Book Review: The Dangerous Ones

The Dangerous Ones 

by Lauren Blackwood
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A lot of tropes, poorly composed plot/logic scenarios, and overall fairly uninspired. Maybe I’m just not into US civil war books; but you’d have thought adding vampires would make it interesting enough?!
A little surprised at the white vampire saviour story here given the author is of colour. Although I do like the attempt to break people, races, and vampires (species?) from stereotypes and look at people as individuals first.

And then there are the tropes! For me, its odd that author Lauren Blackwood admits to wanting to write a book with all the tropes in her afterword… not sure why you would the tropes to be so boring and cliche the way they are here. I don’t mind tropes (generally) but the overall story has gotta capture me, or have really good characters; sadly this had neither. I didn’t hate the characters; but I also didn’t love them. I was very meh for a lot of this story. Again, it’s worth noting I’m Canada and USA civil war stories are far from my thing. That said I’ve read others where I loved the commentary on racism, classism, sexism, etc.

Overall this one just missed the mark for me. One of many subpar romance in a supernatural setting that are available today. Given the flood of these books to the market in recent years I feel that you really need to have something that is fast paced, well written, engaging reader with characters, and has an element that is unique. Vampires during the civil war is just not unique enough for me. All that said I might consider reading another novel Lauren Blackwood, however, I’d be sure the premise is something I really care about.

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.

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Book Review: The Bloodless Princes

The Bloodless Princes 

by Charlotte Bond
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

There is no doubt that The Fireborne Blade is a superior novella to this one, it’s sequel. It had more wit, sarcasm, plot twists, and overall allure than its sequel The Bloodless Princes. We still get snippets of tales, writings, history and lore of the realm woven into the story (which I also adored in book 1). The biggest difference here is the story feels a bit secondary to the acceptance or display of love between our two ladies. And yet there is very little romance overall. Certainly the morale of the story (which gives nothing away to its end) is that you should love who you love openly and fervently, regardless of what others say; and yet I wanted more to the overall plot than what I got.

This easily could have been a full length novel that delved into death, an afterlife (of any kind), resurrection, and the consequences of stories being twisted over time. How do we, as humans, hurt ourselves my allowing stories of history (or fiction) develop and no longer represent truth. After all the writers of history are always the ‘winners’ who rule in its aftermath. An interesting thought with Trump winning his second term a mere two days ago. How will history see this (frankly depressing era for a bisexual, female Canadian like myself) time that indicates the larger portion of the USA population would rather any president that is not a women (even a convicted felon who spouts nothing but lies)? Im disappointed we don’t get more from Charlotte Bond on this topic. A real miss in the grand scheme of this wonderful dragon world she had created. Perhaps she can revisit it in another story?

Overall I just didn’t feel the same endearment for our characters (except maybe our dragon) that I did in book 1. If you were to read this one first, which wouldn’t make any sense in terms of character and plot development; but say you did, you’d likely walk away wondering why anyone cared at all. There is just a lack of substance here to bring our love and support of these lovely ladies (and a cat dragon or is it dragon cat?) much further than we were from book 1.

Perhaps the story was rushed? A bit unfinished or underdeveloped in a hope to publish it quickly on the heels of the successful first story? I don’t know. What I do know is I am still hoping for more stories in this realm, with or without these ladies, and I also desire Bond to write us a more fulsome story next time. One that really bites into the sociopolitical world our ladies live in that is grounded, as our own world is, in misogyny and an unfair set of ‘rules’ that keeps women lower than everyone, just because they can. If there was ever a time we could use some desire and strength to fight back against the patriarchy it must be today after another shattering loss; one that is just stacked on top of so many in these early days of this millennium.

Finally, this story is still worth a read. It’s short and cute at times. It just doesn’t quite live up to what I loved about the first book. That doesn’t undercut its cute cat dragon, nor that it is still a decent novella for a quick read

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