Recommendations from Karin for December 2015.

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:

December has passed ever so quickly. I bought a couple of book bundles but there was nothing exciting among them. But I still lucked out. I really enjoyed three books this month. They were

Feel the Burn by G.A. Aiken



Those of you who read these recommendations might know how much I enjoy G.A. Aiken/Shelly Laurenston’s books (Maia, I know you hear me right now!)
This was definitely another winner. I might warn you from the beginning: if you decide to try these books from the dragon realm you had better not start with this one – you would be completely lost. I feel this is a book that lays the ground for a continuation and yet another start for kind of new story arch. Lots of familiar dragons appear, you get an insight into their family situation and yet there is quite a lot of character development.
The love story is nothing worth mentioning, it feels like it was just thrown in as an afterthought but there is so much happening that I enjoyed reading about. Once again I found myself laughing out loud about Laurenston’s trademark humor and a snarky comment here and there. So, if you enjoy the dragons – I highly recommend this book.

I also enjoyed a (unfortunately) very short book by another one of my favourite authors:

Magic Stars by Ilona Andrews



This book is a spin off of Andrews’s Kate Daniels’ series and features Derek, the former boy wonder as the hero and Julie, Kate’s ward, as the heroine.
Albeit it being very short (and due to Julie’s young age there is no real love story just a hint of deep feelings) it grabbed my attention and kept me glued to the pages for the full hour it took me to devour this novella.
It has got everything a reader like me can ask for – lots of magic, action and - as I mentioned before – feelings. It also gives me hope that the title contains a subtitle: Grey Wolf Book 1. Being the genius that is me, I concluded there has to be at least a Book 2 and maybe more in the future. I sure hope so, as I enjoyed this one so much.

Finally I want to mention a book that has been recommended by Grace Draven (another favourite author of mine. I follow her on Facebook and thus tried this book):

Simple Man by Lydia Michaels



This is completely different from my usual paranormal reading habit. It tells the story of a young man, who led quite a difficult life. His parents died and he had to drop out of school and take odd jobs to take over the responsibility for his younger sister. He lives in a run-down trailer, works in construction, hangs out with his friends and sees his life more or less pass by him without any real goals. That is until the moment he finds out that his sister, who was killed in an accident, made him the guardian of his nephew, a baby of a few weeks.
He has no idea how to care for a baby or what he is in for, but he doesn’t hesitate a moment: of course he wants to care for the little boy.

I think this is one of the best books (mind you, it is still fiction, I don’t believe a single moment that it could all happen like this in real life) that I have read where I liked the hero so much. In a sense I think one can safely say that one can watch the young man become a responsible adult, find the love of his life and get to a place where he can live – well: happily ever after. Highly recommended!

As this is the last recommendation from me for this year, I want to wish you all a happy holiday season and a wonderful, happy year 2016 filled with (among other things of course) lots of good books. Take care until next time.



Aurian: Thanks for the recommendations Karin, and for giving me and my readers something different to try out during the year! I absolutely love the cover of the new Ilona Andrews novella, and I have to admit, Simple Man sounds wonderful. I will add that one to my wishlist. G.A. Aiken's dragons are not to my liking unfortunately.

© 2015 Reviews by Aurian