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Well, just finished "Undead and Unemployed", the sequel to "Undead and Unwed". Great. Yet another addictive book series that I have to spend months building myself up to buy ("Hellsing" because it's uber-expensive, and this series because it's in the... *shudders* romance section). The only reason I read the first one was because my friend Kuri (who has awesome taste in books) lent it to me. For this second one I had to be accompanied by two friends in order to even enter the section it was in. Gah... romance... that section makes me ill.... especially with all the oversexed vampire crap...
But it's not romance!!! I swear it's not, well, apart from the really lame porn terms used in the one sex scene per book (if you ever read standard fantasy, trust me, tons more sex scenes than the books in this series). Okay, so the first book had semi-orgies and major sex subplots in it. But the second book didn't, so it balances. It's vampiric comedy with a romantic subplot that most of the time takes a back seat, as far as I'm concerned.
But yes. A very addictive and unfortunately very quick read (I bought it yesterday, finished it today). And considering it's me talking about a series who's main character is obsessed with shoes and includes a makeup assessment in her first-person descriptions of anyone she encounters, that means it has to be good. Ne?
~~
Oh, and also I'm reading "Ship of Magic" by Robin Hobbs or somesuch. I'm still kinda iffy about it, but I've only read about two chapters. The descriptions are detailed and bring the imagery to life, but at the same time they have a ton of overdone extended metaphors ("frothy green lace" for seaweed or water or somesuch like that), and the tendency to repeat words two sentences in a row without using pronouns or synonyms gets on my nerves (I'm really big on not using repetition except for a specific reason, especially because I tend to do it by accident pretty often).
Research and/or knowledge of ships and the sea, a major-major part of the book (center of its plotline, after all), is very well done. You notice straight off that the author's willing to even name what kind of ship the pirate guy owns, specify how the cargo's supposed to be stored in the merchant ship, etc. etc. (this is done in a "part of the plot" way, not a boring way).
The characters speak and go through thoughts a little too extensively (isn't it more natural to use shorter sentences when you're talking? I understand if you're a priest, but a pirate and his random seemingly none-too-intelligent crew member...), and I've noticed some slight misuse of vocabulary ("bemused" does not mean "amused", it means "confused", period), which sometimes seems to make a bit of an effort to be up there (the word "garrulous" doesn't roll off even my overcomplex tongue that easily).
My biggest iffy factor is on the characterization. The author played a handy trick in the first chapter, though, first pretty much convincing the reader that the pirate-dude was a male Mary Sue, then slowly and subtly making it blatantly obvious that he was only excessively perfect in his own head. Althea, however, got a bit on my nerves... I've only seen one chapter's worth of her, though, and there's already indications that she's yet another case of a character who doesn't see her own flaws, but nonetheless still has them. I hope that's what turns out *finger-crossss*
Anyway, like I said, I'm just starting on this book. There's some interesting concepts, we'll see how they play out. And the first paragraph actually got my ass to set down the book, go to the computer, and (shockingly) bother to write descriptions in the first chapter of "Morbus".
But it's not romance!!! I swear it's not, well, apart from the really lame porn terms used in the one sex scene per book (if you ever read standard fantasy, trust me, tons more sex scenes than the books in this series). Okay, so the first book had semi-orgies and major sex subplots in it. But the second book didn't, so it balances. It's vampiric comedy with a romantic subplot that most of the time takes a back seat, as far as I'm concerned.
But yes. A very addictive and unfortunately very quick read (I bought it yesterday, finished it today). And considering it's me talking about a series who's main character is obsessed with shoes and includes a makeup assessment in her first-person descriptions of anyone she encounters, that means it has to be good. Ne?
~~
Oh, and also I'm reading "Ship of Magic" by Robin Hobbs or somesuch. I'm still kinda iffy about it, but I've only read about two chapters. The descriptions are detailed and bring the imagery to life, but at the same time they have a ton of overdone extended metaphors ("frothy green lace" for seaweed or water or somesuch like that), and the tendency to repeat words two sentences in a row without using pronouns or synonyms gets on my nerves (I'm really big on not using repetition except for a specific reason, especially because I tend to do it by accident pretty often).
Research and/or knowledge of ships and the sea, a major-major part of the book (center of its plotline, after all), is very well done. You notice straight off that the author's willing to even name what kind of ship the pirate guy owns, specify how the cargo's supposed to be stored in the merchant ship, etc. etc. (this is done in a "part of the plot" way, not a boring way).
The characters speak and go through thoughts a little too extensively (isn't it more natural to use shorter sentences when you're talking? I understand if you're a priest, but a pirate and his random seemingly none-too-intelligent crew member...), and I've noticed some slight misuse of vocabulary ("bemused" does not mean "amused", it means "confused", period), which sometimes seems to make a bit of an effort to be up there (the word "garrulous" doesn't roll off even my overcomplex tongue that easily).
My biggest iffy factor is on the characterization. The author played a handy trick in the first chapter, though, first pretty much convincing the reader that the pirate-dude was a male Mary Sue, then slowly and subtly making it blatantly obvious that he was only excessively perfect in his own head. Althea, however, got a bit on my nerves... I've only seen one chapter's worth of her, though, and there's already indications that she's yet another case of a character who doesn't see her own flaws, but nonetheless still has them. I hope that's what turns out *finger-crossss*
Anyway, like I said, I'm just starting on this book. There's some interesting concepts, we'll see how they play out. And the first paragraph actually got my ass to set down the book, go to the computer, and (shockingly) bother to write descriptions in the first chapter of "Morbus".
