The Librain……retired

Welcome to this week’s post! Today, I am doing something a bit different, which you will see later in the post…

Usually, I write these posts about the books that I have finished reading during the previous week. Regular visitors will know that I have been working my way through the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews. I have now reached the final book and am about a third of the way through. As it is such a long series (ten books plus numerous novellas), I don’t want to keep writing about it for yet another week so I am drawing it all to a close today.

These are the blurbs for each book:

First we have Magic Shifts…

After breaking from life with the Pack, mercenary Kate Daniels and her mate—former Beast Lord Curran Lennart—are adjusting to a very different pace. While they’re thrilled to escape all the infighting, Curran misses the constant challenges of leading the shapeshifters.

So when the Pack offers him its stake in the Mercenary Guild, Curran seizes the opportunity—too bad the Guild wants nothing to do with him and Kate. Luckily, as a veteran merc, Kate can take over any of the Guild’s unfinished jobs in order to bring in money and build their reputation. But what Kate and Curran don’t realize is that the odd jobs they’ve been working are all connected.

An ancient enemy has arisen, and Kate and Curran are the only ones who can stop it—before it takes their city apart piece by piece…

Then Magic Binds…

Kate and the former Beast Lord Curran Lennart are finally making their relationship official. But there are some steep obstacles standing in the way of their walk to the altar…

Kate’s father, Roland, has kidnapped the demigod Saiman and is slowly bleeding him dry in his never-ending bid for power. A Witch Oracle has predicted that if Kate marries the man she loves, Atlanta will burn and she will lose him forever. And the only person Kate can ask for help is long dead.

The odds are impossible. The future is grim. But Kate Daniels has never been one to play by the rules…

And finally Magic Triumphs…

Kate has come a long way from her origins as a loner taking care of paranormal problems in post-Shift Atlanta. She’s made friends and enemies. She’s found love and started a family with Curran Lennart, the former Beast Lord. But her magic is too strong for the power players of the world to let her be.

Kate and her father, Roland, currently have an uneasy truce, but when he starts testing her defenses again, she knows that sooner or later, a confrontation is inevitable. The Witch Oracle has begun seeing visions of blood, fire, and human bones. And when a mysterious box is delivered to Kate’s doorstep, a threat of war from the ancient enemy who nearly destroyed her family, she knows their time is up.

Kate Daniels sees no other choice but to combine forces with the unlikeliest of allies. She knows betrayal is inevitable. She knows she may not survive the coming battle. But she has to try.

For her child.

For Atlanta.

For the world.

I must admit that I am feeling quite sad at coming to the end of the series. These stories have been the perfect escapism from my daily struggles with illness and depression. The characters are well drawn and interesting, the settings are detailed and the plots are exciting and gripping. As for the many monsters, what can I say? The authors surpass themselves with each book, creating ingenious and dangerous creatures. I will now try to decide what is going to follow these books! I have a lot of ebooks queueing on my iPad, so the decision may be quite difficult to make.

Anyway, I will write about my choice in next Wednesday’s post. So, until then…

Happy Reading everyone!

Love and best wishes,

Anne

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Welcome to this week’s reading post! I think I am currently doing something that I have never done before during my reading journey: reading such a long series at one go. OK, I was temporarily diverted by some books that I couldn’t bring myself to finish, but I went straight back to Ilona Andrews’ Kate Daniels series. I am enjoying them so much that I am sure I will feel quite bereft when I reach the end! Mind you, there are also numerous novellas set in the same world.

Anyway, these are the booms that I have finished since my last Reading Roundup post…

The two books are numbers 6 and 7 in the series, Magic Rises and Magic Breaks. Here is the blurb for the first one…

It’s a volatile world: waves of magic and technology fight and feed off each other, monsters prowl the streets, werebears, cats, hyenas stalk their prey, and Masters of the Dead ‘pilot’ blood-starved vampires with their minds.

In Atlanta, lives Kate Daniels, former mercenary, Knight of the Order of Merciful Protection, world class swordswoman and smart-mouth, and – recently – mate to Curran, the Beast Lord of Atlanta’s Pack. His problems are now hers, and this one is particularly heartrending – many of the Pack’s shapeshifting children can’t control their beast nature and are doomed to perish. 

A medicine can help – but it’s controlled by the European shapeshifters, who’ve proposed a devil’s bargain to Kate and Curran: In return for the medicine, they must arbitrate a thorny dispute…which promises to send them straight into a deadly trap…

And this is the blurb for Magic Breaks…

Atlanta’s paranormal communities are on the brink of destruction…but one thing is certain: where there’s a fire…Kate Daniels will be lighting her own match…

Now that she’s official mate of the Beast Lord, Curran, former mercenary, Knight of the Order of Merciful Protection, world class swordswoman and professional smart-mouth Kate Daniels has way too much on her plate. Besides her own investigative business, she now shoulders the responsibilities of Atlanta’s large and unruly Pack…whose prominence has generated it’s own special problem by catching the attention of Roland, an ancient and godlike wielder of magic, whose powers are as devastating as his cruelty.

A deadly, epic confrontation is inevitable; the mysterious death of one of the Masters of the Dead during a Conclave of all the supernatural forces of Atlanta adds further tension to an already explosive situation. Now Kate must expose the killer AND prepare for the mayhem about to ensue; knowing that Roland’s attention will be especially focused on her—and those closest to her!

Once again, this series hit just the right spot for me with interesting characters and ingenious plots. The magical monsters get more and more outrageous and the books are absorbing escapism. Just what I need at this time in my life!

I intend to read until the end of the series and then choose something different, leaving the novellas to another time. I have so many wonderful books in my TBR digital pile that I am sure I will be able to choose another great read. Well, I hope so.

Happy Reading!

Love and best wishes,

Anne

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Here’s this week’s post about my reading. During the last seven days I have finished two books in a very long series, decided to take a break to read something else, then returned to the series!

These are the books that I have completed…

The series I am currently enjoying is Ilona Andrews’ Kate Daniels. This week I read numbers 4 and 5 in the series, Magic Bleeds and Magic Slays. These are the blurbs…

First, for Magic Bleeds…

In an Atlanta caught between magic and technology, every dark corner hides a danger. And when a fight breaks out at the Steel Horse bar, a local hangout right between shapeshifter and necromancer territory, Kate Daniels, working for the Order of the Knights of Merciful Aid, is sent to investigate the aftermath.

What she finds is an opponent more powerful, ancient, and deadly than she’s ever seen; and way beyond her power to fight, known as The City Eater. She could ask for backup from Curran, the Beast Lord – but he just stood her up for their date. No way does he get out of that trouble by a nice, easy death. Not only that, but this fight is personal: because Kate soon discovers that the City Eater is family….

Then for Magic Slays…

She may have left the Order of the Knights of Merciful Aid; she may (finally) be officially mated to the Beast Lord—but she still has her attack poodle, Grendel, and ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ Andrea in her corner…and in Kate Daniel’s magic-blasted Atlanta, the mayhem always remains the same. 

Work has been slow at Kate’s new business, but things get messy quickly when a rogue vampire shows up on Kate’s doorstep and Ghastek, Atlanta’s premier Master of the Dead, presents a little problem: his handlers have mysteriously been losing control, and this is not an isolated incident. Almost immediately another tricky case lands in her lap, courtesy of a furtive visit from an elite member of the Red Guard, who needs her help finding a kidnapped scientist and the mysterious device he’s been working on. Oh, and something is eating magic wards. 

As Kate dives into action, she discovers that she may be at the beginning of The End; and that Atlanta is sure to be destroyed if she can’t connect the right dots, and stop a powerful—and vengeful—group determined to wipe out the entire magic community.

So, I got to the end of book five. I have found the series, so far, to be just the ticket! With my current state of physical and mental health, the series has taken me right out of my struggling brain to over the top, magical, violent, wise-cracking and insane characters leading over the top, magical, violent and romantic lives in a well-realised fantasy world. After five books (there are ten in the series plus numerous novellas), I then thought I might try something else for a while before returning to the series. So I tried this…

The book I tried to read was Of Blood and Fire by Ryan Cahill. I actually managed to read a quarter of it before putting it aside. I found the plot so boring and predictable with so much “borrowed” from other, better books. I might return to it in the future, but really doubt it!

So, back to the world of mad, magical fantasy with the Kate Daniels series 😅😂😅.

Happy Reading to you all.

Love and best wishes,

Anne

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Well, it’s Wednesday again so time to write about my reading journey. After last week’s debacle I decided to return to Ilona Andrew’s books, this time to her Kate Daniels series. I have now finished the first three…

These are the blurbs. First for Magic Bites…

When the magic is up, rogue mages cast their spells and monsters appear, while guns refuse to fire and cars fail to start. But then technology returns, and the magic recedes as unpredictably as it arose, leaving all kinds of paranormal problems in its wake.

Kate Daniels is a down-on-her-luck mercenary who makes her living cleaning up these magical problems. But when Kate’s guardian is murdered, her quest for justice draws her into a power struggle between two strong factions within Atlanta’s magic circles.

The Masters of the Dead, necromancers who can control vampires, and the Pack, a paramilitary clan of shapechangers, blame each other for a series of bizarre killings—and the death of Kate’s guardian may be part of the same mystery. Pressured by both sides to find the killer, Kate realizes she’s way out of her league—but she wouldn’t have it any other way…

Then Magic Burns…

Down in Atlanta, tempers – and temperatures – are about to flare…

As a mercenary who cleans up after magic gone wrong, Kate Daniels has seen her share of occupational hazards. Normally, waves of paranormal energy ebb and flow across Atlanta like a tide. But once every seven years, a flare comes, a time when magic runs rampant. Now Kate’s going to have to deal with problems on a much bigger scale: a divine one.

When Kate sets out to retrieve a set of stolen maps for the Pack, Atlanta’s paramilitary clan of shapeshifters, she quickly realizes much more at stake. During a flare, gods and goddesses can manifest – and battle for power. The stolen maps are only the opening gambit in an epic tug-of-war between two gods hoping for rebirth. And if Kate can’t stop the cataclysmic showdown, the city may not survive…

Then finally Magic Strikes…

Drafted into working for the Order of Merciful Aid, mercenary Kate Daniels has more paranormal problems than she knows what to do with these days. And in Atlanta, where magic comes and goes like the tide, that’s saying a lot.

But when Kate’s werewolf friend Derek is discovered nearly dead, she must confront her greatest challenge yet. As her investigation leads her to the Midnight Games – an invitation only, no holds barred, ultimate preternatural fighting tournament – she and Curran, the Lord of the Beasts, uncover a dark plot that may forever alter the face of Atlanta’s shapeshifting community…

By the way, I know that “Ilona Andrews” is a pen name for a husband and wife duo, but I can’t stop using “she” and “her”!!

I am not going to write separate reviews for each book on Goodreads as I powered through these stories and enjoyed them immensely. To be honest, the plots have now blurred together in my brain! I loved the heroine, Kate Daniels, a young woman with terrific fighting skills, a strong sense of purpose and a wry humour. The world building and the range of fantastic monsters were imaginative and well drawn. The plots and sense of place were also very well written. I knocked off a star for some small annoying things such as the repetitive descriptions of buildings, but otherwise I enjoyed the writing.

Apparently, there are at least ten books and several novellas in the series, so I will probably move on to something else soon and return at a later time. I have started the fourth book, so I will let you know how that one goes next week.

So, back to the world of monsters and mayhem! Happy Reading everyone!

Love and best wishes,

Anne

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