Sometimes you have to make a solid choice, but you don’t.

Publisher: Black Swan (Random House)
Pages: 496
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-0-552-77385-0
First Published: 2010
Date Reviewed: 30th September 2011
Rating: 1/5

Anil loves Lina, and Lina loves Anil – but she’s held back a little by their differing religious views, and a lot by her own indecisiveness. She also has dreams of working for a charity while Anil favours architecture. The differences between them mean that they are constantly at odds over their relationship.

It’s very hard to write a proper summary of this book because there isn’t a true plot to it. Although cited as another Romeo And Juliet, The Obscure Logic Of The Heart is not like the great work of Shakespeare at all, in truth it doesn’t really know what it wants to be. Lina’s indecisiveness is reflected in Basil’s inability to decide just what her book is about.

There’s nothing much this reviewer has to say that is positive about the novel because there are just too many issues with it. One is the issue of time. When is the book supposed to take place? If the book begins by recounting the future, and thus the present is the future, it doesn’t much sound like it. If the present is our current present, then their years at university are too advanced. Lina arrived at her first job two months after 9/11. This would mean she was about 21 or 22 years old in 2001. If the author has set the reunion in the present day – around 2009/2010 when she wrote it – that would make Lina only 30. Therefore the decades that have reputedly gone past could never have happened. This is why some proper timing is required because Lina and Anil should be reuniting in the 2020s or 2030s and yet Basil has made no attempt to make the world any more developed, as it surely will be.

The characters aren’t at all memorable nor, like the world, are they developed. Anil is given more space to grow than Lina – who is silly and hesitant throughout, although she needn’t be – and the rest of the characters, though they have more life in them, aren’t particularly good. The purpose of the book is to highlight social, cultural, and religious issues but the youthful relationship between the protagonists isn’t given any time. The author tells you they are a good match but does not show it. It’s impossible to be convinced that they are – indeed it’s difficult not to feel that Anil has been wasting his time from the word ‘go’.

It’s as though all the characters are acting. The romance is supposed to be mired by religious conflict yet neither Anil or Lina are particularly religious – the former is not religious at all. The hero’s parents aren’t religious. The heroine’s mother is, but could be won over, while her father broke with tradition himself (as shown very early on via some letters that make the recipient obvious). So the relationship is not believable and neither is their trouble.

It’s also quite sad that Basil has formed the basis of Lina’s problems around the fact that Anil isn’t Muslim because this isn’t actually the real issue. From the way Basil has drawn the characters, even Lina’s virtuous mother, it’s difficult to see that a little more effort wouldn’t have overcome these complications. The fact the book tries to present a real issue current in our world today, and presents it so poorly, is worrying. The religious conflict is rather throwaway. What actually keeps the characters apart, even though Basil might not admit it, is Lina’s selfishness. Lina doesn’t particularly suffer when away from Anil, in fact she forgets him most of the time.

And this is where the biggest problem of the book lies. Basil is clearly torn between wanting to write about a forbidden romance and wanting to write about the issues in Africa. Lina leaves Anil and then suddenly all emphasis is on the UN and Basil is dedicating pages upon pages to describing conflict and why things must change. Obviously she’s an advocate, and there is nothing wrong with that, but instead of being compelling as it would be if she had written a book that left out the romance, she just leaves the reader confused. If Lina doesn’t seem to care about leaving Anil, the reader can’t be expected to either.

The characters that work for the UN go on about their expensive products being ruined by sand and have lots of parties and a great amount of sex. The way Basil portrays it really doesn’t give the reader a good impression of a group of people who are meant to be aiding the poorest people of the world.

There is a scene in which Lina is with an American colleague. One – the American does not sound as though she ought to be anyone’s boss, in fact she sounds like a silly teenager. Two – Lina says she loves these kind of conversations – a conversation about rape being used as a weapon in war-torn countries, that is being spoken by a man and the American woman, while the latter is trying her best to display as much cleavage as possible. As mentioned prior to the conversation, Lina doesn’t like this flirty behaviour of her colleague’s – if so, wouldn’t she be wondering about the distaste of a conversation about the plight of African women being spoken by someone who is currently trying to get her breasts out? If in writing this scene Basil was trying to show irony, then she surely would have commented on it.

And whenever things get difficult? Basil dons her Victorian clothes and turns to melodrama, causing accidents in convenient places and getting rid of characters that could have caused interesting moments to happen.

There are some errors that are truly terrible, such as the London Underground signs being written in red (an author who has lived for a while in London ought to know that the signs are written in white against a blue background); and human beings do not have green pupils.

And it’s unfortunate really, because the pace of the book is good and it’s an easy read.

Having religious conflict as a theme requires depth. Having social relations as a theme requires depth. And as this book sadly shows, Basil is not a person who can do it.

I received this book for review from Transworld Publishers, Random House.

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Where love doesn’t just get your average definition of a second chance.

Publisher: Carina Press (Harlequin)
Pages: 235
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-4268-9227-1
First Published: 19th September 2011
Date Reviewed: 16th October 2011
Rating: 3.5/5

Sidney and her friend Zoe work and live together, but neither of them would ever have guessed that they had done similarly before. That’s until Dermot MacKay and his men turn up at their shop. Dermot is immortal, born in the fifth century, and trying to break out of his eternal existence. He knows that the key to doing this is finding the reincarnated soul of his wife. But even if Sidney’s shop holds fantastical items, it’s going to be difficult to get her to believe him and even more difficult to leave the long life he had previously wanted to get away from.

Heart Of The Druid Laird is a book that encompasses many genres, some better than others, to deliver a well-written romantic novel. However, it does start rather quickly, and the reader looking primarily for historical content should know that it’s the fantasy element that is the focus.

It can be a little weird how quickly Sidney’s friend, Zoe, accepts everything, indeed it takes less than a couple of days for her to be spouting information as though she has known it forever, and while that is in part true for the nature of her soul’s journey, a quick reminder of the contents of the women’s shop, largely presented as New Age, shows that she would be quite open to it, even invite it. Of course this leads into the whole idea of reincarnation – the reader who believes only in what can be explained may have to suspend belief in order to enjoy it.

The first half of the book is very enjoyable. The genres weave in together well, the imagery is good, the dialogues too. Sidney isn’t easily swayed by Dermot, even when she finally accepts his story. She doesn’t miraculously fall suddenly in love with him: when she has sex with him it is from pure lust, which the reader can easily recognise. For love to work the reader needs her to transition slowly, but for lust nothing needs work except chemistry, which the characters have in bounds. And even when Sidney starts to acknowledge her feelings, she doesn’t suddenly lose the plot – she remains strong, stubborn, and independent throughout. But this last clause is where the book rapidly begins to fall apart as the chapters continue on – although it is understandable that Sidney would become afraid at what might lie ahead she becomes incredibly soppy. Maybe the reader can accept some of that due to the repetition of the idea that she’s been looking for The One, but because the change happens so swiftly, and she was so strong before, it does affect the satisfaction you find in the novel. And as much as the first episodes with the fae can be acknowledged, when the entire story becomes wrapped up in fantasy and everything comes down to something so easily upturned, no matter whether or not you always knew that it came down to the fae, it becomes lacking.

However the characters are in the main very good and the story well plotted. Longley seems to have had a solid idea of where she was headed from the start, everything is tied up nicely and all the questions that you could ask that are directly related to the text are answered. Longley makes a stellar effort with the accents, even if at times some words don’t fit in, and she clearly knows her stuff.

The world-building is excellent, and even though this reviewer is more attuned to the Tudor period, what she knows of the early AD years ran alongside Longley’s creations. And Longley isn’t happy with just her two chosen time periods, she includes in her interior design Elizabethan furniture too. Longley is certainly a fan of history and this positively exudes from her work.

The sex scenes are brilliant – they are not crass, the word choice is regular, and because of this they are hotter than your standard fare. It’s easy to believe in both the couples in this book. However when Sidney worries about contraception and then lets Dermot off, and he, after they’ve had sex, says he couldn’t have kids anyway, there may be eyebrows raised. Sidney didn’t know he couldn’t have children until after the act, so she shouldn’t have let him get on with it after an almost frivolous suggestion for protection on her part. And if this man came from the fifth century… well even people with no knowledge of the period know that those who lived before, often especially those in power, tended to favour fornication and had no idea about sexual health. Maybe a disease would die a swift death in an immortal body, but the idea would surely have crossed Sidney’s mind. Or at least it should have.

While Heart Of The Druid Laird may not quite meet expectations is isn’t far from the mark and is certainly worth the time it takes. People after a bit of mystery will find it here, there’s a drop of angst for those who wish it, and those wanting some history will be pleased that Longley goes back to the past to provide the full story. If Dermot has been waiting over sixteen hundred years for his life to get somewhere he ought to be proud of his narrator’s presentation.

I received this book for review from Carina Press.

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When things aren’t as fantastical as before, it can get a little dull.

Publisher: Mira Ink (Harlequin)
Pages: 395
Type: Fiction
Age: Young Adult
ISBN: 978-0-7783-0446-3
First Published: 2010
Date Reviewed: 19th July 2011
Rating: 3/5

Meghan’s back in faeryland, held captive by Queen Mab. But defeating the Iron fey wasn’t as easy as killing the king, and when the Sceptre of Seasons, a vital element in keeping the mortal world in check, goes missing, there’s only one group of people that could have taken it; and only one human, a prince, an elf, and a cat, who know who they need to find.

The Iron Daughter is the second book in Kagawa’s faery series, and although it begins well and indeed ends with a lot of promise, the main bulk of the book suffers from the same bad quality that Torment and New Moon do – pressure to keep the series going as long as possible. It’s not a bad book, per se, but it does rumble along down paths that you know it could have done without, and loses the true fantastical atmosphere that The Iron King had.

The most obvious issue is with the reiterating of what happened before. Yes, it is useful sometimes to reiterate an event that happened in the previous book in a series, it can help those who might be reading the books in a different order to feel they know what’s going on, but there is a subtlety to doing it right and unfortunately Kagawa has made a mess of it. Instead of giving a few brief words on events at the start of the book, Kagawa gives a summary that lasts for most of the first chapter and then, throughout the rest of the book, continually has Meghan explaining events in great detail unnecessarily. It all seems rather like the author had a word count to fill and when the going got tough she filled it with repetition instead. A reader doesn’t want to be nearing the end of the book still being “reminded” about what happened in the last one, they want instead to be reading a climax.

There are the usual revelations that aren’t really revelations, like Meghan being surprised that Ash doesn’t actually hate her and was only pretending to be harsh in order to save her (this isn’t a spoiler since it’s at the start of the book and obvious from page one to any reader worth their salt), and a lot of time spent on things that could have been given a sentence rather than a whole chapter – this is different to the repetition issue and concerns things like shopping.

Kagawa references a lot of popular media to illustrate what she is trying to say, and although it dates the book and means that it may be difficult for future readers to understand, you can see why she has done it and it does amply explain why Meghan wants to be home – because her life is so full of films and music and therefore the technology that is not compatible with the faery world. But there needed to be more research for things like theatre where she talks about The Phantom of the Opera being a play – which it was originally, following on from the book, but when she mentions organs, it is clear that she is talking about the musical, and few people would refer to this musical as a play.

So the book goes on and on, tripping up on additional plot points and taking forever to get somewhere. Just when you think the characters are going to move on to the next part of the story, someone says they’ve hurt themselves, or an enemy comes along and kidnaps them all, and it simply comes across as forced. About 75% of the book could have been stripped away and the result would have been a very good novel, if short.

The romance is as angsty as ever, and strong, and joyfully I can report that Ash, the hero, doesn’t leave Meghan for very long. In that way, the cover of my copy which pronounces it the next Twilight was wrong. In fact this book and the series as a whole is nothing like Twilight except for the elements of love triangle and high school. The set-up itself, of the bad guys not having been eliminated in the first book, is as acceptable a format as ever in literature, and although Meghan can be very weak at times, she does make an effort when she can. There wasn’t any reason why this book couldn’t have been as good as the first, The Iron King.

But it is just so under whelming.

The potential for the third book, The Iron Queen, is good, and hopefully Kagawa will return to the fantastically magical feel that she created for The Iron King. Thankfully The Iron Daughter isn’t so bad that it will put a reader off from continuing the series, because the relationship between Meghan and Ash is worth following; but for all the glitter on the cover, this book contains little of the glamour to merit it not being looked over in favour of a fast track to the third book.

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Vampires and fairies take the demons down one by one.

Publisher: Bantam Books (Random House)
Pages: 417
Type: Fiction
Age: Young Adult
ISBN: 978-0-553-82557-2
First Published: 2010
Date Reviewed: 15th September 2011
Rating: 3.5/5

Please note that Lee Carroll is a name for the husband and wife team, Lee Slonimsky and Carol Goodman, and thus when I reference Carroll I am alluding to the both of them.

Garet Jones was just a jeweller when she stepped into an antiques store that she later found didn’t actually exist. The owner gave her a box, wanting her to open it, but when she looks inside it weird things happen. However it’s not so much the box at this time, but those who seem out to destroy the city that is on her mind. And who is in the right, the vampire or the fairy king?

Black Swan Rising is a mass of different ideas, stories, cultures, and time periods put together in one book, and while the first half is relatively weak and relies far too much on contemporary elements, the second half is rather special and moves away from reality to become a proper fantasy. Drawing on tales as far apart as Dracula and Swan Lake, Carroll builds a story that will see an ordinary girl take on the extraordinary.

A lot of work has been done to make the book up-to-date so that things from our era – such as Twitter, the usage of LOL on the Internet, and IPhones – are mentioned, and while it makes the book accessible to teenagers it grants the book a very short shelf life. There are also times where the contemporary just does not work, for example when a bad guy is about to unleash evil and this gets compared to a particular basketball player. It may be humorous in its own way, but it jolts you out of the story for a moment especially if you’ve never heard of the player before, which you don’t want happening when you’re speed-reading to find out what’s going to ensue.

For the most part the fantastical elements are those well-used by a lot of contemporary paranormal fantasy writers, and so many similarities can be drawn with books such as The Iron King, Jasmyn, and The Forbidden Game. However there comes a point where a true originality takes over and it is stunning. Carroll uses physics to a good extent in the book, and episodes, such as the one in the water, are quite simply excellent. So too is a later episode on land that is in a way related.

The writing is strictly okay. Garet uses the word “though” far too often, and Carroll could do with using a thesaurus instead of using the same word several times over on one page. The romance is also just all right, because the set up is rather yucky; the idea of someone being with a person who’s already slept with the family tree isn’t very nice.

It is the maturity of the latter stages of the story that make it a worthwhile read, because the writers haven’t been afraid to shock and write material that is gritty, evil, and sometimes downright disgusting yet very good – for this last one I refer to the conclusion of the water episode, it put me off my food but I couldn’t stop reading it.

It is also the concoction of history – factual, legendary, and fiction – with fantasy which makes Black Swan Rising end well and make it a book in which you are truly looking forward to the sequel. That Carroll used an older heroine – Garet is twenty-six – means the story moves a lot quicker because there is more knowledge of the world in advance; and there is a good state of confusion for the reader at the end, where you know enough, but not all, and are therefore happy to want to read on.

Black Swan Rising isn’t perfect by any means, but although it shares a great deal with other books, there is a real sense that this is just to help set some ground before it flies off in a new direction in the next book. And if it does, more power to it.

It may take a while to get into it but if you throw caution to the wind, as Garet does, you shouldn’t be disappointed.

I received this book for review from Transworld Publishing, Random House.

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The past comes back to bite you in the arse, and that doesn’t refer to the sex.

Publisher: Carina Press (Harlequin)
Pages: 197
Type: Fiction
Age: Adult
ISBN: 978-1-4268-9001-7
First Published: 2010
Date Reviewed: 11th August 2011
Rating: 4.5/5

Keri Daniels is going to get promoted – if she’ll fly back to her childhood home and interview the publicity-shy author who happens to be the man she left twenty years ago for her career. If she doesn’t get this interview she’s fired but if she gets it, well there’s no saying what will happen in the process. After all, she left her ex-boyfriend heartbroken and he’s not going to make it easy for her to get the interview. And he might also make it less easy to leave the second time around.

Exclusively Yours is the first book in the Kowalski series and it is as strong as the later-released Yours To Keep. What I love about this series is the family element. If 50% of the book is about red-hot chemistry, and Stacey truly does write character matches that you can believe in, then the other 50% is about the value of family. So much time does Stacey spend on developing, for example, the children in her books, that you feel just as attached to them as you do the hero and heroine. You can become totally engrossed in the family, and when the romantic couple are getting comfy and in walks a kid with a stream of words about how another is going to give someone a swirly in the toilet, as everyday as it is, you can’t help but smile. For prosperity, here is the afore mentioned quotation:

“Uncle Joe,” Bobby yelled. “Brian got ice cream in his hair and then Danny and Joey said they were going to give him a swirly to wash it out and Brian tried to kick Joey in the pee-pee and-”

For this, the first book in the series, the plot has more scope and falls on its feet slap bang in the middle of a well-used but continually well-loved idea – the return of the one-who-got-away. What’s interesting is that both the major characters have a lot of money and status, albeit that one stays away from the culture of the wealthy, but the book never makes this a focus in the way that so many other romances do. Where often the wealth of a character rules the story, in Exclusively Yours it is merely a factor of the character’s personality.

The chemistry is, as mentioned, red hot, and it is incredibly easy to see why Stacey has sexual encounters occur so often because the book would not be at all realistic without them. The other characters are great, each is a fully developed person of fiction, and the secondary romantic couple fits the story well and compliments the main one. Stacey deals with a good few relationship issues and concludes them well without ever suggesting that her way is the only way or that everyone will have a perfect happy-ever-after.

…he had a trace of what men were allowed to call character lines…

A quick bit of research for anyone not familiar with the culture presented is recommended, because ATVs (quad bikes) and very close family relations are a major part of the series in general, and a word should probably be said about the respect towards parents that has crumbled in our world – because the mother’s word being law for everyone including the adults can take some getting used to. As a Brit I don’t know if the picture in my head would match reality, but the world the Kowalskis inhabit is a far cry from my own estranged society.

Keri smiled back at her, remembering the curling iron and aerosol days. If the EPA had shut down their cheerleading squad back then, global warming might have been a total non-issue today.

The setting is simple, almost the entire book takes place on a campsite where there are few things to do (though this does mean there’s more time for sex) but because of the number of people there is never a time when the narrative becomes boring. Even the characters that don’t have a plot are interesting in themselves and the amount of time devoted to dialogue is large but never questionable. Walking to and from a caravan to a campfire, and repeating many of the same trips in quad bikes, has never been less dull.

Exclusively Yours is a brilliant beginning to what has become a continually strong series and is highly recommended to all, romance fans or otherwise.

I received this book for review from Carina Press.

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