Book Review: The Story Guy by Mary Ann Rivers and City of Glass by Cassandra Clare

First up this week is a novella by Mary Ann Rivers, The Story Guy.  I'm not sure how to categorise this one - probably contemporary romance (something I almost never read).

I'd never heard of this author.  I found her while trawling for new authors (I do this a lot since getting the Kindle - it's usually less expensive to try out a new author, and you can often download a free sample to see if you like their writing style.  In this case, the price was so reasonable, I decided to give the whole thing a go).

In her thirties, living alone, and still holidaying with her parents, Carrie is starting to feel dissatisfied with her life.  Her friends are in happy relationships, and although she knows her life is good, it's also just a little too safe and boring, and deep down she's lonely.  She enjoys reading personal ads placed by men who seem to have a 'real' voice to her - nothing glossy and superficial, just honest, often painful insights into their lives.  She never replies.  Until the day she sees something a little more intriguing than usual.  It begins: I will meet you on Wednesdays at noon in Celebration Park.  Kissing Only.  Before she has a chance to talk herself out of it, she's replied and agreed to meet him on Wednesday.

When she does muster her courage and go to meet Brian on that first Wednesday, to find that he's kind and passionate - not to mention gorgeous - of course she wonders why he's restricting himself to this small window of contact.  And she wants more.  As does Brian, apparently, but he won't allow himself to take more.  And as they start to fall in love - and, naturally, can't resist contacting each other outside of those Wednesday interludes - you find out why Brian can't take - or give - more.  And my goodness, was I ever glad I work from home.  I often read while I'm eating my lunch, and sobbing into my sandwiches with an audience would have been most embarrassing!  I can't remember the last time I read a book that made me cry like that.  Brian's struggle is beautifully drawn, and Carrie is no two-dimensional character either.  I defy anyone to read this, and not be sucked in by the characters.  It is a well-written love story (and the love scenes are fairly hot, so be warned) by an author I'm going to be reading again, and I highly recommend it.

5/5 stars.


Secondly, we have the third in The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare - City of Glass.  It's a young adult urban fantasy series.

Again, I can't give much away with my review, in case you've yet to read the first two in the series.  There is still much of Clary jumping into situations without considering the consequences.  She is still only sixteen, so I can forgive her that a little, and the things she has gone through in these three books do seem to have made her grow up and make hard decisions that your average sixteen-year-old probably wouldn't need to, so I'm happy with the development of her character.  Jace is still witty and gorgeous, along with a newly-acquired streak of self-loathing that makes him even more interesting.  And Simon (Clary's friend) has no choice but to grow up fast, thanks to the events of the previous books.  I love the way his character has been drawn, and how Clare uses the plot to put him under pressure and prove his worth.  There are nice little sub-plots featuring the supporting cast of characters and you never feel as if they're just page-fillers.

There's plenty of peril in the book, and you're never sure the characters are going to survive it - something I think is important in a series of this nature.  I used to be a (huge!) fan of the Anita Blake books by Laurell K Hamilton, but she lost me when it became apparent that, in spite of the cast of characters becoming ridiculously large, none of the main characters would ever die.  I don't mean I like my series peppered with painful killings-off of my favourite characters, but if you know Anita's going to save the day every single time, the tension is gone, and tension is the second thing after characters that I value in a novel.  And never mind the fact that Anita turned into an uber-slut at the same time ... but I digress.  (Again!)

This book concerns the villain Valentine and his quest to obtain the third and final Mortal Instrument and his plans to wipe out all opposition when he does.  And of course the quest of our heroes to stop him doing that.  It's fairly standard heroes and villains fare, but it's nicely done and I like the world-building and the characters.  If you don't mind reading YA - and it's not dumbed-down in any way - you might want to give these a try.

4.5/5 stars


It has occurred to me that I'm really only reviewing books I've enjoyed.  The reason for this is that if I really don't enjoy a book, I don't finish it.  Life is too short (and there are too many great books out there) to waste it on less than stellar books.  And I feel that I shouldn't really review a book if I haven't read it in its entirety.  So I may just include a little DNF (did not finish) section, with a few words about why I didn't finish the book and my rating for the part I did read.

This week's DNF:

Tempest Rising by Nicole Peeler.

I really wanted to like this!  An urban fantasy by a new-to-me author, it's about Jane True, a woman who doesn't know why she's drawn to swim in the sea over and over, although it's obvious from the start that it has something to do with her departed mother.  It started off well, the writing style was fairly engaging and I didn't hate the protagonist.  But I really, really didn't like the 'love' interest.  The moment he entered the scene, I pretty much switched off.  This is a problem for me.  You all know how I feel about tension - including sexual tension - in a novel, and for me it just wasn't there.  Jane practically rolls over for him - there may be all sorts of reasons for this that I had yet to read, but it bounced me right out of the story and left me feeling somewhat cheated.  Yes, I like the odd smutty book, but I'd rather read a well-written story without a single love scene, than have them included just for the sake of it.  I may try and go back to it, but I'm a picky reader - you don't often get two chances to grab my interest!  So my rating is based on about 40% of the novel.

3/5 stars.

Friday Book Review

I have 3 books to review this week.

First up is On The Island by Tracey Garvis Graves.

This is the story of Anna, a 30-year-old teacher, and T.J., the teenager recovering from cancer whom she is going to spend the summer tutoring on an island in the Maldives.  Without giving anything away (it happens quite soon after the start of the book and the title's something of a clue!), they are involved in a plane crash, which results in the pair of them being stranded on a deserted island.  They're then plunged into a desperate race for survival.  I was gripped right from that point - how do you even fulfill the most basic need to find water when you're surrounded by millions of gallons of it that you can't drink?  Life on the island is not all swimming and sunbathing; it's hard graft just to survive.  Add to that the loneliness, grief and often despair that they feel, and it's a painful ride.  But it's a beautiful one, too.  In spite of the age gap, you can see what a great team they make, and as T.J becomes a man, and it appears that they will only ever have each other to depend on, it's natural for them to fall in love.

But you know as you're reading it that it can't last forever - they're fighting a constant battle against the elements as well as illness, not to mention the malnutrition caused by their limited diet.  I spent most of the book in an agony of suspense, and I'm not going to spoil the ending for you.  But it was without question worth reading.  It's written as if the story is told in alternating chapters by the two main characters, and I felt this gave the story an added layer, to get both viewpoints as the story progressed.  Yes, I did find myself thinking of both Castaway and The Blue Lagoon, but I thought it offered something different in the characters themselves, more than the setting.  I loved it, and it's gone into my 'faves' folder on my Kindle ... 5/5 stars.


Next up is City of Ashes: Book II of The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare.

This is a YA (young adult series) which began with City of Bones - a book I enjoyed a LOT more than I expected to.  I can't say too much about this book without giving away major spoilers from the first book, but the main protagonist is teenager Clary, and while we see most of the story from her viewpoint, we do get some insight into the other characters' minds, too.  I don't read much YA (being a looong way past that myself, of course!) but I find Clare's writing compelling.  The characters are complex and the story generally doesn't pull any punches, so it's easy to forget that it's aimed at the teen market.  I didn't find this story quite as gripping as the first, but still head and shoulders above much of the adult urban fantasy out there.  (And if you follow me on Facebook, you'll know I was underwhelmed by the big screen adaptation of the first one, which I saw last weekend - I really should have stuck with the books!)  I'm looking forward to reading the next one.  4/5 stars.


Lastly, we have Working for the Devil by Lilith Saintcrow.

Firstly, let me just say that I hate this cover.  My paperback has the original cover, and it's much prettier - embossed with lots of demonic sigils and the like.  But I couldn't find that image, sadly.  Secondly, isn't Lilith Saintcrow the most fabulous name?  And her real one, too.  Anyway, I digress ...

If you follow my blog, you'll know that I've fairly recently gone to the 'dark side' and bought myself a Kindle, so I'm consuming electronic books voraciously.  However, I like to read in the bath, and I do NOT trust myself near water with an electronic device, so I'm happy that I can still read the old-school way every day.  I'm being judicious with the amount of 'real' books I buy now - after all, a large part of the reason for buying the Kindle was the space issue in our bursting-at-the-seams-with-books house.  So I'm rereading some of my immense collection.  Currently, the Dante Valentine series by Lilith Saintcrow..  Working for the Devil is the first one.

Dante (Danny) Valentine is a necromance.  She can raise the dead, and does so for profit.  Or, if not quite profit, enough money to pay her mortgage and allow her to eat.  The book begins with a demon knocking on her front door and pointing a gun in her face with the demand that she follow him to Hell, because the Prince (the Devil) has a non-negotiable job for her.  From then on, Danny's life (which clearly has an angst-filled backstory, glimpses of which we are shown throughout) seems to spiral into something approaching chaos.  Although you get the feeling it's (almost) all in a day's work for her.  I liked the story, the world-building, and most of all, the characters.  It's always the characters that make or break a book for me.  And more than Danny's character, I was riveted by that of Japhrimel, the demon bonded as a familiar to Danny by the Prince.  In spite of his power and willingness to use it, he is taciturn and implacable for much of the story, but he is not the typical alpha male character.  All the characters were well-developed and interesting, but Japhrimel was something a little out of the ordinary.  Again, I can't say much without spoiling the story, but I remember finishing this and immediately ordering the rest in the series.  I still love it, so that's definitely one paperback that won't be consigned to the charity shop any time soon.  (It's unlikely any of my rereads will have less than a five star rating, by the way, unless they're interim books in a series - after all, why would I want to reread them otherwise?) 5/5 stars.