Recommendations from Karin for August 2014.

In order to bring some more variety to my blog, I have asked some of my bookish friends to tell about the books they have in the past month, and to give us a recommendation. Today’s post is made by Karin from Austria.

Karin:

I have read 15 books this last month and more than half of it are beloved re-reads. I did read those three books I had waited for so long and I found them to be good but not excellent. Still, I want to talk about them (at least shortly):

My Beautiful Enemy by Sherry Thomas



Magic Breaks by Ilona Andrews



The Winter King by C. L. Wilson




Sherry Thomas did what she apparently likes doing best; she wrote this book in the style that I have read time and again. She jumps between the “present” and the “past”. It was helpful that I have read “The Hidden Blade” before, because there she explains the two main characters in more detail. This book combines a historical romance with martial arts which I found very interesting. The romance part was covered quite well but I just did not really get a good connection to our heroine, Catherine Blade. As I said, it was enjoyable but not too captivating.

I normally love Ilona Andrews’s books but I had my problems with “Magic Rises” and these continued with the latest instalment. Curran is MIA for the biggest part of the book, and it was full of action. I love Curran, I missed him terribly and the ending is anti-climactic to say the least. 99% of the reviews I read adored this book so I let you be the judge of it – I wonder what you might think about it.

I have waited so long and hard for „The Winter King“ and then I found it to be an average run-of –the-mill romance with a trope I detest (Hero: I think I love her; I have been betrayed by a woman I loved before. Therefore I will not trust her. This will make problems that will end up in her not trusting me. So this will confirm that I can’t trust her, …..) There is magic thrown in and well: this is it.

So all this sounds very depressing and normally I would write about books that were just good. But as I said, I have recommended these books before they were even published and so I wanted to comment on them.

But what I really liked were my re-reads of the Guardian Series by Meljean Brook – in my opinion they are truly excellent and I highly recommend you read them. As I did that once before I will not recount the books in the series but I just want to say one thing: Go ahead and enjoy!! 

Aurian: Thanks for the recommendation Karin! I did enjoy the Winter King very much, and I am sorry you did not like it. I thought it original with the use of types of magic and Summer against Winter. I still have not read the Meljean Brook novels, but someday I will pick them up. I know Maia enjoys her writing as well. And I am ashamed that I have not read the new Ilona Andrews book yet, but I am determined to wait for the paperback to be released first.

© 2014 Reviews by Aurian