Jordan L. Hawk “Necropolis” | Whyborne & Griffin 4

Author: Jordan L. Hawk
Title: Necropolis
Series: Whyborne & Griffin 4
Genre: Historical, Paranormal
Pages: 200
Rate: 4/5 | Goodreads

Alright, time to continue a bit with Whyborne & Griffin before I forgot all about everything. Especially since these books didn’t fit into my October TBR, and since they are nice, and easy to read. Nothing too big, but not too little either.

About: After a mostly unsuccessful Christmas diner at Whyborne’s family, the couple’s Holiday is cut short by Christine’s hurried telegram explaining nothing at all, but requesting Whyborne to get to Egypt ASAP. Being a great introvert, Whyborne didn’t want to go, and had to be persuaded by Griffin, and a ghoul that attacked him at work. For in Egypt, under the dead scorched sands, something darkness is waking. Something evil, hungry, and very angry. And Christine, unknowingly, is stepping right in the middle of it.

Mine: People getting mad at Whyborne, because they thought he and Christine had a fling worked very well here. Best was Christine’s response when confronted about it: “ew“. These little incidents worked well with otherwise pretty stressful plot with too obvious villains, and too obvious masked heroes. I mean, I understand it’s not the goal of these books to serve you a detective, but… Ah, it don’t matter. The books are well written. The adventure was built in a perfectly smooth pace, with pauses for discussion, regrouping, a little bit of romance, and a little bit of comic relief, that this time came in a shape of a camel who stole Whyborne’s hats. Yes, multiple.

These are very light reads, and so far are fun too. Not utterly captivating, but I can still give it a solid 4 out of 5, and continue in November. Because really, why not? They might not put you on the edge of the chair, but they definitely won’t have you bored!

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John Burdett “The Bangkok Asset” | Sonchai Jitpleecheep 6

Author: John Burdett
Title: The Bangkok Asset
Series: Sonchai Jitpleecheep 6
Genre: Mystery, Crime
Pages: 307
Rate: 4/5 | Goodreads

Ah, and so here we are, with the last book of Sonchai Jitpleecheep that left me utterly confused and strangely happy. Confusion comes from the characters. And happiness comes from the end. Both literal – series ended, and less so – the ending of the book was pretty meta.

About: A person is brutally murdered, their head torn off their shoulders with demonic strength. And a message is left for Sonchai at the crime scene, written in blood: “I know who <smudge> father is“. To help him with this case, yet another one that directly revolves around him, a Chinese inspector Krom is assigned to Sonchai. And she soon confirms Sonchai’s suspicion that there’s something inhuman at work here.

The deeper Sonchai gets, the closer he gets to his father, with whom killer baited him closer, deeper into the case, the more he realizes that the world as he knew it has long as ended. This is the new era, era where the only power, respect, and religion is money. The second coming or the apocalypse itself is at the gate. And Sonchai is to choose a role: will you be John the Baptist, or Judas?

Mine: Some of the characters simply disappeared. Everyone forgot about them completely, and it’s really annoying. Especially since the new ones were very basic one-sided, and lacked any depth. The author is really struggling to write any women, and the ones that he does write, end up becoming either lamps or one-tune sounds. Then there’s the whole “every case revolves around Sonchai” deal. People need to stop killing to get his attention. Ending was pretty great though, not the very far end, but the culmination of it, before Sonchai jumped the bathroom. It put the other books together: you had a man whose word was always valued, a man who was loved even when he was hated, a man who was a saint, finally, become a saint. This new Cult, these New Age Apostles, they reach their hands to him with a promise: come, we’ll love you, just sit on the throne, and be our God.

In Lithuania we only have three books translated for us, and I think that was a good call on the publishers. The first three books really tie up the good story with the “happily ever after” attached to it. The rest are darker, and by far, not always good. Yet I don’t feel like I wasted time reading these, they were worth it, even when I hated it. So all in all, final book gets a 4 out of 5 from me.

Chloe Neill “Midnight Marked” | Chicagoland Vampires 12

Author: Chloe Neill
Title: Midnight Marked
Series: Chicagoland Vampires 12
Genre: Paranormal, Vampires
Pages: 361
Rate: 2/5 | Goodreads

One of those books I’ve read twice, back to back, because I just felt like I missed something. Turns out, it’s just that thin of a broth here. Ah well, only one more in the series left to go.

About: Someone’s casting an alchemical net over the Chicago, and it’s huge. And, judging by the supernatural corpses, it means no good either. Merit and her happy little bunch gather up, invade the library, and begin their attempts to translate what pieces they found, just to find out – they’re in a dead end. In the meantime the biggest mobster in Chicago, who held many a supernatural in his pocket, has made a move again, and this time, it seems, he wants to take Sullivan down. Sullivan, being an or becoming an idiot, is easily baited, whether he knows he’s biting bait or not. And I, the reader, sit here wondering who and where got all of these war axes from.

Mine: I have issues with witchcraft and alchemy being put into one and the same pot. Especially when author clearly mentioned FMA as one of her loved sources of inspiration or knowledge, so she knows it, she’s seen it, but she still had a witch cast an alchemy spell, and a programmer make an algorithm that correctly translates it. I’m yet to find a translator that correctly translates into English, so that’s some hardcore fantasy right there. To add to that, their obsession with food got to me. It was funny for a while, but now it’s like reading Joey Tribbiani’s from Friend’s biography: sex, food, food, sex, girls on bread! And if you think that wasn’t enough for me to get the score so low, let me add my favorite stuff: bad guys magically escape cells, the biggest and baddest kick the bucket unwillingly, Merit’s the bigger man who won’t have someone’s blood on her hands in this one particular instance, and now we’re definitely on the magical baby track. At least she confronted Sullivan about fake proposals NOT being funny.

I feel like this was the scraping of the bottom of the barrel. I guess there really needed to be thirteen books. I do hope it ends with a bang, because this one gets 2 out of 5 from me, no more.

Davidson King “Snow Falling” | Haven Hart Universe 1

Author: Davidson King
Title: Snow Falling
Series: Haven Hart Universe 1
Genre: Romance; LGBT+
Pages: 166p
Rate: 3/5 | Goodreads

I really did know that crime books don’t work as romance books. One genre will almost always mess up the other one. So either romance part will be lame, or gangsters will be ridiculous. But here I am, not listening to my own advice, just because I saw a pretty cover, and got promised some mob bosses. As you may guess, “Snow Falling” by Davidson King wasn’t a good book for me.

About: When Julian’s mother died, his father, an officer, has drowned himself in a bottle. He got indebted to the mob, and has fallen as a human being. Thus, once mob knocked on his door, offering an exchange of debts for his talented son, he didn’t blink an eye before handing his child over. On that day Julian as has died. Due to his pale complexion, the criminals claimed he blended in with the snow. That’s what he continues to call himself today, relatively free, on the street: Snow. But that relative freedom didn’t stop him from interfering with Russian Mafia’s Father’s son. The scum was trying to kidnap a luxuriously dressed child, alone on the street, for some reason. Snow interfered, offering an exchange of his own. But if he thought his problems had a limit then, he was very wrong. The kid he saved, a boy too scared to even tell Snow his name, turned out to be a nephew of a far bigger and badder boss.

Mine: All the action in the book revolves around people kidnapping from crime families. You kidnap from us, we kidnap from you, and repeat. Gangsters here are like vampires in Chicagoland Vampires: food obsessed humans who happen to kill other humans sometimes, and some even lose sleep over it. All the side characters were road-signs: they were there to say the right thing on the right time, so the hero could continue saying something clever, high and mighty, and look even more epic, morally superior to others. The story was pretty damn weak too. Between the kidnapping Snow would dance to Lady Gaga songs, preparing for a Drag Show in talent show, with the Boss’s nephew, and get real shy whenever someone walked in on him dancing in such a mighty private place as a the main house kitchen where everyone comes for food.

Alright, so I didn’t like it, and it’s my own fault for taking it before I knew more of what this book will be. The best I can give it is 3 out of 5, for I definitely read worse, and this, at least, was a solid book with no holes in the slim plot.

Joely Sue Burkhart “Queen takes King” | Their Vampire Queen 2

Author: Joely Sue Burkhart
Title: Queen Takes King
Series: Their Vampire Queen 2
Genre: Paranormal, Erotica, Vampires
Pages: 350
Rate: 5/5 | Goodreads

Remember I said “Their Vampire Queen” are short books, so I’ll read them between “Chicagoland Vampires“? Well, I spoke too soon. But it worked well here, and made perfect sense, since the book felt very much like the final preparatory step towards court politics and intrigues.

About: Somewhere out there in the dark beneath the mountain rages a dying leviathan. Dark, scaly, and dreadful he haunts Shara’s dreams. Her Bloods sense that, and urge her to take action, call more Bloods to her side. Especially now that the young, wild, and powerful new Queen has been noticed by others, and attacks already began. But more Bloods mean more troubles too, mostly in their own hierarchy among themselves. Thus Shara, convinced by visions of Goddess Isis, is on the search for something more powerful than that. What she needs is not in numbers, but in political weight. What she needs is a King that would be in her power. Someone mighty, someone dreadful.

Mine: You know, if you took out all the sex, these books would make awesome YA vampire books. But for better or worse, it is not that. And I know it’s not right to complain about erotica in a book that is in erotica genre, but it feels like people there really got no other hobbies beyond limb origami. Which sometimes really works well with the story, but other times, guys, don’t you got something more important? Like nest making?? Prioritize! But I digress. I do enjoy Shara’s character quite a bit. She’s not dumb, she’s true to her heart, and while unwilling to cause harm, she enforces laws she believes in with iron fist on a table. My favorite being: nobody will be made to do anything against their will. Which shone bright once the King entered their domain, and her alpha, her dominant Blood was threatened.

Listen, I am biased here too. There’s too many little things that play to me here, like really well made vampires, a sense of political dread, the bee-hive-mentality. So I don’t know if I can recommend this off the bat. But I can absolutely give it a 5 out of 5.

Chloe Neill “Dark Debt” | Chicagoland Vampires 11

Author: Chloe Neill
Title: Dark Debt
Series: Chicagoland Vampires 11
Genre: Vampires, Paranormal
Pages: 368
Rate: 4/5 | Goodreads 

I admit right away, my rate to this book is full-on biased, because of the implication of vampire mobsters. It wasn’t as great as it sounds, but hey, it made my reading time better, so why not take it and run with it?

About: The more hints there were, that Sullivan’s master Balthazar was alive, the more he denied such a possibility. And then the man just waltzed into their house like he owned it. Merit’s resistances got shattered, and a whole new horror of magic suddenly showed itself.
In the meantime, house Navarre is in a lot of trouble. Their previous master, apparently, loved luxury and perfection, and thus ended up indebted to the mob. Mob with enough balls to make quite a few supernatural houses and clans dance. And now they want their payback.
So, of course, Merit’s in the middle of it all.

Mine: Author has a great sense of humor. If nothing else, I can really give her props for that, she made me laugh in every single book so far, no matter whether I loved the story or hated it. There’s also a lot of references to other things, movies, books, video games, and I do appreciate that too. And then the mobsters. Listen, I can’t help myself. I love vampires, and I love crime books. And I love when these two very different genres on very different Children of the Night try to work together. Usually it fails so hard it’s funny. And usually, like right now, I don’t even mind anyway.

I kinda really hope that these anne-rice-ish pale-faced gangsters will appear in the next book too, they seemed to have the gall and backing for it. But, hope is just that, hope. 4 out of 5 for this one, and on to the next.

Joely Sue Burkhart “Queen Takes Knights” | Their Vampire Queen 1

Author: Joely Sue Burkhart
Title: Queen Takes Knights
Series: Their Vampire Queen 1
Genre: Vampire, Romance, Erotica
Pages: 190
Rate: 4/5 | Goodreads

I found this doom, gloom, darkness, and blood cover, and of course it lured me in to give it a shot. The fact that it’s so short also helped. I figured I can read it between Chicagoland Vampires for a break. Though, mind you, pay attention to the genre and make sure you’re okay with the combo, for a lot of action is bed-based, and there’s blood as due to vampires.

About: Shara was hunted by monsters as long as she can remember. Creatures that come as the night falls, thirsty for blood, her blood. They killed her parents too, and she thought this night was her last, for she has been caught outside, with no shelter in sight, nor weapons at hand. But as the end seemed inevitable, two mighty fellas dropped in, and crushed the thralls like ants, promptly falling to their knees before Shara right after. For she is their Vampire Queen. She gives purpose to their life, as long as she’ll have them, and allow them to serve her. But this newly found Queen has so many questions, that the whole serving part might get delayed due to little detective line unfurling.

Mine: Vampires here seem to operate a lot like bee hives. There’s a Queen, who attracts a court of Bloods around her, and they serve her for it is in their nature to follow her will. Queens can be found in the wild, so, living among humans and such, or other courts, of which there’s only a brief mention before the end of the book, so there’s likely plenty of these little (and big) hives they call nests all over. Now, as for the erotica part, blood and sex go hand in hand here, so keep that in mind. And even beside this whole ordeal, I did really enjoy the darker take on vampires. It’s refreshing after all the humans with fangs who drink blood and happen to be immortal.

I liked this, I think I’ll continue with it. Seeing how short they are, I do think they’ll be good break-books. But I’d avoid audiobooks, the female voice… I would’ve preferred someone more mature sounding for the Queen. For now I give it a 4 out of 5.

Chloe Neill “Blood Games” | Chicagoland Vampires 10

Author: Chloe Neill
Title: Blood Games
Series: Chicagoland Vampires 10
Genre: Paranormal, Vampire
Pages: 350
Rate: 2/5 | Goodreads

Right. I am up to power through this. Only two more books to go. But, easier said than done, knowing the baby prophecy is bound to come true in any page now. And seeing how Merit is becoming this obedient, ever forgiving, supportive bundle of “it’s fine if you mock me by pretending you’re proposing 20 times a day” little vampire lady… It might come both too soon, and not soon enough. I am really done here.

About: GP is shaken at the foundation as their rule is challenged by no other than rogue Sullivan, who had the gall to quit GP a couple books ago. And not only that, there’s apparently more candidates to the throne too. Vampire Hunger Games begin: there’ll be tests, there’ll be challenges, and it will be scary. Like, you’ll have a vision, knowing you’re going to see a vision, get glamoured or something, of your dying boyfriend or a girlfriend, and you’ll still fail somehow… But hey, only the best of the best can lead the GP. And since Sullivan is already being blackmailed, I think we all see who the biggest baddest cutthroat is. In the meantime, someone’s ritualistically killing people, and putting blame on everyone: witches, vampires, you name it.

Mine: Forget all the compliments I ever paid to Sullivan. No. He’s just one of those bad boys with past so dark, that if he told you what he did: you’d go gray then and there. SPOILER And then it turns out that someone somewhat related to him killed someone to teach him a lesson. SPOILER ENDS And that’s the big fat secret that makes him so bad, so dark, such a monster, wow. But what about those fancy sounding ritualistic murders, you ask me? Well, if you’re following these reviews on Chicagoland Vampires, you probably already guessed it anyway: it’s the substance lacking side-plot to fill in the gaps between the pages, with a lot of bark to it, and not a damn bite. The best part about this book was that one plot twist that I’ve not even hinted here to. Suffer with me!

But really, while the series are mediocre, this book here was definitely bad. It’s the first I can truly call bad in the series, so don’t stake me just yet. 2 out of 5, and I continue. I continue ASAP in fact.

Book Facts | Finally Translated | LT

I am a Lithuanian, and I have a book blog in Lithuanian, which is my native language, and I have started my “career” as a bookblogger over there too. Used to be I was a frequent guest at libraries, and was receiving, and finding news about new translations into Lithuanian, since it’s a privilege of English speaking world to not be concerned about being able to read a sequel of your favorite book and such. But as time went by, and I’ve started just skipping over the middleman by reading more and more ebooks (thanks to the fact that I started making my own money early, and bought a tablet early, since that’s also a serious blessing many don’t have, thus leaving them trapped with what choices they’re given, not the ones they can take), thus, books in English, I’ve gotten out of touch with the actual translations.

Now to find a book I loved – translated into my language is an adventure, usually experienced while in the bookstore, searching for new Witcher Saga re-print (we had them translated way before first game ever came out, but now we’re getting new shiny covers!) and so imagine my surprise, when I noticed not just one, but three familiar titles. So here’s what we’ve got, and I apologize for it’s probably irrelevant for absolutely everyone else:

 

Sarah J. Maas “A Court of Mist and Fury“, translated to us as “Trapped in the Dark“, which suits the narrative, so it’s absolutely fine, many translations have different titles from the original.

• English review: A Court of Mist and Fury
• Lithuanian review: Įkalinta tamsoje

High Fantasy; Young Adult (adult/mature)

 

 

 

 

 

Brandon Sanderson “Mistborn: The Final Empire“, translated the same as the original. I really loved this book, so I’m really happy they not only translated it, but gave it a very fitting cover too. We’re notorious with our lame covers, believe me, there’s something to celebrate here.

• English review: Mistborn: The Final Empire
• Lithuanian review: Miglos Vaikai: Paskutinė Imperija

High Fantasy;

 

 

 

 

 

And the last, but hopefully not least, Stephanie Garber “Caraval“, translated to us.. Ugh, literally, I guess. As good as it can be, taking the circumstances. While I didn’t like this book much, I see value in it, and will be happy if someone picks it up, and it becomes their new favorite. As I said before, and will say many times again: it doesn’t matter what or how you read, as long as you read, you’re doing more than a lot of people out there, be happy, be proud, and love what you love.

• English review: Caraval
• Lithuanian review: Karavalis

High Fantasy; Young Adult (don’t take me on my word, I think it was PG)