Dance with the Devil (Dark-Hunter Series, Book Seven): Sherrilyn Kenyon UPDATED

Here's another updated review!  You can find my original review from 2008 HERE.  My feelings about this book seem to have stayed the same.  I still find Zarek to be one of the most psychologically and emotionally complex characters of Kenyon's.  He truly does evolve on so many levels.  He starts off so animalistic and then you realize there's SO much you don't know about him.  At all.  You have NO idea what he has been through, what he has endured, and the demons that still haunt him even many centuries later.  There are so many nuances to his character that I don't feel as if I caught them all or even appreciated them to the degree I do now -- either this book is worth reading more than once, or I'm just a lot more mature in the last 10 years...could be both.

Astrid is a great counterpart to Zarek.  I will, however, say that I don't see much point to her blindness if she's just able to use Sasha to see.  For example, she held off looking at Zarek until he was conscious, but wouldn't it have been a hell of a lot easier to tend his wounds if she could see his back?  No one said she had to look at his face.  Then, when he was awake, that was the first thing she looked at...  Seems a bit pointless.  Unless the reason is so she can seem helpless to those she is judging and, in turn, see how those men treat someone they view as helpless.  This is something in which I can see some merit, but, if it is the real reason, it isn't explained well.

Thanatos is a good bad guy with nothing to lose, and this makes him all the more dangerous.  I was more than a little frustrated by Acheron's inability to help or keep an eye on his Dark-Hunters, the way in which Artemis is so flippant (though I suppose that's in character for her), and the degree to which Acheron went to hide things from Zarek.  Simi is also a point of contention for me.  I found her more annoying than funny -- like she's a parody or an inside joke with Kenyon and her friends and I just don't get it.  I love the idea of Acheron having a "daughter," just not her.  Her speech and obsession with barbecuing (and barbecue sauce) all really rub me the wrong way...  Maybe it's just me, though.  There were times when I felt something similar for Sasha.  While I loved the fact that his crabby butt was a part of this story, he sometimes went a little bit overboard.  Once again, it could just be me.

Overall, I do think Zarek is still one of my favorite, most tragic Dark-Hunters.  I didn't cry this time around, but I did get slightly choked up.  I recommend this book, but be prepared to have your heart beaten to a pulp by Zarek's backstory.

Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels, Book Two): Lisa Kleypas

"A ruthless tycoon

"Savage ambition has brough common-born Rhys Winterborne vast wealth and success.  In business and beyond, Rhys gets exactly what he wants.  And from the moment he meets the shy, aristocratic Lady Helen Ravenel, he is determined to possess her.  If he must take her virtue to ensure she marries him, so much the better...

"A sheltered beauty

"Helen has had little contact with the glittering, cynical world of London society.  Yet Rhys's determined seduction awakens an intense mutual passion.  Helen's gentle upbringing belies a stubborn conviction that only she can tame her unruly husband.  As Rhys's enemies conspire against them, Helen must trust him with her darkest secret.  The risks are unthinkable...the reward, a lifetime of incomparable bliss.  And it all begins with Marrying Winterborne."

First and foremost, I liked this book infinitely more than I did the first in this series!  And that's somewhat of an understatement...  These characters were far more believable, likable, and, perhaps best of all, they had true chemistry and I could feel the sparks between them.  I had a feeling I would enjoy this book because I liked Rhys and Helen even back in the first book of this series (so much so that I thought they were such strongly-crafted characters that they actually overshadowed Kathleen and Devon -- the characters who really should have shone.  I loved the passion and the tension between Helen and Rhys.  As a male lead, I found Rhys dark, enticing, and captivating.  His intelligence and work ethic were poignant, as were the little things he did to show Helen that, in his own way, he really did care for her.  One example of this was his care of her very delicate orchid and the fact that he'd purchased numerous books on the subject.  Little details like this endeared him to me and made me enjoy the book all that much more.  Though I already liked Helen, I hoped that she wouldn't be took prim or demure in a book all her own.  Needless to say, I was thrilled when, right off the bat, she was determined not to let others speak for her or to allow her voice to be drowned out any longer.  This made for a much more interesting story and even better interactions with Rhys as he came to terms with her newfound strength and outspokenness.

I definitely appreciated the little details that were included in this story -- like Rhys's Welsh phrases and glimpses of his background, as well as his love for peppermint creams.  I think those kinds of things are what truly breathe life into a character and it is exactly what was missing from the first book.

One new character I found myself liking tremendously was Dr. Gibson.  She was lively, strong, and I really do hope to see more of her in the coming stories.  I haven't read much of the more recent works by Kleypas, but I think there may have been a crossover character from another series, though I won't reveal my suspicions until I am sure.

As far as criticism goes, I still found Kathleen's primness grating -- especially when she, herself, became pregnant out of wedlock while she was still supposed to be in mourning (I find her more than a little hypocritical, to say the least).  The twins, while a bit amusing, were still so over the top that they're a bit hard to stomach at times.  I have already picked up the third book in the series, so we will see how that one goes.  The language was occasionally stilted, as if too much of an effort were being placed on propriety.  This was not helped by some of the "thesaurus words" -- words that, while technically correct, are overly flowery and so complex that they do not necessarily fit with the rest of the tone (as if the author wanted a better word and opened a thesaurus to find one).

I do recommend this book and I clearly enjoyed it better than the first in this series.

Lady Catherine, the Earl, and the Real Downton Abbey: Fiona, The Countess of Carnarvon

"Lady Catherine, the Earl, and the Real Downton Abbey, a transporting companion piece to the New York Times bestseller Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey, tells the story of Catherine Wendell, the beautiful and spirited American who married Lady Almina's son, the man who would become the 6th Earl of Carnarvon.  The couple presided over Highclere Castle, the grand estate that serves as the setting for the hit PBS show Downton Abbey.  Following the First World War, many of the great houses of England faded as their owners' fortunes declined in the new political and social world of the 1920s and 1930s.  As war loomed, Highclere's survival as the family home of the Carnarvons was again in the balance--as was peace between the nations of Europe.

"Using copious materials--including diaries and scrapbooks--from the castle's archives, the current Countess of Carnarvon brings alive a very modern story in a beautiful and fabled setting, paying particular attention to the staff who provide Highclere Castle with continuity between generations."

This book is a semi-sequel to Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey, which I did enjoy -- especially for a work of non-fiction.  When I found out that there was another book revolving around the lives of the very interesting Highclere and the ever-fascinating Carnarvons, I began looking forward to picking it up.  This book was written with a similar ease and wealth of knowledge to the first, and I found this rather impressive.  I can only imagine the countless hours of research, interviews, and combing through records that it took to write this book.  My biggest feedback on this is that it moved in reverse flow from the first one:  While the other book was slow to start, it began picking up its pace and I ended up finishing it quite quickly; this book began very quickly and interestingly (perhaps because it essentially began right where the other finished), but was dramatically and noticeably slowed down when the Second World War began in earnest.  Personally, I feel like this happened for me because I am not a huge fan of war accounts.  I can manage snippets of personal histories and battles, but as soon as an author begins talking of strategy, battalion movements, and tactics...I have been lost.  My eyes begin to glaze over and I feel as if I've been thrust back into high school history class all over again.  The World Wars have always been the points at which I fumble in my passion for European (especially British) history (and I believe this is due in large part to the WAY in which it has been taught in American institutions over the decades -- very dry, date- and name-oriented, rather than broader-picture).  I feel like the second half of the book -- while it did in a very broad sense pertain to the Carnarvons -- certainly strayed from the aim of the rest of the book.  Lady Catherine and her family were mentioned more sporadically rather than as the main subjects.  I think the latter sections of the book would have benefitted from some more tying-in of various events directly to their lives.  While this happened now and then, I don't think it was enough for someone (like myself) who reads a book like this for the biographical aspect, and not as a history of a war.

Overall, however, I quite liked it.  I loved the pictures that were thrown in; they really helped breathe life into the names and personalities contained in the accounts.  The stories were told with a certain amount of finesse that I almost felt at times as if I were reading fiction instead of biographical information.  As a sequel to the other book by the current Countess of Carnarvon -- the wife of Lady Catherine's grandson -- I think this is a great companion work and will surely be fascinating to anyone who loves Downton Abbey.  It's wonderful to see echoes of stories and characters in the lives of the people who really lived at Highclere.

Night Embrace (Dark-Hunter Series, Book Five): Sherrilyn Kenyon UPDATED

I actually finished reading this book about a week or so ago, but I've been hemming and hawing over how to handle these updated reviews (especially since I've been reading so many of them lately).  It's not a "problem" I have had to address before.  On one hand, I like adding my updated information to the original reviews themselves so the information is all in one place and it's easy to see how my writing/reviewing style has changed over the years.  On the other, I don't get "credit" for reading the book in this year's "book tally" on the right side of this blog.  I ended up going with creating a new review, marking it "UPDATED" and I plan on including a hyperlink to the original review for those of you who want to see what I thought of the book the first time around.  Now, I have to figure out a way to go back and update those reviews I previously just tacked onto the original reviews.  Some of those happened in 2017, so I'm trying to see if there's a way to post-date reviews...  I'm sure I'll figure something out!

Moving on to this review!  I seem to have been on a Sherrilyn Kenyon kick as of late.  I made my husband dig out my enormous box of books from under the stairs (where they're stored only because we haven't put of a bunch of shelves for them yet) and it was like a treasure chest.  I ended up having to read the UK version of this book and the English nerd in me was interested by the fact that it used apostrophes as quotation marks.  It drove me crazy at first, but I got over it (after regaining my husband about the oddity and having him roll his eyes at me, of course).

I originally read this book in 2008 and you can find the review here (along with the official text from the back of the book - it seemed silly to include it on this review too).  Clearly, I felt as if it was one of the most amazing things I'd read and I fell in love with Talon.  While I still enjoyed it (especially the lively sense of humor Kenyon manages to weave throughout), I didn't cry this time.  I think it's because my reading material has been inundated with heartbreaking, gut-wrenching backstories lately, and I'm slightly desensitized.  Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed it.  I found Sunshine charming, but I got a very different visual image of her this time around -- not sure why.  I love seeing recurring characters and I appreciate when an author is able to incorporate them into another character's book.  Seeing Julian and Kyrian again was a treat (especially when they had to come rescue him from Sunshine's apartment).  I loved Acheron in this book.  While we see him in Kyrian's book, I don't think he played as big a role and we certainly don't get to see as much of him or learn as much about him as we do in this book.  His relationship with Artemis is insanely complex and twisted (and I will now say that House of the Rising Son makes a little bit more sense to me...if only a little...).  The biggest comment I will make is that some of the dialogue was jarringly awkward.  One perfect example is when Nick and Acheron are drinking and Nick is grabbing a bite to eat.  Nick's mother orders food for Acheron (being the loving, concerned mother she is).  When Acheron gives the food to Nick, Nick realizes he's never seen Acheron eat (which is an odd time for the realization after his years of working with Acheron), and then he flat out mentions it to Acheron.  It's just awkwardly formulated and I think Kenyon is a much better author than that.  In addition to this, the use of "baby" endearments was a bit off-putting.  I'm not saying it can't be used, it just didn't feel like it fit the characters well, and it felt overused at times.

Overall, I think Kenyon has a knack for creating characters with brilliant gravitational pulls.  We feel drawn to them and are instantly empathetic.  Talon's backstory was rich and his tragic history coupled with his unique abilities and life as a Dark-Hunter made for an interesting story.  I liked Sunshine, but I found myself a little bit annoyed by her - I can't quite put my finger on why.  There were great plot twists in the story that kept it fun and exciting, so much so that I finished it in just a couple of days.  While I can appreciate that Kenyon was setting up a few other books with her inclusion of Vane, Valerius, and Zarek, I think she spent quite a bit of time on them - more so than I'm used to with her other books.  She usually introduces them, but doesn't really spend entire chapters in their point of view.  Part of me wonders if this was due, at least a little bit, to a need to fill in more information when Talon and Sunshine's story was a bit shorter than she wanted.  I certainly don't feel like the book suffered for this, but a noticeable amount of this book was dedicated to other characters.

This was a dark, yet oddly light-hearted read (oxymoron much?).  We're introduced to complex subplots and other rich personalities and characters.  I definitely recommend this installment in this complex, creative Dark-Hunter series.

Cold-Hearted Rake (Ravenels, Book One): Lisa Kleypas

"A twist of fate...

"Devon Ravenel, London's most wickedly charming rake, has just inherited an earldom.  But his powerful new rank in society comes with unwanted responsibilities...and more than a few surprises.  His estate is saddled with debt, and the late earl's three innocent sisters are still occupying the house...along with Kathleen, Lady Trenear, a beautiful young widow whose sharp wit and determination are a match for Devon's own.

"A clash of wills...

"Kathleen knows better than to trust a ruthless scoundrel like Devon.  But the fiery attraction between them is impossible to deny -- and from the first moment Devon holds her in his arms, he vows to do whatever it takes to possess her.  As Kathleen finds herself yielding to his skillfully erotic seduction, only one question remains:  Can she keep from surrendering her heart to the most dangerous man she's ever known?"



This book took me only a little over 24 hours to complete, so, despite its length, it was a surprisingly quick read.  I used to be very into Lisa Kleypas and her books and thought I'd return to one of my favorite authors.  This is the first book in another of her series, so it seemed like a great place to start. Let me start off by saying I think West, Devon's younger brother, was perhaps one of my favorite characters.  Though he's a secondary character, I almost felt that he overshadowed Devon at times and that we saw more of him than we did the true male lead in this book.  Given that fact, I felt as if the story were spread a bit thinly between too many characters.  I can see where Kleypas was going with it -- setting up the other books in the series, and such -- but I think it was at the detriment of the connection I could have felt to the main characters.  I vacillated between liking Kathleen's fire and being supremely annoyed with her contrived sense of propriety and flair for dramatic overreactions.  She went on and on about being proper and what was "right," and, yet, she seemed to actually do very little of it:  "do as I say, not as I do," perhaps?  While I initially liked Devon very much, I felt like I didn't see nearly enough of him to really "love" him.  So much of this genre relies upon its readers' ability to fall in love with the male leads and truly believe in the love and romance.  I think this story felt a little bit shy of that.  The biggest issue I will take is that Devon -- a rake who had sworn not to marry or fall in love -- really fell for Kathleen FAR too quickly.  He made his resolution to have her after very little time together.  Even for a rake, this felt a bit too forced for my tastes, especially given the fact that he spent relatively little time with her.  There's lust at first sight and then there's forced romance with little-to-no development.  His realization that she spoke to a secret part of him came, I felt, far too quickly.  I don't want to make any harsh "accusation" (in quotes simply because I don't feel like it's the right word to use here...), but the love scenes between Kathleen and Devon felt almost..."rape-y."  She clearly didn't want the attentions, but this is usually overcome by the female lead's hidden desire for the male lead.  I think what was missing here was that hidden desire.  Sure, she cared for Devon, but it was nowhere near as developed as it could have, should have been.  It made Devon's insistence on a physical relationship almost uncomfortable to read at times.  Of course (predictably - because what would this genre be without love), they do, indeeed, love one another, so it almost makes it better in the end.  There was the start of an excellent, dark backstory for Devon, but it faded away.  It was barely mentioned in his conversations with Kathleen and I feel like that is something that usually creates such a powerful bond between the two leading characters.  I feel like their love story was swallowed up in Kathleen's contradictory attitudes/actions, the unreal speed in which Devon decided he wanted Kathleen, the loud voices and big personalities of all the other characters, and the lengths to which Kleypas went to set up the rest of the series.  There were also some rather jarring, repetitive word choices.  Unfortunately, I can't seem to find the few examples I'd pulled (I wish I'd marked the pages), but one that sticks out is "silkier than silk" toward the end of the book.  Most of these awkward wordings came in the forms of metaphors and similes I felt were beneath an author of this caliber.  The rest of her writing is eloquent and uses an expansive vocabulary, so it simply rubbed me the wrong way (and, quite literally, grated my reading to a halt) when I did stumble across these sections.



Now that all of that is out of the way, I will say that I still did enjoy the book, regardless of all of the above criticisms.  I certainly would not have read it as quickly as I did if it had been an unpleasant read.  The plot was unique and I liked the premise.  All of the characters had very different personalities from one another and I can appreciate the time that Kleypas took to develop them all individually and to help establish the rest of her series (even if I did feel as if that was to the detriment of this particular installment).  I recommend it even though I liked it less than I recall liking the rest of the books I've read by Kleypas.  I'm intrigued to pick up the next book in the series and see where she goes with it.

The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde: Neil McKenna

"'I have put my genius into my life, but only my talent into my work.'  So said Oscar Wilde of his remarkable life -- a life more complex, more troubled, and more triumphant than any of his contemporaries ever knew or suspected.  In The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde, Neil McKenna focuses on the tormented genius of Wilde's personal life, reproducing remarkable love letters and details Wilde's previously unknown relationships with men from various walks of life.

"McKenna has spent years researching Wilde's life, drawing on extensive new material, including never-before published poems, letters, and other writings.  He also quotes, for the first time, from recently discovered trial statements made my male prostitutes and blackmailers about Wilde.  McKenna provides explosive evidence of political machinations behind Wilde's trials for sodomy, as well as his central role in the burgeoning gay world of Victorian London.

"Dazzlingly written and meticulously researched, The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde is the first book to fully chart Wilde's astonishing odyssey through London's sexual underworld and to reconstruct his emotional and sexual life and paints an astonishingly vivid psychological portrait of a troubled genius who chose to martyr himself for the cause of love between men."

I picked up this book about a month ago.  Having finished graduate school, I (surprisingly) found myself missing more "serious" reading material.  I hadn't read too much Wilde above and beyond "The Importance of Being Ernest" and The Picture of Dorian Grey in high school, but Wilde had always seemed like a very interesting British literary figure.  I knew he was scandalous and I was interested to gain a better grasp of why.  To be sure, this book certainly went the extra mile to ensure of just how and why Wilde was famous, as well as infamous.

I must start off by saying I learned an astonishing amount about Wilde, and to a depth I certainly was not expecting.  I had an idea that Wilde was a complex man, but I had no clue just how complex.  I am impressed by the sheer amount of primary sources, personal accounts and letter, and diary entries McKenna was able to obtain, let alone work into this biographical work.  I will provide a word of caution, however:  This angle focuses a great deal on Wilde's personal sphere and sexual life -- often using pretty explicit language and descriptions.  I wasn't offended by any means, I was just not expecting it (though, I suppose I should have, given the book's title and description).  I didn't find it gratuitous or included with the sole intent to shock.  I don't feel this should be a deterrent from reading this book -- just don't say that no one warned you!

The book was, overall, very interesting.  I learned so much about the complex man who wrote provocative, highly-controversial, and memorable works, as well as helped promote and support love amongst men in Britain.  I was moved by the obvious depth of his love for Bosie and shocked by the breadth of Wilde's passions and affairs.  There was fascinating information about Wilde's marriage and family life.  I was truly moved by how tragic his marriage to poor Constance was.  The fact that a part of her continued to love and care for Oscar -- even after all his infidelity, overspending, indiscretions, lawsuits, scandals, and imprisonment -- was profoundly moving.  Despite all of Wilde's faults, I found him captivating.  What an interesting man he must have been!  What it must have been like to converse with a mind of his ilk!

I was extremely impressed with this biography.  Though this genre is not normally my cup of tea, I loved how much I learned.  I will admit that it took me much longer to read than I am used to.  The writing was eloquent and filled to the brim with excellent information, so I'm unsure why this was the case.  There were times I would think, "Well this bit was interesting, but I think this could've been shortened by a few paragraphs."  Then, I would consider the fact that those paragraphs contained some interesting source material and it may have been a loss to Wilde's legacy to omit them.  This book ended up being as much a biography if Wilde as it was the history of homosexuality and love between men in Britain.  I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in Wilde or this fascinating history.  I will reiterate my caution that the reader cannot be sensitive or easily offended by the material -- more's the pity because you're missing out on some rich, fascinating history!

I want to conclude by including some of my favorite quotes from the book.  Both come from early on in the work and, I think, they really helped to suck me in.  The following quote is from a letter Wilde wrote to a woman to whom he'd proposed when he was younger.  His friend, her brother, died and Wilde wrote this in a letter to her:  "I am so glad you are coming to town.  I want to see you though the memories you will bring with you will be most bitter.  Yet often I think when a friend dies those who are left become very close to one another, just as when an oak falls in the forest the other trees reach our and join branches over the vacant place" (21).  The next quote comes from comments Wilde made about his extended visit and tour of the United States:  "America is a land of unmatched vitality and vulgarity...a people who care not at all about values other than their own and, who, when they make up their minds, love you and hate you with a passionate zeal" (35).  I found the first one profoundly beautiful, and the second quote to be extremely poignant...and familiar.  Is it just me or does this ring true about a hundred years or so after Wilde penned it?

Gone Girl: Gillian Flynn

"What are you thinking Amy?  The question I've asked most often during our marriage, if not out loud, if not to the person who could answer.  I suppose these questions stormcloud over ever marriage:  What are you thinking?  How are you feeling?  Who are you?  What have we done to each other?  What will we do?  Just how well can you ever know the person you love?  This is the question that Nick Dunne must ask himself on the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary, when his wife Amy suddenly disappears.  The police immediately suspect Nick.  Amy's friends reveal that she was afraid of him, that she kept secrets from him.  He swears it isn't true.  A police examination of his computer shows strange searched.  He says they aren't his.  And then there are the persistent calls on his mobile phone.  So what really did happen to Nick's beautiful wife?  And what was left in that half-wrapped box left so casually on their marital bed?  In this novel, marriage truly is the art of war..."

I actually read this book in the matter of a couple of days while I was visiting my family out of state/housesitting/using the peace and quiet to finish writing my Master's thesis in early November of 2017, so I am, unfortunately, a little bit late on my review.  I swear I recall starting a review for this, but I cannot seem to locate it...  I heard such good things about this book (and the movie came out not too long ago), so I had been contemplating picking it up for awhile.  This trip seemed like as good a time as any -- especially when my younger cousin (15) was thrilled to see me reading it because it was a book she, too, loved.  (Part of the reason I read it so quickly was she wanted to watch the film version together after I'd finished the book...unfortunately, we couldn't find it on Netflix in order to do so...bummer.)

Anyhow, I feel like this review is going to be much shorter than my other recent reviews because I have to tread a VERY fine line between reviewing what I found to be so brilliant about this book, and not giving away any of the earth-shattering twists and brilliantly-written turns.  It's safe to say that I now understand why this is an award-winning book.  Flynn's knowledge and expertise in the field of the human mind was astonishing and her craftsmanship was spectacular.  There was never a boring moment.  Everything felt as if it was held together by invisible threads I couldn't fully see, nor did I completely comprehend them, but I could sense their presence...and I knew the culmination would be something epic.  I was not disappointed.

Nick and Amy - through her diary entries and accounts of her friends and family - were so deep and multi-faceted.  There were nuances and complexities that I could only fully appreciate after I closed the book and stared unseeingly off into the distance and contemplated what I'd just read.  This is a book that will leave you with aftershocks.  It will stay with you long after you've closed it.  It makes you question reality and just how well you (think) you know the people you love and with whom you surround yourself.  I am a firm believer that this is a mark of an excellent book:  when it stays with you and pops back into your consciousness every now and again.  It leaves an undeniable tattoo upon your soul.

I absolutely recommend this enthralling, disturbing, brilliant read.  Prepare yourself to be sucked right into this book and loathe to put it down until you've turned the last page.  This is a bit different from a majority of my other "for fun" reading material, but I'm so glad I branched out.  Enjoy!