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Review – Envy of Angels by Matt Wallace (E-book)

EnvyofAngels_Final_hires I’ve been a casual fan of Matt Wallace’s for quite some time. His stories have been engaging and (in the case of Sundae) moving. When I read the synopsis for Envy of Angels, it piqued (I always have to Google this word) my interest. Was it a feast or a famine?

In New York, eating out can be hell.

Everyone loves a well-catered event, and the supernatural community is no different, but where do demons go to satisfy their culinary cravings?

Welcome to Sin du Jour – where devils on horseback are the clients, not the dish.

The Goods – An urban fantasy where food takes center stage? As someone who’s worked in the food service industry in varying roles and who loves cooking and eating fabulous food, I was intrigued. This initial book in the series shows us the inside of Sin du Jour through the eyes of two excellent cooks who aren’t where they want to be professionally. The staff have to prepare incredible dishes (using a very special main ingredient) and create a wonderful party for two rival demon clans.

This story has everything I want. The characters are interesting, memorable, and as well fleshed out as you can ask for. The protagonists are interesting and strange, though the biggest protagonist may well be the clock. My personal favorite part of the story is where the crew whose job it is to procure certain specialty items goes up against… Well let’s just say I’ll never look at a chicken nugget the same way again. The conflicts, as strange as they are, have real stakes. Wallace has taken all of his many skills and written a truly fascinating and hilarious piece of fiction.

The Bads – I got nothing. I mean seriously. NOTHING.

The Verdict – If the bit in “The Goods” doesn’t hook you in, I’m not sure what can. It’s a brilliant concept, wonderfully executed. It’s one of those “I wish I had thought of it” moments. Go and buy it. I give this Five out of Five Golden Arches.

BLOG – http://www.matt-wallace.com/
TWITTER – https://twitter.com/MattFnWallace
Amazon Link – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00WDVL0HQ/

e-book, fiction, pimpage, review

Review – Origin of Might (Ebook)

OrginOfMight-Cover

I’ve been following Steven’s blog and writing for a while now. His stuff has an undeniably quirky sense of humor about it, and he has a unique voice. When I saw this freebie, I decided to go ahead and give it a try. Is it a MIGHTY SUCCESS, or a MIGHTY FAILURE?

Oliver Jordan’s day was like any other: Dealing with customers and coworkers at Job #1, getting delayed on the way to Job #2 by another senseless superhero battle, and delivering that last pizza of the night to Old Man Pembleton.
Except this time Mr. Pembleton’s tip was far from normal. This time Oliver was given a ring that would grant him powers beyond his wildest dreams. Oliver only needs to figure out how to make the thing work.
Not an easy task when you are busy dealing with apathetic teenagers and alien abduction.
Origin of Might is the first in a series of books set in and around Garrison City, home to such heroes (or Mighties) as the Shadow Fox, Power Surge, Lady V, Spitfire, and the legendary Captain Might.
Can Oliver Jordan find the time to work two jobs, provide for his family, attend school functions, spend quality time with the wife and kids, and save the world?
The answer begins here.

The Goods –  I love super hero stories. I don’t think they should be limited to just comic books and the great thing is, they aren’t. I’ve reviewed a few hero books on this here blog, including Pilgrimage by Matt Selznick and Other People’s Heroes by Blake Petit. This book fills squarely in the latter camp, a more traditional capes and cowls, four color blast of fun.

This is an origin story. I say that for those of you who may not clue into that from the title and description. For me, that’s a blast. I love origin stories. We get to see Oliver Jordan (a nod to a couple of heroes) as he is before he gets the powers granted to him by the ring. We get to see him fumble and get the snot knocked out of him. There are a few minor mysteries, including why Old Man Pembleton gave him the ring, but no instructions or warning that someone might be out to get him. There’s plenty of action and we get introduced to a few of this city’s other heroes.

The Bads – This is an origin story. See, I put that in the goods and the bads. I know there are some of you out there who don’t care for them. That’s not why I put it in the bads, but if I had paid for this, I would have felt slightly cheated. I would have liked to see just a bit more of something other than Jordan getting pulverized. It’s a bit on the brief side. It feels very much like the first episode of a comic or TV series. I think $.99 or $1.99 would be a bit more of a fair price for something of this length.

There’s only one other thing that bugs me about this. In a way, most of this book feels like it’s aimed at younger kids. Heroes are called “Mighties”. There’s an overall lightness of tone and humor which I think would work with young teens. I imagine if it were made into a bit of animation, it would be all primary colors and chunky bodies. Then there are the scenes where Jordan gets stomped on and brutalized. The villain in this piece is pretty violent and I recall some vivid levels of description when it comes to that. I wouldn’t necessarily want my younger teen to read this. It’s almost like it wants to be the CW Flash and Nolan’s Batman at the same time. There’s a disconnect. It occasionally knocked me out of the story.

The Verdict – I really like this book. If the price point doesn’t throw you off, or if you’re a Kindle Direct person, I wouldn’t hesitate to grab it. Just know that it might not be for the younger set. It’s a quick read and I do want to see more in this universe. I give this Four out of Five Power Rings.

BLOG – www.steevenorrelse.com
TWITTER – twitter.com/SteevenOrrElse
GOOGLE+ – plus.google.com/u/0/+SteevenOrr/posts
Amazon Link – https://www.amazon.com/Origin-Might-Mighty-Book-1-ebook/dp/B01E056EZA#navbar

e-book, ePub, reposts, review

Review – Dominion of the Damned (Ebook)

jm bauhaus I’ve been following, reading, and enjoying Jean Marie’s work for a while now. I consider myself a fan and we’re also friends via the usual social media channels. She blends fantasy and romance in a way that I enjoy. When she solicited reviews for this book, I immediately raised my hand. Does this meet my standards? Read on and find out!

Nursing student Hannah Jordan knows things are bad when her mother dies while giving birth to a son. She knows things can’t get much worse when her mother gets back up and tries to have the baby for breakfast. When she’s forced to put her mother down like a rabid animal, only one certainty remains: Hannah will do whatever it takes to stay alive and protect her baby brother.

dominion coverThe only survivors out of a family of survivalists, Hannah and the baby ride out the zombie apocalypse in their family’s backyard bunker, emerging months later to find a world taken over by the newly self-appointed saviors of humanity: a race of vampires hellbent on preventing the extinction of their food supply.

The Goods – Zombie vs. Vampires with humans stuck in the middle? Sign me up! This uses the typical horror tropes well, without abusing them a la Twilight. The romance angle is well written and I enjoy watching the principle love interests falling for each other. Hannah Jordan is the kind of kick ass heroine I think we all need to see more of. She’s strong, but far from a robot. She knows her way around a gun and isn’t afraid to go hand to hand. She’s also smart, though she makes plenty of mistakes of the sort you’d expect from any young person. So, she’s no Mary Sue. The pacing and amount of detail are both solid. JM knows how to keep the story moving, but she doesn’t sacrifice character development. It’s definitely a page turner and literally kept me up until midnight so that I could find out what happened.

The Bads – As much as I enjoyed the book, it’s not without its flaws. Hannah is in her bunker for five months and it seems to me that the world went from normal to post apocalyptic far too quickly. Things happen that probably should have taken longer than five months. When a prisoner is telling her what’s happened since the zombie outbreak, it sounds like everything fell apart too quickly. Speaking of too quick, while I applaud the pacing, there are a few scenes that seem to move the plot along a little too quickly. More time with her settling into life at the camp would have made what happened next a little more believable. By that, I mostly mean the relationships that she builds with the other humans. They go much too fast. In addition, everything at the human camp is a little too clean and nice. Hannah starts off paranoid and justifiably so, but she works through it too quickly.

There’s also something that bugged me about both this and another romance I read recently. People are too nice to each other. I’ll grant you that most of the vampires are evil buggers, but I don’t recall there being an ounce of tension between Hannah and the people she ends up befriending. She does things that should bother her new neighbors and there’s no huge reason for anyone to be so open and trusting. I suppose I’ve just come to think of the post-apocalypse genre as being chock full of anti-social behavior.

Finally, while I found the idea of the solution to the zombie problem to be interesting, it was also a little confusing. How it works is a mystery, as is how it was developed.

None of these by themselves hurt the book that much, but a few answers might be forthcoming in the sequel.

The Verdict I enjoyed this book. The vampires are mostly monsters, though the doctor has an interesting explanation as to why that is. The romance is heartfelt. And the plot and characters worked for me. The flaws pulled me out of the story a few times, but getting back in was never a problem.

I give this book four out of five silver bullets and look forward to the next in this series.

Amazon Link

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Review – Tincture: An Apocalyptic Proposition by Matthew D. Jordan (Podcast)

tincture For me lately, finding a new bit of podcast fiction to enjoy comes more from recommendations than from actively searching. That’s certainly true for Tincture. Nathaniel Rich recommended it to me and when I saw that it involved a post-apocalypse with a wild west flair I was sold.

Synopsis: Grave robbing requires a corpse, so at most, this was all just simple thievery.

Rhamuel and the last of his family, Abranyah, travel their barren world, shack to shack, selling tinctures to keep a full belly and evading the dogmatists to keep their throats safe. Time turned funny after The Whatever, an apocalyptic event that few remember and even fewer can explain, danger now as commonplace as the unrecognizable relics of war, and the madman Aphulan – along with an iron rule over his small township – may hold the answers. With a cure for The Sick and a duty to protect their family, Rhamuel and Abranyah set off on a journey to the “other place,” the days before The Whatever, and ready themselves for a glimpse into what happened, and what was always meant to happen next.

Production: The audio quality is very good. The music complements the story and I do believe some use was made of reverb and the like.

Grade: A-

Cast: This is read by the author. He does an excellent job, using inflection and tone change to good purpose.

Grade: A-

Story: I wasn’t disappointed. The writing was very good. The thing that struck me most, though, was the world building he did. The use of language and description painted a world that was just different enough from our own in every sense to be unsettling but familiar. It’s never certain exactly what caused the Whatever, but that’s okay. He borrows some from Stephen King (more on that in a second) and much like King’s Dark Tower the why of it isn’t as important as how drastic the change is.

This isn’t fan fiction. None of the characters or situations borrow directly from King’s work. Still, it’s evident that the author loves the series (at least the first book anyway). And he does something I’ve very rarely seen in fiction. The book, The Gunslinger, is real in this fictional world and is treated by at least one character as being a biography of sorts. So, it’s more than a product placement. I hope to be talking to Matthew soon (and perhaps have him on a podcast) to talk about what inspired this.

You guys know by now that to me character is vital. That’s one aspect that makes this a win for me. All of the characters are interesting and well rounded (as well rounded as I suppose amnesiacs can be). Even the villain, while deliciously evil and psychotic, is three dimensional.

This book also does something that I often see used as a device that may or may not work. The interstitial book within a book. It quotes extensively from a sort of travel guide. It’s a good way of giving information out about the world without being info-dumpy. In this case it worked for me. Even the editing notes on the pseudo-guide are interesting and informative.

The only thing that I’m a little sketchy about is the ending. The nature of Rhamuel and Aphulan is revealed. I won’t spoil it here. Suffice to say that it seemed a little, strange. Not a good strange. Not a bad strange either, really. It’s something that I hope gets talked about more in book two (which I’m currently listening to).

Grade: A

Verdict: In case it’s not obvious, I thoroughly enjoyed this podcast novel. It’s one of those cases where I plan on buying the e-book and perhaps even reading it. It’s also one that I would consider listening to more than once.

Grade: A

Podcast Page
Amazon Page
Tincture’s Website

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Review – Brothers Jetstream: Leviathan by Zig Zag Claybourne (Review)

leviathan Every once in a while, I’ll see a tweet or a Facebook post talking about a new author. Usually, I don’t pay too much mind to those. Much of it depends on the source and the rest on how much social media fatigue I’m feeling. One such day in May, my good friend Dave Robison recommended this fellow named Zig Zag Claybourne. Well, I don’t care how tired I am, I follow very nearly anyone Dave recommends. I’m glad I did. Because I read this book.

ADVENTURE… just got 35% cooler. Milo Jetstream. Ramses Jetstream. Coming to save the world one last damn time against the False Prophet Buford in the battle to save the Earth, preserve the soul, and make sure folks get home in one piece…

Secret cabals. Fae folk in Walmart. And the whale that was poured into the oceans when the world first cooled from creation.

Adventure doesn’t need a new name. It needs a vacation.

The Goods – Do you like Buckaroo Banzai? If you don’t, and it isn’t out of ignorance, then you can stop reading here. If you do, let me say that without question (because I both picked up on it and confirmed with Double Z), this book was inspired by it and if you do, then again you might just stop reading here and skip down to the BUY ME links. If you’re still reading then you want more info.

The adventure and weirdness starts from the first few pages and rarely lets up. This book and everything in it are absurdly, ridiculously fun. That’s not everyone’s cup of tea. I get that. But angels who love sexy times, a group of stalwarts called the Battle Ready Bastards, sentient whales, vampires (who secretly run Hollywood), and Atlantidieans are begging you to read this. The universe he’s created are full of creatures and mythology that he has made his own and it is HUGE.

One of the things that I’m going to put in both The Goods and The Bads is this – you feel like you’ve been dropped into the middle of the most interesting, odd, and action packed series that you’ve run across. This is very much like The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension. There is no prequel. There is a promised sequel. There is no primer. You have to figure out some things as the book motors along. Other things may well leave you scratching your head. In this sense, it also reminds me a little like Hitchhikers Guide.

The characters in this book are clever and interesting and as varied as you could possibly ask for. I love the rich soup of people that Double Z has created here. I end up caring more about some of the side characters than I do about the titular brothers, if for no other reason than they never felt like they were in danger. As forces of nature, who do have a human side, they were more iconic than the rest. Still, I loved them. The wit and banter between them made me laugh many, MANY times.

The Bads – If you haven’t gotten it by now, I love this book. Now, that’s not to say it doesn’t have flaws. As I mentioned, you are dropped in the middle of things, and Double Z doesn’t spell things out (very often). For me this is a good thing. It distracted only once or twice, but I kept going. Some people are not going to dig this.

There are a LOT of characters and a crap ton of stuff is going on. This leads to things getting muddy as hell in the third act. I kept going and the waters cleared and I was rewarded for my efforts. For the muddiness of the water I’m only dinging this a half star, because it remains so fun all the way through. It was that fun and adventure that kept the bog from being a slog.

Really that’s it. This book is a big hit with me. There is another book coming out. I don’t know when, but I will be keeping my peepers pealed.

I give this story four and a half out of five krakens.

Amazon
Smashwords
Author’s Site

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Review – The Pariah by Philip ‘Norvaljoe’ Carroll (Podcast)

pariah I’ve known Philip for a long time. He’s a good writer and we worked together on a number of projects. He has a solid sense of story. When I saw that he was putting out a new podcast and supporting it via Patreon I knew it would be something worth checking out. It’s still in production. Usually I wait until a story is finished but I thought I’d help boost the signal. This review covers the first 8 episodes.

Synopsis: The kingdom of The Highlands has been peaceful for many centuries and has developed great wealth in that time. Her neighbor nations saw the country’s riches and grew jealous, plotting to take some for themselves.
Keo Noshahne new from a very young age that he was destined to do great things. He knew he would be one of the country’s special empathic creature handlers. He was unaware of his destiny to save the kingdom and possibly the entire world. Though, in doing so he must become The Pariah.

Production: The audio quality is sound. Not a lot of bells and whistles.

Grade: B

Cast: Philip does this as a dramatic reading. His talents as a reader are strong. He injects the story and characters with personality and energy.

Grade: B+

Story: This is a low fantasy universe that reminds me quite a bit of Ravenwood by Nathan Lowell. It’s not a YA fantasy per se, though that may be the target audience. I think it, like most YA, is easily accessible by a wider audience. The characters, even by this point in the story, are already developing and changing. There’s a lot of potential for growth. This feels like a fairly traditional “chosen one” kind of story line. The promise of the premise is that he will somehow become an outcast. We haven’t hit that part of the story yet, so I’ll be interested to see how that plays out. The pacing is a little on the slow side, giving the audience a chance to get to know the main characters and to develop the world. There’s a lot of potential here and I look forward to each new episode as it comes out.

Grade: A-

Verdict: I really think this is a podcast you should give a listen to. If you like low fantasy or are looking for new YA/MG stories, I highly recommend it.

Grade: A

Podcast Page
Amazon Page
Patreon Page

pimpage, review, western

Review – Hell Bent For Leather by Josh Unruh (E-book)

leather I recently reviewed Josh Unruh’s book “Werewolves of Mass Destruction” on the blog. He was tickled by my honest review and sent me a copy of Hell Bent For Leather to review as well. So, in the spirit of full disclosure, I did recieve this e-book for free.

Chet Leather is the best cowboy West Texas has ever seen. He also has the Sight beyond sight, able to See to the heart of things. That means he Sees ghosts, demons, and the difference between honesty and lies.

That’s how he knows Dan Reed, his best friend, told the truth about selling his soul to the Devil. But Dan had died and the Devil come to collect before Chet knew anything about the pact. Now it’s up to a cowboy that sees ghosts and a washed-up old priest to save Dan’s soul.

But it’s going to take a confrontation with a bandito who can’t be killed, a battle with a hundred vengeful souls, riding against demonic cattle rustlers, and, finally, a chat with the Devil himself.

Chet’s out to make enemies of the Damned, and when he’s done, it’ll be Hell Bent for Leather.

The Goods – Anyone who knows me, knows that I’m a sucker for supernatural stuff, especially though not limited to the Christian mythos, and Westerns. This should be the perfect blending of the two. And you know what? It is! It’s obvious from the title that Josh loves a good pun and there are a few of those in the book. By and large though, it’s a serious piece of Wild West Fantasy, though. I could easily see this being adapted into a comic book or other visual format, because Josh is very gifted at painting a solid picture with his descriptions. That’s especially true when we get to meet the denizens of hell. There’s one seen where he describes a demon and you don’t want to eat when he does. This isn’t a horror book, though. It’s less Hellraiser and more Hellboy. There’s darkness, but there’s plenty of action and slightly over the top magic/mysticism.

One of my criticisms of “Werewolves” was that it was light on the character development. This story proves that that wasn’t a shortcoming of Josh’s. I suspect, as I said in that review, that it’s a matter of having the room. Here, Chet and the other characters, even the Devil, are more nuanced and fully fleshed out.

It had me flipping pages as fast as I could to see what happened next. The pacing was great and the scenes between action beats were well done.

The Bads – I really can’t come up with any huge criticisms. Or any little, nit-picky ones. That’s not to say this book is perfect. No book is. But I had nary a single bone to pick with Josh’s story.

I give this story five silver bullets out of five.

Amazon
Josh’s Site
Josh’s Twitter