Genre: Fantasy

Review: Talon – Julie Kagawa

Talon is different, because dragons. At the same time, there are some very familiar themes where sometimes a war is fought because of what they are used to, and because of the fear of those who are different. My Talon review: First off, I just need to let you all know I’m a huge Kagawa fan! Her stories are always somewhat different, and the universe in which her characters evolve original even while in a genre I am already familiar with. This is also the case in Talon, where the world-building is well done, even if I still have questions after reading the first story in the series. I enjoyed how Ember was trying to think outside of the box, […]

Posted 27 April, 2015 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 17 Comments

Review: Forgotten Sins – Rebecca Zanetti

Oh wow! I finally got to read the first Sin Brothers story – after having already read all the others, and I was still surprised by all the twists and turns. And Shane is totally hot!! My Forgotten Sins review: Forgotten Sins explains the back-story for the Dean brothers a little, but I hadn’t really missed that much starting reading the series with book number two. However, I had completely missed Shane’s book, and his story was mostly an enigma to me. I’m happy to say I loved every word of it, both he and Josie were great characters, and for once, I even enjoyed that one of the characters started the story having amnesia! It made the story move […]

Posted 23 April, 2015 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 6 Comments

Review: Cursed by Fire – Jacquelyn Frank

The overall plot and storyline in Cursed by Fire were quite good, but I found the writing to be stilted, and the characters not fully three dimensional. My Cursed by Fire review: Dethan was the tortured hero, punished by the gods for having gone against them by drinking from the fountain of immortality. Selinda a princess, stuck with a fiancé who only wanted what was best for himself, not for the good of the village, and with no love for his princess. While this is a much-used trope, it can still be done very well, if the story and the characters manage to truly capture my interest and make my feelings involved as well. However, I didn’t really feel that […]

Posted 31 March, 2015 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 6 Comments

Review: Golden Son – Pierce Brown

I don’t even know where to start! Golden Son is fast-paced awesomeness, danger, brutality, chess-play, intrigues and deadly battles. My Golden Son review: Golden Son starts two years after the end of Red Rising, and it’s obvious from the start that much has happened in Darrow’s life in the meantime. The readers are brought into the midst of the action, on a space-ship where there is either a big victory to be won, or a loss so bad it might be impossible to recover from. The pace is more or less at break-neck speed through-out the story, and that really goes well with the plot and the characters and all that’s at stake in Golden Son. The intrigue in Golden […]

Posted 5 January, 2015 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 31 Comments

Review: Heroic Abduction – Eve Langlais

Purple, strong, hot alien meets headstrong human female who is always ready for a new adventure in Heroic Abduction. My Heroic Abduction review: Dyre is very different from the other purple aliens I’ve come to know through the Alien Abduction series! He’s a mercenary who wants to be a hero, and that brings about many humorous situations in Heroic Abduction. With his inner musings commenting everything from how Betty looks to what he’d rather have her eat instead of her pizza, I was howling with laughter more than once! Traveling through the galaxies searching for one of Betty’s human friends, Dyre, Betty and Zista come into lots of difficult situations where Dyre can prove just how heroic he is. Expect […]

Posted 17 December, 2014 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 6 Comments

Review: Clean Sweep – Ilona Andrews

Clean Sweep is the amazing start to yet another awesome series by power-couple Ilona Andrews. Witty, magical and with a strong female character, I loved the way the first story in the Innkeeper Chronicles is so different from their Kate Daniels series. My Clean Sweep review: Dina is a really good character to follow, she has some magic, but it’s mostly chained to the inn she’s the hostess of. And it’s a very special kind of inn, too, in which people of various species come to stay, and where the keeper has to make sure they are safe during the time they are there. With vampires, werewolves, aliens and parallel worlds, Clean Sweep encompasses a whole universe of characters, possibilities […]

Posted 16 December, 2014 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 18 Comments

Review: This Shattered World – Amie Kaufmann and Meagan Spooner

This Shattered World continues the Starbound adventure in a beautiful and fulfilling way! The characters, the worldbuilding and the story are all amazingly well done. My This Shattered World review: In This Shattered World, the readers are taken to another terraformed planet, one that doesn’t progress the way it’s supposed to, and where the army is needed to keep order and a fragile peace. There are rebels hiding in the swamps, and they are apt at coming and going without being noticed. The story starts out very strong, with the army captain Lee in the local bar with some of her soldiers. And she is kidnapped from right under their noses once she realizes that a guy who is checking […]

Posted 10 December, 2014 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 14 Comments

Review: Mortal Heart – Robin LaFevers

Mortal Heart rounded up His Fair Assassin series beautifully! With much more mythology, and the big mystery of why Annith was being left behind, I was up half the night because I couldn’t sleep until I had finished reading. My Mortal Heart review: The setting was awesome, the character development of Annith was really good, and I loved learning more about the mythology of Mortain and the other nine my favorite assassin nuns and others worshipped. Annith finally showed her backbone, and she acted according to her own beliefs rather than blindly following the abbess. And let me tell you, the abbess really pissed me off in Mortal Heart – not that I actually liked her in Dark Triumph or […]

Posted 24 November, 2014 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 22 Comments

Review: Dark Triumph – Robin LaFevers

Sybella is an amazing character to follow, and I fell in love with both her and Beast in Dark Triumph! My Dark Triumph review: Fast paced, filled with danger and intrigue, battles and battlescars, Dark Triumph kept me up part of the night, and on the edge of my seat to see how Sybella would deal with all of her problems all at once. And my dislike for Mortain’s abbess grew in this story – that woman needs to be marqued, and soon! The main character in Dark Triumph is Sybella, but Ismae and Duval show up as well, as does Beast. And d’Ablret truly showed his despicable colors in this installment as well. Filled with many characters that […]

Posted 28 October, 2014 by Linda @ (un)Conventional Bookworms in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review: Crushed – Eliza Crewe

The fact that Crushed has a half-demon female character who actually enjoys having to eat humans to survive is one of the reasons I loved it so much! My Crushed review: The world-building is awesome, and the characters are many with several of them well developed. Even if Crushed is the second book in the Soul Eaters series, and I have not read the first book, I had no trouble following the action, the story and the plot to the fullest. Meda is a very intriguing main character, both because she is a half-demon actually trying to work with the crusaders to fight against demons, and because she actually needs human souls every now and then in order to […]