Cold Magic ~ A Review

Cold Magic by Kate Elliott was one of those reads where you can loose yourself in the story easily. I like to read before bedtime, and found that I could open the book back up and be quite lost in it's richly researched alternate history, great characters and fantasy/Steampunk elements in this book.

It's quite a concoction.Elliott herself calls it a "mash-up" of "Afro-Celtic post-Roman icepunk Regency novel with airships...". Elliot somehow makes this Steampunk, fantasy, sci-fi so realistic you can taste the coal smoke on the air, feel the sting of cold on your nose and fingertips. When I read where the girls were in massive factories, she didn't nice it up at all, there were beleaguered workers that were treated more like slaves. As you read through this alternate history world, you come across pieces of information which links what you know as history of our world and the world within this book and it is done with such exacting measure a laser could not have done better.

The adventure is continuous once our main character, Cat Barahal is forced into marriage to a powerful cold mage--who is arrogant to the extreme. Cat, and her cousin, Bee, seem to be typical teenagers who are experts at sneaking through windows when they should be in bed. But the adventure starts when Cat is taken from the home of her aunt and uncle, and later feels betrayed, after the mages discover that they have the wrong daughter and decide the only way to end a magical marriage is to kill her.

I don't come across  a book so well written that I look forward to reading it every night--and this was a large book. When I do enjoy a book this much, I call it my "Top Shelf".

If you love alternate history, Steampunk, fantasy, sci-fi, adventure with some (light) romance involving young adults, this is an excellent book to get your hands on. I'm looking forward to Elliott's second novel Cold Fire.

New Purchases from Bookstore!

I am sooooo far behind my reading list it is not funny.

 I've wanted Black Magic Sanction since I knew it was coming out, way back last year. Well, I guess it helps to wait, I got the hard cover on sale. That is a bit of a scare, if a hard cover doesn't sell and B&N needs to put it from $25.99 down to $6, that may mean it wasn't very good. I hope not. I'm pretty sure I saw good reviews on this. But I buy Kim Harris mainly because her writing is somewhat like mine. I like the characters in it, and especially Rachel Morgan is a realistic character--even her pixie, Jenks seems real the way she writes him. And all the magic is from mixing ingredients into a pot, and sometimes things really get out of hand.

Anno Dracula, by Kim Newman is a new one to me, but it has been out since 1992. This looks very promising. I discovered it on a blog I follow and since I didn't win a copy, I bought it.

Description:
It is 1888 and Queen Victoria has remarried, taking as her new consort the Wallachian Prince infamously known as Count Dracula. His polluted bloodline spreads through London as its citizens increasingly choose to become vampires.
In the grim backstreets of Whitchapel, a killer known as 'Silver Knife' is cutting down vampire girls. The eternally young vampire Genevieve Dieudonne and Charles Beauregard of the Diogens Club are drawn together as they both hunt the sadistic killer, bringing them ever closer to England's most bloodthirsty ruler yet.

 Golly! I don't know about you, but I think this one has me itching to read first!

Cold Magic by Kate Elliott was also a must, since Ms. Elliott friended me on facebook, and I think we had a conversation one afternoon there. Which was super cool! I already know the woman is an accomplished writer, and has a great site from which you might pick up some great advice.

Cold Magic was also one of Sumiko's picks. Which, as I recall, she liked. I know it was posted under "Sumiko's Reads" a while back in Lorelei's Muse, so I  may have to read up on what she thought of it.

There you have it. I get to go to the bookstore so infrequently, when I do go I try to buy more than one book.
Oh! one more thing. I must welcome my mysterious 79th Follower. If you read this, Mr./Ms. 79th Follower, do leave a comment so I know who you are. I cannot see my Followers box at all. Unless you wish to remain anonymous, and become one of my stalkers and lurkers, who I love and adore equally *wink*.

Who will be my 80th Follower? I wonder. Will it be YOU?

It's Friday, and I'm posting as if it's the 13th again!

I know it isn't the 13th, but it is Friday. And things are still screwed up here at blogspot, but I'm able to post, and so will do so, and need to let you all know: I CAN'T LEAVE A COMMENT UNDER MY NAME/GOOGLE ID. Thus I must use "Anonymous" but I will try and remember to place my name into the comment at end so you know it's me [=

Be that as it may, I've started up my 6th blog here at blogspot. "WHAT?!!!"

You heard me. My sixth one is simply called Lorelei's Journal. It's my writing journal. You can pick it up by clicking on the above link. I needed a place where I could just post/write about writing. My writing, mainly, my thoughts on characters. I might merely be thinking about future books, and maybe even commenting on other author's books in as far as they relate to what I'm writing, or maybe just to mutter boldly about something that may be insignificant to you, but more significant to me. I might even post about how well the book(s) is/are doing. Like just on Wednesday, I saw that my eBook had hit--not an all time high, but it hadn't been quite so high in a while--and it's really confusing to explain it to someone like my husband. But the # is how it ranks against other books out of several thousand individual books which are selling on the same day and in that hour it is posted. It was at #40,508 on Wednesday. It had been really down in the low #180's and even lower for about two weeks. I was nervous. But it picked back up. I know if people find out about the book I'm sure they'll want to buy it. That's why getting on people's blogs as a host is very important if you want to get the word out about your book. Half your work is done once you get the book written. I think getting it published is about 1/4th and promotions another 1/4th.

I'm still at a disadvantage as to how many eBooks sells until I get my royalty statement. Amazon sure as heck isn't going to tell you too much, I guess. But the physical books are shown, for some reason. Sort of a cool tool, and I didn't even know about it until I sort of stumbled upon it one day!

My friend, Sumiko, of Sumiko's Reads on this blog has read the next Sookie book up from what I'm reading. I'm currently reading Dead in the Family. She and I will compare notes on what we thought of this one, and I thought it would be fun to give our individual slants on it here, once we put our heads together. I'm almost finished and will get it done this weekend. I need another book to read!!!! I'm going to go with Cold Magic by Kate Elliott. I sort of need something different to read. And I always like to check out new authors. Besides, I'm on Kate's facebook, so, I feel I owe her some feedback once I get done.

So, there you have it for today. I love blogspot. I just hope they get these things fixed soon. They are aware of the problems (I went to something where it posts about problems they are aware of), so I'm hopeful this is resolved soon.

I'm not sure if my voting thing is working properly (at the left), I know that Heather was going to vote, and I'm sure she did, but I'm not seeing results. I'm wondering if it has gone the way of my "followers"? I can't see them, either. I have no idea who over the last month has joined my following list, unless they've made a comment. So, don't think I'm ignoring you if I have not come over to your blog, I simply can't see who you all are! Crazy Internet!

Everyone have a safe and wonderful Memorial Day Weekend!

Sumiko's Reads ~ Cold Magic

My friend, Sumiko, has been busy. Besides reading her books she is also busy knitting a sweater. I almost fear she may loose herself in the knitting and reading and we'll never see her again. Just one large sweater walking about the campus with a book in her hand.

Without further ado . . .
Hi everyone!

I finished Cold Magic in a rush of adrenaline. And it was both enjoyable and very satisfactory. As I may have mentioned last time, I was a teensy bit worried about finishing the book and then having an unspecified time to wait for the next one to come out due to my experience with her Crown of Stars series. (That one was originally planned as a trilogy and wound up as a series of seven books.) I think that anyone with similar fears should not worry. Cold Magic ends with our heroine in a pretty good place. You can definitely see where the story continues but it is by no means a cliffhanger.

Moving from an incomplete trilogy to a finished one - on Sunday I read Fire Study, the 3rd book in Maria V. Snyder's "Study" series. I am serious - I received the book sometime last week and started reading Sunday morning and stayed in bed 'til I was done. My cat was not pleased but I was happy and possibly a bit sad to be leaving the main character. I know that Snyder is writing another series set in the same 'verse but it just won't be the same, will it?

I will post Sumiko's comments on Maria Snyder's series on Saturday, so please swing by for that.

Welcome Sumiko to My Blog!

I want everyone to welcome Sumiko to my blog. She loves to read. She told me she can read a book in a week. I told her that I just don't have the time to read that much, but would love to be able to post more often about books, and asked her if she would like to do this. She accepted. I swear I didn't bribe her.

So, without further adue . . .

Hi everyone!

I am Sumiko - a friend of Lorelei's. My qualifications for this are mainly that I am her friend and that since I was first taught to read, I have been reading almost constantly. I read many things - fantasy, mystery, romance, literary fiction and non-fiction. Of course, what I most want to talk about are the fantasy novels that I am ingesting like potato chips!

Currently, I am reading Kate Elliott's novel Cold Magic. This was a recommendation from an online friend. She had just finished the book and was enthusing. I checked it out and when I saw it was by Kate Elliott I HAD to have it. Elliott is an author I've read for a number of years. The first books of hers I read were the Jaran books. I read those so long ago that the most I can say about them was that they were intriguingly set in a world that was based in Russian culture rather than the more usual Germanic-Celtic culture.

Then I fell into her Crown of Stars books - loved them. Did the whole - read the book, wait for years for the next one, re-read incessantly, etc. with that series. It was intended to be a trilogy and wound up as a series of 7 books. I can't say that they all stayed at the same high level as the first couple but they were good.

She has a gift for creating characters that you love and then doing horrible things to them. I am in the middle of Cold Magic and there has just been one of those exciting turns of events that makes me wish that I didn't have to put the book down!

According to her website, this is the first book in a trilogy. Oh dear, I fear I am in for another round of read, wait, re-read, wait, etc.

Kate Elliott's website is http://www.kateelliott.com and she is also on facebook and twitter.