Brook, Meljean - Demon Marked
Thu, Oct. 13th, 2011 12:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterNicholas St. Croix is trying to track down the demon who killed then impersonated his mother; royally screwed up his psyche; and killed Rachel, the woman who loved him. Ash doesn't know who she is, although Nicholas tells her she looks exactly Rachel. All she knows is that she has absolutely no memory from before three years ago, that sometimes her eyes glow eerily, that she frightens all the nurses, and that she doesn't need to sleep.
I like Ash, especially when she's trying to figure out how to survive with human beings and their strange emotions. I was much less fond of Nicholas, who lives for revenge and doesn't trust anyone. That said, Meljean Brook was trying to break the mold a bit; several times in the book, she mentions that thankfully Nicholas isn't a misogynist due to his evil mother-who-was-a-demon-in-disguise. I also like that there is no illusion about Nicholas being a nice guy. He's a jerk a fair amount of the time, and that's actually what Ash likes about him. Er. That sounds off-putting, but I feel it makes much more sense when your heroine is part demon.
The other thing I really like about the Guardian series so far is how prominent the women are. The first few books definitely feel like "Now meet the hot heroes of books #2-8!" But I was glad to see that several female characters from previous books continue to play a large role in the plot. I think it's more in the last three Guardian books, due to spoilery events, and the final Guardian book is focused on the biggest baddest Guardian guy (of course), but I will take what I can get in this genre. More details under the cut.
Spoilers for previous books
We don't see that much Irena here, but she's clearly a force to be reckoned with, now that she's heading the Guardians. Taylor gets a lot of page time both here and in the previous book. Lilith continues to be awesome, which makes me SO HAPPY. And there are more hints of Rosalia's plots. Obviously this is all due to Michael being stuck in the frozen field, but that is one of my favorite plot twists in the series. And of course he is the hero of the last book, but given how many kickass heroines Meljean Brook has had in the series so far, and given how much page time has already been given to Taylor, I am really hoping Michael doesn't end up overshadowing everyone in the last book.
My main issue with the book is that the plot resolution and the romance resolution aren't paired up, so after the main plot is resolved, you still have to wait around a bit for the romance, which makes it feel anticlimactic. And then there's a bit more plot thrown in to set up the next book, which also feels a bit anticlimactic when it really shouldn't.
Other than that, I am glad Brook seems to have more interest in awesome heroines who may not like each other but work together. I always want more, but I figure it's a nice departure for the paranormals I've been reading of late.
I like Ash, especially when she's trying to figure out how to survive with human beings and their strange emotions. I was much less fond of Nicholas, who lives for revenge and doesn't trust anyone. That said, Meljean Brook was trying to break the mold a bit; several times in the book, she mentions that thankfully Nicholas isn't a misogynist due to his evil mother-who-was-a-demon-in-disguise. I also like that there is no illusion about Nicholas being a nice guy. He's a jerk a fair amount of the time, and that's actually what Ash likes about him. Er. That sounds off-putting, but I feel it makes much more sense when your heroine is part demon.
The other thing I really like about the Guardian series so far is how prominent the women are. The first few books definitely feel like "Now meet the hot heroes of books #2-8!" But I was glad to see that several female characters from previous books continue to play a large role in the plot. I think it's more in the last three Guardian books, due to spoilery events, and the final Guardian book is focused on the biggest baddest Guardian guy (of course), but I will take what I can get in this genre. More details under the cut.
Spoilers for previous books
We don't see that much Irena here, but she's clearly a force to be reckoned with, now that she's heading the Guardians. Taylor gets a lot of page time both here and in the previous book. Lilith continues to be awesome, which makes me SO HAPPY. And there are more hints of Rosalia's plots. Obviously this is all due to Michael being stuck in the frozen field, but that is one of my favorite plot twists in the series. And of course he is the hero of the last book, but given how many kickass heroines Meljean Brook has had in the series so far, and given how much page time has already been given to Taylor, I am really hoping Michael doesn't end up overshadowing everyone in the last book.
My main issue with the book is that the plot resolution and the romance resolution aren't paired up, so after the main plot is resolved, you still have to wait around a bit for the romance, which makes it feel anticlimactic. And then there's a bit more plot thrown in to set up the next book, which also feels a bit anticlimactic when it really shouldn't.
Other than that, I am glad Brook seems to have more interest in awesome heroines who may not like each other but work together. I always want more, but I figure it's a nice departure for the paranormals I've been reading of late.
(no subject)
Fri, Oct. 14th, 2011 05:20 am (UTC)I tried a Brooks short story about bounced hard, but I might try more. It sounds like she is doing interesting things.
(no subject)
Wed, Oct. 19th, 2011 06:35 am (UTC)I think sometimes her ambition exceeds her skill, but she's been improving as the books go on, and omg I really appreciate powerful heroines.
(no subject)
Mon, Oct. 24th, 2011 03:48 pm (UTC)On one hand, she totally screws with typical romance genre conventions (SPOILER:
Whoa I did not expect her to actually kill off Michael)
I also really liked that her heroines are mostly all dominant, and there's none of this alpha-male bullshit like you see in some paranormals. She even managed to do the whole "the heroine is damaged because she was raped" in a way that was not cliched or icky to me.
OTOH, (SPOILER:)
The only openly queer couple, one woman gets killed rather abruptly, and she doesn't even warrant an on-screen death. Bleh.
Also, as far as I can tell, every single one of her main character heroines has been raped or tortured. WTF? Maybe I'm wrong since I've only read one book, but from reading summaries of the others, I've got Charlie, Alice, and Irena were raped, and Rosalia and Ash were both tortured in ways that damaged or destroyed their memories. Seriously?
(no subject)
Mon, Oct. 24th, 2011 10:20 pm (UTC)Oof, I have mixed feelings about Demon Forged, because I think it's actually more successful as urban fantasy and plot than as a romance novel! I didn't really buy Irena, and the sex scenes felt really off to me.
Totally with you on the annoyance of the dead lesbian =(. I also wish there were more POC... there are some on the side, and one of them is getting a novella (Radha I think?), but I keep feeling like the POC characters get sidelined. I like Savi a lot from Demon Moon (#2), but I HATE her love interest and felt anything from his POV was super exoticizing and squicky.
I also didn't notice that about the heroines, so thanks for pointing that out! I think for me, a lot of her female character torture works because it's in the romance genre and I feel the heroines almost never get angst in the genre? I also like that it's more a past trauma, not like the filmed-in-detail assaults you see on TV a lot. But! YMMV! I don't recall Charlie being raped, though it may have happened when she's turned into a vampire. Alice definitely is in her backstory, but my feeling reading the book was that her main dilemma was the deal with the demon, not rape backstory.
I think Brook generally doesn't do that well with the rape backstory as well; it didn't piss me off in this book, but I also felt it was one of the flattest parts of the story, and ditto with Alice's sexual trauma in Demon Bound (#4). I dunno though... would be interested in what you think if you decide to read more!