• 875 and counting …

    4 Comments

    Finished Dead Man Rising by Lilith Saintcrow. This is the second in Saintcrow’s urban fantasy series about Dante Valentine, a nercomance who raises people from the dead. Be warned: there are some spoilers ahead.

    In this one, Danny’s mourning the loss of her demon lover Japhrimel (from book one, Working for the Devil). But she doesn’t have time to grieve long. Her friend Gabe asks Danny to help her with a series of brutal murders, all of which lead back to Rigger Hall, the school where Danny and other students were horribly abused as children.

    This book was quite a bit darker than the first one, much more so than I expected. Poor Danny’s about to snap from grief over losing Japhrimel already, and then she has to confront the horrors of her childhood. Not a light read at all. 

    Still, Danny is a very likable character as she tries to work through her grief and adjust to her new demon-enhanced body. She gets a little whiny toward the end of the book, but she does have a lot to deal with. And once again, I enjoyed Saintcrow’s blend of magic and technology. (Plus, there was a glossary of terms in this book. Yeah!)

    But overall, I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as the first book for one reason — Japhrimel. Although Dante thinks about him constantly, the demon doesn’t show up until the last few chapters of the book. His appearance reminded me just how much I liked him in the first book — and how this book suffers from his absense. (Jace is just not a good substitute for the demon, which Dante and the reader quickly realize.)

    But I get that Japhrimel’s resurrection was part of the climax and not the middle arc of the story. Still, if you’re a Japh fan like me, this book ends much better than the first one. 😎

    Overall, if you’re looking for a dark urban fantasy read, give Dead Man Rising and the rest of the Dante Valentine series a try. Thumbs up.

    Up next: The 47th Samurai by Stephen Hunter.

  • Adventures in gift giving …

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    So it’s finally started to happen — my friends are having babies. Nick and Chelsea, and Amy and Alex are both having baby girls over the next few weeks. So this weekend, I went to Target to get baby shower gifts for the expectant couples.

    Oh my.

    First of all, it took me a while to find the stuff they were registered for because for some reason, the baby stuff aisles are labeled Q (at least they are supposed to be, I never saw a Q sign), while all the other aisles are labeled A through G or something like that. Something alphabetical that makes sense. What Q has to do with babies, I have no idea.

    And it didn’t get any easier after I found the stuff my friends had registered for. Body pillows and breast pumps and other things I didn’t even recognize, but that look like torture devices from the Middle Ages. Seriously, I have no idea what a Diaper Genie is, but I bought refills for it, even though they look like expensive rolls of duct tape. And this musical, light-up toy thingie that will probably drive N&C crazy. :joker:

    I felt like Alice in Wonderland trying to navigate through this strange and curious world my friends have entered into. Maybe I should have bought a Glo-Worm and seen if he could give me some mushrooms to eat, like the caterpillar in the Disney movie. Things might have made more sense then. 😮

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    Words of the week …

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    There was an interesting post over at Fangs, Fur, and Fey this week talking about authors who blog and how much of their work they share online. One person commented that she likes to see a sentence or two from daily writing. I thought this was a cool idea and thought I would share a paragraph I’ve written this week.

    This is from Assassin 2. I’m currently working on the second draft of the book, really getting into the story and adding all the description, etc. Anyway, here’s a paragraph about one of the bad guys, a defense lawyer. Enjoy!

    At first glance, Jonah McAllister looked like any other man in the room. Classic tuxedo, white shirt, diamond cufflinks, polished wingtips. His gunmetal gray hair was parted on the side, with a thick doowop that curled up, down, and around his forehead like a scoop of vanilla soft serve. Although he had to be pushing fifty, Jonah had the face of a much younger man — smooth, clean-shaven, free of wrinkles, even around the corners of his brown eyes. My guess? Botox and the finest Air elemental facials and skin treatments his retainers could buy. Still, for all his youthful vigor, Jonah McAllister radiated aw-shucks charm the way a snake-oil salesman might. Shake his hand, and you’d be wiping the grease off yours for the next ten minutes. And wondering where the hell your wallet went.

    If you guys like these sort of mini-excerpts, I might share more as I go deeper into the book. Let me know in the comments.

    Have a great weekend! :ww:

  • A lost theory …

    Warning: there be spoilers ahead, if you haven’t watched last night’s episode of Lost yet.

    I don’t think I’m going to like what happens to Sawyer in the season finale of Lost. Based on the previews at the end of last night’s episode, it looks like Sawyer, Kate, Jack, Sayid, and Hurley are on Lapidus’ helicopter and that it’s about to go down in the ocean.

    Since we know Sawyer isn’t one of the Oceanic Six, I’m betting that he gets all noble, kisses Kate goodbye, tells her he loves her, and takes a header off the helicopter to lighten the load so it won’t crash. We already know everyone else survives (except for Lapidus).

    Oh, Sawyer. I really hope they don’t kill you off. Josh Holloway is one of the few reasons I’m still watching the show. Sigh. :cry: 

    What about you guys? Got any Lost theories to share?

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    Summer fun …

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    Holy summer, Batman! :batman:

    Can you guys believe it’s almost Memorial Day? With the longer days and lack of good TV to watch (except for The Closer and Burn Notice, which I am eagerly awaiting), I tend to be more productive in the summer as far as writing goes.

    I thought I’d share some of the stuff I’d like to accomplish this summer — or at least by the end of September, when my time will once again be sucked up by the TV’s siren song. In no particular order:

    1) Write Assassin 2 (working on it right now — 62,000 words and counting)

    2) Write Assassin 3.

    3) Write Spy 3.

    4) Write Charm Queen (think urban fantasy with cowboys and magic)

    5) Write a romantic suspense or my long-percolating romantic comedy

    6) Whittle my TBR pile down to 10 books. So I can order some stuff I really, really want, like Fire and Ice by Anne Stuart and Ill Wind by Rachel Caine. And of course, the new one by J.R. Ward. :scooby: 

    What about you guys? Got big plans this summer? Share in the comments.