Andrew D. Mellusco - The Mirror and The Meretrix

The Mirror & The Meretrix
Blackstone & Brenwen 


By Andrew D. Mellusco


Kindle Edition Available 





Product Description (from Amazon) 

Red Riding Hood is charged with murder and only her childhood sweetheart, the idealistic and roguish lawyer, Elliot Blackstone can rescue her. Joined by Blackstone & Associates' newest addition and fervently ambitious trainee, Centaur Epona Brenwen, he must uncover the plot behind Abigail Hood's incarceration before royal assassins, Rose Red and Snow White silence her for good.

Meanwhile Blackstone's lawyers, Sandman, Vincent Traum and, Fire-Nymph, Fury have their own problems as a seemingly innocuous insurance case involving a magic mirror turns deadly as a murderous and thieving band of seven Dwarf-Giants are released for lack of evidence.

Could these two cases be linked? And what is the real identity of Hansel, murder victim and robbery witness? All the lawyers do know is that somebody wants the magic mirror and will kill to get it. Elliot Blackstone just might be facing the last case of his talented but young life.

Blackstone & Brenwen - The Mirror & The Meretrix is an exhilarating legal thriller set in a fairy tale World-Tree, where peril lies behind every precedent and adventure within every adjudication. The term ‘magic circle law firm’ has never been so appropriate.

For those lovers of all things lawerish, fantastical, and all manner of craziness in-between.



About the Author (from Amazon)

Andrew was born in 1978. Raised in picturesque Lincoln he spent his infancy watching the jousting at the castle in summer, and his childhood playing kiss chase in the fields behind his house; he always wanted to be a knight... or a rogue... a knightish rogue perhaps? Having escaped an adjuster's life in London Insurance land, Andrew now teaches English as a foreign language. He has taught in Thailand, Taiwan, Argentina and is now teaching in Spain. Andrew is currently working on his second Blackstone & Brenwen novel.

http://blackstoneandbrenwen.weebly.com


O.Scarlett! REVIEW by Kendra

I love reading Fairy Tales written in new and unusual ways. When the author contacted us asking us to review this book, I was intrigued by the combination of Fairy Tales with lawyers! And, while I’m not a huge fan of the crime genre, I do like a good mystery, and, as I’ve said before, it was combined with Fairy Tales. His website decided it for me. It has to be one of the best Author sites I’ve ever seen!

So I offered to read and review it.

For the most part, I really enjoyed it. There were at least twenty Fairy Tales worked in. They weren’t completely true to the Fairy Tales, but they were usually clearly recognizable. I even found Charles Perrault, a fairy tale writer, in there. “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,” “Snow White and Rose Red,” and “Jack and the Beanstalk”  were the most important and prominent, but I really enjoyed the scene where Elliot visits the tailor shops and meets “The Brave Little Tailor” and the two imposters who are making “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” There were even a few of the more obscure Fairy Tales.

The main characters were Elliot, Vincent, Fury and Epona. Elliot is half angel and is a Criminal Defendant, Vincent is a Sandman and is in Finance, Fury is a Fire Nymph and is in Insurance, and Epona is a Centaur, and is Elliot’s new trainee. They were pretty well developed, although I found the Vincent/Fury romance a tad bit sudden on Fury’s part.

I didn’t find very many plot issues, but there were a few glaring ones. For instance, I had Vincent’s and Elliot’s parentages mixed up for a while, due to the fact that Vincent’s was explained in a flashback before Elliot’s is explained, and, at that point, Vincent had not been properly introduced. Also, it is stated that Elliot’s angelic parentage is secret from Vincent; however, Vincent seems fully aware that Asmodeus is Elliot’s uncle.

I did have some issues with the angelic/demon part. In this book the angels are, for the most part, bad, and the demons are good. The “fall” of the demons had been because they thought that the humans ought to be considered as part of society and ought to be protected, and the angles thought that they were parasites. Also, Elliot was too much of a womanizer for my tastes.

The World-Tree was an interesting concept. However, I was not able to completely form a good image of it in my head. I’m sure the author has it completely worked out, but I couldn’t quite merge the scenery with a tree. I really tried.

Also, the meretrixes, which were important enough to be in the title, were not explained until nearly the end. If they had been explained sooner, things would have made much better sense for me. From various clues, I had assumed that they were a sort of waiting maid to the queen. However, they were more of a companion for single male visitors of importance. They sit beside them at meals, dance with them at balls, or even simply take walks with them in the garden. They are supposed to be perfectly beautiful and to not have relationships.

Other than those issues, I really enjoyed the book. I can really see this author becoming quite popular. The plot was amazing! Elliot kept me guessing as to what string he would next pull to get them to bring Abigail to justice. The story was told in a rather all-knowing sort of way, so often the only mystery was what was going through Elliot’s head. However, there was a proper balance of stuff for me to foresee, and stuff for me to be surprised at, so it wasn’t bad. I love how the Fairy Tales were used – usually in completely unexpected ways. The plot was genius, pure genius.


Note: This was border line for me when it comes to sexual content. Nothing was described, but it was referred to a lot, and was even observed fleetingly in the second chapter. If it had been any worse, I would have handed it up to my mother, although I’m not sure she would have enjoyed the crime/lawyer plot as much as I did, as that is even less of her genre than it is mine.

Genre/Theme: Lawyers, Fantasy, Fairy Tales, crime/murder mystery
Reading Level: MATURE TEEN - college to
ADULT - self-explanatory 
Profanity:  LOW - few mildly offensive words. Mostly British and words unique to the World Tree
Sexuality:  OBVIOUS - blatant sexuality in text, but not explicit. No details, but two characters are obviously making love in the second chapter. Elliot is stated to have slept around (including, it’s hinted, with Fury), and his room is decorated with stuff like a nude Valkyrie pen holder and a fertility headdress. 
Other: The murderess bites a hole out of the victim’s windpipe, then drinks some of his blood.  The two assassins do quite a bit of killing, some of it quite bloody. The victim’s body is rather gruesome. There is quite a bit of death, actually. Drinking is encouraged by the Lawyer firm, one of the mottos being “a problem shared over a drink is a problem solved.” There is also some witchcraft.

Kate Bloomfield - Frost Arch

Frost Arch
Frost Mage Trilogy #1

by Kate Bloomfield
Elizabeth Hay, Editor

Kindle Edition Available



Product Description (from Amazon)
In a future where ignorance has destroyed the world that we know, humans are slaves and Mages - advanced beings with abilities beyond everyday reach - rule the land.

Avalon Redding is one such Mage. Barely eighteen years of age, she wields the gift of fire yet she is unable to control it. She leaves her family in the dead of night and heads to the city of Frost Arch, her future seemingly grim.

Will Avalon be able to overcome the trials that befall her? Will she be able to save the ones she loves and stay strong within herself?

Time will tell.

'Frost Arch' is the first book in The Fire Mage trilogy

(Approx 115,000 words - 6136 Kindle Locations)

Book #2 is due for release in August 2012

About the Author (from Amazon)

Kate Bloomfield was born in London, and grew up in Australia. Kate spent her youth studying Graphic Arts, before working as a full time Artist, and writing in her spare time. Her first book 'Frost Arch' (Published Feb 2012) is part one in a soon to be released trilogy.
Follow Kate on Twitter: @KateBloomfield
Check out Kate's blog for updates on her writing: www.katebloomfieldauthor.blogspot.com.au

This biography was provided by the author or their representative.

---

O.Scarlett! Review by Rachel

I found this book for Free via the Pixel’s of Ink, Young Edition. 

This is book 1 of a yet unwritten trilogy.  Book 2 is to come out later this year.  The book is written first person, from 18 year old Avalon’s point of view.

The prologue gives an excellent overview of the setting and culture where Avalon lives.  This is a world over 1,000 years after the collapse of our world, a popular setting.  There was a huge war between the magic power-weilding Mages, and the technical Humans.  The Mages won, and all Humans were treated as nothing more than work beasts, without rights or feeling or language.  ----  It was feared that Avalon’s little sister had been born a human, and their family went to great lengths to hide her.

-----  Basic Plot  ----

Avalon is a Fire Mage, but she has very little control of her powers.  Both of her parents are also Fire Mages.  She also has a younger sister which shows no talent at all.  After several near disasters with her sister, Avalon decides that the best choice is for her to run away.

She finds a ride with the old man that has a delivery mail service.  He allows her to ride in his carriage, with the instructions to leave a small box alone – as it contains a dangerous animal found in the wild.  By the end of the ride, she decides to rescue the little animal from a life as a science experiment.

She finally arrives at a city, Frost Arch, where it is the depth of winter.  In fact, it is always winter here.   She quickly finds a job, lighting fires at the Forsythe manor house, and warming up the tubs of water.  She meets a young man, Jack, who is the Healer there, and helps her find the house and get settled.  He teaches her all the duties that she will be performing, and helps her learn her routines.  She enjoys his friendly helpfulness and counts him as her first real friend.  She learns most of what she needs to know to survive in the real world from Jack.  She also meets a black haired girl named Raeven, who works at the post office.

Her first night, she discovers that the little animal that she rescued and she thought she had let free, was still with her.  It was a tiny fox with wings, and he is able to camouflage himself, and appears to be able to understand her.  It doesn’t stay tiny for long, and by the end of the week, Jack has discovered her pet, and joined her in an attempt to hide it. 

Jack talks to his friend Camryn, who raises and trains the Master’s Pegasi horses.  Camryn reluctantly agrees to hide the pup in a stall, and quickly becomes attached to the little creature.  Within days, he has grown as large as most of her horses.  They decide to train him to fly, but Hawthorne seems to be tethered to the ground and is unable to soar.

The Forsythe’s have two grown children named Noah and Rain.  Avalon catches Noah’s eye the first night he arrives.  He quickly becomes attached to her and grants her many favors, seeming to enjoy her company.  She has no idea why Jack and Camryn are so concerned that she stay away from Noah.  It is apparent that they know something they are hiding from her, and so she hides his growing attention from her new friends.  One night ends very badly, and Noah is gone the next day.  Avalon is much the wiser; unfortunately, the event has caused her to lose her powers.  

Nothing Jack does seems to help her regain her powers, but he teaches her to light fire the old way, with matches..  Charles lets her stay, for now, doing more housework and other light duty in hopes that she will recover her powers.  During this time, Jack urges her to try getting Hawthorne to fly with her on his back, and it works.  And then suddenly, Hawthorn disappears.

Things go from bad to worse, as Avalon gives in to curiosity, and finds a door at the top of a forbidden staircase.  She slips inside and finds that her Master has much to hide – forbidden items from the ancient days are throughout the room ..., and then Master Forsythe returns.  Almost - she gets away with it by hiding, and then something happens; she is discovered and damages many items, including Mr. Forsythe’s face, while she tries to escape.  She is now a fugitive.  Soon she is captured, and placed in a prison for humans.

To her amazement, Jack and Raeven rescue her.  After recovering at Raeven’s house, the three of them make plans to rescue Hawthorne, who has been captured by Miss Frost – the ruler Mage of the city.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The book is fairly well written, and I found myself easily drawn into the characters and the story.    It was easy to become involved in the world, but it did seem to take forever to develop the plot.  Plus, if you were reading carefully, the ending is quite predictable.  It is a lengthy book, but enough new material keeps popping up to keep it more enjoyable than not. 

Note:

Usually, books rated for 9 – 12 year olds hold little or no reference to the “real world”.  So I was very shocked to find more than the usual, “He found her attractive and wished to kiss her” as part of the romance, and a rather more detailed than I would like rape.  There was also several mentions of Raeven having romantic feeling for Avalon, although the affection shown was never more than sisterly. 

I personally, would not hand this to a child under the age of 13, and would discuss parts of it with my child if they were younger or more immature.

The magic involved is not “normal” magic.  Each of the Mages posseses some talent.  Avalon’s power or talent is to control fire.  Miss Frost controls ice and cold.  Jack has a talent for Healing.  Some can tell if you are lying, or cause you to see an illusion.  Mages are ranked from 1 – 10.  Avalon is a 5 – strong enough to work and hold her own in society without a problem.  Miss Frost is a 9.  Anyone beyond a 9, it is assumed would go mad trying to keep their power under control.  Some have useless powers, but as long as they have one, they are at least “not human” which means no talent of any kind and a live of slavery and imprisonment.

Genre/Theme: Post-apocalyptic, Fantasy, Coming of Age,

Reading Level: (by appropriateness)   TEEN - middle school and up – due to a few violent scenes including one of near rape  
 Profanity: (by amount in text)  LOW - few mildly offensive words 
 Sexuality:   SUBTLE - hinted, but not explicit 
MILD - descriptions of affection/desire 

The most graphic scene involves Noah nearly raping Avalon.  
 Other: 
For the most part – this has little or no comment about sex or violence or bad language.  But there are discussions of romantic feelings between the main female character, Avalon, and the two people she interacts with the most – one male and the other female.  There is quite a lot of violence, but it is mostly glossed over without graphic detail, although there is plenty of detail for anyone with a good imagination.  Some of the more graphic spots include, one attempted rape,  Avalon trying to escape her master after sneaking into his secret room, life in the human prison, and the final fight between Avalon and the main Mage of Frost Arch.  She also steals her pet flying fox, and the man transporting it is killed as a result.

Lauren Howell - ROWAN

Rowan
Kelly Foster

by Lauren Howell
Paperback Available through Amazon

Product Description (From Amazon)

Jake, a dragon who wears orange Chuck Taylors, shows up in Kelly Foster’s living room disguised as a human. When he starts going on about a lost sword, a magical pendant and Stonehenge being the gatekeeper to the lost city of Atlantis, Kelly feels a little more than skeptical. But when Jake tells her it could all be the key to finding her father, Kelly doesn’t hesitate to jump on board. Swept away to the world of Rowan, she picks up a band of followers along the way, Henry, Tyler, Sky, and Caesius. Will they help her find her father or will someone more sinister cause their paths to go in opposite directions. Will Kelly do what she came to do then go home? Because the fate of Rowan is up to her.

O.Scarlett! REVIEW by Rachel

 I found the story to be exciting enough to read it from beginning to end in a very short while. The story itself was good - and I enjoyed it.

The idea of a girl suddenly being asked to join a boy on an adventure who claims to be a dragon caught my attention - add in Atlantis and a magical world, and I was willing to give it a shot. It was a fun story that hummed along at a good pace so you stayed around in spite of the many grammar errors and abrupt scene changes, unless you really get offended by editing issues .... such as the dwarves going to rescue the dwarves (instead of the elves).

There were also a lot of spots that left me shaking my head ... she got dropped into the ocean in the middle of a storm and still had her back pack with the dragons shoes when she woke up on the shore? Wouldn't it have drug her under and drowned her? or maybe have been dropped to the bottom of the ocean?  

I never really figured out the scenes with the tree houses with Sky either ... it needed more, or maybe less.  I was unsure where people were going or coming from, Sky had washed up the island alone many years before when her parents were lost in a boat during a storm.  She learned to use some kind of magic force to survive and create an elaborate tree house complex.  During the time she was there, many others were marooned on the island with her.

There was also a lot of repetition of comments ... they get to a stream, and one gets a drink and then the next one gets a drink and then the next one, and then they all get a drink.... .... there are several spots like that.

But the ending left me with a frown ... I didn't mind the abrupt ending or the sudden shift to weeks after (although shifts like that should have had a chapter break - or a page break – or dots - to warn us that a scene change or time jump was coming - I could sometimes get several pages of confusion before I finally tripped on a clue that made me realize that we had changed scenes.  Perhaps this is a Kindle formatting issue.... )  BUT ... they are setting up for a big war and the whole battle is so anti-climatic ... Like being excited to go to a hot air balloon show and finding out the balloons are not going to get off the ground.

It has a lot of potential. It is a great story, just needs a tad more polishing for readability.

Notes:

This is a light hearted fun tale that makes an excellent rainy afternoon book.  Most young teens will find this a great adventure read that inspires the imagination and provides more than one hearty laugh or gasp of fear.

Genre/Theme:   Fantasy – Dragons, Atlantis, Parallel Demisional Travel
Reading Level:   Teen
Profanity:  Low
Sexuality:  Mild

There is some attraction between two characters who turn out to be brother and sister.  From reading other reviews, this did bother some people.

Later, two of the characters are caught “making out” and there is a lot of focus on the hurt feelings afterwards.  There is “teen drama” in this book.  There is also a nod toward the green agenda and all religions are roads to God philosophy.

Ben Woodard - The Boy Who Flew With Eagles

The Boy Who Flew With Eagles
Mythic Adventure Collection #1


by Ben Woodard
illustrated by Laura Leikona

Kindle Edition Available




Product Description (From Amazon)
Famine. A giant eagle. And a boy who would be prey.

The book combines excitement, adventure, and the dream of all humans. To fly. Naa'ki, a boy snatched by a giant eagle, must use his wits and knowledge to survive. And to save his people and animals from starvation. To succeed, he will have to give up his future.

O.Scarlett! REVIEW by Tenya

Having been raised in the Pacific Northwest, I have a great appreciation for these kind of Native American tales, full of wisdom and a true appreciation for the natural world.

Ben Woodard has woven this story beautifully. It's easy to read. As an adult, I enjoyed it immensely. What human has not wished to soar on the wind? I was charmed from the first sentence. Wonderful!

As a homeschooler of 13+ years, I recommend this book as an example of Native American folklore and as a thought-provoking, unobtrusive invitation to wildlife conservation. Most third or fourth graders should be able to read this book on their own, and even those into their teens will probably enjoy it. Even though it is aimed at boys, which is fantastic, I think many young ladies will value it as well.

Notes:
Additionally, the illustrations by Laura Leikona which highlight each chapter are simple and beautiful.  Between the lovely aesthetic of this book and the good writing, it's a must read for all families, and especially for boys.  One of Ben Woodard's goals is to create books which excite young men about reading.

Genre/Theme:  Native American Tales, Children's Literature, Wildlife Conservation
Reading Level:  CHILD to ADULT - Most 3rd graders should be able to read this book independently.
Profanity: NONE
Sexuality: NONE