The Watchers - Jon Steel

one sentence summary
An unlikely group team up to fight against evil...

review
I really wanted to like this book, I loved the style of the writing, I loved the descriptors of the setting but I HATED all of the characters. I know I was supposed to feel sympathetic and relate to them but I didn't. I tried to, but they were such crap I couldn't get over it. The plot was interesting but Steele let the details get in the way, the story could have been better told at half the length (much like my opinion on LotR). The pacing we terrible, 100 pages of descriptors followed by 5 pages of moving the plot forward, rinse repeat. It was so frustrating because I wanted to enjoy it but just couldn't

4/10

Blood Red - Heather Graham

one sentence summary
In New Orleans for a bridal shower get away three normal women find themselves wrapped up in the world of vampires.

review
Writing typical of Graham, with reliance on cliches and tropes but with enough character development to draw you in.  I would recommend this to anyone who likes trashy vampire romance, good reading for a distracted day.

7/10

Day by Day Armageddon Origin to Exile - J. L. Bourne

one sentence summary:
Zombies have taken over, only the smart survive.

Review:
I would call this a well written zombie survivor diary. The story in my opinion is realistic with chaos and lots of shifting attitudes of the main characters. The highlight of the story is a dog and how many sacrifices the people make to keep the dog around, to maintain their humanity is amazing (and realistic to my way of thinking). I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys zombie apocalypse stories where people actually survive in realistic ways.

7/10

Fangland - John Marks

one sentence summary
 A reporter travels to Transylvania following a story and disappears, her source shows up in New York and strange things start happening.

review
This is a well written story with an original idea pushing it. The characters are well developed and deal with the situations they are thrown into in a realistic way, which is nice. The dialogue is a bit stilted from time to time and the action is a bit off (but I can't quite put my finger on why). All in all it is a moderately well done modern Dracula story.

7/10

Under the Dome - Stephen King

one sentence summary:
A dome encases a small town cutting them off from the rest of the world.

review:
in true Steven King style this thriller looks more at the horrors man can do onto themselves that that of any outside force. By putting people in a stressful situation and seeing how they would react to the situation and each other is a far more spellbinding and terrifying read than any monsters in the closet could create. A look at this small town functions as a representation of the world at large with characters representing every mindset. The novel has parts that are really badly edited but for the most part it is enjoyable.

7/10

Storm Front - Jim Butcher

one sentence summary
Wizard for hire works as a detective and solves mysteries in modern day Chicago.

review
I enjoyed this story but the writing didn't flow as well as I was expecting it to. I think that will get better in the next books. Dresden is a very strongly developed character who we genuinely want to see what happens next to.

8/10

Earth to Hell - Kylie Chan

one sentence summary:
Emma's adventure continues as she raises Simone and hopes one day to be reunited with her beloved John.

review:
less than ideal, this novel doesn't live up to expectations. I was hoping that it would continue the story where the first trilogy left off, but instead it jumps forward in time and  the only character that is even recognizable is Emma. I found it frustrating how little they had bothered to sort out in the 8 years between the books, it is as if their lives froze (so as to not miss any plot points) but 8 years went by. *sigh* such a disappointing read, but I will read the next two in hopes they get better.

5/10

Darkborn - Alison Sinclair

One Sentence Summary:
There are two races, one born of light the other of darkness, they coexist but what happens when something threatens both races??

review:
This was better than I expected it to be. The characters were fairly stock, not a lot going on with most of them but there are enough entertaining quirks that they kept me interested in what was happening to them. And that was the strong point of the book, a fast paced plot that keeps the pages turning. I recommend this to you if you enjoyed the Hunger Games series.

8/10 middle/high school (the people who like hunger games)

The Poet Prince - Kathleen McGowan

one sentence summary:
the third book in a series that follows the bloodline of Jesus to today's world with a paranormal twist.

review:
Not as good as the first book in the trilogy but better than the second. The story was a bit slow and in my opinion the best part is the historical flashes. I enjoyed the whole story, but found the parts from the perspective of the female lead to be a bit dry and frustrating because there was romantic turmoil and her character did not handle it the way her character (from the prior books) would have. I found it very frustrating how much the character changes without any actual character development.

8/10

Out of Body (Court of Angels) - Stella Cameron

one sentence summary:
a psychic woman from a family of people with "special abilities" falls in love while helping solve a serial killers killing spree.

review:
written to the typical standards of trashy romance stories, this is a good one. The characters are all lovable, especially the back ground characters (you can tell who Stella Cameron is going to focus on in the sequels). The writing is not great but there are no grammatical errors so it did have a better than average editor. I recommend it for plane or train reading.

6/10 

Blood Lite - ed. Kevin J Anderson

one sentence summary
a collection of short, often witty, paranormal stories.

review
these stories range in quality from "why the hell did I waste my time reading that" to "wow, listen to this..." with the majority being in the first category. I was disappointed by most of the stories but Butcher's was really good and Snell's was interesting (if not particularly well executed) but that was pretty much it for good writing. The more I know the author the more disappointed I was in their story.

2/10

Dark Heavens Trilogy - Kylie Chan

one sentence summary
A nanny enters the world of mythology when she agrees to care for the daughter of a god.

review
This is a great series, the mythology is so well researched and described that it is easy to fall under the spell of the story and believe the unbelievable. The series gets stronger as it continues forward, the third book being the most well written. I enjoyed the characters for the most part, the only really weak link is the character of Simone, a little girl wise beyond her years. For the most part she is believable but she is also the only catalyst that dispels the suspension of disbelief that is so crucial to fantasy writing and she does it more than once. Aside from that I look forward to this series continuing.

Faeries Gone Wild - Mary-Janice Davidson, Michelle Hauf, Lois Greiman, Leandra Logan

one sentence summary
A collection of four short stories all with happy endings and a dash of love.

review
Mary Janice: absolutely hilarious with characters from her other novels flitting about. Well written and witty - the best story in the book for sure.
Michelle: another hilarious story, the tooth fairy is losing her job because the mothers in her district are forcing their kids to stop believing. She has to figure out a way to save her job with the help of a hunky sandman. a story worth reading for sure.
Lois: an author I hadn't read buy will keep an eye out for. Her story was sweet but she was trying to fit too much plot into too few pages. Well written if a bit rushed feeling.
Leandra: the age old story of trying to find your place in the world, well told and entertaining but ultimately forgettable.

8/10

Skylight Confessions - Alice Hoffman

one sentence summary
Follow one family as it shatters and tries to pull itself together.

review:
I really enjoyed this story, I can tell the imagery from it is going to stick with me for a long time. The characters were very well developed, they all had wonderful flaws and were very relatable. Hoffman must have spent longer researching mental illness and drug addiction than she did writing the book because from my perspective it was really well written. I highly recommend anyone interested in drug addictions or anyone who wants to understand how to develop characters without glaring descriptions.

9/10

Aftertime - Sophie Littlefield

one sentence summary

The world as we know it has ended and the remaining humans struggle to survive.

review
The romance angle of this seems like an afterthought, and, in my opinion the novel would have been a lot better without it. (my theory is that when sending it out to publishers harlequin said "sure, but add some sex" because that is what it feels like, tossed in and not thought through.) The story line is interesting Cass, a recovering alcoholic is searching for her daughter in a world torn apart by mind melted cannibals. The character of Cass is wonderfully flawed and realistic, trying to keep sane and to find her child. It is worth reading if you enjoy end of the world stories.

7/10

Tall, Dark and Dead - Tate Hallaway

one sentence summary
a witch has a goddess living in her but this doesn't keep her from falling for a warlock vampire...

review
this book could have been better, the main character is great as are some of the supporting characters but the rest of the plot falls short. The writing is strong at points but it falls flat when it comes to dialogue. It was disappointing that the writing wasn't better as it would have added to the story to actually use language from the era of the characters. I will still read the rest of the series at some point when I can buy them at discounted prices. I recommend this if you like quirky stories with a paranormal twist.

6/10

The Delaney Christmas Carol - Kay Hooper, Iris Johansen and Fayrene Preston

one sentence summary:
many generations of the Delaney family have looked into the magic mirror and seen a glimpse of the future, these are three of those stories.

Review:
none of these stories were particularly well conceived or well written. Iris Johansen's was the best in my opinion and the other two weren't much worse. All three felt rushed and without strong plots. The Delaney family, however, does seem like a family worth writing about and I will probably seek out more of their stories.

4/10

The Twelve - Justin Cronin

One sentence summary:
The fall out of a military project to use an extinct virus to engineer super soldiers and unleashes an evil that is so horrific the world quarantines North America to avoid all out loss.

review:
A sequel so epic it deserved its own post! The writing is better than the last half of the first book but it is better in parts and mediocre in others. It is easy to tell as a reader what parts Cronin really enjoyed writing, bits about Grey and the "past", the year "0" parts especially stand out as well done. I would love to read more about year 0. The writing was pretty good and the plot pounds along at a healthy clip.  I thought it was really clever how Cronin summarized the first novel in the prologue in "bible verse" format. There were some really dark plot points though, darker than expected (which is saying a lot for a post apocalyptic story). I recommend this to anyone who enjoyed The Passage.

8/10 (if you have read The Passage this gets a 10/10 read it now rating, though I may be alone on that judging by the other reviews) I guess objectively (based on writing of this as a stand alone) I would actually give this a 5 or maybe 6 but I love the characters so much I rate it much higher.

Silver Dragon Trilogy - Katie MacAlister

one sentence summary:
Romance and dragon/demon politics do not always go together but love always finds a way.

review:
These are quirky comical easy reads with a healthy dash of sexy. The characters are all really well drawn out and the interactions between them are charged with human emotion. I enjoyed the settings that MacAlister used from the underworld to the apartments of characters from her earlier series. I also really liked the bits about the characters from earlier series, it was kind of like catching up with old friends. I recommend this series to anyone who likes quirky romances.

6/10

The Bearskin Rug - Jennifer Stevenson

one sentence summary
sex demon freed from his bonds vs good guy cop, which will she choose?

review
an entertaining smutty read. not "well written" but not terrible.  Apparently this is book 3 in a series, I will be going back and reading the first two if I happen to ever find them used for cheap. The plot is a bit wishy-washy and the characters feel stale (but that might be because I missed the first books... but it should be better). It is fluff, a brainless read with an adequate amount of smut.

5/10