horns and halos finale

In 2010 Aimee of (now defunct) my fluttering heart hosted the Horns and Halos reading challenge. There were several levels, and participants pledged to read a certain number of novels featuring angels, demons, or both. I said I’d read seven (it being a perfect number and all), and I got pretty close to that goal over the course of the year. One thing I always find quite interesting: the ‘before’ and ‘after’ lists – and by that I mean the list of books I thought I’d read, and the books I actually did read. Have a gander yourself…

Books on the original list:

Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey

Archangel's Kiss by Nalini Singh

Coffeehouse Angel by Suzanne Selfors

The Ninth Circle by Alex Bell

The Angel Experiment (Maximum Ride, Book 1) by James Patterson

The Demon's Covenant by Sarah Rees Brennan

The Demon King by Cinda Williams Chima

Books I did read:

Archangel by Sharon Shinn

Archangel’s Kiss by Nalini Singh

Terminal World by Alastair Reynolds

Demon’s Fall by Karalynn Lee

A Madness of Angels by Kate Griffin

Mirrorscape by Mike Wilks

Lucky me, one of these challenge books ended up on my best of 2010 list! And I read quite a bit out of my comfort zone with a couple of these picks, so I’d count the whole experience a success. That said, of the books on that original list, I now only plan to check out The Demon’s Covenant by Sarah Rees Brennan. Which isn’t to say I won’t ever pick the others up, but I’m on a bit of a break from angels (sorry, dears). I enjoyed our time together!

Do you have any favorite angel and/or demon books that I should pick up?

demon’s fall

It has been ages, but you might remember that I’m taking part in the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge hosted by Aimee of my fluttering heart. I went fairly angel-happy at the start of the year. Then my interest tapered off, and I went the route of straight fantasy, zombies, and all that other stuff (fairy tales, anyone?). I am determined to finish strong, so when I had the chance to request a copy of Karalynn Lee’s Demon’s Fall from the NetGalley catalog, I took it.

When Kenan, an incubus, finds a caged angel for sale in the Hellsgate marketplace, he sees her as a challenge. Certain that his skills in seduction will work as well on a heavenly creature as they do on mortal women, he buys Jahel, intent on having her soul as a novelty in his collection.

Knowing he must gain Jahel's trust, Kenan treats her more as his guest than as his slave. When she reveals what brought her to the mouth of Hell in the first place – retrieving the soul of a young girl she was guarding – he even offers to help her complete her mission.

Though he has promised Jahel freedom, Kenan soon realizes she has captured his heart. And as their passion for one another grows, they find themselves caught in a struggle between Heaven and Hell, one that will lead them to the very edge of the apocalypse...

Just in case you didn’t catch it in the summary, this is a ROMANCE NOVEL. Adult-level reading. Very scandalous. Well, a story about an angel and a demon falling in love was going to be scandalous anyway…but let’s times that factor by about a hundred for the ess-eee-ex, okay? Okay. If you’re not into it, no worries. But the story’s good. Serious.

Kenan is a demon with a lot of allure. Jahel is a caged angel. They meet in a marketplace in Hellsgate, which is just what it sounds like – a city on the edge of the gate of Hell. Kenan has his own reasons for buying Jahel, but the main plot follows their adventures trying to fulfill Jahel’s quest. And that quest…is surprisingly familiar. Throw in a little bit of the fairy tale of Snow White, some of the Biblical apocalypse, and you have our story. Perhaps surprisingly, it’s a mash-up that works.

Of course, the focus of the novella is the romantic relationship between the two protagonists. Four words: steamy, and too quick. I’m all for the reforming bad boys cliché, but Demon’s Fall moved at a pretty fast clip in that department. I would have appreciated a little more development, a couple more pages in that section. I wasn’t disappointed, but it was a little thought in the back of my head while I read.

Bonus: the secondary characters and setting. This story worked for me mostly because of the wonderful description of Hellsgate, the funny and endearing secondary characters, and how the protagonists interacted with both. Some of the supporting characters provided crucial moments of hilarity in conversation, or made me randomly smile. So that was a huge plus. I can also tell that I love a fantasy setting when I find myself hoping that there will be more books set in that ‘world.’ I’ll say it: I want more!

Recommended for: fans of steamy romance, angels, demons, unconventional fantasy mash-ups, and original world-building. Again, an advisory: adult-level reading.

I read an e-galley of this book courtesy of Carina Press and NetGalley. Demon’s Fall releases on October 25, 2010.

in which i become less of a hypocrite

When people ask me what my favorite genre is, I usually say ‘SCI-FI and fantasy.’ Just like that, I prioritize sci-fi, even though the majority of my reading is on the fantasy side of things. But there’s a little bit of me that still thinks it’s more acceptable to be caught reading sci-fi than fairy tales or anything with magic. Why? Probably leftover guilt from hiding most books with magic from my mom as a kid. I could read whatever I wanted, but I didn’t show her anything I thought might be ‘questionable.’

Or maybe it’s that while reading sci-fi is undeniably nerdy, it is also proof positive that you are intelligent. Or maybe it’s just the look on people’s faces when you confidently say ‘fantasy!’ It used to be that you’d get vague answers of ‘Oh, you like the Tolkien books?’ but now the stakes have changed. New number one response? ‘Have you read the Twilight series?’ Sigh. Just so you know, I read the first one. Quit after that. Have nothing against vampires except that they’re overdone. Or sparkly. But you know.

Enter Elitist Book Reviews. These people know literary condescension inside and out. Well, and they’re hilarious. You’ll actually like it and start to crave it when they talk down to you. Wait…that’s just me? *ahem* I saw a book over at the site that clearly fitted as sci-fi, and also had airships on the cover (hello, my steampunk obsession?), and the review mentioned ANGELS. I tried to imagine how that combo could be bad. Didn’t succeed. Ordered Terminal World straight away.

Spearpoint, the last human city, is an atmosphere-piercing spire of vast size. Clinging to its skin are the zones, a series of semi-autonomous city-states, each of which enjoys a different - and rigidly enforced - level of technology. Horsetown is pre-industrial; in Neon Heights they have television and electric trains.

Following an infiltration mission that went tragically wrong, Quillon has been living incognito, working as a pathologist in the district morgue. But when a near-dead angel drops onto his dissecting table, Quillon's world is wrenched apart one more time, for the angel is a winged posthuman from Spearpoint's Celestial Levels - and with the dying body comes bad news.

If Quillon is to save his life, he must leave his home and journey into the cold and hostile lands beyond Spearpoint's base, starting an exile that will take him further than he could ever imagine. But there is far more at stake than just Quillon's own survival, for the limiting technologies of the zones are determined not by governments or police, but by the very nature of reality - and reality itself is showing worrying signs of instability...

There are reasons I love sci-fi. Some of them are obvious: I expand my vocabulary, or it’s a good conversation topic for when I meet a cute, geeky boy. Not that those are real reasons (except for maybe in my subconscious). But the other ones: where I learn about science, and where the plot is often the driving force, where the intricacies of world building really start to matter and add up. Also? A lot of sci-fi novels are big, fat books. You can’t finish them in one sitting. Although I like to gobble up a book as much as the next person, there’s something to be said for a story that you have to consume over a couple days and nights, and makes you dream of the stars.

I enjoyed this book. I read it in as close to one sitting as I could manage. In fact, I stayed up all night before work on Monday to finish it. I enjoyed it, but it was not life changing. I was happy to be caught up in investigating a new/distant future and to see which twists and turns the story would take. But I didn’t love or connect to any one character so much that it flipped the story from ‘like’ to ‘love’ territory. Of course, that doesn't mean I'm lukewarm. It's solidly in 'like,' and nowhere near 'dislike' or 'meh.'

I think part of it had to do with the ways in which the characters and their histories were revealed. We come into a story where everyone has a background, or a dark, secret past. And while some of that was unraveled, a lot of it was left in the background, and it seemed like we were supposed to take it on faith that those things put the characters in ‘gray’ territory. But really? This story could not have been more black and white. I was never in any doubt of anyone’s motives, nor did I ever feel any sympathy for the devil, as it were.

Terminal World did have strengths, of course. The description was really first rate. The inventiveness of the world building and the route of the adventure and the overall mystery were also top-notch. There were action scenes to make anyone's heart pound. There’s also enough left out of the story to guarantee that sequels can follow. It’s just too bad that it didn’t hit the sparkling highs I expected. I guess that means I’ll just have to try another sci-fi novel!

Recommended for: sci-fi fans, anyone with a thing for angels or dirigibles (especially together!), aerial battles and sky pirates, and those who are in the mood for a big, fat book with an interesting plot.

This book counts for the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge.

a madness of angels

Most of the time my process for selecting the next book to read is very transparent, and then other times it seems mysterious. I have a couple of questions that I can’t answer about how I came to acquire and read A Madness of Angels. Where did I first see it? Who recommended it? What was it about the recommendation that caused me to finally buy it? Because I bought it off of Amazon on a whim and read it immediately. Immediately, as in it arrived in the mail at work and I started it at the bus stop. While the other 80 books in the to-read pile stared at me with reproach in their eyes.

I CAN tell you that the cover art and the title worked a bit of magic. It looked dark and fantastical and like it might just fit in for the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge. Also, though I am always skeptical when blurbs claim that the writing is ‘Gaiman-like,’ I can’t shake the desire to see if they’re right.

For Matthew Swift, today is not like any other day. It is the day on which he returns to life.

Two years after his untimely death, Matthew Swift finds himself breathing once again, lying in bed in his London home.

Except that it's no longer his bed, or his home. And the last time this sorcerer was seen alive, an unknown assailant had gouged a hole so deep in his chest that his death was irrefutable...despite his body never being found.

He doesn't have long to mull over his resurrection though, or the changes that have been wrought upon him. His only concern now is vengeance. Vengeance upon his monstrous killer and vengeance upon the one who brought him back.

Kate Griffin (an alias of Carnegie-nominated author Catherine Webb) writes a tale that is bright with vision, reeking with the scent of urban life and bustle and waste, and earsplitting with the sounds of a city’s chaos and rhythm. A Madness of Angels is mesmerizing, smart, descriptive (a bit to excess, on that score), violent, geographical and magical.

Matthew Swift (he of the ‘resurrection’) is a conundrum, even to himself. He’s unraveling both the mystery and his sanity, and the journey and chase and characters he meets on the way are the meat of the novel. But a close second is the city of London. Its secrets and byways are both the setting and an entity in and of themselves. The novel is urban fantasy in a very pure sense. It’s so tied to the geography of a particular city that I almost felt like I could take a copy with me and do an A Madness of Angels tour of London.

And the madness is catching. Shortly after finishing the book I referred to myself as “we” in front of my roommate. She was tipsy, so the explanation didn’t go over well. But…I’m not sure I can explain this book. I’ll try, though, by referring to other writers. It’s got a bit of the flavor of Charles de Lint’s urban magic, the barest taste of the absurdity of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and it follows in the footsteps of Gaiman’s odd and wonderful London Below (in Neverwhere). Add to that a certain horror-flickiness, and you’ve just about got it.

Recommended for: fans of horror, dark urban fantasy, superb mystery and danger. Oh, and there’s some solid humor, too. In sum, quite satisfying, and definitely an adult level book. The story continues in The Midnight Mayor.

Although a rather unorthodox pick, this book counts for the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge.

a trip through the mirrorscape

There’s a pattern I’ve noticed in middle grade novels marketed to boys. It goes something like this: extremely bright but under-appreciated boy is suddenly accepted to special school, where he discovers he has unique powers/abilities. He then goes on to make a couple of key friends, confound the bullies, and save the world in truly adventurous fashion. Of course, the most popular series that follow the formula are the Harry Potter and Percy Jackson’s Olympians. One of the newest entries into this oeuvre (if you want to call it that) is Mike Wilks’ Mirrorscape.

Enter the Mirrorscape - an amazing world limited only by the artist's imagination… Fulfilling the dream of a lifetime, Melkin Womper is apprenticed to a master painter, Ambrosius Blenk. Son of a village weaver, Mel is over-awed by the master's richly colored and vividly detailed paintings. He is particularly amazed by the colors, because there are no colors back home. To have color in your life, you have to buy the Pleasure, and the sinister scarlet-robed Fifth Mystery own the rights to such Pleasures.

Soon, Mel and his new friends Ludo and Wren find themselves caught in a power struggle between the Mystery and the master. One that involves stepping through paintings into a world where the bizarre is commonplace and all logic is irrelevant. A world where angels, pyramid mazes, imaginary monsters, talking houses and - most importantly - the simple paintbrush all combine to form a hugely original and deeply compelling fantasy.

This is a thrilling adventure filled with fantastical creatures in an incredibly visual secret world.

Mirrorscape is set in one of the most interesting and truly awesome fantasy worlds I’ve read about recently. Wilks uses patently gorgeous language to describe color and other visual stimuli. The creature descriptions beg you to enlarge your imagination. And the plot is pretty interesting too – it moves at a fast clip towards adventure and everyone getting their just rewards.

And yet…the story lags at times. Why, you ask? That hero/protagonist/wunderkind – Mel – is a prig. No, really. And where the heroes of the biggest bestsellers in middle grade boy books overcome that challenge and learn humility, compassion and other ‘real person’ qualities, Mel seems static. He’s just GOOD. It’s like he pops onto the page as a perfect person and doesn’t need to grow from his adventures. Sort of annoying, you know?

Despite an inability to connect with the main character, I kept reading this one almost compulsively. It’s just vivid with description and fantasy and actually interesting side characters. The angels mentioned in the summary are rather hilarious, if I do say so myself. And I’ll be looking out for the second book, too. Weird how that works, isn’t it? Just goes to show that it’s possible to detest a character and yet love the world he’s in enough to keep going. Superb world building, Mr. Wilks!

Recommended for: fans of the middle grade boy-adventure genre and those really interested in world building, visual description and unique fantasy worlds.

This might be cheating a little, but I'm going to count it toward the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge.

the intensity of angels

There are going to be a couple of major themes in my reading this year: a) angels, b) demons, c) fairy tales and d) all the rest. Why? I’m taking part in reading challenges. One of which is the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge hosted by Aimee of my fluttering heart. I got the challenge started off with Archangel by Sharon Shinn. It was a great start and a great read – and it got me excited for what else is in store. Now I’m on to my next H&H challenge read (before even cracking a fairy tale…sad!).

Nalini Singh began her new Guild Hunter series with an e-release novella, Angels’ Pawn. She followed that up with the novel Angels’ Blood. That book rocked hardcore. Just…amazing. It was back before my blogging days, or I would have reviewed it for sure. Still might, one of these ‘My Favorite Reads’ Thursdays. Great world-building, amazing and scary creatures, and a terrific lead character in Elena. The Guild Hunter stories brought me ‘round to the idea of angels. I’ll admit I was a skeptic. Now I’ll gobble up a story with an angel in it…like peach pancakes.

And now the second in the series, Archangel’s Kiss, has arrived. So let’s set this up: the world is ruled by angels, and then on the next level by their servants, vampires. On the lowest rung of the power hierarchy are ordinary humans. So you can bet that leads to some interesting situations. The Guild Hunters are humans who have special abilities – they can track vampires, and they help keep the status quo by working for angels. The whole system is supposed to weed out abuse. But at the very top of the top? Archangels – uber-powerful, scary and old angels who’ve played the political game and really rule the planet. So what happens when Guild Hunter Elena gets together with Archangel Raphael?

Crazy adventures, that’s what. I don’t want to spoil what happens in Angels’ Blood, because I love it so much. But let’s suffice it to say that Archangel’s Kiss takes Elena and Raphael’s story farther and through more peril than ever. It doesn’t have quite the same intensity and violence as Angels’ Blood, but this second installment isn’t lacking in plot or action. Far from it. There’s horror and bone-cracking to spare. It’s simply a more character-driven story. You really get to know who these ‘people’ are. And you see facets of each that repel and charm and draw you in.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that this is a paranormal ROMANCE. Yes, in all capital letters. It’s very steamy, as was its predecessor. But in this series, it totally works. There’s violence to offset the sex...or perhaps complement it. However, if you can’t read a love scene to save your life, then this is not the book for you. The scenes are skip-able if you’re just not that into romance, but if you have an avid aversion, I’d say don’t bother.

Vampire hunter Elena Deveraux is back after a year – to find that her lover, the stunningly dangerous archangel Raphael, likes having her under his control. But almost immediately, Raphael must ready Elena for a flight to Beijing, to attend a ball thrown by the archangel Lijuan. Ancient and without conscience, Lijuan's power lies with the dead. And she has organized the most perfect and most vicious of welcomes for Elena...

Ms. Singh writes first-class action and relationship stories, which just happen to have a fantastical edge to them. The Guild Hunter stories pull an insanely good plot, a hot romance, fantastic world-building, great writing and unexpected twists and turns into one compact, superb package. These books are not to be missed!

Recommended for: romance fans, paranormal and mild horror junkies, those curious about the angel trend in popular literature, and anyone with a taste for fantasy with a great character-driven storyline.

starting off angelic

Her serious geniusness, Aimee of my fluttering heart, is hosting the Horns and Halos Reading Challenge in 2010. I’ve signed up to do seven items, but I’m fairly sure that I’m going to go overboard. Fun!

My first foray for this challenge was Sharon Shinn’s Archangel. Well, actually…I read Angelica first. Because someone, whose name/blog I cannot remember at the moment, but whose taste I trust, said it was a favorite read. That’s the kind of thing I can’t resist. I’ve found that it’s the best method for discovering absolutely wonderful new books, too. New to me, at any rate. So I read Angelica. I liked it. Not world-changing, but worthwhile and a tad addictive. I then got Archangel, which is the first in the Samaria series (Angelica is #4), on the strength of that read. And after the summary, my thoughts…

Set in a society founded as an egalitarian utopia but now tainted with vices and inequity, Sharon Shinn's love story is plotty and calamitous. Rachel and Gabriel have nothing in common beyond wishing that the god Jovah had ordained they wed other people, yet they must cooperate in singing a mass to the god on the occasion of Gabriel's elevation to Archangel. Upright Gabriel has enemies among both mortal and angelic peoples who prefer to risk world destruction over his restoration of the old order.

Impending apocalypse. Unhappy and dissimilar people forced into marriage. Angels in a world that blends sci-fi and fantasy. Treachery. Fate. Love? All of those things I’ve just listed would make me want to pick up the book – but throw them together, and it’s compulsively readable. I stayed up into the small hours of the morning to find out how/if it could ever work for Gabriel and Rachel, and (on a larger scale) if civilization would survive. It was worth it.

But besides being the sort of book you find hard to put down, afterwards I was struck by several interesting thoughts. First off, what this story is, the romance part of it, I mean, is an arranged marriage. And if you haven’t read a Harlequin or Mills & Boon, let me just tell you: it’s been worked to death. So when I picked up the book, got about twenty pages in, and inferred ‘arranged marriage,’ I was VERY skeptical. I remained skeptical.

Even as I connected with Shinn’s characters and worried over them and gnashed my teeth a bit at their stubbornness, I was not sure I liked the set-up. But somewhere in there, the story converted me. That’s where the secondary characters, the world-building, the history and the plot come in. There was so much depth, so much to explain the quirks and draw you in and set you up to BELIEVE in the story – it just worked. And let me just say, Shinn found an amazing formula, because there are several more books in the series…

Second: music. Sadly, I am not any kind of music aficionado. I roomed with a voice major in college, though, and now she’s marrying a barbershop singer, and they live five minutes away, so… Sorry. Got carried away. What I meant to say is that I am acquainted very peripherally with musical theory. I can identify beautiful music. I don’t make it or appreciate it as much as I should. BUT. This book can’t help but make you feel something about vocal harmonies, even though you never hear a single note. It’s as if some of the words sing. While I read the descriptions of singing, I would find myself imagining an amazing and glorious chorus. And really? That’s talent. I felt like music was being made in my heart while I read. What a precious thing!

Third: names and places. Archangel is the first in the Samaria series. The god’s name is Jovah/Yovah. There are place names such as Jordana, Bethel and Mount Sinai and the Galilee River. All of these scream ‘Biblical’ to me. And really? It’s a story about angels. Archangels, even. So what does this mean? It’s symbolism, definitely. I think that the point is to realize that the world is a religious colony. I didn’t get that the first time I read a Samaria novel: I thought it was pure fantasy, an alternate world. But that’s where the ‘sci-fi’ part comes in. All of these names link the world of angels to a possible real past in ‘our’ world. Space and science have changed the histories and memories of mankind, but it could be part of the future. Very interesting to think about, at any rate.

If you couldn’t tell, I liked this book a lot. Just thinking about it and typing up this review, I remembered how engrossing the story was - so I ordered Jovah’s Angel, number two in the series. I can tell there’s another sleepless night in my future!