Friday 17 July 2015

Dual Book Review: House of the Rising Sun and City of Eternal Night by Kristen Painter

House of the Rising Sun (Crescent City #1) by Kristen Painter
Publication Date: May 13th, 2014
Format: Library book.

Augustine lives the perfect life in the Haven city of New Orleans. He rarely works a real job, spends most of his nights with a different human woman, and resides in a spectacular Garden District mansion paid for by retired movie star Olivia Goodwin, who has come to think of him as an adopted son, providing him room and board and whatever else he needs.

But when Augustine returns home to find Olivia's been attacked by vampires, he knows his idyllic life has comes to an end. It's time for revenge—and to take up the mantle of the city's Guardian.


https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18453118-house-of-the-rising-sun

 I'm thankful for Netgalley existing. But, then again, what book lover wouldn't like a website where it's centered around free eARCs (advanced reading copies) for review. I'm sure a lot of people would agree with me. It's even better, though, when you discovered a new series that you immensely love and suddenly you're enraptured in this new world and you're just like 'I want to read more!' so you frantically search for the authors' previous books and finally break down and request it as an inter library loan and are willing to pay $2 if the book has to be sent from another library out of state and--

Wow. This is probably the worst run-on sentence that I've ever created. Imagine if I actually had a paid editor to take a look at my book reviews. Well... for one, I imagine they would be much more well versed and they would probably have a headache. I would at least get a lot of messages with a lot of deep sighs.

Harlow spent her life thinking she was no where close to being a fae. In fact, she truly only knew about her mother who was as much human as anyone else: Olivia Goodwin. They don't talk that often and, in fact, one of the biggest reasons why she decided to approach her mother in the first place is because she owes money to get out of jail. She was caught trying to hack a computer program, which happens to be her special talent: manipulating electronics just by touching it. Without the money, though, she's stuck in jail for a long while.

She only managed to get in contact with her mother once before she was killed by an unknown person. Suddenly, she finds herself owning a piece of her mother's estate alongside a stranger that she never met. The hope to sell it off to save herself from jail suddenly disappears in one moment. But even this starts a series of events that forces her to face her own heritage and her past.

Meanwhile, Augustine spent his life relaxing and living with Olivia. He's not her true son but he certainly thinks of her as his mother. At least she treated him like a person more than his actual mother did. But when she dies, he decides not to just sit aside and let the 'police' work on the problem. He decides to take the matter in his own hands... and now a young girl, Harlow, became part of a thorn he never expected to find.

Ahhhhh!! I'm a huge fanatic for urban fantasy books like this. I would be lying if I said that I didn't fall for the book cover for the third book which also led me to do more research on the series. I'm glad that I decided to request it in the first place because it led me to checking out the first two books at the library and reading it just changed my outlook on urban fantasy.

In other words, I'm saying everyone should read more Kristen Painter books because the writing is beautiful. I didn't even remotely care about the multiple point of views in it because it added in that much more depth in this story. So much love, passion, and time has been placed in this book and you can definitely tell. In fact, I can confidently say that Kristen Painter is on my automatic to-buy author list. I love it.

What are you doing? Buy her books. BUY THEM NOW!!!





City of Eternal Night (Crescent City #2) by Kristen Painter
Publication Date: December 2nd, 2014
Format: Library book

Magic and mystery collide in this second installment of the new urban fantasy series by House of Comarre author Kristen Painter.

Still coming to terms with their unexpected partnership, Augustine and Harlow have a tentative truce. With Harlow slowly working to accept being fae, Augustine still learning how to be Guardian, and feelings growing on both sides though, they do not have an easy road ahead.

But when a young girl is stolen from the Mardi Gras Exemplar Ball -- the biggest far event of the year -- Harlow and Augustine must put all their issues aside to bring her home alive. Harlow's father, Braziano, is of course their number one suspect, but evil lurks in every corner of the city and time is running out. Their only choices: Either find a way to rescue the girl, or Augustine must die.


https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20924711-city-of-eternal-night


Fae magic is a wonderful thing. It can be dangerous as well but, hey, if it can create an outfit that looks just as lovely as the one Harlow wears, it can't be all that bad... right? Riiiiiight??

Harlow recently learned that she is of fae heritage and that her father is an asshole. Man, you can tell just how awesome family's in this series... (note the sarcasm if it doesn't translate properly through this text). She's spending her time learning how to control her powers as well as learning how her powers can be used. Other than Harlow's and Augustine's slow descent with falling in love with each other, things are... sort of coming together in the end...

That is until after the Mardi Gras Exemplar Ball. There's always a sort of play where the daughter of an important figure gets kidnapped but nothing truly happens to her. It's all part of the entertainment. But when the kidnapping suddenly becomes all too real, Augustine finds himself deep in spending all of his time as a Guardian trying to find her and take her home safely. But it's a difficult task... and the girl's father is becoming incredibly impatient and with the kidnapper randomly sending parts of this young girl... the deadline is tight. 

There are only two answers: find the girl or kill Augustine for her freedom.

Another wonderful adventure written by a wonderful author. I'm so enamored with this world that I'm not even sure how to accurately portray how I feel about this book. Wonderful world building. I mean, it connected with the former series, House of Commare, especially since it brought back older characters. I didn't know that til after I finished reading the second book. (Speaking of, look forward to the future review of Blood Rights and Flesh and Blood, hint hint...) In my opinion, if I ever managed to publish a series of book that I'm passionate about, I want it to be just like this. Clearly not exactly like this but I want it to show that there was a lot of passion put into my work. I want to be able to make it clear that I spent lots of time developing this world and my characters. That's one of my dreams.

I hope this, at least, gives even a tiny bit of an idea on how much I love this series. It gives a fresh breath of air in the urban fantasy genre and I love it. Give me more. Give meeeeeeee!!! Asdfghjkl--

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