Leah Petersen

Control Point by Myke Cole

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Stay tuned! At the end of this review is something REALLY COOL!

This was a great read. I generally avoid fantasy set in the modern (or sorta) world, and never considered myself a military-anything buff. So Control Point was a very-pleasant surprise. I devoured the book in two days.

Cole does a great job of building an alternative reality that’s believable and authentic. He sprinkles in fantastic nuggets of how the world we know and live in now would react to a subset of the population suddenly popping up with magical powers. He examines the political and social impact without ever moralizing or making a judgment. It would be easy to draw a clear good/evil line in a story like this and get preachy but Cole did none of that.

All of this in the middle of taking us into a fully-realized alien world full of its own creatures and cultures and believable magic system.

This is a great debut and I’m thrilled to have found it.

But because every book has its faults, I do have the following complaints:

I couldn’t give Control Point five stars because Cole used one of my pet peeve writing techniques, internal monologue. I’ve gone on record before about how much I hate IM, but I know it doesn’t bother most readers so that’s probably neither here nor there to the majority reading this.

I also agree with another reviewer who wondered when Britton would “man up.” At some point it began to feel like he debated a point with himself, only to forget the next day what he’d decided the day before.

That said, neither of those annoyances were enough to override the imaginative plot and worldbuilding and the realistic action scenes. Definitely a recommended read.

Now here’s a great example of one of the best things about Control Point:

See, this is a challenge coin for the SOC, the Supernatural Operations Corps. You don’t get detail like this unless you’ve got a well-built world. Cole not only seamlessly knit together a fantastical world with ours, but did it without you noticing. No long info-dumps, no boring explanations. Just great details like this drizzled in and among the action.

And the coolest thing about these coins?

I got one.

But seriously, great book, totally worth the read.

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Prince of Thorns
by Mark Lawrence

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I’m not the first one to point out that making an anti-hero work is really difficult; it’s a fine line between being disgusted by the actions and hating the character. Lawrence hit on the balance. I still walked away disturbed, perhaps more so at the end than I’d been all along. But Lawrence created all the right circumstances and a world that made Jorg what he is without justifying it, without apologizing for it, and making you think about the potential for the monster in all of us.

Chillingly wonderful character development.

Combined with an inventive storyline, a fascinating world, and a great pace and cast of supporting characters and you’ve got a book I read in one day. Just couldn’t stop.

Bravo.

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Red by Kait Nolan

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The premise of this one so intrigued me that I picked it up, even though I’ve been feeling a bit glutted with YA books lately. I’m glad I didn’t pass it up. YA heroines often leave me feeling empty, as if they’re a bit shallow (some of that just being the effect of youth rather than bad writing.) But Nolan did a great job of giving us a scarred and complex heroine paired with a similarly scarred and complex hero and making their struggles and developing relationship utterly realistic (for werewolves.)

I was drawn right in and couldn’t put it down. Highly recommended.

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It’s here! If you don’t know about the Evan Gabriel series yet, you haven’t been here long. Steve Umstead, @SteveUmstead is a friend and a talkented author and at last, with his latest, Gabriel’s Revenge, the  Evan Gabriel series is complete. All three of the books, Gabriel’s Redemption , Gabriel’s Return, and Gabriel’s Revenge are available as well as a the complete series in one volume: Gabriel’s Journey.

Pretty cool, huh?

So, to celebrate, let’s have a quickie. Ummm, I mean, something not dirty that we like to do around here, a 5MinuteInterview.

1. Tell us what this trilogy is about in less than 140 characters.

Scifi story of a man who crosses galaxy searching for Redemption, Returns to where it all began, & seeks Revenge on those responsible. (Whew, made it by 6 – I usually only talk about one book at a time in a tweet…)

2. What’s the one thing you’re going to miss the most about writing Gabriel’s story? The thing you’ll miss the least?

Not sure on that one; it hasn’t really sunk in that the “arc” is complete. I think I may miss the secondary characters more than the main few, as they never had much of a stage, and won’t have any future possibilities. Several of them could have been developed much more, I believe, and that’s probably something I could/should have done.

3. I’ll admit I’m jealous that you’ve finished your trilogy as I’m currently stressing over book 3 of mine. How does it feel to have them finished? What’s next?

I knew exactly what it would feel like to write the final scene of book three, as I had had it in my head from the moment I wrote the opening scene of book one. I never planned a trilogy, but when I finished book one, I knew I had an arc that could continue, and wrap up with that scene I had imagined before. So as I was typing that last chapter of the last book, it was flying out of me faster than I could even type, and it felt great. So I’m not sad or disappointed it’s over, as I know I wrapped it up exactly how I wanted to, right down to the cold beers in the sand.

As for what’s next? I’ve been stewing on a couple of ideas unrelated to Gabriel, but after I’ve had a few people inquire about more within the same universe, and since I had already set up quite a backstory for the main character, I’m currently slapping together an outline for a prequel. Something that shows how Gabriel became…Gabriel, I suppose.

4. What’s the first thing you’re going to do on that day when you hit the New York Times bestseller list?

I’ll double check the NY Times list, then wonder who the hell submitted my name…unless they mysteriously and suddenly open their lists to independent/self published authors, no reason why I would ever show up there. I’m indie and happy. More than happy, actually. Like uber-happy.

5. When you accept a lifetime achievement award for your contributions to the literary community, who are you going to forget to thank?

Oy…my writing certainly isn’t going to contribute to any literary community. I never had any illusions about that. I wrote/write purely for entertainment, I write what I enjoy reading. So any lifetime achievement award will be for the most coffee drunk, or the most nails bitten, or something along those lines. But…I’ll probably forget to thank my high school English teachers, Mrs. Graves & Mr. Jones. I thought they were both pure evil back then, but man did they set me straight going forward…

So… bought yours yet?

———–

Steve Umstead has been the owner of a Caribbean & Mexico travel company for the past ten years, but never forgot his lifelong dream of becoming an author. After a successful stab at National Novel Writing Month, he decided to pursue his dream more vigorously…but hasn’t given up the traveling.

Steve lives in scenic (tongue-in-cheek) New Jersey with his wife, two kids, and several bookshelves full of other authors’ science fiction novels. Gabriel’s Redemption was his debut novel, published in February of 2011; Gabriel’s Return, the second in the trilogy, launched in August; the finale, Gabriel’s Revenge, book 3, hit the virtual shelves in December.

Crash Into You by Roni Loren

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a great read. Hot and steamy without being so focused on the erotic elements that it neglected the plot. I was pleasantly surprised at the depth and intricacy of the conflict that is so often missing in erotic romance, where hook-ups are often the whole point of the anemic storyline. Nice bit of mystery and suspense here to make the relationship that much more important and satisfying.

Well done and worth the read.

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