Review: Seven Souls A Leaping Anthology

Seven Souls A Leaping by Lisa Pietsch, K.F. Zuzulo and Heather Long

Publisher: Sapphire Blue Publishing
Genre: Paranormal Romance

Heat Rating: 2

Blurb

At the New England New Age (NENA) Investigations, no case is too weird. The paranormal detective agency relies on the familial talents of siblings Duncan and Samantha MacDougal and their cousin Tara Conroy. While Duncan and Samantha tend to the field work, Tara mans the office tapping sources in both the physical and spirit world. Fate takes a hand when a killer named Jeffrey Wiles begins a death-dealing spree that puts the lives and loves of these investigators on the line.



Lia’s Review

Frozen Hell by Lisa Pietsch:

Danyelle Roy is a private investigator feeling the pinch of the economy. When she begs her friend Murphy, a bail bondsman, to give her some work, he does so reluctantly. Jeffrey Wiles isn't the kind of criminal you want to send a cute redhead after. He slaughtered a 13-year-old girl while her parents slept and then used her blood to paint Satanic graffiti on the walls. Duncan MacDougal is a specialist in paranormal investigations and he's never seen anything like the Satanic spellcasting done by Jeffrey Wiles. When Duncan and Dani team up to capture Wiles, the magic is overpowering.

The instant I started reading this story I felt as though I was watching a bad movie filmed in a scenic location but with robots instead of actors. This story concentrated so much on details and what everything looked liked instead of character feelings. In the second scene of the story when Wiles attacks and kills a little girl, instead of her feeling any real emotion, all the details concentrated on the candles that Wiles lit. Although the story did get better as it progressed, it lacked conflict. I felt like the only reason that Dani and Duncan fell in love is because her cat told him they’re soul mates. I liked Dani, she was an enjoyable character, although the rest of the story needed to be developed more.


Star Light, Blood Bright by K.F. Zululo:

Samantha MacDougal can see auras. Her gift usually helps her pursue rascals and wraiths for her family’s business, New England New Age Investigations. But when she begins to track Satanic serial murderer Jeffrey Wiles along icy Boston streets, her own life’s light is in danger of being extinguished. She is alone in her struggle until handsome Boston detective Ike Marshall mysteriously provides a supernatural shield of light that warms her as never before.

I didn’t like this story at all. There was too much concentration on details (just like in the first) and no concentration on plot or character development. It lacked conflict, especially in the romance department. Ike Starr, the hero, had no personality whatsoever and Sam MacDougal was a very dumb heroine. When she started to see the evil specks of aura, instead of realizing them as Wiles spirit, she instead just wrote them off as nothing. Then, when Wiles (while possessing her neighbor) came to her door, and she was warned that it’s Wiles, Sam still opened the door instead of run and hide. By the end of this story, I was so annoyed with this heroine that I skipped the last three chapters and moved on to the last story.



13th Night by Heather Long:

Since the day she learned to put her ABCs together, Tara Conroy has been sharing a ghostly correspondence with the spirit world. One spirit, in particular, Darian, has been talking to her since she was twelve years old. His letters take a darker turn as she and her cousins hunt down killer Jeffrey Wiles.
Darian Barnes ran afoul of a witch in 1929 as the stock market crashed. She cursed him, and for nearly a century Darian has existed as a spirit, always seeing, never touching or experiencing, until one day he encountered Tara. For the first time in eighty years, someone could hear him. He watched over her, guiding, protecting and advising—always there when she needed a friend.
Now Darian and Tara must find a way to bring their love into the physical world and destroy Jeffrey Wiles once and for all…

After reading and being disappointed with the first two stories, I was a bit reluctant to read this one. I was very shocked to see that this one actually had a plot and well developed characters. The conflict wasn’t just a part of the plot, but there was conflict between the characters. Tara and Darian were both very enjoyable characters. I was rooting for them to succeed the entire time. This story was not filled with any of the purple prose the first two stories contained. It was an enjoyable end to this poorly written anthology. Ms Long definitely gained a new reader with her story.

2 ½ Tea Cups!

Review: Master of Mine—BDSM Anthology

Master of Mine—BDSM Anthology


Publisher: Evernight Publishing
Genre: BDSM Romance

Heat Rating: 3

Blurb

Pleasure is just a smack and gasp away, as men and women push their boundaries for sexual satisfaction in ways many can only dream of fulfilling.

A collection of BDSM short stories, Master of Mine will take you on an erotic escape with characters you won’t soon forget. From forced seduction to the tried and true, let the authors of this anthology take you on a ride screaming with pain and pleasure.


Wendy's Review

Well, I was so impressed and hot reading these 9 BDSM short stories!

I have to say each of these authors complimented each other in this book. The stories kept you hopping and the domination and submission of each character had you wanting more from each story. There isn't one story where it slowed down—it was one continuous hot sexual tension-filled book.

This reader has to say hats off to each of them!



Denied by Lauren Gallagher

Lauren took you into Domme, Lady Roxanne's world where she met Elliot who needed to feel real pain to enhance his sexual release. He knew that she was the one for him because she wasn't afraid to give a big strong man what he needs to find the fulfillment and pleasure through the pain he craved.


Tempted (Dark Lust) by Jenika Snow

Jenika's story had you wishing for your own vampires, tying you up and having their way with you. Athena wakes up after a night of drinking to find four vampires there to give her everything she ever craved. She was tied and told that she wasn't a prisoner but in the story she discovers that she was a prisoner in her own sexuality. She was enthralled in their dungeon as they gave her was she desired. Giving her pleasure through explicit words had her coming over and over.


Spice It Up by Alexandra O'Hurley

Alexandra brought a story of a woman who was missing a part of life that gives you the ultimate satisfaction in sex. Kellee began an online chat with a man that could give her what she craves. Jed and Kellee agreed to meet at the club to see where their online chat could take them. Entering the bdsm club was new to Kellee and she was thrilled and excited watching couples and threesome having open sex. When watching a show of a woman openly enjoying her partners, Kellie wanted more and Jed was more than ready to take her and show her what she was missing, including a spanking when needed.


Lady Blake's Tales for the Queen by Pepper Anthony

Pepper takes you to the queen's bedroom where Lady Blake tells a tale that has you wanting more and more. She weaves a story of a woman who needed to be shown that she was a submissive and that what she craved was alright, that punishment brings pleasure when given by her future husband. Lady Blake knew the queen was pleased and she was excited to have done a job well done.


After the Honeymoon by Rachel Clark

Rachel gave us a story of a married woman who was heading for a divorce due to not feeling the love they had when first dating. When a man and woman discover that they needed and craved the same things and that they almost lost everything because of it has you wanting to shake them and say, look you need this and you need to realize that she needs this. It actually took another couple to show them that because you are married, the honeymoon doesn't have to be over. Go into the lives that lead you to a world that has you second guessing your choices in marriage.


Hidden Pleasures by Ashlynn Monroe

Ashlynn brought a story of a couple who had a great marriage and vanilla sex, but when a wife comes home to her husband watching porn, Jill decided that she was going to approach Ty and ask him what was missing in their relationship. She already knew that she wanted more but hadn't realized that her husband wanted more. Taken back, Ty couldn't believe that Jill would understand and even want to learn more about his old life style, a life style that he gave up to marry his virgin bride. Together he teaches Jill exactly what he wants and was pleasantly surprised that his wife wanted, or better yet craved it. Great info for starting up in the lifestyle, of domination and submission.

Mistake by London Saint James
London gives us good girl goes to bad boy biker to get what she needs. She needs to feel dominated and controlled and for Xavier and Sienna their mutual needs lead to hard and fast sex. Xavier doesn't give Sienna the chance to think of their love as a mistake and he shows her what she can't deny. This book brings you on the brink of sexual satisfaction all on its own, wanting or more like needing, to be bad.


Bad Romance by Melissa Hosack

Melissa brings you on a paranormal romance of a woman who was doing her mother's dying wish of burning an old cabin down. What she didn't realize was the werewolves knew that she was there to kill off their breed, and Jason was there to kill Ashe before she could kill his breed. But what entailed was woman and man enthralled by each others animal instinct and mating begins. This story, for being so short, is everything a reader loves: romance, suspense, rough sex, and also tenderness.


Taken for Pleasure by Angelina Rain

Angelina showed in this story a misunderstanding can lead to all sorts of complications. Duncan Morrison couldn't believe that his soon to be ex-wife had a sexual disease, but it was the rumor around town. Alyssa couldn't help herself, she was so mad at her husband that when she saw his lover coming in to the doctor's office, she had to do something to make her leave him alone so the lie began. What she didn't count on was Duncan demanding to know, in his own dominating way, what happened. So together, through spanking and correcting past mistakes, the husband and wife came to terms with where the marriage broke down.

5 Tea Cups!

      

Review: Hearts of Fire anthology

Entwined Hearts: Hearts of Fire by Nicole Austin, TJ Michaels, Ciana Stone and N.J. Walters

Publisher: Ellora's Cave
Genre: Paranormal Romance

Heat Rating:2

Blurb

The Chosen. Eight strong individuals gifted with unique paranormal abilities and tasked with protecting shards of an ancient crystal—the Heart of Fire.

Brought together by destiny, each couple has managed to bond and fuse their crystal pairs through a hot and intense sexual joining. The four couples have overcome great personal challenges and remained apart, preparing to face an ancient evil once again.

Now the time has come for the eight Chosen to join forces and defeat Asmodeus, Prince of Hell, once and for all. Their plan is clear yet complex—activate a hidden energy network, gather on spiritual lands and fight an epic battle between good and evil, which will impact mankind for eternity.

Of course, nothing ever goes as planned. And Asmodeus has some tricks the Chosen never anticipated.



Claudette’s Review

Firstly this book is book five in the ‘Hearts of Fire’ series.
Four couples who each have been born with a destiny to hold a piece of a powerful jewel and destroy a major demon, the prince of Hell no less. Gifted with psychic powers, their love and sexual energy make them even more formidable in their quest to defeat their enemy.

This is not a book that can be read as a standalone. Like me unless you’ve read the previous books you’ll not only be hopelessly lost and barely be able to distinguish one couple from another, you’ll find that you can’t emotionally connect to any of the characters either. The book drops you straight into the action right from the beginning. Entwined Hearts is a short novel and by rights, it should have been added to the previous book; but because the previous books were each written by different authors, the concluding book is the one which all the authors have written the parts about their individual characters.

For me reading this book was like catching a film three quarters of the way in and enjoying it because it’s your kind of film, but not getting into it because you missed all the important bits.

By rights, this book would have very much benefitted from a long prologue covering the characters childhoods, how they each met and fell in love, and giving more insight into their individual characters and temperament. By book five the couples are all in love and established, and each set on the course to complete their destinies and reunite the powerful jewel -The Heart of Fire, so that it can be used for good and not be touched by the prince of Hell Asmodeus.
Since not even the couples visual appearance is described, it’s hard to have even a mental picture as a reader.

There are many times that I’ve read a book in a series and it has taken great lengths (sometimes way too much) recapping past events to get the reader up to speed with what had happened previously. It is so important to be able to understand the characters and their motivations. This alone would not have been enough in this case; the plot centred so much on them finally completing their destinies that they forgot to let us into the heart of the characters themselves.

I was really looking forward to this book, because I know that it was written by authors with amazing writing skills, especially since several of them are favourites of mine. This book is an exciting paranormal romantic adventure – but only if you have read all the previous books in the series.

2 Tea Cups!

Review: Wonder Anthology Edited by Selena Kitt

Wonder Anthology Edited by Selena Kitt

Publisher: eXcessica Publishing
Genre: Paranormal Romance

Heat Rating: 4

Blurb

Whether it’s werewolves, vampires, shapeshifters, angels, ghosts or aliens—these are stories with all of those strange and wonderfully sexy creatures that fascinate the human psyche! Come on a spicy, paranormal journey that ventures into titillating realms bound only the imaginations of your favorite eXcessica authors!


Kylie’s Review

Wonder is a paranormal anthology, consisting of twelve stories and authors, edited by Selena Kitt. Dealing with everything from vampires, vampyres, lycanthropes, werewolves, shifters, aliens, succubus, fae, fairies, angles, and ghosts. The writing is as varied as the subject matter, ranging from very good to mediocre. While not all of the stories end in happily ever after, or even happy for now, they all contain elements of physical, if not always romantic, relationships.

Sweet Revenge by Wynter O'Reilly is the story of a lycanthrope trying to track down and punish those responsible for the death of her brother and parents, while simultaneously dealing with the fact she is mated to a vampire. The plot while not entirely new, was interesting enough, however there were simply to many things going on for such a short story. The entire thing would have been better served in a full length novel.

Selena Kitt's On Cherry Hill is excellently written, but like many of her works this one delves into a dark and somewhat taboo area. On Cherry Hill deals with forced sex from an authority figure, in this case a police officer. While I didn't particularly care for the dark tone of the story, there is no denying it was very well written, with a twist at the end that I never saw coming.

D.B. Story takes us back to the roots of were wolf lore in his story Where I Am, adding his own little twist. All the basic elements are there a college boy gets bitten, searches for a cure, and meets a girl. In this story the bite is from a mosquito not a wolf, and instead of mauling and killing the girl of his dreams, our hero actually changes a she wolf into a werewolf like himself. What is an interesting take on the werewolf legends, unfortunately reads more like a bunch of scene ideas that have been thrown together. More of a plot outline than a story.

Marks by Sommer Marsden is the story of a woman dating a vampyre, with out knowing that he is a vampyre. Rather than being just another tale of vampyre and human romance, Marks focuses on the very intimate and erotic nature of the vampyre bite. Not your traditional love story, but instead looks at love and passions in a new and unique way. A story of gaining your ultimate desire and how that can either save or destroy you. Marks will forever change how you look at vampyre bites.

J.M. Snyder's One of Us, is a story that would never work out in real life, and that may be the thing I loved most about it. One of Us is a simple tale of boy meets boy, boy bites boy infecting him, boy helps boy thru his first shift, and boys run off into the woods and live happily ever after. There is an elegance about the simplicity of the story line, that makes is completely believable and unrealistic at the same time. In real life and love we overcomplicate things adding drama where there is no need for it. J.M. Snyder has taken people to their most basic elements and written a rich and wonderful story about them, that I absolutely loved. The plot the characters the writing it was all great, a true gem amidst so many others.

Claimed by Dakota Trace starts off like most shifter stories full of angst and aggression. The heroine is a jaguar/tiger hybrid and as such is shunned by her pack. The shifter elements of this story are the same one's that can be found in most shifter stories, where it differs, is when the heroine takes her human form. She is a veterinarian specializing in large cats, this puts her into a position to not only help the animals when needed but also to protect the shifter secret when they are the ones that get caught. Claimed is a decent story, there is nothing that stands out to make it great, but if your looking for a fun little shifter story it does the job credibly.

Medusa by Piers Anthony reads more like a adolescent male fantasy than the futuristic sci-fi story it was meant to be. In the not so distant future humans have found alien life, and are discovering other planets that will support our life forms. In great U.S. tradition there is a special interest group that looks after all the aliens we capture to ensure they are not being mistreated. Our hero is a member of said group and as such is tasked with looking after and documenting all things pertinent about an alien life form that was captured on a planet we are about to take over. During the course of the aliens incarceration our hero bonds with her, granted this happened after she morphs herself into a human form resembling a pin-up girl. In an attempt to escape the alien offers sex in exchange for help, and our hero very piously refuses all the while un-zipping his pants. I could go on, but suffice it to say the story proceeds as one would expect.

Overkill by Roxanne Rhoads is very aptly named. Our heroine is dating a vampire, who she frequently breaks up with and subsequently always takes back. Her favorite method to break up seems to be staking her boyfriend in one of his various body parts, of course never his heart. After being stabbed six times most people or vampires would get the hint, but this couple takes dysfunctional to a whole new level. I must say it was a truly different kind of love story but the level of drama was a bit much.

In Shifting Desire Elise Hepner combines the unlikely pair of fairies with BDSM, and makes it work. Of course any story that starts out with "I need an orgasm" is bound to catch attention. Shifting Desire caught mine and kept it to the very end. Fairies are always portrayed as so delicate, at least in body, that the idea of them practicing BDSM seems wrong somehow, and yet it worked very well. For those traditionalist out there, there was no leather and the bondage was done with magic rather than chains, but all in all it was a surprisingly good fit.

Darcy Sweet's The Choosing was perhaps the most erotic of all the stories. Since the beginning vampires have been portrayed as very sensual creatures, as well as blood sucking fiends. The premise being that vampires need not only blood to live but also the sensual and sexual energy of a special chosen one. What I really liked about this story is that instead of focusing on the vampires needs, we are focused on the kind of woman it takes to fulfill them. The Choosing was not at all what I thought it was going to be, and I was pleasantly surprised at it turned out to be.

I am still not entirely sure what Christable Roseau's Perchance to Dream is about. The heroine is a woman who has been severely abused by her ex-husband and is trying to get her life together. She seems to go from cowering in fear, to having erotic dreams about feathers at the drop of a hat. I believe that the author was trying to convey the importance of hope and eternal love, but don't hold me to that. The story, if I'm interpreting correctly, could have been very interesting but lacked the clarity to fully get the message across.

Last but not least is Butterfly Boy, by Erin O'Riordan. This is a completely unique story. A fairy that has been bit by a vampire bat and become something new and evil. Now I love all things paranormal, but this one was a little out there for me. The writing was good and the characters believable, but something about a vampire bat biting a fairy that I could not wrap my head around. So I leave it to you read the story and judge for yourselves.

The good the bad and the paranormal, this anthology contains it all. With so many stories and such a wide range of topics there is a little something for everyone here.

3 ½ Tea Cups!