Andrea Cremer

Book RANT: For those unfamiliar, there are occasions when I'll read a book that SOUNDS perfect for me, and may indeed include details that suit me quite well, but SOMETHING ruins the entire thing for me. That's when I rant about my unhappiness and the injustice of it all.

Please note I will rant, rave and curse the gods for the author's writing and the book's content. I will never attack an author on a personal level and I do try to remain constructive.

Today we have Nightshade a Young Adult Paranormal that had me literally gnashing my teeth.

Since this book rant has spoilers, I'm placing the majority under a cut.

What I liked:
I really enjoyed the world building of this book. It was something different; you have the Guardians (the werewolves), the Keepers (the ones they protect, who keep the world in Balance), the Searchers (the 'enemy' the Guardians protect the Keepers from) and than the regular old humans who are stuck in the middle. The Guardians don't see any reason to keep themselves under wraps, as long as they don't go shouting to the humans 'hey we can be wolves!' all is good. The Keepers meanwhile are doing pretty much the same thing, just they don't turn into wolves. All that undercurrent tension makes itself very apparent to the humans who segregate themselves pretty far away.

I liked that the Keepers were obviously power-tripping maniacs, who did bad things (a lot) and probably would win sociopaths of the year if anyone so cared to make that award. They had their own little clans (in this book its the Nightshades--Calla--and the Banes--Ren) they oversaw, had some fighting, but by in large they treated the Guardians the worst. There wasn't a single redeeming feature for them and for that I found them entertaining to read about.

I felt that the way Cremer handled the Guardians was refreshing. They don't so much as become wolves as they are always both, but never at the same time. Just depends on which body they want to walk around in. They retain some of their wolfy-ness as humans and vice versa. I also liked that the Banes and Nightshades may have been rivals, but they make a good effort to be more of an integrated group when the time comes. Calla and Ren's idea to begin melding the group before it was necessary was important and I thought clever.

I loved Ren. He was a playboy, and arrogant and pushed Calla, but he also respected her wishes. He tried to make things work between them, he took her advice and didn't sneer at her. He respected her as an equal Alpha leader--maybe he didn't agree with her decisions, but he didn't try to undermine her or take away her power. Was he a bit of a jerk and bully at times? Yeah, but he also showed real emotional turmoil when discussing what was happening in his own Pack.

What I did not like:
CALLA. No seriously. I was kind of intrigued with her in the beginning chapters, when it was obvious she was trying to mold her own future and do what was best for her Pack. I was kind of irritated with how standoffish she would be with Ren, than what a tease, than standoffish, than outraged...sure they couldn't 'consummate' their union until the actual ceremony, but for crying out loud! She was such a tease! She'd tell Ren they needed to stop, but would cave pretty quickly, only to get angry at herself (which quickly became anger at Ren) and start the cycle all over again. Then also she was something of a two-faced hypocrite. On the one hand she was planning her upcoming union with Ren, making him believe her whole heart was into it (well as much as he was, they were both kind of doom and gloom twins at times) and on the other it was 'Oh Shay...he makes me feel so wibbly wobbly'.

The Calla that was a good leader, and a strong alpha and who I wanted to read about would suddenly become a lovestruck idiot, flaunting common sense and authority. I understand that there is something fishy about the whole business of the Keepers and Shay, but Calla lost all sense when with Shay. Ren was bending over backwards to do whatever she asked of him in regards to their relationship and the upcoming Union, but she repaid him with lying and falling in love with another guy.

Which brings me to SHAY. Oh ye gods above. Half the time he was very milquetoast--worried, distracted and doing his level best to put himself into suicidal situations. The other half he was pushing Calla to flaunt tradition, get rid of Ren, love him more and trust him more. Some of Calla's very serious and very reasonable objections--like I don't know, the entire fate of her people?--just breezed past him. Let me say this once: love does not conquer all. If a person says something along the lines of 'we need to tread carefully because my masters have no compunction about killing us all if we are caught' the reaction should not be 'run away!'.

He didn't take her responsibility to her Pack very seriously I don't think. Or he chose to ignore it in favor of doing things to get himself killed.

I skipped around for the last two hundred plus pages of the ARC and unless I was missing all the dramatic shifts of character in the passages I wasn't reading, not much seems to change. In fact I think the end, where I thought Calla was going to do the right thing and finally trust Ren, and stop treating him like an unwanted stalker, she goes and does a very stupid thing. Karma kicks her butt for it though. And I won't lie I kind of rooted for it. Maybe, just maybe, in the second book she'll weigh her options a little and realize 'going this alone is the worst possible idea I've ever had'.

And god help her if she hurts Ren (emotionally speaking) some more. I'll invent a way to climb into this book and beat the snot out of her.


As you can see I had some very...strong...feelings about this book. Its not very often I'll come across a book that I want to enjoy with every fiber of my being, but can't because the main character makes me want to shoot her. But this is my purely bias'ed opinion. Around the blog-o-sphere the book seems to be quite popular, so maybe I'm just missing something.… (mehr)

I enjoyed Rise, but not as much as I liked Rift. It ws a decent continuation of the story but oftentimes felt there was a little too much running around that wasted time. There was little to no battle in this one, as it was really more about growing relationships and setting the scene for Andrea Cremer's original quartet. Still, the duo was enjoyable.

One thing I particularly appreciated: there was more than one occasion where the opportunity for sex came up and characters rightfully took a look at their environment and said "I'd love this, but it's not the time". I know that may be frustrating for some readers who enjoy supernatural romance, but it addressed such a huge pet peeve of mine and earned Andrea Cremer some serious points.

While I liked the duology a lot, I don't know if I want to go on and read the following quartet. I'm not crazy about werewolf books (and the method of their creation as explained in Rise is really unimpressive). I'm also worried that they will have a lot of romance, which really isn't my thing. The end of Rise gave us an opening for a really interesting plot (gathering the Scions) but I'm on the fence as to whether or not that would be enough to counter-balance what I assume the rest will be. If you've read the Nightshade books - what did you think?… (mehr)