I Was a Teenage Weredeer (Bright Falls Mysteries, #1): 3.5 Stars

Author: C.T. Phipps
Length: 9 hrs 54 min

I listened to the audio version of this book. I thought the narrator did a good job voicing all the different characters, from a crimelord dragon shifter to vampires, werewolves, teenagers with New York accents, etc. It was easy to listen to and the story moved at a swift pace.

The plot itself contains many elements: a murderous demon, a corrupt town history, human sacrifices, a coven made up of magic-hungry teenagers willing to do whatever it takes to obtain shifter abilities. The world here is similar to that of the Sookie Stackhouse series in that vampires and shifters have “come out” to the public; but while their existence is known, it’s not entirely accepted. In certain states it’s legal to shoot shifters on site, and there’s hierarchy among the different types of animal shifters. Unsurprisingly, werewolves are at the top of the totem pole, while main character Jane Doe’s race of weredear possess the ability to become shamans. Within a few pages of the book we learn that Jane Doe’s best friend Emma is a werewolf, and her sister Victoria has just been found dead with Jane’s brother as the primary suspect. Thus begins the unrelenting cycle of events that unfold throughout the book.

The story takes a lot of turns, and we learn quickly not to take everything at face value. Many characters have secrets that they don’t want coming to light in the wake of Victoria’s murder and the subsequent investigation. There’s an unintended trip to hell, a haunted forest with evil spirits lurking within, and a magical convenience store of sorts that can be conjured up if you need to buy an enchanted rabbit foot and some scented candles. There’s a lot of nerd references (I say this as a proud nerd) to the Matrix, Star Wars, LOTR, etc. One of the characters is constantly quoting sci-fi movies. It makes you feel like you’re hanging out with a close friend and I found myself laughing at this quite frequently.

The book doesn’t take itself too seriously, so while we’re accompanying Jane on her twisted journey to find Victoria’s killer and exorcise a demon, there’s a lot of fun to be had as we learn about the paranomal history of the town and the eclectic characters we meet. The one thing that grated on me was Emma – her sarcasm and general negative personality made me question why she and Jane were friends, but to be fair I haven’t been a teenage girl in over ten years so maybe I just can’t relate to snark as a relationship-builder anymore.

Overall I enjoyed the story. It was something different, and I love any book that treats supernatural beings and magical occurences as completely normal so that we can enjoy the fun of it rather than dwell on its unlikelyhood. That’s the kind of world I’d want to live in- though I might stay away from Bright Falls and its penchant for human sacrfices!

I received a free audiobook in exchange for an honest review!

The Vow (Lords of Action #1): 3.5 Stars

Author: K.J. Jackson
Length: 292 pgs.
3.5 stars

I picked this up as an Amazon freebie and read it as a Book of the Month with my Freebie chicks!

This was a pleasant surprise of a book. I'm glad it was chosen as BOTM because I wouldn't have gotten to it otherwise and it would just be stewing on my TBR. It tells the story of Ara and Caine, who are brought together after a mistaken rescue at a brothel virgin sale. Ara ends up working for Caine running his household, and together they run a secret operation rescuing other girls who are put up for sale. Over 6 years they rescue countless girls and fall in love in the process.

Of course neither Caine nor Ara admit their feelings for each other, and a lot of the book is frustrating in that they both push the other one away in mistaken attempts to do the honorable thing. This misunderstanding goes on for quite a while and you want to yell at them to JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER. Seriously, a quick honest conversation could clear all of this up.

Fortunately while they're stewing over their suppressed feelings, there are other things going on. Word of their undercover operation may be getting leaked somehow, threatening both of their reputations and putting them and their rescued girls in danger. Caine learns he must find a wife in order to keep his estate afloat. And Ara is haunted by a horrifying secret she's been keeping about something that happened in the brothel all those years ago.

A few nice twists were thrown in which caught me off-guard and enhanced the story. Overall it was an enjoyable historical romance with a little mystery to keep it interesting.

The Broken Puppet (Elite Kings Club #2): 3.5 Stars

Author: Amo Jones
Length: 274 pgs.

3.5 stars

This book picks up immediately where Silver Swan left off, and I enjoyed that aspect of it as most sequels automatically jump forward months at a time and simply give us a quick wrap up of what’s been going on (although to be fair it does jump forward a bit, AFTER it picks up from where #1 left off).

Madison and her friend Tara use their power as rich kids to generate fake IDS/passports to leave the country and flee to New Zealand. They only last a few months before being tracked down by the Elite Kings, and they’re dragged back home. Bishop is still his mean old self that he was in the first book, and although Jones writes him as being more affectionate towards Madison as the book goes on, there’s still a lot of scenes where he chokes Madison, or physically forces her to do something or accompany him somewhere.

As for the mystery surrounding the Kings, we do get some answers to questions that were asked in Silver Swan. Some new mysteries are introduced however, and it’s hard to mention them in a review without giving too much away. Madison discovers she has more than one family member that she never new existed. She learns more about her heritage. She also starts having flashbacks of childhood torment at the hands of a man only known as Lucan who called her “Silver”. It’s all very creepy as memories that Madison’s subconsciously been suppressing for years slowly come to the surface.

There’s a lot of action in this book – someone is shot, someone who’s dead apparently really isn’t, more than one character goes missing, etc. We find out why a certain King has been treating Madison as if he hates her. It definitely gets crazy but these kids still take the time to party and hook up while it’s happening. The book’s storyline pushes the boundaries of reality-which I think I said in my review of Silver Swan- but there truly is never a dull moment or one in which you don’t feel like Madison is in imminent danger. Who can she really trust? What do the Kings plan to do with her? Why is her dad such a selfish asshole (seriously, he spends about 5 minutes checking on Madison after she’s injured at one point in the book, before saying “we better go” and leaving with her stepmother)?

Unfortunately these questions are never answered due to the giant CLIFFHANGER this book ends on. Imagine my mental pain and anguish when I learned that the third book won’t be released until May 2018!! (I have already pre-ordered it lol). I’d be lying if I said that Amo Jones hasn’t completely piqued my curiosity and left me dying to find out the rest of the story.

Silver Swan (Elite Kings Club #1): 3.5 Stars

Author: Amo Jones
Length: 261 pgs.
I picked this book up as a freebie during a price drop and after seeing a friend give it 4 stars I couldn’t wait to read it! I was not disappointed. I could not put this book down and flew threw it in about 2 days.

I wasn’t sure initially what I wanted to rate it. Some of the writing had grammatical errors and a few passages read as amateurish. And I’m not the grammar police but I can’t help but take note of those things in a published book. But the content and the storyline made me overlook those small mistakes.

Let’s focus on the storyline for a minute. It revolves around Madison Montgomery, who is well known among her peers due to the fact that her mother shot and killed her father’s mistress before turning the gun on herself. So it’s just Madison and her dad, who’s pretty much absentee due to his line of work.. However her dad’s just gotten remarried, so they move to a new city and Madison joins an elite prep school where she instantly befriends a girl named Tatum. Tatum is likable and funny, and they quickly add another girl to their group that they meet by the name of Tillie. I loved the dynamic between these three girls. Their dialogue was youthful and true to their age most of the time with the lingo they would use (can you tell I’m older than them based on the fact that I just used the word lingo?) My only issue with their triad was that the similarity between Tatum & Tillie’s names confused me at times. That’s probably just me though…

Madison quickly learns she has a new stepbrother, Nate, and he and his 9 friends make up what is known as the Elite Kings Club. There’s a lot of hearsay about what actually goes on with these guys and they’re not the nicest guys. The way they size up Madison and eye her evilly-especially the ringleader Bishop-gave me the chills. Tatum immediately warns Madison to be careful, and once she finds out Nate is Madison’s stepbrother she reiterates this warning. In fact Madison’s warned many times throughout the book to watch her back.

Shit hits the fan instantly between Maddy and the Kings. This is probably why people refer to this book as being insane. Right away she’s lured to a remote location, taken hostage and asked seemingly random questions. Maddy has no idea why she’s being asked these questions, but the whole ordeal definitely made me feel unsettled and anxious as to what was going to happen next. You know there is definitely more to the Kings that meets the eye.

Nate goes back and forth between being a sleezeball creepo trying to scare Maddy, and being an overly affectionate step brother. His protective attitude towards Maddy I didn’t really buy considering that they’d only just met but I let that slide. The thing about Silver Swan is that you have to suspend the rules of a typical teenage reality in order to accept what’s being laid out in front of you. Because the way the Kings behave, and the things they do to Maddy to terrorize, assault and stalk her, would not go unanswered or excused in the real world. (At least I hope they wouldn’t.)

Maddy finds herself drawn into a erotic cat and mouse game with Bishop. He is admittedly delicious to read but he is a bad, bad guy. He is not nice to Maddy at all, and he tells her straight up that he hates her. By his actions and the way he treats her for the first 2/3 of the book, we have no reason to disbelieve him. This is where I started to feel conflicted about this book. I LOVED the events that unfolded. I loved all the action and confrontations and scheming and the naughty nature of the Kings. I did. But the relationship between Maddy and Bishop- while Amo Jones gives us some delicious encounters that seem beyond the reach of actual teenage behavior-to me seemed definitely mentally and emotionally abusive.

I’m not on any ethical or moral committee and I’m definitely not a saint, but the fact that Maddy made no attempt to preserve her dignity and self-respect by defending herself or standing up to Bishop at any point, really bothered me (and as I’m totally into super dark erotica no one is more surprised by this than me)! But the whole Maddy/Bishop thing went beyond dark erotica. It was hate sex. Literally, Bishop tells her he hates her as he’s f#*^ing her. And Maddy chalks this all up to him being a bad boy, or mysterious, or blah blah blah. Not once does she say you know what, I don’t deserve to be spoken to like this. In fact she actually blows off a really sweet guy in order to continue degrading herself with Bishop.

She’s also the first to defend Nate, even after a scene in the woods where the Kings attack her AGAIN. She says that despite all he’s done, she knows Nate wouldn’t hurt her. Oh, really? Because I thought that’s EXACTLY what they were doing to you in the woods. WTF Maddy.

Despite all the above, I DID like Maddy. She was funny, strong (just not when it comes to men apparently), self-assured, a loyal friend, and gun savvy. On the downside, she is INSANELY naïve- when her friends make offhanded yet obvious comments that are meant to warn her about one thing or another, she shrugs them off or moves on to a different subject. It seems like clues are being thrown at her left and right that she is either in danger or that things are not what they seem, and she ignores them or makes excuses.

And it does seem like everyone else knows what’s going on aside from Maddy. I’m not saying this is really the case, but throughout the entire book you can’t really be sure who is actually trustworthy and that adds to the whole sense of foreboding and unease.

Speaking of unease, I have to give Amo Jones credit for creating this completely disconcerting atmosphere. You constantly feel as though the main character is in danger, you’re just never really sure why or from who exactly. And because of that you HAVE to keep reading. I’ve already purchased book #2, Broken Puppet for $2.99 and I’ve started reading other books since finishing this one a few days ago, but I think I may actually have to set those aside for the moment so that I can continue on this journey with Maddy and get my questions answered!!

So overall it was an addicting and exciting read, the only downsides for me being the struggle with the Bishop/Maddie dynamic that I’m still trying to understand-and the fact that he became a softer version of himself towards the end of the book which was hard to swallow as being a realistic transformation, after being built up as a robotic asshole for most of the book-and the bits of writing that bothered me here and there. But those are small issues that won’t keep me from continuing the series.