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Source: Books
The Scribe
The Singer
The Secret
I am going to review all three as a set because all three have to be read to get the whole story. Book one is a real cliffhanger!
This story evolves around 2 distinct cultures (or are they distinct?). You learn throughout the story that the cultures involved are the offspring of the Fallen and the Forgiven. Twenty-one angels fell from heaven. Seven died, seven returned (Forgiven) and seven stayed on earth (Fallen). The offspring of the Forgiven are the Irin and the offspring of the Fallen are the Grigori. Both sets of offspring have inherited magic abilities from their angel fathers. The Irin’s stated role on earth is to protect the humans (who are unaware of what is going on) and to hunt/kill the Grigori. The Grigori are vicious hunters and users of the humans (but are all of them this way?). The Irin society’s numbers are decreasing because two centuries ago, the Grigori attacked the Irina (the females) and decimated their numbers. However, all is not what we think it is throughout the story. Actually, what we learn in Books 2 and 3 totally turns the story upside down and nothing is quite what it seems in the early stages of the story. The author does this very well. There were several spots in books 2 and 3 (I was reading these on my Kindle), that I had to stop and put in a note so I would make sure I remembered a few things. Many passages are highlighted. I normally do not do these things—a good indication of how the story evolves over the life of the books.
My thoughts: I loved this trilogy. I found book 1 because it was the monthly selection of an online book club I am in some time ago and I really enjoyed it. I had other reading obligations at the time so I could not get to books 2 and 3 until now. But the story just would not leave my head and others recommended it to me that I knew I had to finish the series. And I am so glad I did. The author has created a rich and complex world and is very good at the world building. Her world is very descriptive in the narrative but not so descriptive that she bogs us down with it. A lot of the world building is also done in the character interaction/dialogue which the author did a great job with. I am very critical when it comes to dialogue. If I don’t feel that the dialogue is believable for the characters to say to each other, the book falls flat for me. Sorry—that’s just the way I roll. It’s a quirk. The main characters in this trilogy are Malachi, a centuries old Irin scribe, and Ava, a current day very special human (or is she?), and of course, they are going to become fated mates. The secondary characters are wonderful and add so much life to the story. Much of the story takes place in the Istanbul and Vienna areas and these locations also add a lot of life to the story.
We learn in a note to the readers after the story concludes in book 3 that the author is now planning more books in this world for some of the other characters and I for one, am looking forward to reading them also.
The series for Cat and Bones is over and Ms. Frost has given us a book of outtakes and deleted scenes. I have always enjoyed reading deleted scenes and outtakes from books that authors choose to share. I like finding out why they were deleted or re-written. I like seeing if things might have been different for our characters in some way. I think it is just fun. Jeanine has shared with us some great deleted scenes and she gave us the context of the story at the time of the scene so we would understand where the characters were at story wise as well as why the scene ended up on the chopping block. If you enjoyed the adventures of Cat and Bones, you will enjoy this collection.
Recently I’ve noticed that a lot of the authors I’ve been following for years are spacing the time between books in a series more and more. Now sometimes it’s a health or other personal issues which I completely sympathize with and understand, hey as much as I’d like to have that new book real life and family is a priority, but sometime it’s not. Here are some of the reasons I’ve been consistently running into:
The saddest part is that some new series I’ve picked up are really interesting but there has been no follow up..and its been 12-18 months for some of these books. Honestly I’ve lost interest in anything that’s not my core reading, as far as series are concerned, that aren’t indie authors. Do you think it’s over stressed authors, publishing houses that think people will stay loyal no matter what or an over critical me?
Geek Sneak Peek 