Book Review Wednesday: Hold Me Closer Necromancer (4 stars)

If I were to describe this book in one word, I’d say ‘funny.’ The humor is dark in places, but it’s also got geek references and song lyrics. And it made me laugh. That’s important.

Now, the summary:

Sam leads a pretty normal life. He may not have the most exciting job in the world, but he’s doing all right—until a fast food prank brings him to the attention of Douglas, a creepy guy with an intense violent streak.

Turns out Douglas is a necromancer who raises the dead for cash and sees potential in Sam. Then Sam discovers he’s a necromancer too, but with strangely latent powers. And his worst nightmare wants to join forces . . . or else. 

With only a week to figure things out, Sam needs all the help he can get. Luckily he lives in Seattle, which has nearly as many paranormal types as it does coffee places. But even with newfound friends, will Sam be able to save his skin?

Sam was a great character. For one thing he’s got an awesome name.  He’s a good guy who loves his family and friends. We like a good guy. He’s also flawed, being the kind of guy who hates confrontation, is no good at sports, and has a tendency to put his foot in his mouth. Subtlety, he admits is not his strong suit.

He also has some great inner dialogue. Here’s a couple examples that made me laugh:

“There were no windows in my bedroom, so I had to sit up and read my clock to figure out how angry I should be at my visitor. Eight A.M. I hated whoever woke me up. Had they come an hour earlier, I would have also hated their families and any household pets.”

“She whistled when she noticed my back. I assume because of my injuries. I mean, my ass just isn’t that spectacular.”

“Next time a talking head ended up in my easy chair, I would have all sorts of points of reference, but at that moment, I was completely at sea.”

The humor reminded me a little of Buffy the vampire slayer at times. Lots of geek humor. I like geek humor.

As for why I didn’t give it five stars, there were flaws. The plot was a little slow and clunky at times. There were also some plot holes. Sam finds something about his past, but decides not to ask his mother about it until a good way through the book. This didn’t make sense to me. Sure he didn’t want to bother her, but it was life or death kind of stuff. It felt forced.

Next, there was a bit of insta-love. I hate insta-love. But it only took up a very small part of the book, so wasn’t that bad. It didn’t stop me from enjoying the story, just annoyed me. If you really hate insta-love don’t worry too much about it. It’s only on a couple of pages.

Overall though, I loved it. One of my favorite reads this year. I’d say if you’re a fan of geek humor then definitely give it a spin. Happy reading.

And as always here’s the link to more reviews if you’re still pondering: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8041873-hold-me-closer-necromancer

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Book Review Wednesday: Anna Dressed in Blood (5 stars)

Maybe you’ve heard of this one. It’s got a creepy looking cover with a girl in a blood soaked dress.

Cool looking huh? Now there is some gore in it, but overall I’d say this isn’t that much of a scary book. You might disagree. Remember I’ve read a lot of stephen king, so your definition of creepy may differ from mine.

Here’s the blurb:

Cas Lowood, armed with his late father’s athame knife, kills ghosts. In Thunder Bay, Anna, forever 16, drips blood on her white dress from throat slit in 1958, and rips apart anyone who enters her house – except Cas. He makes new friends – high school queen Carmel, jock Will, admiring nerd Thomas and Tom’s voodoo grandpa Morfran – to fight this demon.

Full disclosure here: why did I choose to read this book? Because it reminded me of the television show supernatural which I love. If you love love love some supernatural then get this book. You’ll enjoy it. I mean it has this guy called Cas, who by the way is nothing like that wonderful angel, but makes up for it by basically being a younger version of Dean. Go read the preview and see if you agree with me. He sounds so much like Dean Winchester. For the first few chapters my mind kept going ‘Dean, why are you calling yourself Cas? Do you miss him that much?’

Now, the book does have a couple issues. There is a vibe of insta love going on. And our Cas/Dean protag does spend a large amount of the book dealing with teenage problems. The whole ‘I don’t need friends, I’m a badass ghost hunter’ kind of thing. And I felt some of the adults – particually grandpa Morfran – were less fleshed out. It was a little like those kid shows, where the adults drift in when they’re needed and then conviently disapear into the background.

Saying that, I think the mother was done well. She knew her son had to do this, that if she didn’t help he would sneak off and kill ghosts anyway. She helped where she could, and worried when she couldn’t. I’ve read a couple reviews that shun her for not grounding him, but I think she did what she could. She didn’t want to lose her son. I can understand that.

Now my favourite character of all was Thomas. Think Xander from the television show buffy when he was all shy. (There’s also a Giles like character who helps with research.) Thomas was just so darn cute. All plucky and determined, and then a girl walks up and he’s blushing and falling over himself.

The plot wasn’t bad. There’s a decent amount of action here. One big twist near the end, but not much in the way of twistiness before that. For me it was like watching a television show (more like Buffy than supernatural). The plot was good, but not brilliant, but that didn’t matter because it was the characters that made me stick around. There were some hefty loose threads by the end, but there is a sequal that might explain those.

So if you like Buffy, or Supernatural then go read it. And as always here are some more reviews if you aren’t convinced: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9378297-anna-dressed-in-blood