Review: The Devil Whispered by Shawn Starkweather

3/5 Stars 413 Pages (in paper) Published February 1st 2021 by Shawn Starkweather Publishing Company

Honestly as great as the plot and the characters were in this book, I had the hardest time getting immersed into it. For whatever reason, I still haven’t figured it out over five hundred pages later, I Just couldn’t keep my attention on this book. Whether that’s a me problem or a book problem I’m not sure, but I do have these good things to say about it. If you’re looking for an action packed cyberpunk mystery novel mixed with military personnel, robotic limbs and internal computers, and crazy body mods and just crazy tech in general, than this is definitely something you should look into checking out next.

At the beginning of this book we find out main character, Jacobi, hunting down a man for some kind of mob boss. He finds him surrounded by drugs and girls and easily apprehends him, and brings him back to his father. This is just the beginning though, because the favour he gets in return will really help him out later in the book. What’s really going on here, Jacobi learns after visiting his friend in jail after he has brutally murdered his wife, is that someone seems to be hunting down the members of his old army team. But why would someone do that? Their names and team were all under lock and key, not just anyone would be able to have that information. But his friend says it wasn’t his fault and that someone made him do it. How could someone just control another person like that? All these questions and more are all wrapped up by the end of the book.

Out of all the characters I think I like Risa and his other friend with the robotic limbs the most. I read another review that says this book seemed sexist, and while that opinion is valid, I really didn’t get that vibe from it. I would say the vibes I got from this book were more military James Bond with all the cyberpunk goodness and crazy tech we love that comes along with that genre. The world around the characters wasn’t explained in depth, and honestly neither were the characters themselves, and maybe that might be why I had trouble really getting into it. That being said, though, I did enjoy it, and I don’t think I lost any time while I was reading it. It just took me longer than usual to get through it because of those things.

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Overall, If you’re looking for something exciting and action packed, with lots of tech and storylines within the bigger storyline, than this might be something you want to check out next. I would say that anyone aged sixteen and up would be able to read this, there’s not really any explicit scenes, and what very little sexual scenes there actually are in this book, I counted two, they’re glossed over very quickly and don’t get too in depth with them other than saying yeah, they did this. Which I appreciated. I don’t think that this is one of those kinds of books. The plot twists were exciting and everything weaved together really nicely in the end. And I’m left wishing I had an internal computer or robotic limbs, or those cool night vision mods that turn your eyes all black.

If you’d like to grab a copy, you can do so here!

And if you’d like to follow the author on Twitter, you can here!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe.

Disclaimer: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.ca and affiliated sites.

Book Birthday Review: Fire and Cinder (Fairy Tales of the Magicorum #6) by Christina Bauer

Who could have guessed another Fairy Tales of the Magicorum book would be out so soon after the last? Not me! But I’m excited for it nonetheless. I couldn’t wait to see what our heroes would get up to this time, and wasted no time starting it, especially after the events of the last book. If you know me, you know I fully enjoy this series. It’s perfect for anyone looking for a quick read to break up the other books on your schedule, and doesn’t usually disappoint.

4/5 Stars 265 pages Published February 23rd 2021 by Monster House Books

Following Elle, Agatha, Alec and Jacoby in this book, we find Elle in her house eating pizza to cope with the loss of her boyfriend, Alec, who’s been transported into a magical gemstone prison by an evil fae. She feels like she can’t control her magic enough to go and save him, but knows she needs to do something, and in the meantime, she needs to take care of herself too. But after that, she accidentally sends herself back in time to see her mom and her in her childhood home. This sets off a chain of events that also sets the pace for the rest of the book.

Agatha, on the other hand, just wants to go back to her normal life but without her mother and sister, before she found out all the things she didn’t know about herself and her ties to the fae world, like the fact that she’s the last of a missing species and the only one who can save their world. She doesn’t mind the new obsession that Jacoby has developed with her, though, she even has started to like having him around. But she would never tell him that, of course.

The boys however are kind of backup characters for this book. I feel like the spotlight is mostly on the girls, occasionally showing what the boys are thinking to help the story move along. I really enjoyed reading this, and the ending! Wow. That’s all I have to say about that, this is a no spoiler review blog after all. But let me tell you, when the action starts, it really all goes down at once. Will he girls be able to save the fae world and the people that they care about? You’ll have to read to find out!

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This was a very easy and relaxing read for me, and I really enjoy getting thrown back into this series whenever there’s a new book out. The writing is funny and quirky, lots of silly little jokes tossed in there to liven it up, but when it comes down to it, there really are some important and serious things that happen in this book and those don’t take away from that. I think this was a very nice addition to the series, an I’m hoping for more Bryar Rose appearances in the future, maybe even another book from her point of view. And did I even say anything about how beautiful this cover is? Because I think it’s my favourite for the series so far! Like always I love the characters because of how silly and realistic they are despite their magic abilities and the obvious differences between our worlds, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.

If you’d like a copy, you can grab one here!

And if you’d like to keep up with the author, you can here on Twitter!

Thanks for reading! If you haven’t checked out my spot on the blog tour for this book, there’s an excerpt and all the book information you could possibly need here!

Disclaimer: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.ca and affiliated sites.

Refraction by Christopher Hinz Review

Let me just say that this was one of the most interesting, and well put together books I’ve read in a long time. I did put it off for a while when I was taking a break from reading, but I wish I didn’t. There wasn’t a single thing about this book that wasn’t intriguing, and I couldn’t get enough of it. I also wouldn’t change anything about it. Completely unique, I hope I can read more books this different in the future, because if you’ve read it, you just know that it’s going to be something that’s stuck in your head for a while after you finish it.

5/5 Stars 400 pages
Published November 10th 2020 by Angry Robot

Aiden has a power. It’s not anything he deems special or exciting though, because his power is that sometimes when he sleeps, he manifests a pile of slime somewhere in a ten foot radius from his body. And once he wakes up, it falls to the ground, or into whatever it’s levitating above, and hardens, usually destroying the thing in the process. It’s messy, it’s kind of gross, and his sister hates it. But it’s his life, and that’s all he’s known since he was a kid. Then one day, everything he knows is turned upside down.

After receiving a cryptic phone call from the people who bought his deceased parents house, he learns that his father has hidden a safe behind the old furnace, in the wall, and it’s addressed to him, and not only that, but if it’s tampered with or forced open by someone else, the contents will be destroyed. So he heads to their house after a fight with his sister. But what’s in the safe changes his life forever.

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This is the beginning of the longest week of Aiden’s life. He learns that he was adopted, and that the first eighteen months of his life, him and six other babies were basically science experiments until the project was forced to shut down, and they were adopted out. Six other people who can do what he does, and maybe more. And he needs to get to the bottom of it. But what he finds at the bottom, and frankly, on the way to the bottom, is really crazy and almost unbelievable if it wasn’t happening in real time. He almost gets killed many, many times, makes some interesting friends, and has the adventure of a lifetime. And I couldn’t put it down.

I would say that this is probably one of my new favourite books. When I was describing the events to people I know, it all seemed so crazy. And it really is. That’s just what I loved about it the most.. I think it’s something you just have to experience to really understand it. I highly recommend it to everyone reading this. Even if you think it wouldn’t be for you, just give it a shot. What’s the worst thing that could happen?

If you’d like to grab a copy, you can do so here, through my Amazon Associates link.

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe, and enjoying insane books like this.

Lost Solace (Lost Solace #1) by Karl Drinkwater Review

4/5 Stars 273 pages
Published October 15th 2017 by Organic Apocalypse

Though I haven’t read anything from author Karl Drinkwater before, I’m intrigued by their other works after this book. I was a little confused at first, but once I was into the book, I really was into it. You know I love a good sci-fi space adventure, and this just adds another story to my list of ones I really enjoyed. A really nice cover, a very unique story, unlike anything I’ve read before, and an action packed plot, I couldn’t put it down.

Following a girl named Opal, it shows her life as she flies through space in a stolen military ship with an insanely upgraded artificial intelligence, who she’s named Clarissa. It begins with her in chryo, and Clarissa waking her up and making her food. Though they haven’t known each other for very long, they’re very familiar, and are headed to a lost ship, something they’re not even sure is anything more than a myth. Opal is hoping to not only get rich off of what she finds on it, but to find information to her past on it also. All that, without being caught by the military. What a dream that was.

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What she finds on the ship, however, is beyond anything she could have imagined. A kind of alien species, or something like that, that has bonded into a ship, and created something grotesque and horrifying and really interesting and insane all in one go. Flesh cakes the interior, creating turrets that seem to grow out of the wall at key points for attacks, and horrifying monsters spawn again out of the wall to track not only Opal, but the military that tracks her down to kill her.

This book was very interesting and unique, and even though it’s not my new favourite, I’m glad I got the chance to check it out. If you’re looking for a very different and action packed sci-fi adventure, this is the book for you.

Grab a copy for yourself here through my Amazon Associates link!

Here’s a link to the author’s Twitter if you’d like to keep up with them!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe.

Echoes of Darkness (Echoes Trilogy #2) by Cheryl Campbell Review

5/5 Stars 384 pages
Published October 5th 2020 by Smith Publicity

If you read my last review, I read the first book in the series, Echoes of War, in like less than 24 hours. This book was no exception to that as I also finished it in the same amount of time. I just can’t get enough of the trilogy, and I can’t wait for the last book, even though it comes out next year. I really haven’t stopped thinking about them since I started them, and I’m excited to see them nicely sitting together on my bookshelf with the rest of my favourites.

Following Dani, Brody, Oliver, Mary, Miles and Hattie, along with all the other characters that we’ve grown to love (and hate) throughout these two books, it shows their lives in third person, jumping to and from each of them when needed to give the story the sides you need to see to really put it all together. I gladly started this book less than half an hour after finishing the first one. I was very thankful to have the second book ready to go, as that doesn’t happen very often with me. As you might know, I’m really bad for leaving multiple books in a series to sit for months or even years after I read one, and I want to change that.

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We get to see their lives not long after the first book ended, with Dani and Mary and another character on a supply run. However, things don’t go as expected. They’re blown off the road by a group of Wardens and their insane tech, and have to be rescued by Gavin and his team, as well as Miles. Though this book isn’t as action packed as the first book in the first half, the second half is total destruction, and that’s what I love about this trilogy. The characters are everything I want from them and more, and there’s really never a dull moment, even when they’re simply training, or interacting with each other. I think my favourite might be Oliver, or maybe Hattie, aside from Dani of course.

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So in the last one, we saw the armies, one military and one scavenger, come together and take back Portland, and set their eyes on Boston next, even though it’s pretty far from them, and there’s a whole other area between them. But Dani knows what she needs, especially when things take a turn for the worse, and a kidnapping takes place that forces her hand. I loved the amount of work that was written into the story, not only from Dani, but the rest of the team as well, and the life that was woven in between the annihilation that happens. It really sucked me into the story, and I knew once I picked it up that even though I was debating reading something in between the first and second books, that I wouldn’t be able to do that.

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Overall, if you’re looking for something insanely exciting and action packed, as well as emotional and just really well put together, than you should pick up this trilogy next. Of course I love aliens and destruction, so this was easily one of my new favourites. But I think even if you don’t exactly love those things, and are just looking for an action packed book to pick up, I definitely think you should give these a chance.

If you’d like to grab a copy you can do so here with my link through Amazon Associates!

And if you’d like to keep up with the author, you can follow on Instagram here!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe.

Echoes of War (Echoes Trilogy #1) by Cheryl Campbell Review

5/5 Stars 400 pages
Published September 10th 2019 by SparkPress

Here’s another book I knew was going to be right up my alley before I even started it. Following a young woman in her 20’s named Dani, it shows her world, one torn apart by war, as an alien military has ravaged Earth for the last few decades. Though the Echoes, an alien race who had integrated themselves into the human population for hundreds of years, were living just fine before their military counterparts began trying to extinguish the human race, everyone opposing the Wardens are being torn apart. It’s all anyone can do to just barely survive.

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Living with her uncle Jace, Dani’s life as a scavenger has been hard. Always watching her back, she’s risking her life every day just trying to go out and steal food. It’s a little help that her boyfriend is part of the military defending their territory from the Wardens, but they’re not innocent either. They scoop up anyone they can to recruit them to fight for them, including other scavengers like Dani. Whether they’re an Echo or not. And even though the Wardens are Echo Military, they do horrible experiments to their own people and are genocidal against the humans, which is a lot worse than just being forced into the Military. No one can win this war, it seems like.

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That is, until Dani comes along. After losing her life, she regenerates as a young ten year old girl and must grow up all over again. Usually Echoes keep there memories with them when they regenerate, but Dani’s different. Her and Jace relocate to a small town and start fresh there. And Dani’s determined to change the way the world is, because she’s not the only one sick of the war.

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This book was amazing, and like I said, I knew from reading the description that I would love it immediately. It’s action packed, heart and gut wrenching, and the story isn’t one that’s used up and repeated. As you might know if you have followed my blog for a while, or even if you just read my blog name, I love books about aliens and/or the apocalypse. Everything about them intrigues me, and this book was no exception. I read it in just under a day, and I’m very thankful that I have the second book in the trilogy ready to go.  I can’t wait to start reading it, and I have high hopes for it because of how much I loved this one.

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If you’re into books about aliens living among humans, and also a war against those same aliens on a war torn Earth, then this is the book for you. And if you don’t, I highly suggest giving this one a chance. I just loved it so much that I want everyone I know to check it out. It’s not so gory that it makes you shy away from it, but it’s still action packed and interesting. The characters are easy to imagine, and somehow they’re very realistic although their world is nothing like our own. I just can’t get enough. I hope we get to see more of Brody, Oliver, Dani, Mary, Hattie, Miles and everyone else I love in the next book, and I’m going to start it right after this.

If you’d like a copy, you can grab one here.

And here’s a link to the author’s Instagram, if you’d like to keep up with them!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re having a great day and are staying safe.

Strays (Werewolf Academy #1) by Cheree Alsop Review

4/5 Stars 275 pages
Published August 13th 2014

I’ve really been in a werewolf mood lately, and this book was a nice addition to this. Though, it wasn’t my new absolute favourite book, it was an easy read and an action packed one at that. A smooth ride from start to finish, It was what I wanted and nothing more.

Following a set of stray werewolf twins that live in a world where humans have tried to commit genocide against them, we learn about them pretty quickly. I did feel like a lot happened before the book that would have been an interesting prequel maybe, instead of just having everything brought up in conversation, but I think that’s just me being picky. Do they really talk about the biggest trauma of their lives that often?

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After losing their parents to a brutal murder in front of them, Alex and Cassie have lived at a mostly werewolf boarding school since they were about seven years old, and have grown very close with the Dean, even considering him their adopted father. Alex hasn’t stopped thinking about the man that killed their parents and older brother though, and he’s determined to stop him from doing anything else to other werewolf families like his.

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I think one of the big things I didn’t love about this book, was that I feel like the young children didn’t act their age, and neither did the older children. They all kind of acted like adults, but were called kids and young teens. Not a big problem, just something that I notice a lot when reading this kind of young adult fiction.

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The story itself was action packed and full of the kids making their own families, and I loved that although the school in the beginning was completely segregated between lifers and termers, that is, orphans and werewolves with families, Alex was able to bring them all together with his ideas about training, and just how he acted in general. Though he isn’t an alpha, he acted like one, and everyone followed him. I can see later in the series, him becoming an alpha, even if that doesn’t actually happen.

Overall, I did like this book, but like I said, it wasn’t my new favourite, and that’s just something that happens a lot. It was a good time, but they can’t all be my favourite, right? If you’re looking for a werewolf boarding school kind of young adult book, than this is the one for you. Definitely check it out if you get the chance! I’m looking forward to seeing what happens in the next book.

If you’d like a copy you can grab one here!

And if you’re interested in keeping up with the author, you can follow them on Twitter here!

Thanks for reading! Hope you’re doing well and staying safe.

Portal 24 by Meredith Stroud Review

3/5 Stars 240 pages
Published September 5th 2013 by Hot Key Books

With a beautiful and very mysterious cover, Portal 24 is the first book I’ve read by author Meredith Stroud. Though it wasn’t my absolute favourite book, it also wasn’t something I completely disliked. I would love to check out some of her other stories in the future to see if there’s something that would be more fitting for me personally.

Following a team of young people, though I’m not exactly sure of their ages, they live life as time travelers trying to save the world. I picked this book because I love science fiction like that, and i thought it would be nice to read a new time travel book, since I haven’t in a while. The story begins with Darius, a young man who has to hustle to survive in his life. With no parents, he relies on friends to have his back and help him trick money from people he deems bad, so it doesn’t seem like the crime it is. He has a girlfriend, and is mostly content with his life. That is, until a stranger shows up.

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She tells him she needs his help, and if he doesn’t come with her, his girlfriend and everyone he knows won’t exist anymore. She talks about this wild topic of time travel, which he’s reluctant to believe, like anyone would be. But he’s not willing to risk anyone’s lives. He goes with her, and is introduced to his new life and his new family.

Though this was an exciting and action packed book,  it just wasn’t what I had hoped for. I was thinking there would be many adventures, and even though I’m not disappointed by that, I was really hoping for a little more insight into their world and how everything works. I don’t really feel like I know any of the characters very well, or the world that they’ve been adopted into through the corporation that employs and takes care of them, even though I feel like I spent a good amount of time with them throughout this book.

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Overall, it wasn’t a bad read, but it wasn’t my new favourite thing in the world. I don’t feel like I wasted any time reading this book, and I’m looking forward to checking out more from the author in the future to see what they’re all about. I would recommend this book to people who like young adult books about time travel, that are more action packed and gory than anything else.

If you’d like to get a copy for yourself, you can grab one here.

Thanks for reading! I’d love to hear what your thoughts about this book are if you’ve checked it out, or if you’re just wondering about it. Stay safe, and have a great day!

Bronze Dragon: Riders of Fire (Dragons’ Realm Novella) by Eileen Mueller Review

Are you looking for a third person fantasy novella full of dragons, magic and fighting? Do you like when one of the  points of view is from the dragon itself? Then this might be something you’ll want to look into. Following a dragon named Handel and his handler Idelian, it shows their lives as they quickly change course entirely and end up somewhere they never thought they’d be.

 

You may have noticed I posted this book not too long ago as it was a free book in my inbox. That’s kind of what spurred me reading this, though I have tons of books I need to get to, this was a short and easy read. The world it’s set in isn’t especially exciting, but the characters and kinds of characters inside it makes it.

 

4/5 Stars 89 pages
Published December 2nd 2018 by Phantom Feather Press

Although it’s not something I’d usually read, I was quickly swept up into the world inside this book, and I’m glad I gave it a chance. Able to mind meld, we get to see a seamless transition between dragon and rider, because they can not only speak to each other inside their minds, but they can send pictures and feelings as well. That’s just something that comes naturally to both dragons and their riders.

 

We also learn about Hans, a young boy. This story was unexpectedly exciting, and something I was really into. Though I don’t usually like books about magic and dragons, this was interesting and kept me sucked in the whole time. A quick read, I finished in less than an hour.

 

Because this is a novella, like another book I read recently, it’s half ads. After about 65%, that’s all there is to the book. I’m not mad about seeing them, I just think it’s a little bit of false advertising to say that the book is this long even though a lot of is is ads and descriptions for the other books in the series. This is why I only give it 4 stars.

 

The book is available here.

Here’s a link to the author’s Twitter.

 

 

Thanks for reading!

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling Review

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling 4/5 Stars 352 pages
Published April 2nd 2019 by Harper Voyager

With a beautiful and mysterious cover, The Luminous Dead pulled me in with comparisons to The Martian, and Annihilation, both books I loved. Inside the cover is a story that jumps right into the action with Gyre in third person, wiggling through a crevice. I had no idea what I was stepping into, and this is another book that once I started, I didn’t want to put down until I was finished.

 

Gyre had assumed that there would be a team with her on this expedition, and that she would enter through a mining camp before going underground. Both assumptions were wrong. Basically alone except for one voice through a com that barely talks to her at first, her suit is her new skin, she won’t even be able to take it off to sleep for the time that she plans to be underground, over a month. She notices something strange, however, and that is that someone’s been in the cave, had access to the old camps inside and recently. At first she spends her time carrying equipment down from the surface to the first camp, but that’s when the mystery begins to form around her.

 

Later she falls while surveying an area, and the voice inside her com, Em, is unexpectedly angry. However, she finds a body at the bottom, and that was something she wasn’t expecting. The body wears a suit just like hers, and when she tells Em that she’s done with the expedition, Em remotely locks her suit and forces her to stay in one spot until she agrees to keep going. That’s when she learns that there have been thirty-five expeditions before hers, and out of the thirty-five, only eight have came out of it alive. This is the beginning of the longest journey of her life.

 

Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book, and the only thing I have to say that I didn’t like about it, is that if I didn’t read the description, I would never have known that she lied her way onto the project. It jumped straight into the action, and although the description was interesting, I feel like I did miss a part of the book because of it. Everything else, I loved. I do think that the comparisons made are true, this book reminds me of the tunnel/tower in Annihilation, and how alone Gyre was reminds me of how alone Astronaut Mark Watney was in The Martian. If you’re into those two books, I would say go ahead and check this one out.

 

The book is available here, and here’s a link to the author’s Twitter, if you’d like to keep up with them.

Thanks for reading!