort on the side.

Ben faces some character assassination. I never preferred him to Hunter, so it didn’t bother me to much, but I would have liked some foreshadowing in the previous novels. Hunter and Joanna still have chemistry. Their scenes together range from playful to bittersweet, and I hope they manage to work things out because they’re fun to read together.

The Touch of Twilight is not welcoming to newcomers. Pettersson bases her mythology on comic books and astrology, an uncommon choice in urban fantasy. The world building is tight, but the complexity and terminology might not be easily picked up without reading the first or second novels before the third. In this one, I was looking for growth in Joanna’s character. The first was her introduction to the world of the Zodiac as well as the readers’. The second allowed her to make mistakes and realize the consequences of her actions. The third focuses more on the relationships and less on the action.

The action present satisfies. There are some excellent horror-style segments involving message-by-minion. Once again things build to a large confrontation between the Light and Shadow troops. Joanna works with Chandra and shows a capability for strategy, both things that reveal the growth I wanted to see. She still makes a number of mistakes, but she is learning from them. Her stumbles do not frustrate me like those of most heroines because she did suddenly gain her powers and the other Zodiac warriors spent their lives preparing for the fight.

Pettersson creates a number of questions to be (hopefully) answered in the fourth book. The plight of the changelings, human children who aid the Zodiac warriors, comes up often in The Touch of Twilight but is not resolved. I like how important imagination is to the powers of either side, and the kids who believe in the warriors are easy to emphasize with. The book ends with Joanna knowing one character might be in danger. Zoe Archer, Joanna’s mother, might return. The Scent of Shadows was an impressive beginning and the novels become ever more interesting as Joanna overcomes her past and faces the present.

Grade: B+

The summary:
On the surface she’s a sexy, sophisticated socialite, at home among the beautiful people of the Las Vegas upper crust. But Joanna Archer inhabits another world: a place ordinary humans cannot see . . . a dangerous dimension where an eternal battle rages between the agents of Light and Shadow. And Joanna is both.

Stalked by an enigmatic doppelganger from a preternatural realm, Joanna can feel the Light failing—which is propelling her toward a terrifying confrontation with the ultimate master of evil, the dark lord of Shadow: her father.

Vegas is all about winning big . . . or losing everything. To save her friends, her future, her worlds, Joanna Archer must gamble it all by fully embracing the darkness inside her.
Read an excerpt here.

Gwen’s review of The Outlaw Demon Wails (Rachel Morgan, Book 6) by Kim Harrison
Urban fantasy hardcover released by Eos on 26 Feb 08

I know I’m not alone here.  I know there are other Rachel Morgan fans out there.  I know there are some former Rachel Morgan fans out there who wrote her off as being TSTL.  I’m here to tell all of you, current and former, that RACHEL GETS A CLUE in this sixth entry in the series!!  Yes!!  Really!  No seriously! I’m not kidding!

In this latest episode of the Saga of Rachel, she discovers some home truths about herself and her family.  These revelations open whole new doors and exciting possibilities to our heroine.  She is still battling Algaliarept, Minias, Newt, Trent, Quen, and the FIB.  She has made an uneasy truce of sorts with the vampire and werewolf communities.  Her fellow white witches generally don’t want to have anything to do with her, believing she is a black witch who deals in demons (they deal in her, she insists).

This is also the Kisten-less Rachel.  I’m actually kind of glad that loser is out of her life.  He always struck me as vain and not very into what was good for Rachel.  Rachel begins a relationship in this book that has promise for something good in her life, with a guy who can deal with her, shall we say, eccentricities.  I won’t spoil the details, not that there are many to spoil, but this is a nice note in the book.

Rachel finally grows up in this book.  She realizes some things about her relationship with Ivy, and vampires in general, that she should have realized YONKS ago.  I’m glad she reached this point – at long last.  It makes her previous stupidity about Ivy (and Kisten) somewhat tolerable.  She kept putting herself, and her friends, in all these idiotic situations because she was such a bonehead.  Well, she finally twigged that perhaps that wasn’t such a good idea.

What I like the most about Harrison’s writing is that we’re not so much reading a book, as we are a diary of what happens in this witch’s crazy life.  Harrison really does a nice job of moving us from one story arc to the next and still moving her overall plot along.  Yes.  This book has a plot.  It isn’t just one interesting story after another, strung together loosely by some details.  We actually, almost, have an HEA at the end of the book, even if Rachel isn’t exactly riding off into the sunset with the love of her life at the end.

This was a VERY satisfying entry into The Hollows and Rachel Morgan world.  I learned a lot about our intrepid, sometimes stupid, little heroine.  And enjoyed the hell out of the story along the way.  I didn’t see anything on Harrison’s site, but I’m hoping we get a few more entries into the Rachel Morgan world.

I recommend this book to anyone reading the Rachel Morgan series.  If you’ve walked away from it, this might be a good entry to rejoin the fun.  If you’re new to the series, I recommend reading the extra materials on Harrison’s site before you attempt the book – it’s a complex world.

Grade: A

Summary:

     To save the lives of her friends, Rachel did the unthinkable: she willingly trafficked in forbidden demon magic. And now her sins are coming home to haunt her.

     As Rachel searches for the truth behind a terrifying murder, an even greater menace threatens, for the demon Algaliarept will stop at nothing to claim her, and the discovery of a shocking family secret throws Rachel’s entire life into question. If she is ever to live free, Rachel must first walk willingly into the demonic ever-after in search of long-lost ancient knowledge.

     But when you dance with demons, you lay your soul on the line . . . and there are some lines that should never be crossed.

     Read an excerpt.

Hey Bev – Unabridged Audio is released! 

Other books in this series:

	Book 1, Dead Witch Walking,  mmppb (mass market paperback) (Eos, Apr 04), coming in hardcover (EOS, Apr 08)
	Book 2, The Good, the Bad, and the Undead, mmppb (Harper Torch, Jan 05), coming in hardcover (Eos, Jun 08)
	Book 3, Every Which Way But Dead, mmppb (Eos, Jun 05), coming in hardcover (Eos, Sep 08)
	Book 4, A Fistful of Charms, mmppb (Harper Torch, Jun 06), coming in hardcover (Eos, Oct 08)
	Book 5, For A Few Demons More, mmppb (Eos, Nov 07), hardcover (Eos, Mar 07)