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Weekly Book Round Up #22

10 January 2014



 
This is the final book in the Healer series. It follows Avry and her band of followers on their final quest to defeat Tohon and win the war. This series has been a bit hit and miss for me, as these are very much fantasy books (which isn't normally a genre I get on well with, other than Game of Thrones), and in places I felt that they were pretty poorly written. The premise of the books is that there were once people with the ability to heal the injuries of others through magic. But a plague began which wiped out much of the kingdom, and couldn't be healed by the healers. The surviving population blamed the healers for meddling and creating the plague, and all out war began. If you've read Maria Snyder's other books, you'll probably enjoy this series.
 
 
 
Nicola's rating: 3/5
 
 
 


 
 
Clealrly this is just one of those weeks for finishing trilogies. This is the final Nadia Stafford book. Nadia Stafford is an ex-cop turned hit woman who works for a mafia family. She's also got a lot of issues, which are brought up and worked through in this novel. I feel like this one has been a long time coming (the second book in this series was published in 2009), but was definitely worth the wait! Nadia finally manages to sort out her feelings for Jack and Quinn, and all the loose ends are nicely tied up. I know that Kelley Armstrong has been sticking with her supernatural stuff for a while, but I'd definitely like to see some more crime/thriller writing from her in the future!

Nicola's rating: 4/5
 
 




 
I've just finished reading this one, and it's left me feeling a bit emotionally drained. I spotted this on Goodreads a while ago and decided to get it from the library. This is two stories from before Charlaine Harris became super famous for the True Blood books, set (as far as I can tell) in the eighties, or just before. The first story is your standard Charlaine Harris murder mystery, if you've read the Aurora Teagarden or Lily Bard mysteries you'll know where I'm coming from. The second book I was expecting to follow in the same vein, except it doesn't. In this short story, women in a small college town are being attacked and brutally raped, and the main character is also raped. This was really quite harrowing to read, and I would definitely warn people that could be triggered by this sort of thing to steer clear. Also, because this book is set in the deep south in America, and I'm thinking it was set in the late 70's/ early 80's, there's quite a bit of casual racism. I found it pretty difficult to stomach, on top of the graphic rape scene. I would still recommend the book to people, as the mysteries themselves are intriguing and she does keep you guessing until the end, but anyone sensitive to the issues mentioned should probably steer clear.
 
 
Nicola's rating: Sweet and Deadly: 3.5/5
A Secret Rage: 2/5




1 comment:

  1. I've been thinking about reading one of Maria.V Snyder's series, I might give this one a try! It's always fun to read what other people have been reading lately :)

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