Ink of Blood

(I received this book for free as part of Goodreads First Reads giveaways).

(This review may contain spoilers).

I felt this book worked fairly well as a children’s book, but I did think that the narration of the main character of his past would have worked better to be shown in the book, rather than told about.

I did like Dinky as a character, but I did think that some of the speech used in the book was a bit adult in nature and not always good for all ages.

I did really like the illustrations used in the book. They were really nicely done and some of them were quite beautiful. It was also nice to see how Dinky viewed his previous place as different to the one he ended up in.

Some of this book assumes knowledge of horses and I think it would benefit from a bit more detail about certain things, such as the name Dinky as a foal is called. It was also nice to see the other horses in the book, but I would have liked a bit more detail with them. I felt that dialogue was used a bit too much and I would have liked to ‘see’ more of the world.

I did think it was interesting that there were questions raised in this book that were potentially deep ones. It would be good to see where the author takes those questions in the future books in the series.

I do think my niece would like this book and I do intend to pass it on to her. At least, I do think she’ll really like the illustrations and Dinky’s character.

(I received this book for free as part of Goodreads First Read giveaways).

(This review may contain spoilers).

I personally felt that this book was a more unique story about a zombie apocalypse, because rather than showing the start of it and everyone trying to escape/survive, the author showed a world that had some semblance of order even after the disease had hit… and people actually taking on jobs directly relating to dealing with the rising dead.

I found Rob an easy character to relate to. It was interesting to see the fact that his job had become almost mundane, when the very act of burning people is probably a horrific one… when they’re still ‘living’, even if it’s not real life.

Rob’s desperation to find his son came across really well in this book, I felt. I liked seeing the glimpses of his life with his wife and son, though I would have liked a few more details about how long ago the dead started rising… was it fairly soon before the events of the book, or had it been going on for quite a long time?

It was interesting to see the reactions of the other characters to what was going on, too. I found it intriguing how some of them viewed the whole thing. And I really liked the fact that Rob still tried to help out the other people, even though he was desperate to find his son.

I found the book, on the whole, to be really well-written. There were a few scenes that made me hold my breath, particularly the one in the church. And the descriptions of the dead feeding on the living were particularly creepy.

Some of the characters voiced the theory that perhaps the infection could be reversed and I think it could be interesting to read a sequel with that possibility. I would definitely look at more books by this author in the future. This was a quick, easy read and had a main character who was easy to relate to and empathise with. And as I said earlier, this was a fairly unique take on the ‘suddenly the dead are coming back and attacking the living’ theme.

(I received a free copy of this book from Broad Universe Publishing, through NetGalley, in exchange for a review).

(This review may contain spoilers).

I’ve always liked books about myths and legends and although I got a bit confused while reading this book, I still found it an entertaining, well-written read with an interesting plot and characters.

I thought it was pretty interesting how the author merged the different pantheons in this, even though I would have liked to see more of the characters and how they fit together. (Both Thor and Loki were referenced to, but I always thought that Loki was more like Hermes from the Greek pantheon… so…)

I did find myself drawn into this book pretty much from the beginning, but I wasn’t too happy that the book kept switching between first and third person. I would have preferred either to stick with Alexander’s first person POV, or keep it all in third person… that is, unfortunately, one of my pet peeves and I struggled to really connect with Alexander for a while, having spent a short amount of time in his head before being yanked out again.

I felt that the idea about the possession was an interesting one, but I couldn’t help feeling sorry for Camilla. Alexander did lose a lot of sympathy from me after the way he was.

I did find this book easy to read and, of course, it was nice to see the characters from the legend in their modern-day forms… though I felt that Apollo was much stranger than I would have thought. It was a bit disappointing to see many of their aspects weren’t explored.

The form of address was interesting – brother-cousin. It was an interesting way to see how they viewed their family.

I liked the fact that the characters had limitations to what they could do. I would have liked to see more of Alexander’s evolution. The ending was interesting, but I felt there wasn’t enough setup to reach that.

I would probably read the next book in this series at some point in the future. It would be nice to see more of the characters and their world.

(I received this book for free as part of Goodreads First Reads giveaways).

(This review may contain spoilers).

Although this book was the second in a series, I still found it fairly easy to follow. The plotline and characters were really interesting and I was very intrigued by them.

I particularly liked Steo as a character. I was a bit less certain of Cyrus at first – he seemed quite weak for part of the book. But he did grow on me later on during the course of the book.

The world in this book was quite an interesting one. I would have liked to see more of the different planets and the alien species. The glimpses I had of the world made me want to see more of it. I also liked learning about the different types of technology there was. The rest of the crew of the Orion were really interesting as well. I would have liked to see more of their history and how they all came together. I also particularly liked Yuina as a character. There was an exchange she had with Cyrus that really made me smile.

Steo was a character I could really get behind. I like the ‘good’ guys… and that’s how Steo came across to me. I would have liked to see more of his relationships to the other characters… and how his loyalty to them is so strong.

The hints of Muuk’s civilisation were quite interesting and I would have liked to see more details about that. I couldn’t really understand what Admiral Slaught was trying to achieve… possibly because I only read about him in this book. It was also good to see characters who didn’t just kill for the sake of it and who tried to find more peaceful solutions.

On the whole, I found this book to be really well-written and I really cared about the characters and what happened to them. I would definitely be interested in reading other books about these characters at some point in the future.