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review 2016-03-29 10:00
Hell & High Water (THIRDS Book 1)
Hell & High Water (THIRDS Book 1) - Charlie Cochet
I stumbled upon this series a few days ago and it sounded like I would like it, so I immediately got me the first book.
I half expected just to get some men and women in uniform, shapeshifters, a brewing struggle between human and shapeshifters and some romance, a setup that worked well for me in several other books I read so far, but I got more.

Let me elaborate:
The world Charlie Cochet created is one where shapeshifters (aka Therians) were created by accident by humans in the 70ies when biological warfare in the Vietnam War released a virus which later required development of an antidote. This antidote created the shapeshifter mutations.
To cope with that, the government created a Therian government called THIRDS (aka Therian Human Intelligence, Recon, Defence Squadron).
The counterpart for the human population is the HPF (aka Human Police Force).

The story starts with human homicide detective Dexter J. Daley’s testimony against his former partner after him witnessing him committing cold blooded murder. This leads to Dex being treated like an outcast and as a traitor of his precinct in the HPF and human race, since the victim was a young Therian.
Eventually he loses his job but he gets sort of promoted to be an agent with the THIRDS because his dad is a sergeant there. Therians clearly don’t have a problem with family members working together.
Agent Sloane Brodie is a jaguar Therian and Dex’s new team leader and partner. He previously lost his partner and rejected all other potential candidates so far. He and the rest of the team fully intended to do the same with Dex because they were all still grieving. All while they had to solve a case of murders of Therians.
But well Dex is Dex …. He somehow managed to find his place in the team and the heart of Sloane and the process of it was somewhat funny as hell. Dex is a dork. A huge ABBA singing dork.
I loved Dex’s banter with Sloane.

Sloane turned, arching an eyebrow at Dex.
“ABBA?”
“What kind of gay man are you?” Dex thrust a finger toward the door.
“Out of my house. Your kind isn’t welcome here.”


“You seem to forget where you are. You’re in Casa de Dex, and in Casa de Dex is much singing.”

“You gotta stop doing that!”
“Doing what?”
“That popping-up-outta-nowhere thing you do.”
Sloane’s brows rose in amusement. “ I use doors like everyone else.”


“Are these,”-Sloane peered at the wrapping paper-“stripping Santas?”
Dex wiggled his brows, “In thongs. Pole dancing.”
“Sometimes I worry about you.” Sloane shook his head, before tearing through the paper.


I also loved the banter between Dex and his team mate Ash. So funny.

Ash rushed forward, and Dex aimed his rifle.
“I swear I will send your hairy ass back to Narnia if you don’t back the fuck up,” Dex warned him, releasing the safety on his rifle.


Oh god, he was about to get a hard-on at work, and the bastard (Sloane) that was the cause of it was loving every moment of it.
Think unsexy thoughts. Think unsexy thoughts.
Ash’s growl echoed through the showers. “What are you two gay boys doing in there?”
Aaand done.

I loved the writing style of this author. This was my first book of hers, but I’m already set on reading the second book in this series.
She created an interesting world and I hope she writes more about the development of the Therians in the future instalments.
The way she developed the team dynamics and their banter was beautiful and just perfect.
I also liked that in this world the main problem was the hate of some humans against the Therians and not skin colour or a different sexuality.
It was also refreshing to read a shifter novel without them acting like sex starved idiots in a frenzy.

But there were also some parts I didn’t like that much.
The mystery came a bit short for my liking and felt rushed in the end because the development of Dex’s and Sloane’s relationship took a huge part of the book. It also was kind of obvious after a certain point. This could have been done better.
I also thought that Dex at the beginning was vastly different from the Dex who started at THIRDS. He went from depressed and frustrated to an always funny and happy dork in no time. However I like the Dex at THIRDS better.

I would recommend this book and I’m going to continue the series not just because of the cliffhanger , but also because I want to know how the relationship between Dex and Sloane continues. I also want to know more about the rest of the team.
 
 

 

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review 2016-02-20 04:14
Like a Game of Chess
Guardian - Jack Campbell
I enjoyed all the twists and turns in the story, despite the fact that this was a bit of a slow read for me. I love the Dancers. They rock the story. Definitely becoming hooked on this series.

Reviewed for Bitten by Books. http://bittenbybooks.com.
 
 
 
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review 2015-05-18 16:55
All things considered this wasn't too bad
Taken by the Gay Tank: A Military Science Fiction Adventure - Randy Dangle

This was a surprise because it was somewhat sweet.  It also seems to be a parody .  I mean, the commanding officer is General Horace Steele (who I will admit at one point seems to have more two hands, though he doesn't do anything interesting with them).  And c'mon, whose name is really Randy Dangle?

 

Though there are some funny lines "his smooth face was bright and eager to serve his commanding office" or "He began to feel a tingle in his trousers".

 

 

Still, I have read much worse.  

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review 2015-04-12 14:59
Yukikaze by Chohei Kambayashi, translated by Neil Nadelman
Yukikaze - Chohei Kambayashi,Neil Nadelman

I actually bought Good Luck, Yukikaze, the sequel to this book, first – the mention of AIs in the publisher description piqued my interest. After I realized I'd screwed up, I of course had to buy Yukikaze, but the whole thing made me a little nervous. If I hated Yukikaze, its sequel would probably have sat on my shelves, taunting me and collecting dust, until I finally guiltily added it to my “sell to used bookstore” pile unread. But I did not hate it. I loved it.

Thirty or so years ago, the JAM, mysterious aliens, invaded Earth using a strange portal located in the Antarctic. We managed to beat them back, and, in the book's present, the war now takes place entirely on Faery, the planet just on the other side of the portal. The war has absolutely nothing to do with the average, every day lives of most human beings, and most of the people fighting the JAM are actually convicts from various countries, serving their time on the Faery Air Force (FAF) base.

Rei is one such convict. He's part of the SAF (Special Air Force), and Yukikaze, his fighter plane, is a Super Sylph. Super Sylphs have powerful central computers that collect combat activity data, and their duty is to always make it back, even if it means watching while FAF comrades die. SAF pilots like Rei are selected for their ability to be as cold and detached as possible.

The beginning of this book, the foreword, was a little rough. So many acronyms, so much jargon. I kept having to flip back and reread certain paragraphs and pages, and I was worried that it was a sign of worse to come. Thankfully, after that I pretty much gobbled the book up. The jargon and acronyms never went away, but I got used to a lot of it and just accepted that I wasn't going to be able to follow every last bit of it. I was still able to picture the aerial battles and get the gist of what was going on, and that was all that mattered.

The way Yukikaze was structured made it feel almost like a series of short stories, each dealing with a particular chunk of time in Rei and Yukikaze's partnership. The "stories"/chapters were, of course, tied together by Rei and Yukikaze, but they were also tied together by the book's themes of isolation, the futility of the war, and the necessity (or lack thereof) of humans in a war fought by machines. One of the things I loved about the book was the way little details gradually coalesced into something strange and sometimes unsettling.

One of the odd things about Yukikaze was how bare-bones all the characters were, even Rei. We never learned what crime Rei committed, how he became an SAF pilot, or what his life on Earth was like. He had a few stray thoughts about a past girlfriend who left him, but that was it. It fit with the way just about everyone in this book was isolated. The FAF was so isolated from Earth that it was viewed with almost as much fear and suspicion as the JAM. The SAF, in turn, was isolated from the rest of the FAF. Although Rei had one human friend, his entire existence was pretty much wrapped up in Yukikaze.

That's why the possibility that humans might not be necessary to fight the JAM shook him so badly. If humans weren't necessary, that would mean that Yukikaze didn't need him, and he couldn't accept that. This was, for me, one of the most gut-wrenching threads in the book, especially as the true shape of the war between the JAM and the Earth became clearer and Yukikaze became more independent.

One of the things I was hoping to get out of this book was an awesome sentient fighter plane, which is what the publisher description led me to expect. It took a long time, but the book eventually delivered. Just not in the way I expected, or to the extent I hoped for. Yukikaze started off as a really excellent fighter plane with a very advanced central computer, but still primarily in Rei's control. She gradually became more intelligent and capable of operating without her pilot. Indeed, at times she actively ignored her pilot. However, she could barely communicate (with Rei, anyway – she communicated with other computers just fine), and the motivations behind her actions usually had multiple possible interpretations.

As much as I dreaded the direction the book seemed to be taking, the second half of it was my favorite. I loved learning a bit more about the JAM, and the question of where human beings stood in the war kept me at the edge of my seat. When Yukikaze began to come into her own, it was glorious. And also kind of terrifying.

All in all, I loved this book, even though the ending left me feeling a little sad and hollow (it's a full day later, and I still have a book hangover). Thankfully, I can take care of that with the sequel. I looked at the original publication dates for Yukikaze and its sequel and was a little horrified to learn that they were published 15 years apart. That hurts just thinking about it.

Additional Comments:

I couldn't figure out how to fit this in my review, but I felt it needed to be mentioned. There is an instance of semi-sexualized violence near the end – a male character attacks a woman who is drugging him, rips her shirt open, and bites out a chunk of one of her breasts. Even if Kambayashi considered the biting itself to be necessary, I'm not sure why he chose that particular body part.

Extras:

  • Yukikaze fact sheet (6 pages)
  • "About Yukikaze" by Chohei Kambayashi
  • "Human/Inhuman" by Ran Ishidou - I didn't always agree with the way Yukikaze was interpreted, but it was still an interesting essay, and some of the interpretations hadn't even occurred to me.
  • "The JAM Are There" by Ray Fuyuki - More literary analysis. This essay was less interesting to me.
  • List of abbreviations and acronyms

 

(Original review, with read-alikes and watch-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

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review 2015-02-26 06:08
Imminent Betrayal
Imperfect Sword - Jack Campbell

This series is seriously suspenseful. I admit I am quite hooked. There were moments in this book where I thought it was all over, so kudos to you, Mr. Campbell. My question now is, when is the next one coming out?

Overall rating: 4.5/5.0 stars.

Reviewed for Bitten by Books: http://bittenbybooks.com.

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