TBR Challenge Review: Wild & Steamy by Meljean Brook, Jill Myles, Carolyn Crane

Format: ebook
Pub Date: August 2011
Publisher: Self published
Length: 48K words
FTC: Purchased myself

Since I tend to know where or how I acquired my print books, I retreated to my digital TBR for help with his month's theme, "How did this get here?"  I'm pretty sure I picked this one up around DABWAHA time, but I honestly can't remember. Close enough!

Anthologies are a fun way to try new authors or to read shorter works by a favorite one. I'm always curious to see how well short stories and novellas fit together both with the theme and with the other authors included. In Wild & Steamy, I have to say not so well. Each author's story was well crafted, but as a whole, it just didn't fit together.

Review: Heart of Steel by Meljean Brook

Format: Trade paperback, ebook
Pub Date: November 2011
Publisher: Berkley
Length: 320 pages
FTC: Purchased myself

It's rare for me to find a book with true depth that I also love on a really emotional level. Heart of Steel was such a book for me.

I know I've talked about my history background before. But I minored in English lit. Which means I've read and analyzed my share of literature, both contemporary and classic. And, while I love it, most genre fiction just doesn't have the layers there to really analyze in the over-detailed way you tend to do in lit crit classes. Heart of Steel has depth to spare. And at barely 300 pages for the trade paperback version, that's saying something.

Review: The Osiris Ritual by George Mann

Format: Hardcover (also available in Trade Paperback, ebook)
Publisher: TOR
Pub Date: August 2010 (orig. published in the UK in 2009)
Length: 319 pages
FTC: Review copy courtesy of the publisher

Egyptian artifacts, steampunk, and mystery together in one book? Yes, please. I was so excited to get my hands on this book. I'm an Egypt nut. And although I'm fairly new to the steampunk subgenre, it is definitely growing on me.

I was worried that I would be a little lost coming into the series in the middle, but this stands alone just fine. There are a few references to previous cases, but nothing that makes this book difficult to understand. In fact, the best parts of this book are the mystery aspects.

Waiting on Wednesday: Heart of Steel by Meljean Brook

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted over at Breaking the Spine. It highlights books we just can't wait to get our greedy, book-loving hands on.

Of all of the over-hyped books last year, the Iron Duke was one that truly did live up to its buzz. It was so refreshingly different from anything else I'd ever read. The next book in the series, Heart of Steel, comes out November 1st.

Heart of Steel by Meljean Brook
Pub Date: November 1, 2011
Format: Trade Paperback; ebook
Length: 384 pages
**This cover may not be the final version.**

The Blurb:

Return to the gritty, alluring world of steampunk with the New York Times bestselling author of The Iron Duke.
Growing up in the dangerous world of the Iron Seas, the mercenary captain of the airship Lady Corsair, Yasmeen, has learned to keep her heart hard as steel. Ruthless and cunning, her only loyalty is to her ship and her crew-until one man comes along and changes everything...Treasurehunter Archimedes Fox isn't interested in the Lady Corsair-just the captain and the valuable da Vinci sketch she stole from him. When it attracts a dangerous amount of attention, Yasmeen and Archimedes journey to Horde-occupied Morocco- and straight into enemy hands.

Also looking forward to:

The Naked King by Sally MacKenzie
Pub Date: June 7, 2011
Publisher: Zebra (Kensington)
Length: 353 pages
Formats: Mass Market, ebook

I am a Sally MacKenzie junkie. I know her books can be rather predictable, but I love them anyway. They always manage to tug on my heartstrings. Even when they are being a bit silly and funny. There's just something about the dialogue, the characters, and MacKenzie's sense of the absurd that make these so fun.

I've heard this is the last book in her Naked series, though, which has me a bit bummed.

The Blurb:
           Indiscretion Is Just The Beginning. . .

One night of slight overindulgence—oh, all right, he was drunk—and Stephen Parker-Roth finds he must betroth himself to prevent yet another scandal. But his "intended" is lovely, a redheaded beauty under her horrendous, unfashionable bonnet, and before long, he's congratulating himself on compromising such an excellent candidate—and anticipating what other naughtiness they'll get caught at before the wedding. . .

Lady Anne Marston has long since given up any thought of marriage. That is the price she pays for the mistakes of her past. But one little conversation with a handsome rogue should never have led to a sham engagement. Even if it did end in a rather shocking kiss...in broad daylight. . .on the front step of London's premier gossip. Now, trapped between a secret and a lie, Anne must somehow disentangle herself from this charming, maddening man before the truth comes out—or her heart gives in. . .

Jumping on the YA Bandwagon

Authors writing in multiple genres is nothing new. Neither is authors abandoning one successful genre to write in another. A decade ago, authors jumped ship from romance to mystery. Or from historical to paranormal. Today, it seems everyone is jumping on the Young Adult bandwagon.

At the RT Book Lovers Convention earlier this month, YA was everywhere. There was even a "Teen Day." And many of the YA authors are well known romance authors. Authors who are successful writing historical or contemporary adult romances are cranking out YA books now.

The reasons are varied: an expanding market for YA (with corresponding publisher demand), a perceived decline in the historical or contemporary romance market, author boredom with the genre they write in, pressure from agents and publishers to conform...

Personally, I get irritated when it seems as if an author is jumping on a trend bandwagon. I'm fine with an author who writes in more than one genre. But I intensely dislike it when an author basically abandons one readership in pursuit of another. Readers who make an effort to remember an author's name, who anxiously await the next book are apparently worthless when weighed against the almighty $.

No, authors don't "owe" their readership anything. And they're free to write what they like. But it still irks me when authors seem to choose a new genre to write in just because everyone else is doing it.

Review: Wilder's Mate by Moira Rogers

Format: ebook
Publisher: Samhain
Pub Date: March 8, 2011
FTC: Digital review copy provided by the author(s)

I am not normally a fan of historical western romances.  Even though I have liked Moira Rogers's paranormal romances in the past, I was a little leery about this one. Turns out, though, that the paranormal and steampunkish elements in Wilder's Mate helped make this book just different enough to slide past my genre pet peeves.

Strong, silent type is practically a requirement in a western, and our hero, Wilder, fits that stereotype to a "T." But, he's also far more compassionate than most of the other men in Satira's life. Satira, herself, is a far cry from the schoolmarm type of characters who used to so annoy me in traditional historical westerns. She is fiercely independent, her mother was a prostitute, and she is sexually experienced.

As a bonus for me, there's the trademark witty and occasionally snarky dialogue. They didn't pretty up the language to adhere to 19th century usage. Which I actually prefer TYVM.

"I know about full moons and new moons. I'm not a fool."
"So what are you going to do when he starts humping your leg?"
"Ophelia!"
Her friend snorted. "It's a perfectly valid question."

Review: The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook

Format: Trade Paperback
Pub Date: October 2010
Publisher:
FTC: Purchased myself

The Blurb:

After the Iron Duke freed England from Horde control, he instantly became a national hero. Now Rhys Trahaearn has built a merchant empire on the power — and fear — of his name. And when a dead body is dropped from an airship onto his doorstep, bringing Detective Inspector Mina Wentworth into his dangerous world, he intends to make her his next possession.

Mina can’t afford his interest, however. Horde blood runs through her veins, and despite the nanotech enhancing her body, she barely scratches out a living in London society. Becoming Rhys’s lover would destroy both her career and her family, yet the investigation prevents her from avoiding him…and the Iron Duke’s ruthless pursuit makes him difficult to resist.

But when Mina uncovers the victim’s identity, she stumbles upon a conspiracy that threatens the lives of everyone in England. To save them, Mina and Rhys must race across zombie-infested wastelands and treacherous oceans — and Mina discovers the danger is not only to her countrymen as she finds herself tempted to give up everything to the Iron Duke.

This one is for the holdouts. Readers, like me, who view overly hyped  books with skepticism.  The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook deserves every bit of praise it's received and then some. This is one of those books that will shape the publishing world for years to come.

I am a steampunk virgin. Before this book, I'd never read a steampunk novel. In fact, steampunk fans have made me a little...hesitant in the past because they seemed so proprietary over what makes a book steampunk versus gaslight.  And my only experience with the steampunk aesthetic was through some spectacularly awful movies. But with several people familiar with the genre applying the steampunk label to this, I felt I had to give it a shot.