9. The Dirk and Steele series, by Marjorie Liu

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

Note: I started reading Marjorie Liu before I started 50 Books POC; I’m doing an overview for your enjoyment, but I’m only counting the one I read since I began the project for my own totals.

The best description of Liu’s novels comes from meganbmoore, who described them as “The X-Men as genre romance.”

Dirk and Steele is a high-priced, high-class security agency… because its agents are all secretly shapeshifters, telepaths, and other mutants! Each novel is a romantic thriller featuring psychic powers and/or magic, plus some truly cracktastic plotting.

Liu’s prose is ordinary at best, though her dialogue is good, and can veer into ultraviolet. Her plots tend (quite endearingly, in my opinion) toward “everything and the kitchen sink.” Her cast is multiracial and multicultural, and both her heroes and heroines tend to be sweet and tough, wisecracking and angsty. The romances are frequently interracial, though so far I think they’ve all been person of color/white person.

I like her because her romances ring true and don’t make me want to take out a restraining order on the heroes, I love psychic powers and angst and she has lots and lots of both, there’s plenty of action and wry comedy, and I enjoy her enthusiastic approach to plotting (“And then he runs away to the circus, and there’s an old woman who can turn into a dragon, and then they all get on a train to Russia with some immortal dude. And then a mummy attacks.”)

Here’s a quick run-down on her novels. They don’t need to be read in order (and I don’t think I’ve listed them in order.) Like Suzanne Brockmann, there’s a large cast of recurring characters and the supporting ones tend to get their own books and own romances eventually.

Eye of Heaven. Blue is an Iranian-American agent with electrical powers and tons of family angst, including a brother who ran away to join the circus. Iris is a white circus performer who can turn into a lion. Together, they fight organ-leggers! Someone loses an eye, or maybe an ear; I forget. Great fun. Click here to buy it from Amazon: Eye of Heaven (Dirk & Steele, Book 5)

Shadow Touch. Artur is a Russian psychometrist. Elena is a healer. They’re both held captive in an evil laboratory and must bond on the psychic plane to escape. This one is super-angsty. It was the first I read, and got me hooked on the series. Click here to buy it from Amazon: Shadow Touch (Dirk & Steele, Book 2)

Tiger Eye. Dela is a psychic who opens a magic box. Hari is the ancient shapeshifter who pops out of it after being imprisoned for thousands of years as the slave of the owner of the box. The novel avoids accidentally creepy power dynamics by having the characters realize how creepy and horrible Hari’s situation is, and do their best to free him. Sexy and sweet. Click here to buy it from Amazon: Tiger Eye (Dirk & Steele, Book 1)

The Wild Road. He’s a gargoyle disguised as a human. She’s an amnesiac covered in blood who tries to steal his car. They go on the run and end up squared off against the Queen of Elfland, if I remember correctly. The combination of two stoic, quiet, brooding characters is surprisingly entertaining. Click here to buy it from Amazon: The Wild Road (Dirk & Steele)

The Red Heart of Jade. Loved the main couple, but the plot crossed the line from wacky to incomprehensible. Some funny bits, but overall skippable. Click here to buy it from Amazon: The Red Heart of Jade (Dirk & Steele, Book 3)

The Last Twilight. Rikki is a virologist investigating a hot zone. Amiri is a mild-mannered former teacher and current agent by day, and a cheetah whenever he feels like it. They fight biological weapons-makers in Africa. I loved the main couple and the supporting character (Eddie), and appreciated Liu pointing out that Africa is a very big and diverse place, and that just because Amiri is from Kenya doesn’t mean he knows anything about the Democratic Republic of Congo. Given that, it’s too bad that the actual plot centers around every African cliché from Ebola to hatchet-wielding rebels. I think I would have also bristled at the African hero having an animal form if this had been the first Liu book I read, but since it was about the sixth and the series has multiple shapeshifters of various races, I didn’t. Your mileage may vary. Overall, though, I enjoyed it a lot. Click here to buy it from Amazon: The Last Twilight (Dirk & Steele)

I haven’t yet read the last two on this list, but you can still click to buy them from Amazon!

The one with the merman: Soul Song (Dirk & Steele, Book 6)

The one that isn’t Dirk and Steele: A Taste of Crimson (Crimson City)

Tess Gerritsen - Harvest

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I just finished 'Harvest' by Tess Gerritsen, and wanted to write a quick review, but rapidly realized that I couldn't quite bear to do that without trying to plug her Jane Rizzoli novels as well, so this is a bit of a two part entry.

First of all, Harvest. It's a stand alone novel, and not part of a series as far as I'm aware. ( Summary, with some spoilers )

Realistically, there aren't many great plot twists and I wasn't surprised by much, but I did really really enjoy it. The book is well written, I like Abby a lot as a character, and Tess Gerritsen worked as a doctor before becoming a writer, so the medical backdrop to the story is really precise and well detailed.

However, I didn't feel it was one of Tess Gerritsen's better books. I believe it's her first novel, and it shows - it's good, but compared to her later books, not nearly as good as it could be. I reserve much more praise for her Rizzoli/Isles series, which are fantastic and I've been reading for a while. I love Jane Rizzoli, the lead character in these, mostly because she's so gloriously unpretty - she's short, and a bit stocky, and is a wonderfully flawed person. She's the most fantastic antidote to the stereotypical Glamour Girl In Law Enforcement which I sometimes feel Patricia Cornwall and Kathy Reich tend to fall into when writing their heroines.

I think Tess Gerritsen has a historical thriller out as well - The Bone Garden - which I need to get my grubby little mitts on. I'm really hoping it's good, for a combination of historical novel/thriller/hard science in one book is quite close to my dream combo for comfortable evening reading...

#8: A Taste of Crimson by Marjorie M. Liu

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

This is the second book in the multi-author Crimson City series. I’ve read the first, but I think you can read this one ok without it. While Liz Maverick’s Crimson City focused on the vampires of the city, Liu’s book focuses on the werewolves.

Keeli “Mad Dog” Maddox is the granddaughter and heir apparent of the Grand Dame Alpha of one of the city’s most powerful werewolf clans, but prefers to work as a waitress in a human restaurant. When she sees a woman attacked by a gang of humans, she saves the woman, but is stopped from killing one of the humans by Michael, a vampire called the Ventix who hunts his own kind when they break the law. Any werewolf who attacks humans is supposed to do jailtime, but Michael put in a good word for her, and she’s allowed out on bail the next morning, provided she helps Michael find a serial killer who appears to be a werewolf, and has been killing vampires.

Liu seems to like to do some partial reversals in typical traits for heroes and heroines, and this is no exception. Keeli is the violent one with anger management problems, and Michael the one who has to keep calming her down. And while it may just be a coincidence of the first two books, I can’t help but notice that the series seems to be systematically putting the heroines in charge of the city’s various factions. Both books are also big on the “ZOMG! Our love is forbidden because our people kinda hate each other!” though that may also be coincidence. As both pulled it off well, I’m not complaining. Since this is Liu, there’s lots of plotting and factions and conspiracies, but since it’s a multi-author series, it’s a little more controlled. I’m not comfortable, though, with the racial allegory that seems to be in the series (vampires are the rich white people, werewolves are the downtrodden minorities, complete with segregation laws that claim not to be, but everyone knows that they are) but that seems to be the norm for most worlds with a focus on vampires and werewolves.

#1 Barack Obama, Dreams of My Father

[waelisc.livejournal.com]

Hi, I'm new to this comm but have been reading it for several weeks.

Last week puritybrown said she was the last person in the Western hemisphere who hadn't read Dreams of My Father so I'm in good company, being the second-to-last at that point. I've had it on my bookshelf for months but didn't start to read it until Inauguration Day, and I wonder if I was unconsciously trying to protect myself from greater disappointment if Obama didn't get the nomination / didn't win the general election / or was prevented from taking office for some horrible reason? In the sense that if he didn't make it to the Presidency, I'd be even more depressed by how tragic it was if I'd read his book. I'm not saying that was rational, of course.

Anyway... the whole book was very absorbing, and I was mightily impressed that Obama already had so much insight into family dynamics and social forces by the age of 32 or 33, when he was writing this book. It's clear that he's incredibly intelligent, but high IQ doesn't always go hand-in-hand with perceptiveness about human nature.

The most moving part to me was the long section near the end when his grandfather's (youngest?) wife, very elderly by the time Obama met her in Kenya, told the story of the last several generations. It felt significant, in a good way, to hear a woman's voice after 400+ pages of mostly men.

One of the back cover quotes said something about this being "as readable as a novel" and that is quite true - as engrossing as a good novel. I was thinking last night how much I liked Auma, Obama's Kenyan sister, and it gave me a small start to remember she's not a character, she's a real person.

#2, Hope Anita Smith & E.B. Lewis, Keeping the Night Watch

[waelisc.livejournal.com]

This is a set of poems for teenagers, written by Hope Anita Smith and illustrated by E.B. Lewis. The poems are from the POV of an African American boy named C.J., whose father left their family for some period of time, months or perhaps a year, and has just come back. His absence was hard on everyone in the family. Among other things, C.J. took over some of the parenting while the father was gone, like reading to his sister every night before she goes to bed.

The poems are about everything he's feeling: anger at his father for leaving in the first place, disappointment when his little sister wants Daddy to take over the bedtime stories again, disbelief at how no one else in the family seems to share his anger, distrust about whether his father's sadness about the whole episode is real.

Apparently this is the companion volume to another set of poems about C.J., The Way a Door Closes, by the same author but illustrated by Shane W. Evans. I couldn't find that one at the bookstore but will keep an eye out for it.

Lee, Jennifer 8. -- The Fortune Cookie Chronicles

[jain]

1. Jennifer 8. Lee, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food

Breezy writing style and a very quick read; the author was trained as a journalist, and it shows. A little lighter on the history of Chinese American, etc. cuisine and heavier on discussion/reviews of specific modern restaurants than I would have preferred, but overall a good introduction to Chinese food around the world.

Craig Laurance Gidney - Sea, Swallow Me

[badgerbag.livejournal.com]

My mind is blown - dense, gorgeous stories - Poetry sex violence drugs gods like reading Story of the Eye but with industrial music.

I feel bruised.

Totally fucking awesome.

Just go buy it.

Damn.