Must Remember by Colleen S. Myers - 4 stars

Book 1 in the Solum Series

Must Remember by Colleen S. Myers
4 stars

I got this book through NetGalley and after reading it, I will definitely be buying it.

This book falls under the New Adult genre. I was pleasantly surprised as I was reading this. It's a bit of Sci-Fi and a bit of Fantasy mixed together. There's humor that you wouldn't expect either. I was laughing out loud which is extremely difficult. There is sarcasm, romance, magic, action, aliens, and more.

Elizabeth/Beta is our heroine and the narrator in this book. I love the nickname Myers chose for Elizabeth. I've seen Beta used as a nickname. I found it clever. Beta is a college girl and her entire world ends one day when everyone around her stars going crazy. That was how the book opened. That whole first chapter had me going "What the hell am I reading?!" Then she wakes up on another planet with two suns in a uniform she doesn't recognize with no memories of how she got there.

Some books that have amnesia dive me crazy because they tend to drag it out. Beta gets flashbacks and dreams that slowly clue us in without ruining the plot. In fact, I found that Myers paced the plot and action quite well. She didn't info dump us on too much and allowed the characters to describe the world.

One thing I did have a problem with was the love triangle. I'm just not a fan of them. We do know who she prefers pretty early on but she kept going back and forth which is annoying. Thankfully she chose by the end of the book so it wasn't too drawn out. Of course, the rejected guy won't be giving up that easily. I'm on team Marin.

The character development for Beta was great. Things weren't dragged out and when she started getting bored, she decided she wanted to do something about it. But she was very real. The memories that began to return scared her and at points she was very human in not wanting to remember the pain.

I enjoy fantasy more than sci-fi and the fact that this was both made it great and unique. I love the elemental magic that was included and I love the jatua. They are tattoo-like markings that appear on a person's skin. They are basically the person's story. I just found it cool.

I'm excited for the next book, Can't Forget. Must Remember didn't end on a cliff-hanger exactly, but it's enough to make you want more. I definitely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys magic, aliens, or romance.

Hidden Gates by D.T. Dyllin - 1 star

Hidden Gates by D.T. Dyllin
1 star

I don't like giving 1 star but the more I write this review, the more I don't like this book. This is not a YA book like I thought it would be when I read the summary but a NA. The New Adult genre is a difficult one. You have a character that's between a teenager and an adult and the author has to find the right balance. I don't believe that balance was found in this book. I had a hard time not rolling my eyes while reading this.

Forbidden love? Check! Love triangle (quadrangle)? Check! Annoying (slutty) best friend? Check! Soul maters? Check! I'm sure there are more cliches I can add in there. I don't have a problem with a lot of cliches but throw them all together and it's just painful. Things were so predictable when it came to the relationships in this book. Almost everything was predictable.

PJ is our protagonist. She's a Seer and her best friend, Bryn, is a Guardian. PJ isn't allowed to be with anyone but a Gate Keeper or a Seer descendant. No lowly Guardian for PJ. But who is PJ in love with? You guessed it, Bryn, the lowly Guardian. But we can't forget about the slutty best friend, Jenna. She's a Speaker, she can speak/read any language. She's also second-class to the beloved Gate Keepers and Seers. Don't get me wrong, I like that there are levels of power and the fact that the Gate Keepers and Seers are snooty. That makes for a interesting complication. This wasn't. We were never given a reason why Speakers and Guardians are so lowly. Hell, we aren't even told why these special humans exist! On top of that you have dragons. Yes, dragons. Oh, and "aliens" who come through the gates take over people's bodies. What's a Gate? I don't know.

Every character is flat. There isn't any depth to them. The entire plot focuses on PJ and the three love interests. Romance is basically the only plot point. There isn't any real character development. There's no real movement throughout the story. There's very little action. Everything focuses on PJ and how she loves Bryn but he's forbidden. I wanted more than that. I wanted some reason to be emotionally invested in these characters or this world but there wasn't anything for me to care about.

The plot Dyllin was trying to write just didn't come through. It needs to focus less on PJ and her love struggles and more on the end of the world plot point that was introduced at the end. Overall this book just wasn't for me.

Rereading and more

I'm having a hard time reading new books lately. I've actually been rereading a lot. I'm in this weird mood and I find rereading is useful when in these little ruts. I have specific go-to books for time like these. Harry Potter, Kate Daniels, The Others, and a few others are the ones I tend to gravitate towards. Audiobooks also work wonders.

Of course, rereading doesn't give one much time to review new books. It can be a bit frustrating. It's like I have writer's block for reviewing. Very odd. Since I'm not reviewing anything at the moment, I thought I'd share some pretty cool fan art that I've come across during my frequent visits to Deviantart. It is a wonderful place. I'd definitely recommend anyone to check out the artwork people post.

Peter and his Shadow by FlyingMilkPig
Peter Pan

Magic Mornings by Qinni
Harry Potter 

Heir of Fire by annalise
Throne of Glass

The Promise of the World by StickyLeaf
Howl's Moving Castle

through the looking glass by LanWU
Alice in Wonderland

The Book Thief by Laura M
The Book Thief

Hanging t

Dear Tom by Soylent Green
Harry Potter

Distorted Beauty by Blanca Morelos
The Lunar Chronicles

Written in Red by Anne Bishop - 5 stars

Book 1 in the Others series

Written in Red by Anne Bishop
5 stars

I recently discovered this book thanks to @has_bookpushers on Twitter. I inhaled this book and then moved on to the next book within days. I stayed up way to late but it was so addicting I couldn't stop reading.

This world is another unique one. There are vampires and shapeshifters but there are also other creatures that don't have names. They are known as the terra indegine or Others. The Others despise human and consider them "clever meat." They lease the land humans occupy by on the continent of Thaisa. I think Thaisa is North America in Bishop's world. There are some clues even though every country and city have different names than the real world. Bishop includes a description of the world for her readers which lays out the setting without turning into an expository essay.

We have multiple points of view and all of them are in Third Person Limited. Our main protagonist is Meg Corban. She's a difficult kind of human. She's what the Other's consider "not prey." She doesn't have the prey smell and she has a child-like innocence. She's a sweet blood. This is because she is a Blood Prophet or cassandra sangue. Meg escaped from a compound full of other Blood Prophets and winds up in the Courtyard in Lakeside. Blood Prophets have the need to cut and once the skin is cut, they see prophecies. If they speak, they feel an orgasmic-like euphoria but if they don't, all they feel is an excruciating pain.

This book...I can't believe I didn't know about it sooner. The I love the setting, the plot, the characters, everything. Even though it's set in an alternate universe, it's not hard to follow. That makes things much easier to understand. Bishop manages to explain things without the reader feeling overwhelmed with details. I love when an author can do that.

Meg's view of the world is so different and I love it. She thinks differently and that has an impact on everyone in the Courtyard. Simon, the leader of the Courtyard is a Wolf and Bishop managed to capture the essence of the Wolf and the other terra indegine shapshifters. They don't think like humans and Bishop is able to show this. I loved it. I loved the relationship/friendship that forms between the two. There is actions and fights and there Bishop doesn't hold back on the descriptions of kills.

I love this book. There isn't a heavy romance element and I find that refreshing. You can see the budding relationship between Meg and Simon but it's slow to start so we'll see what's in store for them. The world so interesting and addictive. I just want to know more. Anyone who is a fan of fantasy and alternate universes would love this book. It's like Kate Daniels by Ilona Andrews or Nalini Singh's Guild Hunter sereis. The world is different yet still familiar. Ah, so amazing. Definitely a must read.

The Iron King by Julia Kagawa - 4.5 stars

Book 1 in the Iron Fey series

The Iron King by Julie Kagawa
4.5 stars

So I just did a reread of the series and I still found myself enjoying it immensely. Our main character is Meghan Chase. She's your average girl who has a crazy best friend, Robbie. She lives on a pig farm so she's poor and is an outcast. She's also a half-faery; daughter of Oberon himself. Robbie is actually Robin Goodfellow from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. When he decides not to give Meghan the concoction that hides the fey from her sight, Meghan discovers her true identity.

Puck

Of course, not long after she finds out about the fey, her brother is kidnapped by fey. Meghan enlists the help of Robin, aka Puck, to find her rescue her brother from the clutches of the Iron Fey. These Iron Fey are dangerous to the realm because iron is toxic to them. Since Meghan's half-human, iron doesn't affect her.

There are a wide variety of characters. We have Oberon and Titania from A Midsummer Night's Dream as well as a lot of different fey creatures. The main cast include Meghan, Puck, a cait sith named Grimalkin, and Prince Ash of the Winter court. Meghan needs help from Ash to find the Iron realm and defeat the Iron King. They strike a deal: Ash would help find and destroy the king and then he would take Meghan to the Winter court.

Ash

It's quite obvious from the start that Ash is going to be the love interest in this series. He's the brooding type and distant. He has to be; to survive in the Unseelie court, you have to hide emotions. Emotions make you weak. I found that Meghan and Ash fell in love pretty quickly and I'm definitely not a fan of insta-love. It didn't exactly fall into the insta-love category but it was pretty close.

Meghan goes through many trials and many many fights to the death. She's not really able to defend herself very well so she has to rely on Ash and Puck (spoiler)*. We learn about the faery world through her eyes and it's definitely not a world for the weak at heart. I like how Kagawa introduced us to the world of the fey. There weren't info dumps and Meghan's reactions are very realistic. However, she is a very strong lead and nothing deters her from her mission to save Ethan.

Grimalkin

I love Puck and Grimalkin. Puck provides some comic relief and it's obvious that he loves Meghan. He goes against Oberon's orders quite often on her behalf. He has some pretty cool powers and he never knows when to shut up. Some would find it annoying but I didn't. Grimalkin is a cat through and through. He is in it for his own interests as he helps guide Meghan. Of course everything comes with a price and he likes to collect favors. I like his sassyness. He's also not afraid of running from a fight. He disappears when trouble shows up. That's a cat for you.

The climax of the book was definitely interesting and it has lasting effects for the rest of the series (spoiler)**. The actions in the Iron Kingdom and the promises made between the characters add to the complexity of the series and makes everything so much better.

I like the how Kagawa wrote the characters, giving them history and not simply giving us flat characters to help the story along. I think she did a great job writing the story and having it in first person works well for the book. Obviously I recommend this book and the rest of the series. It's enjoyable and an easy read.

Burn for Me by Ilona Andrews - 5 stars

Book 1 in the Hidden Legacy Trilogy

Burn for Me by Ilona Andrews
5 stars

This book was great. I mean absolutely awesome. I loved it. It is so different than the books out there so that makes it even better. I love the writing and the characters and the world Ilona and Gordon created. It's so different than their other works yet it's still clearly written by the wonderful duo that is

Arcane Circle

Ilona Andrews.

Our main characters are Nevada and Mad Rogan. Nevada has a pretty cool but secret power. She can tell when people are lying. She's technically called a Truthseeker. It's the third rarest gift there is. She's kept her gift hidden for very good reasons. She uses it for her investigative work as she is a PI and she knows exactly what she's doing. She's very protective of her family. They mean everything to her and she will do everything in her power to make sure they're safe. I love this about her. She may be poor but she make sure the family gets everything they need.

Then we have Mad Rogan. Mad is the perfect term to describe this guy. He's super sexy and super powerful. He spent his time in the army destroying cities and leaving nothing standing. He's a Prime telekinetic. Primes are these super powerful mages (I don't have another word for it) who basically run the world. There are different houses with different Primes.

Nevada and Rogan have to work together to bring down Adam Pierce. Nevada has no choice because the firm who technically owns Baylor Investigative Agency. House Pierce wants Adam returned alive and  unharmed. Adam is a Prime pyrokinetic. He can control fire and he likes to use it. He's really just crazy. Rogan is thrown in there because he's trying to track down his cousin's son. Rogan has no qualms with hurting or killing people. Nevada becomes his moral compass in a way.

What I love so much about this book is the interactions between Nevada and Rogan. I love the witty remarks and comebacks. It's classic Ilona Andrews. There is humor and sarcasm mixed in with all the maddness going on in the characters' world. There is a Kate and Curran like quality to the relationshop but it's different enough to make Nevada and Rogan completely separate from Kate and Curran. Nevada doesn't take crap from Rogan and Rogan finds her amusing. It's just a really good relationship and it will definitely be interesting to see where it goes from here.

This will be a trilogy with a Happily Ever After. I finished Burn for Me in about four hours. I just couldn't put it down. I got the audiobook so I can reread it again and pick up the things that I might have missed in my rapid page turning.

Ilona Andrews created a website just for Burn for Me. It gives an overview of the characters, powers, and the world they created. I recommend checking it out because it gives an easy overview without being spoilery.

Obviously I recommend this book. I love Ilona and Gordon. They're brilliant writers and I can never get enough. If there were more stars I would give it to them. Now I have to wait for the next book to come out. I am very impatient when it comes to their books. Magic Shifts (Kate 8) is the next release and I'm so ready for it to be out now. I guess I just have to stick with the regular updates to the serial Sweep in Peace.

The first cover option. 

Master of Crows by Grace Draven - 4.5 stars

Master of Crows by Grace Draven
4.5 stars

I loved this book. I absolutely loved it. Draven writes wonderfully and she is able to immerse you in her world without confusing you. There were no info dumps and the characters were well developed. I like the type of magic that occupied this world and I like how the class systems worked because it gave the story some life.

The main two characters are Martise of Asher and Silhara of Neith. Martise is a slave and is sent to Neith as an apprentice. Her true purpose was to spy on Silhara so her master, Bishop Cumbria, could find an excuse to execute him. There is extreme hatred between the two and neither bother hiding it. Martise is a well and is able to translate old texts. Silhara is in need of her abilities so he can find a way to kill the false god, Corruption. Silhara also has to try to make Martise's Gift appear. It's obvious she had it but it doesn't want to show itself.

Silhara is an ass but there are good reasons for this. He is a powerful mage who lives in squalor. Neith is a ruin for someone of noble blood. The title "Master of Crows" is an insult because they associate crows with evil and death. In truth, Silhara only uses some dark magic and not for dark purposes. At the moment Corruption wants to use Silhara as his avatar to rule the human world. Silhara is doing his best to resist the evil god but he can't resist much longer. He needs to find a way to kill him.

Martise is an average woman but with a beautiful voice. She isn't beautiful; she is plain and unassuming. She is very smart and clever however and her role as a slave serves her well. She picks up information because who pays attention to a slave? She finds that she fits in at Neith. Gurn, the servant but truly Silhara's friend, is mute but uses sign language. He cares for Silhara and soon comes to care for Martise. I like Gurn. He's a giant with a big heart despite a dark past.

We do end up finding out about Martise's Gift but it is not the Gift anyone expected. It's actually a curse. It's quite sad actually but there is an excellent reason behind Draven's choice of Gift for Martise. I like that Silhara is extremely powerful and that he is a tortured soul that Martise comes to love.

This is a fantasy-romance so obviously the two fall in love. Their love isn't instant and it's obvious that it is a difficult thing to embrace. I like how their relationship grew through the book and the discovery's they find in each other and in themselves.

There is plenty of action and suspense. The ending is a HEA for which I am grateful.  I couldn't see it ending any other way. The entire book is just written brilliantly. Her words paint the picture in your mind and you find yourself completely immersed and up way late into the night when you should be sleeping.

I highly recommend this  book. I read it in the anthology "Darkly Dreaming." I just discovered that there will be a sequel coming out. Draven hadn't planned for one but she changed her mind and decided that it sounded like a good idea. I'm excited. There is no official date yet but Draven did provide a small snippet from the next book, "The Brush of Black Wings." You can read it here. But don't read it before you read Master of Crows. Seriously, there are spoilers and this is one book you don't want to spoil for yourself.