Book Log #56: Matters of the Blood, by Maria Lima

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

You can’t pick up an urban fantasy these days without getting some variation on the “heroine in tough pose and generally without a head” cover. Nor are your chances good of finding an urban fantasy that does not involve vampires. Maria Lima’s Matters of the Blood has both of these things. But don’t let that stop you from picking this up, since it is in fact a fun read!

First up, this is actually less of an “urban” fantasy per se and more of a “rural” one. I’ve said in reviews of other things (c.f. Doranna Durgin’s A Feral Darkness) that I like seeing contemporary fantasy novels that aren’t set in major urban centers. Lima’s series is set out in a more rural stretch of Texas, and the setting alone adds a lot of color to the book.

Second, while Lima’s heroine Keira follows the standard mold of Heroine Who Has Great Magical Powers and Much Attitude But Who Really Just Wants to Be Left Alone, she’s nonetheless likable. Keira doesn’t go too overboard with the sass, and what attitude she’s got towards her family is justified! To balance that out, she’s got a lively friendship going on with her best friend Bea, and an intriguing almost-a-relationship with Adam Walker, the mysterious owner of a local dude ranch.

Which of course brings me around to the vampire part of the story. It’s not a spoiler to say that Keira discovers that OH HEY this guy’s a vampire; it’d almost be more surprising if she discovered he wasn’t, really. As a character Adam brings nothing new to the vampire milieu, but even given that, I liked him. He wasn’t overly angsty as a vampire love interest goes, which helped.

The mystery’s fun, too, as Keira, her brother Tucker, Bea, and Adam must investigate recent murders around their town–including that of Keira’s undertaker cousin Marty, the one member of their family who has no powers whatsoever. There are interesting power plays going on with Adam and his subordinates, and good backstory to bolster it all up. I’ll be coming back for more. Four stars.

Mirrored from annathepiper.org.

Book Log #57: Blood, Smoke and Mirrors

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Robyn Bachar’s Blood, Smoke and Mirrors was favorable reviewed on Smart Bitches, and that’s always a fine thing, so I took it upon myself to check this book out. It was my first from Samhain Press, who certainly did make an impression upon me with the gorgeous cover for this thing. Yeah, sure, it’s yet another Headless Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy heroine, but I will at least give this one points for not having a tramp stamp!

Points off, though, for how the girl on this cover is significantly thinner than I think the heroine’s actually supposed to be. That’s one of the things that stood out for me reading through this: i.e., that the heroine frequently describes herself as overweight if not outright fat. So I’m thinking that a bit more realism of cover portrayal might have been nice here, even as I acknowledge that yeah, that probably wouldn’t have sold as well. C’est la vie.

Anyway, the core concept of the book was the other thing that grabbed me: i.e., that our heroine is a witch who’s been banished by her brethren for violation of the Do No Harm rede–in self-defense against a would-be rapist. Naturally, Cat’s pretty bitter about this, and it doesn’t help much either that the one who turned her in was her own lover, Alexander Duquesne. But: Cat’s also in line to become the Titania, the mortal representative to Faerie in her neck of the woods. And cranky as she is at Lex, she’ll have to team up with him to find out who doesn’t want her anywhere near the Titania position.

All well and good. I waffled though about whether I liked the worldbuilding or not; it was certainly clearly laid out and pretty detailed. Some aspects of it were definitely unusual, such as “witches only do this kind of magic and necromancers only do this kind and guardians only do this kind”, not to mention an apparent progression of necromancers eventually becoming vampires. I’ll give due credit for that. I must note though that some of that also made me go “wait, what?”, a bit too much for my liking.

Same deal with Cat and Lex. What kicked this over into paranormal romance land for me, rather than urban fantasy, was three things: 1) their relationship was one of the biggest conflict drivers of the book, 2) there was quite a bit of emphasis about the sexual attraction between them, and 3) the Big Misunderstanding trope showed up. And while paranormal romance land is not a bad place to be in the slightest–witness the number of paranormal romances I’ve read and have on my to read queue–I found myself wishing there was a little less relationship angst and a little more plot.

Cat herself was another thing I waffled about. I liked that she came across a lot as a truly everyday woman, not only because of her weight, but because of her tastes in clothes and food. But at the same time, she was very much in the mold of Smartass Heroine, often to her own detriment, and that’s something I’d really like to see a bit less of in my heroines these days. (Less smartass, more smart.)

Last but not least, I found most of the antagonists a bit too much “evil because that’s their function in this plot” rather than “evil because they have actual motive”. Cat’s father didn’t work for me as a character, and neither did “Lovely Laura Barrenheart”, just because I had a very hard time imagining how any vampire who expected to be taken seriously would actually saddle herself with a name like that. But that said? Zachary Harrison did work, and was deliciously ambiguous.

All in all I liked it well enough, and can definitely see how the parts that didn’t necessarily work for me might work a lot better for others. I think for me this was just a question of taste and style preferences in my reading rather than any real fault of the book. Three stars.

Mirrored from annathepiper.org.