Shannon C.’s review of Dark Chance by Melissa Lopez
Contemporary paranormal erotic romance ebook released by Samhain Publishing 10 Jun 08

I’ve said this before and will doubtless say it again, but in order for me to really appreciate a romance, I need a strong heroine. I need to know that the woman who ends up with my hot, tortured hero actually deserves him and is simply not just the first willing sweet thang to come along and let him experience the healing power of her vajayjay.

That’s why I’ve decided I’m done with Melissa Lopez. She’s got a great concept for a series, and plenty of material to work with, but I am pretty sure I was not supposed to be cringing in abject embarrassment for the poor heroine, simply because girlfriend wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.

Olivia has been sent on a mission from her dark masters in Netherworld. She’s supposed to push FBI agent Malin Cross down the path to the Dark Side so that Satan can add him to his armies. She’s supposed to do that by acting as Malin’s perfect submissive, which is, of course, his deepest, darkest fantasy. Then she’s supposed to convince Malin to go over the edge and actually kill the serial killer he’s been hunting.

Olivia… Oh my. As I said earlier, this woman is possibly one of the stupidest heroines I’ve read about. I think she is supposed to be cutely naive, but mostly this didn’t come across well. When she actively asks strangers if they know where the serial killer is Malin’s been hunting–yeah, really really good detective work there, Nancy Drew–I actively cringed through the scene. And since she refers to Malin most of the time as “Master’, well, I’m afraid that Barbara Eden as Jeannie from I Dream of Jeannie came to mind and never quite left.

Malin is, predictably, much more interesting. I would have liked to know him better, but that wasn’t allowed for such a short story. I was left with a lot of questions about him, like why it was he needed to be a dominant. I thought his reactions to Olivia were very realistic, but I didn’t entirely believe in his serial killer obsession.

As usual, the sex scenes here are hot, although there wasn’t really any D/S stuff actually going on other than the fact that Malin wants a dominant. But the romance itself didn’t entirely satisfy me, as I felt the story probably could have ended just a smidge later, so that these two could actually resolve some of their issues.

As for the plot… This story was just too short. It’s a romance, so of course you know how it’s going to end, and it ended in much the same way that the last story did, with some literal deus ex machina stuff going on. I think I’d like to see Ms. Lopez try to redeem someone who really wasn’t a very good person in life, or have a true morally ambiguous character need to be brought to the path of righteousness. Unfortunately, I think after having given this author two chances, not even an interesting premise and a truly detailed idea of hell sells me on continuing the story.

Grade: D

Summary:
Do you believe in chance?

Absolution Book One

A book of Netherworld.

Olivia Sutcliff is a lost soul who has endured the tortures of Netherworld for more than a hundred years, but now she’s given one chance to get out—on a task set by the Dark Prince himself. She must use her sexual wiles to help damn an innocent man, and failure means a fate worse than hell.

FBI special agent Malin Cross has devoted every waking moment to catching the killer who haunts his nightmares. Until he meets the woman of his dreams. She’s a perfect submissive, one who anticipates his every fantasy. But she also asks too many questions, leaving Malin to wonder if she’s as innocent as she seems…or if she’s bait to lure him into the killer’s web.

As Olivia entices Malin deeper into a world that wants him destroyed, her second thoughts grow into a desire to save him from making a damning mistake.

But as the forces of light and dark collide, their lives—and their souls—hang on the one sacrifice that could destroy them both.

Warning, this title contains the following: explicit sex, graphic language, and graphic violence. Netherworld is a dark, foreboding place.

You can read an excerpt here.

Read my review of Dark Sentinel here.

Shannon C.’s review of Dark Sentinel (Book of Netherworld) by Melissa Lopez
Paranormal erotic romance released by Samhain Publishing 17 Mar 08

Melissa Lopez has a gifted and fertile imagination. There are no cliches and same-old same-old paranormal plot devices in Dark Sentinel, which earns the book points. Unfortunately, the writing style and the characterizations drove me crazy.

Lash is a damned soul, condemned to spend eternity in Netherworld, which is essentially Hell. Then he’s given an opportunity–he must see to it that Teva, a mortal, is condemned to join the ranks of souls in Netherworld.

Teva isn’t sure what to make of this quiet giant of a man. He seems to be suffering from amnesia, and he takes pleasure in little things, like being able to drink water. She takes him in when she finds him, naked, on her property, and soon she and Lash must fight their sizzling attraction to each other. Her soul is at stake if they give in to temptation.

The characters are very problematic, most particularly Teva. I just didn’t ever get a sense that I knew who she was. She seemed to have been bred from innocent-heroine central casting. She’s entirely too sweet and too trusting, and I didn’t really get what Lash saw in her. Plus, and this is a tiny thing but it still bugged, Teva was the kind of person who says “gosh” and “heck” in everyday speech. This made her come off sounding not like an innocent young thing, but like someone’s middle-aged mother.

Lash I liked a bit more, but he still didn’t entirely work. He’s a tortured soul–aren’t they all in paranormal romances–and some of the stuff he goes through was pretty horrendous. My heart broke for him when he experienced small pleasures like being outdoors and doing comparatively easy hard work like splitting wood. He just seemed like an adorably nice guy, but even he was a bit too good to be true, the sort of guy that, aside from the whole tortured repeatedly thing, would be any woman’s dream man. Hell, the man uncomplainingly watches chick flicks!

I also didn’t really buy the chemistry between the characters. Once more, this has to do with writing style. Lopez uses a lot of words that are designed to make the sex scenes hot, but after a while I kept wondering if all the stuffing Lash does to his cock would hurt. And while I’m not a fan of the “love grotto” and “turgid manhood” school of romance novels, I definitely prefer something other than “he shoved his cock into her sticky hole.”

Regarding the plot, it was interesting. It’s very clear that Ms. Lopez has thought long and hard about this world she’s created, and I liked that the story was fairly dark. I think there are lots of directions she could go with the Netherworld books, and lots of types of creatures it would be interesting to meet. But I will say that the human villain in the book was so screamingly obvious, not to mention horribly cheesy that I had a few eye-rolling moments. The book also took too long to hit its stride for me. There are also a lot of scenes of graphic violence. After all, a condemned soul gets to die repeatedly over and over, which means there’s a lot of opportunity for gratuitous torture.

I am curious enough to keep reading Melissa Lopez’s next book, but I’m not sure I’d recommend it except to those who are really, really die-hard fans of dark paranormals.

Grade: C-

     Summary:

     Their love could give him a second chance at life—or condemn her to an eternity of damnation.

     A Book of Netherworld

     Yanked from his tortured existence in Netherworld and dumped naked in the Louisiana Bayou, Lash could swear he’s died and gone to heaven. Except for the fact that a millennium ago he died a condemned soul, forever barred from Paradise. His new life feels like the next best thing, full of small miracles. Like silence. And ice water. And the company of a beautiful, compassionate woman.

     Teva is a woman with a taste for heavy-metal music, an inherited talent for magic, and a trusting heart. She knows nothing about the mysterious stranger she’s taken in, only that he needs her help. And the fact that he’s gorgeous hasn’t escaped her attention. She can’t see Lash as anything other than a sexy, gentle man who soothes her nightmares away.

     Then Lash learns the real reason for his reprieve from Netherworld—he’s been sent to corrupt Teva’s soul with sinful pleasures. Starved for tenderness and aching with desire, Lash yearns to accept the loving embrace Teva offers. But he can’t give in to passion without tainting her, condemning her to the horrors of Netherworld.

     The ultimate battle between good and evil is brewing, and Lash stands caught in the middle between Teva, who owns his heart—and Satan, who owns his soul.

     Warning, this title contains the following: explicit sex, graphic language, and graphic violence. Netherworld is a dark, forbidding place.

     Read an excerpt here.