My July Covers
Below is a quick round up of the books I’ve read during July, displayed in covers. My July in review to follow tomorrow. This month has been crazy, plenty of reading but a little bit less reviewing which means I’m slightly behind and playing catch up. Anyway, here are my covers:
Red Right Hand by Levi Black
Red Right Hand is a book based in a world full of monsters. A dark and frightening place that takes inspiration from the work of Lovecraft. I must say that I didn’t love this book and this puzzles me to an extent. Perhaps the fact that I haven’t read any Lovecraft didn’t help but for me it was a strange combination of brutal truths and flashbacks combined with gruesome horror. I certainly wouldn’t try to dissuade anyone from reading as I’m sure Lovecraft fans will find a wealth of imagination here to capture their attention.
The pacing is good. We get off to an immediate start as we’re introduced to Charlie Tristan Moore as she returns home from a disastrous night out with her boyfriend to be confronted by three skinhounds (which are every bit as bad as they sound and seem to have designs on Charlie). Charlie is rescued by an unlikely Man in Black (MiB), a strange character, foreboding, not totally trustworthy, with a ruined red right hand and a leather coat that seems to have a mind of it’s own. I wouldn’t say that the MiB has any redeeming characters, in fact it feels a little like going from the frying pan into the fire as Charlie is forced into becoming this stranger’s acolyte and releasing and embracing some strange latent magic from within herself in order to help him locate two elder gods – who he assures her are trying to destroy the world and need to be stopped. As an added incentive to Charlie the MiB decides to also take her boyfriend along for the ride.
This unlikely threesome (or four if you include the coat) set off on a night’s adventure. One night is all they have and in order to find these Gods they will first have to make the acquaintance of a very unsavoury character who will be able to help Charlie to find the right direction.
Charlie is a character with a harrowing background. She has suffered a traumatic experience and now tries to protect herself from the world by taking all and every sort of self defence class imaginable and projecting a tough outer image. If this is something that you will find difficult to read about then be warned of this now – I wouldn’t say that any of the flashbacks that Charlie experiences are gratuitous but they’re still disturbing. I think for me I was a little puzzled by this aspect of the story and it jarred me slightly. We had the full on night of horror where our characters visit the downright weird and wonderful and encounter monsters that are described to perfection in all their grossness but then we have these flashbacks in which we gradually piece together Charlie’s story and put together the pieces of the most terrible night she ever experienced. I guess the reason for this is to show you that Charlie is a survivor and she certainly needs to be in order to survive the night intact. But, like I said I think I would have preferred the focus to remain on the bizarrely horrific rather than trying to combine the two.
Without a doubt this is a fast paced read. It sets off with a no holds barred opening scene that pretty much defines how the rest of the novel will go. The writing is strong and the descriptions are, frankly, brilliant – the writing here will leave you in no doubt as to what these creatures look like and so if you’re a bit squeamish or easily scared – or you just don’t want more food for your nightmares – then steer clear because this author knows how to conjure up monsters and they are nasty without doubt.
I can certainly see the strengths of this book. For me I thought the two aspects didn’t sit particularly well together, I would have preferred to stick to the horror. I also had a difficult time forming any attachment to any of the characters. But, all that being said, I imagine that horror fans will love this and whilst it wasn’t totally for me I have no doubt that this will hold a lot of appeal for others.
I received a copy courtesy of the publisher through Netgalley for which my thanks. The above is my own opinion.
You might be a king or a little street sweeper, but sooner or later you’ll dance with the reaper…
29 July 2016
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Books by Proxy, hooded figures, The Friday Face Off
Here we are again with the Friday Face Off meme being hosted by Books by Proxy . This is a great opportunity to feature some of your favourite book covers. The rules are fairly simple and can be found here. Each week, following a predetermined theme choose a book, compare a couple of the different covers available for that particular book and choose your favourite. Simples. This week the theme is:
Shrouded in black, in morals I do lack – A cover featuring a character wearing a hood or cowl.
This week’s book is The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. I thought there were a lot of covers last week but this week was just silly – basically I stopped looking as it was getting ridiculous. So, my covers are:
My favourite is the last cover – I love the autumn feel and the colours – plus the character is wearing a hood (so it’s appropriate!) and he’s carrying his musical instrument so really ties in with the story. Lots of great covers to choose from them and some of them very dark and moody.
Time Siege (Time Salvager #2) by Wesley Chu
Time Siege is a great second instalment to the Time Salvager series by Wesley Chu, in fact I would say it’s even better than the first. There’s no shortage of action, a lot of character development and a twist at the end of the tale.
In case you didn’t get round to reading Time Salvager my review is here, and, customary warning: if you haven’t read the first instalment this review could very well contain spoilers.
Time Siege continues to take forward the story of James Griffin-Mars and Elise Kim. James, now an exChronman and fugitive, is in hiding with the Elfreth tribe and at the start of the book he’s hatching a plan. James is determined to save his sister from a disease that is slowly taking her life away. Having only just been reunited he’s determined to do everything in his power to find a cure, even if it means making more space jumps (that could potentially kill him) or bringing more people through time (and once again breaking the rules of time travel). Elise meanwhile seems to be becoming the ‘mother’ of the tribe, somewhat stealing her away from her efforts to find a world saving cure. The tribe is growing and more mouths to feed means more search and retrieve missions. The only option is to try and lure another person to make these salvage runs. At the same time we have Securitate Kuo from the Valta Corporation and all her supporting minions aiding Chronocom in their search for James and more importantly Elise! So, James sets off on a recruitment mission and Elise leads the tribe into hiding on the Mist Isle (previously known as Manhattan).
There’s such a lot going on in this instalment. It has a different feeling completely to the first book and I thought it was very cleverly written managing to combine some great action sequences where you fear for everyone and wonder who is going to survive combined with some great character building. Personally I loved the journey through the Mist Isle and encountering yet more tribes and their battles with each other to try and survive. Alongside this was the shockingly awful tactics of Kuo who will go to any lengths to obtain her goals. This character is beyond ruthless and reading her POV was almost grimly hypnotic. On top of this we visit a remote and brutal prison where a rather daring prison break is made – but I won’t elaborate more on that point because of spoilers.
In terms of the characters. Well, James goes through something of a meltdown in this instalment. He suffers from a massive bout of self pity that leads to some rather dreadful decisions. We know from the first book that James likes to find solace in the bottom of a bottle and his problem now really begins to show reaching a point where he is no longer capable of making rational decisions. I don’t suppose being constantly haunted by the ghosts of his past helps much in this respect. On top of that Elise is becoming more and more involved with the survival and running of the tribe, in fact her time is almost completely consumed by it meaning that she has less time for James – adding further to his sense of loneliness. He’s never really felt like a part of the tribe and now he can no longer salvage he feels worthless.
Grace was one of my favourite characters from the first book and she still is in Time Siege. She’s just a total force of nature charging around bossing people about and putting everyone in their place!
In terms of criticisms – well, I didn’t really have anything to be honest, this was a really entertaining read with excellent pacing. I think the only thing that stood out for me was that the whole ‘world saving’ issue took rather a back seat. But, I think that may be deliberate on the part of Chu – I think that issue may play a bigger role in the next book (although I could be completely off track with that). Both books in the series so far have had such a different feel and given the ending here I suspect that book No.3 will be the same in that respect.
I think this has such a lot going for it. Urban warfare with dramatic fight scenes that are really well drawn, characters that are far from perfect but yet still make you feel something for them and an ending that leaves the way open for a fantastic conclusion. Yes, this is something of a cliffhanger of an ending but oddly enough not the sort of ending that left me feeling exasperated at all, although, obviously I’m really keen to find out how this story ends.
Definitely recommended. I would also suggest that you need to read the first book in the series before picking Time Siege up. It might be that you could read this in isolation but personally I think the background and world building in the first is necessary to really set the scene.
I received a copy courtesy of the publisher through Netgalley for which my thanks. The above is my own opinion.
Late Eclipses (October Daye #4) by Seanan McGuire
Late Eclipses is the fourth instalment in the October Daye series and is a book packed with emotion and revelations. Without doubt this is my favourite of the series so far and this is a series that I’m now totally hooked on and thoroughly enjoying – it seems to get better with each book and clearly this has something to do with the fact that each instalment just adds yet more layers and depth to the characters and the world making it richer as you progress. This is a wonderful combination of great characters (both good and bad), mysterious goings on, would-be romance and fantastically dark urban fantasy with fae shenanigans that never become boring.
If you haven’t read the previous books be warned that there may be spoilers contained below.
At the start of the book Toby is called to the Tea Gardens where Lily seems to be seriously ill. No sooner has Toby rolled up her sleeves to get serious when more difficulties seem to strike and from there the problems just escalate. To be honest I don’t want to go too much into the plot, suffice to say, like each of the previous books there is a mystery going on, people are dying, and, as we know, Toby can’t help herself from rushing into the fray head first. Of course in this particular book what works really well is the sense of isolation that is built up around Toby. In this particular book we see the return of an old enemy of Toby’s who has been absent from the first book, Oleander de Merelands. Unfortunately, although Toby keeps suspecting that Oleander is behind things she has no proof and nobody else has caught sight of her which all lends to the view that maybe Toby is starting to succumb to the sort of madness that sometimes takes possession of changelings. On top of that Raysel seems to have cranked up her own rather nasty endeavours somewhat and as a leftover from An Artificial Night the Queen of Mists is also gunning for Toby. Things look fairly bleak and for a while there it almost felt like Toby was going to flounder. Of course that’s the really great thing about these stories so far. Toby has made a lot of enemies, she also seems to have enemies just purely by dint of her own parentage, but she’s also making some firm friends.
By the conclusion of this story there are a number of eye openers. Revelations that are revealing and yet also not. Tantalising revelations if you like. You learn a little but you know that you’ve only seeing the tip of the iceberg and that if you just dipped below the surface a whole passel of further revelations would be waiting to spring out and surprise you. I think at the moment my biggest curiosity comes in the form of Toby’s mother Amandine. I have so many questions in that respect that I’m almost chomping at the bit to start the next book.
I really loved Late Eclipses. It’s cleverly written, much like the other instalments, to give a tantalising glimpse of the world in which Toby lives. At the end of the tale we can see that Toby has moved forward in more ways than one and I think this is a good thing because I feel at the moment that a huge amount of trouble is going to come her way, I just can’t help thinking that there is eventually going to be some backlash from her previous encounters and hopefully she will be at least a little better prepared to meet it if it does occur.
I highly recommend Toby Daye. It’s an excellent urban fantasy series. The main protagonist, well, she isn’t perfect, she makes mistakes but she is just great to get on with. The surrounding cast are well developed and whilst each story builds on the one that came before the stories have a standalone feel to them that, even if a few threads are left hanging, doesn’t leave you with that cliffhanger feeling.
Books and travelling with Lynn 