100 Book Challenge - Book 28 - Grave Dance

Book 28 / 100

Book: Grave Dance (Alex Craft #2)

Author: Kalayna Price

ISBN: 978-0-451-46409-5

Pages: 371

Having spent a month recovering from the events of Grave Witch (the first book in the series), Alex Craft is ready to go back to work, solving murders and raising the dead would help take her mind off her complicated love life, her absentee love interest, Fae Investigation Bureau agent Falin Andrews and the "L-word" confession from Death.

Of course, that doesn't mean that the job is any less confusing.

Bodies with only parts left, in fact only left feet left behind. As she begins to investigate, two attacks by creatures created by a mix of witch and fae magic force her to defend herself with the help of some of her new powers, but the worse is yet to come as destroying the constructs leave behind tears into the Aetheric which brings her to the attention of a cult of Skimmers (normals that leech magical power off others) and the FIB who answer directly to The Winter Queen.

Can Alex survive the attacks, avoid the FIB, the Skimmers, and The Winter Queen, and solve the murders and the other mysteries that come her way?

Rating 5 out of 5 ghosts. I’m loving the Alex Craft series, it blends the mortal world, the Faerie world, and so many other worlds it’s not funny, even in this case, the Nightmare world. I love how Alex’s powers are evolving, and how it almost seems she’s ramping up the powers, almost reminiscent of the Anita Blake novels in that regards.

100 Book Challenge - Book 26 - Beautiful Redemption

Book 26 / 100

Book: Beautiful Redemption (Caster Chronicles #4)

Author: Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

ASIN: B00936ROW4

Pages: 465

Ethan Wate is dead. But that, as they say, was just the beginning of his adventure.

Having given his life to restore The Order, Ethan finds himself in the Otherworld. With the help of his mother, Aunt Prue, a Dark Caster and a hideous bat/human monster he begins a journey to find his way back to the Mortal World and the love of his life Lena Duchannes.

Lena has to continue on, not giving up hope that Ethan would find his way back to her, so when Ethan finds a way to communicate with her from the Otherworld, things begin to fall into place that would lead to the final showdown with the evil Abraham Ravenwood for possession of The Book of Moons, a key piece in Ethan’s quest.

As Ethan continues his quest, he learns the truth about his fate, and the dark heart of the Far Keep and how one Mortal man’s quest for power lead to things that were never meant to be. Can Ethan face the evilest of Keepers, Angelus, and win his freedom to return to the mortal world?

 Rating... 5 out of 5 spells. This folks, this is the final chapter in what I would almost call an epic story of love, loss and magic. And while it does drag in a couple of places, it almost feels as if that was intentional to make you feel what Ethan is feeling. I highly recommend this book series, you can’t just read one, you gotta do them all.

100 Book Challenge - Book 25 - Beautiful Chaos

Book 25 / 100

Book: Beautiful Chaos (Caster Chronicles #3)

Author: Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

ASIN: B005JZD382

Pages: 529

The Order is broken. It’s the End of Days.

With Lena’s choice to be herself and claimed by neither and both light and dark, chaos is reigning on Earth. The signs of the apocalypse are descending on the small town of Gatlin. The casters and supernatural folk are finding that their powers are off, the mortals are cowering in fear. Meanwhile Abraham Ravenwood is searching for the hybrid Incubus John Breed, with urgency as the Eighteenth Moon approaches.

There is one way to save the world, Gatlin, Lena, Link and all Ethan’s loved ones. A sacrifice that must be made in order to bring about The New Order. The One Who Is Two. But just who is this person, and can they find them before the Eighteenth Moon?

Rating... 5 out of 5 spells. Okay, so it should be clear to anyone reading all my reviews that I am loving this series... Although I must caution you, if you’re anything like me you will need a box of tissues around for the end of this book, trust me on this.

100 Book Challenge - Book 24 - Beautiful Darkness

Book 24 / 100
Book: Beautiful Darkness (Caster Chronicles #2)
Author: Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
ASIN: B00457X7IQ
Pages: 513

Beautiful Darkness picks up where Beautiful Creatures left off with Lena unclaimed by light or dark and the future of both sides of her family hanging in the balance... But not deciding and saving Ethan has had a bad effect on Lena... Especially with the consequence of taking Macon's life!

Lena begins to descend into darkness, egged on by her cousin Ridley and the mysterious John Breed and in doing so she pulls away from the one person who can help her out... John convinces her that The Great Barrier is the place to go to find the answers to all her questions.

With Ethan, Link and a Keeper-in-Training, Liv, following closely they head into the Caster tunnels heading for the place where the mortal and Caster worlds meet. Meanwhile Lena's mother and the evil Abraham begin to turn the tide of things in the natural order, swaying Lena to the dark side.

With help from the light casters and from beyond the grave can Ethan reach Lena in time to save her from herself and her mother and ancestor?

Rating... 4 out of 5 spells. If you enjoyed the first book then this will be a must read. If you haven't read the first book then I recommend reading that first then picking this one up.

100 Book Challenge - Book 22 - Grave Witch

Book 22/ 100

Book: Grave Witch (Alex Craft #1)

Author: Kalayna Price

ISBN: 978-0-451-46380-7

Pages: 325

Alex Craft is wyrd. A Grave Witch who has the power to talk to the dead, raise their shades, and see into the realm of the dead. As it happens she’s also a private investigator and consultant to the police. And, much to her dislike, the daughter of the new Governor and Humans First Party supporter.

Add to all that the fact her finances are drying up, and she’s just been drafted to do a pro-bono raising for the police, and things are looking a little grim. But still, there’s Death, who looks great in jeans, and homicide detective Falin Andrews, who both help her to work out the twists and turns in the case she’s investigating… The death of the previous Governor. And it’s going to take all her wyrd abilities to pull it off.

Rating… 4 out of 5 gargoyles. I really enjoyed this book, it was a little slow at the start, but you got the pay-off for sticking with it. In the world of the book, the Fae (or fairies if you insist) have come out of the mushroom ring and the witches out of the broom closet, the folded spaces have unfolded and suddenly the world was a much larger, and magical place. I love stories like this that fold the fantasy into the reality of the world as it is, it’s almost enough to make one believe that there are things like that out there… Now I gotta wait for book #2 in the series to arrive.

100 Book Challenge - Book 12 - The Reckoning

Book 12 / 100

Book: The Reckoning (Darkest Powers Trilogy #3)

Author: Kelley Armstrong

ISBN: 978-0-06-145056-3

Pages: 391

Picking up where The Awakening left off, Chloe and her friends have found a safe refuge with Andrew, a friend of the boy’s father. With the help of other supernaturals they start to understand a little more about their powers, and realize just how unpredictable they are, at least in Tori and Chloe’s cases, Simon and Derek however are shown to be successes, Simon cannot see other sorcerers and witches, and Derek is peaceful and calm and in control in wolf form.

While Chloe is being trained to control her powers, things go out of control and she begins to raise a cemetery, demonstrating in no uncertain terms that this group of supernaturals were something to be feared.

That act sends them down a path that leads straight back to the Edison Group, with several dead bodies littered along the way. Once there though, plans are made, old friends and new allies work together, but is it enough?

Rating… 4 out of 5 ghosts. This was a good story, but it didn’t really finish, it just kinda stopped. I have to wonder if there’s some bigger arc, maybe the author is planning a trilogy of trilogies that will complete the story… I will confess though, there were several points in the story where I began to wonder if any of them would make it out alive.