Masques- Patricia Briggs

Aralorn is a noblewoman turned spy/assassin. She realized early on that she was not cut out for court life and left home to pursue a more fitting occupation. One day, she rescues a dying wolf who turns out to be a powerful mage in disguise. He becomes her companion and after four years eventually learns to trust her. Aralorn has been given a new assignment: spy on the ae'Magi, the powerful and charismatic leader of the mages. With shapeshifting magic of her own, she accomplishes this task, but also learns how cruel the man is behind his charming facade. Few dare speak ill of the ae'Magi as mages are to be respected and feared, but Aralorn sees the evil in him and makes it her mission to see him destroyed. Only with Wolf's help and a great deal of magic will this be a successful endeavor.

A quick note: This book is pretty obscure as in, there weren't that many copies printed. Should you want to read it, I think you'll be hard pressed to find a copy.

Overall Merit: This is very different from Briggs later work (see the Alpha and Omega series). It is unpolished and at times hard to follow. I like her character work so kudos for that. Because this was her first novel and written at the age of 20 nonetheless, I have to cut her some slack. I liked the concept and the relationship between Aralorn and Wolf, but she spent a lot of time describing unimportant things instead of focusing on the plot. There were a lot of extraneous characters and events and I think if the story had been taking in a different, more succinct direction it would have been stronger. Score- 7

Characters: This was the one aspect that Briggs did the best with. I liked Aralorn and Wolf. Wolf's personality and backstory was the stronger of the two, but Aralorn didn't annoy me in the way that so many fantasy heroines manage to do. She was legitimately independent and although her personality didn't smack me in the face with strength, she was solid and more importantly, not irritating. I mean there was no uber strength here, but the characters were enough to make me want to continue on and read the sequel even though I didn't absolutely adore this book or anything. Score- 8

Blush Factor: You can often tell a lot about an author (age, religion, political views) based on how they handle the romance in a novel. That may not sound very plausible, but if you look hard enough, patterns emerge. Look for things like, the presence and usage of homosexuality, waiting until marriage, etc. This romance speaks of an author who is young and worried about being too explicit or too offensive and errs on the side of caution. It was sweet and I'm glad that she exercised restraint instead of throwing Wolf and Aralorn into a head-over-heels smoldering romance. However, there were times where the romance might have been too subtle and easily missed by a careless reader. Score- 6.5

Structure: This bothered me a bit because Briggs switched in and out of perspectives using page breaks, a technique that annoys me at the best of times. It's really more personal preference than anything, but it makes it less confusing for me if the author breaks perspectives up by chapters, rather than having a very long chapter with multiple perspectives. Chapter changes allow the reader to fully depart from one perspective and transition into another whereas page breaks can leave the reader stranded, straddling two perspectives and wondering why the story suddenly changed. Also, her transitions were a bit muddled and often I couldn't follow where the story was going or why she had chosen that specific place to break off. Score- 5

Plot: Yes, this was cliched, but when I started the book I didn't expect anything more. If you can accept the cliches and read without being too critical then the book isn't that bad. If you're a stickler for banalities then you'd best steer clear. I mean there have been several iterations of "kill the evil mage". This story didn't bring anything super new to the table. I gave this book the score I did because it didn't irritate me. I wasn't a phenomenal story and there wasn't anything new here. Score- 6

Vervain says: "Aralorn uses 'green magic', which she inherited from her mother. This means she has the ability to shape shift, but not as effectively as if she were full-blooded instead of half human."

Bloodring (Rogue Mage #1)- Faith Hunter

In a post-apocalyptic world ruled by Seraphim, neomages like Thorn are relegated to luxurious "prisons" called Enclaves. However, when Thorn came into her powers she realized that she could hear the thoughts of all the others in her New Orleans Enclave. Between going insane and living as a fugitive in the human world, she chose the latter and has lived in fear of discovery for the past ten years. However, her life of faux-normalcy is shattered when her ex-husband Lucas is kidnapped by dark forces, Thorn knows that it is not long before they come after her. Then there is the issue of the kylen (part human, part seraph), Thaddeus, who shows up at her doorstep and starts asking questions. She is strangely attracted to him in spite of the knowledge that any misstep will result in her being killed by the humans or shipped back to her Enclave--either way her death will be inevitable.

Overall Merit: I loved the premise behind the book so I forced myself to slog through it and it did get better by the end. However, for the most part it was remarkably slow and filled with unnecessary characters. I did like Thorn's powers, stone mages are not common, most authors opt for all-around powers or elemental magic, so Hunter's innovation was a plus. I really wanted to like this book and was so disappointed that I couldn't bring myself to enjoy reading it. Usually a 350-some-odd-page book will take me about 3-4 hours to read tops, so about a night or two worth of reading. This book dragged on for a good four days and often put me to sleep early. If I'm really into a book I will push through the exhaustion and read into the wee hours of the night. I could not do that with this book, even though I desperately wanted to. I mean the characters weren't bad or anything and the romance had potential, but the story dragged and there was not enough action by a long shot. Score- 6 (for premise)

Characters: Thorn was a solid character, I really did like her, but I felt like the others were not fleshed out enough, especially Thaddeus (Thadd). He showed up at random intervals during the story and Thorn seemed way more focused on her cheating ex-husband, Lucas. The other characters like Jacey and Rupert didn't do all that much and then there was the random kid, Ciana who showed up and didn't do much but serve as a bad plot device. The same things could have happened without her. Audric might be the only one who got any fleshing out other than Thorn and that was probably only because he shared a secret with her. Score- 4

Blush Factor- What blush factor? No really, it kept going on about how Thorn was "in heat", but nothing ever happened. Yes, she suffered with her intense sexual desire, but again nothing happened. There was no romance, no chemistry between any of the characters. If Hunter hadn't told me that Audric and Rupert were a couple there was no way in Hell I could have guessed it for myself. I was promised a nice romance sequence between Thorn and Thadd and I got nothing. Zero. Zip. Zilch. Mushy-gushy fans, don't waste your time. Score- 2

Structure: I loved the idea of the post-apocalpytic society ruled by Seraphs. It was lovely that the world nearly ended after a series of horrific plagues. And people getting branded for cursing? Beautiful. Eternal winter/mini ice age? Gorgeous. So where was the story to go along with this imaginative new world? I'm still looking for it, I'm afraid. One of the main problems is that there were a zillion things going on at the same time. There was the thread with Lucas and the one with Ciana and then there was something going on with a weird amethyst at the same time. For a moderately short book, way too much. I got lost and confused, I mean that might have had something to do with the fact that I was skimming, but I skim a lot of books and still manage to keep up with the plot. Score- 5

Plot: This was so promising. I read the back of the book and got excited. I do give Hunter credit for doing her research, as most of the factual basis, including the names of the Seraphim, were spot on. The story though was lacking at a fundamental level. She stretched it in too many directions instead of focusing on one main plot line. I wanted to follow Thorn on her adventures, and potential budding romance with Thadd, instead I was reading about things I didn't care about. It's nice that the people have a picnic on a day that the sun chooses to shine, but how the Hell does that relate to the story? If she had focused her plot and honed in on the important details, it would have been a much more solid novel. Score- 4

 Vervain says: "Neomages have a special glow about them so Thorn has to use amulets to dampen her glow and blend into the human world."





In summation: I was disappointed.