SPIRIT WITCH

Spirit Witch by Helen Harper
Book 3 of the The Lazy Girl's Guide To Magic series
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook

About Spirit Witch:

If anyone appreciates what it means to be dead to the world, it's Ivy Wilde.

Barely recovered from her brush with necromancy, Ivy is flung once more into a world of intrigue, adventure and potential death and disaster. It's not her fault - it just so turns out that she's now the only person in the entire world who can communicate with the dead. And they're a chatty bunch with a list of demands.

When the ghosts offer information about a witch-hating mass murderer in return for Ivy's help, she has no choice but to get involved. She might be getting herself into more trouble than she realises though - and that's even before she's dragged to Sunday dinner so she can meet Winter's family...

Source: Info in the About Spirit Witch was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35489715-spirit-witch on 04/09/2017.

My Thoughts:

Now innocent little Brutus... I also like the fact that this cat familiar is displaying more and more cannily intelligent behaviour... A cat who can ring Ivy on her mobile?!?... Oohh... I wonder what else the author is going to make Brutus do to torture Ivy??... now, there's a thought!

By the way, what's with the wand? Ivy never uses a wand. She's too lazy for that. Anyways, this book has the best cover yet in the entire series thus far! Hopefully it will be uphill from here on with the arts department for this series rather than downhill... **fingers crossed**

Another good thing going for The Lazy Girl's Guide To Magic series, is that, it always ends the book nicely. Sure, it leaves hints that there are more books to come, this is a series after all. However, it never leaves a book with a big gaping cliffhanger that you want to smack the author with the book upside the head. Authors like that tends to be unfollowed by me unless they have a really really masterful voice. So for the mediocre ones, they get even less chance of being read, never mind bought.

This series seems to be, not only "growing" on me, but also "addictive". So be warned!

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 4
Story itself = 4
Writing Style = 4.5
Ending = 4.5
World building = 4.5
Cover art = 4.5
Pace = 4.5
Plot = 4.5

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Lazy Girl's Guide To Magic:

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Meet The Author

About Helen Harper:

After teaching English literature in the UK, Japan and Malaysia, Helen Harper left behind the world of education following the worldwide success of her Blood Destiny series of books. She is a professional member of the Alliance of Independent Authors and writes full time although she still fits in creative writing workshops with schools along with volunteering to teach reading to a group of young Myanmar refugees. That’s not to mention the procession of stray cats which seem to find their way to her door! Helen has always been a book lover, devouring science fiction and fantasy tales when she was a child growing up in Scotland.

helenharper.co.uk | twitter | facebook | pinterest | goodreads

FTC Disclosure:
This book was purchased with private funds.
No money received for this review.

SHIFTING SHADOWS

Shifting Shadows by Patricia Briggs
Narrated by Alexander Cendese and Lorelei King
Novellas in the Alpha & Omega and Mercy Thompson serieses
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Shifting Shadows:

Mercy Thompson’s world just got a whole lot bigger…

A collection of all-new and previously published short stories featuring Mercy Thompson, “one of the best heroines in the urban fantasy genre today” (Fiction Vixen Book Reviews), and the characters she calls friends…

Includes the new stories…
“Silver”
“Roses in Winter”
“Redemption”
“Hollow”

…and reader favorites
“Fairy Gifts”
“Gray”
“Alpha and Omega”
“Seeing Eye”
“The Star of David”
“In Red, with Pearls”

Source: Info in the About Shifting Shadows was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20821263-shifting-shadows on 07/02/2018.

My Thoughts:

I believe that these collection of short stories or novellas in the world of Mercy Thompson would have been better read chronologically within the series' timeline. As it is, I read them in one bulk as given here in this anthology after I've read the books that has been published already thus far. And a few of those books were read, like, donkey's years ago, that I have forgotten the events in those stories already. This kind of diminished my enjoyment of the little stories here, however, I would still read them even though it is no longer according to chronological order because they are good reads. And I am a die-hard Mercy Thompson fan. Little bits of morsel to savour. Most of these little stories are like little snippets with in which the ending and the start was in the books in the series, therefore, if you haven't read the books, it would not make a lot of sense and I presume that it would just be more frustrating than an enjoyable read. So caution to those who are not followers of this urban fantasy world. This anthology book is so not a good place to start reading about the Mercy Thompson world or the Alpha & Omega series.

Plot... some of the short stories does not have much of a plot because it is just a little slice of the bigger story in whatever book in which the short story fits into the Mercy Thompson timeline. So, in so many ways, the plot rating does not apply to this anthology. However, even though the stories here are just short and/or snippets, the wonderful story telling quality that is the trademark of this author still shines through, that is why this book remains a good read despite all my whining about it.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 5
Character development = 4
Story itself = (N/A)
Writing Style = 4
Ending = (N/A)
World building = 5
Cover art = 4
Pace = (14 hours & 52 minutes)
Plot = (N/A)
Narration = 3.5

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries


  Books In The Mercy Thompson Series:
Click on the cover image to go to my review or to the GoodReads page of the book for more info.

                     

  Books In The Alpha & Omega Series:

             

About Patricia Briggs
	Patricia Briggs was born in Butte, Montana to a children’s librarian who passed on to her kids a love of reading and books. Patricia grew up reading fairy tales and books about horses, and later developed an interest in folklore and history. When she decided to write a book of her own, a fantasy book seemed a natural choice. Patricia graduated from Montana State University with degrees in history and German and she worked for a while as a substitute teacher. Currently, she lives in Montana with her husband, children and six horses and writes full-time, much to the delight of her fans.
www.patriciabriggs.com | facebook | twitter | goodreads | Amazon

FTC Disclosure:
This book, in all it's purchased formats, was bought with private funds.
No money received for this review.

DEAD HEAT

Dead Heat by Patricia Briggs
Narrated by Holter Graham
Book 3 of the Alpha & Omega series
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: ebook & audiobook

About Dead Heat:

For once, mated werewolves Charles and Anna are not traveling because of Charles’s role as his father’s enforcer. This time, their trip to Arizona is purely personal — or at least it starts out that way...

Charles and Anna soon discover that a dangerous Fae being is on the loose, replacing human children with simulacrums. The Fae’s cold war with humanity is about to heat up — and Charles and Anna are in the cross fire.

Source: Info in the About Dead Heat was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22571699-dead-heat on 03/02/2018.

My Thoughts:

I dove straight into this book right after Fair Game because by then I became a rabid fan of this series.

Why can't they keep Dan delos Santos' amazing cover art??! Somebody needs to clue in the UK art department that their cover art sucks!

This would be the second book I've listened to by Holter Graham. I have forgotten his halting way of reading. And he doesn't pause or give any indication that the scene has changed and suddenly the story lines does not make sense so I have to go read the ebook for that part to understand what is going on. That made the pace a whole lot longer than the 11 hours listening time that this book is supposed to be. And then there's the way he gives some characters a slurring way of talking, ala Al Capone or some such Italian mobsta. This made his words indistinct, and so not a desirable trait.

On the up side, this book has the same wonderful story telling quality and world building that this author is famous for! So needless to say that I enjoyed this book despite all my whining! The horse talk though, went right over my head.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 5
Character development = 4
Story itself = 4
Writing Style = 4.5
Ending = 4.5
World building = 5
Cover art = 4.5
Pace = (11 hours & 25 minutes)
Plot = 4
Narration = 3

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Alpha & Omega Series:

About Patricia Briggs
	Patricia Briggs was born in Butte, Montana to a children’s librarian who passed on to her kids a love of reading and books. Patricia grew up reading fairy tales and books about horses, and later developed an interest in folklore and history. When she decided to write a book of her own, a fantasy book seemed a natural choice. Patricia graduated from Montana State University with degrees in history and German and she worked for a while as a substitute teacher. Currently, she lives in Montana with her husband, children and six horses and writes full-time, much to the delight of her fans.
www.patriciabriggs.com | facebook | twitter | goodreads | Amazon

FTC Disclosure:
This book, in all it's purchased formats, was bought with private funds.
No money received for this review.