Happy Hour of the Damned: Drinks and Fingered Foods

I have a fear of zombies. It is a real fear. While I do not believe in vampires, demons or were-creatures, I do believe that zombies are within the realm of modern day existence.

I have recurring nightmares of zombies. I avoid zombie movies. They directly lead to nightmares.

In contrast. Zombie books. I do not avoid. I read them. I read them looking for information that will help to me survive the upcoming zombie war. This book was not one of those informative tomes.

Lately, I have been reading non-apologetic creature books. I refer to books about supernatural creatures that do not subject themselves to vegan or non-human diets or abstain from other nefarious acts against humanity in order to survive. It was the whining that bothered me.

I mean... A sober Vamp is a dead vamp. A ghoul must to eat. The were-creature who does not dance under the moonlight is dangerously grumpy. The necromancer has skeletons in her closet. That is where they need to stay for all of our safety.A demon that doesn't collect souls will  be shot back to Hell.

After reading some Felix Gomez, undead private eye, I picked up this Amanda Feral book. Happy Hour of the Damned is the first in what I hope to be an undead series from Mark Henry.

Imagine spending your entire life striving to be in the popular group since high school. Imagine never finding satisfaction with wearing the richest clothes and shoes, having a great apartment, a luxurious car, a professional and rich boyfriend, getting into the best clubs, invited to exclusive parties, competing with the best in your industry, and striking absolute fear into your subordinates everyday.

I know crazy, right?

Despite all of her money, influence and resources Amanda had not find her clique. Her special group of BFFs to make her life complete and accept her completely without looking at her back while imagining the best location to hide their knives - blade in first.

Then one day Amanda falls flat on her face and her life changes forever.

I think she expresses it best here:

You know, I could just sit here and ramble on about the nightmare of being dead, eating helpless people, breaking and entering, not having circadian rhythms. I could tell you that I was horrified with the direction my life had taken. I'm on a downward spiral into a vision of Hell not glimpsed since a Nine Inch video. Blah, blah, blah. Who wants to hear it? It's not true, anyway. The truth is this: I wasn't enjoying life when I was alive. Now that I'm dead, its' gonna be another story.

She doesn't need this book. She is going to wing it. That is with her right hand zombie gal pal Wendy, the man-whore vamp Gil, and the soul sucking demon Liesl. If only I had friends like her. The four of them party around Seattle having the times of their "lives."

 That is until, someone starts kidnapping members of the supernatural community and all zombie hell starts breaking loose at local Starbucks shops. What will Seattle do?
No worries. Amanda Feral is on the case.
Queue disembodied deep voice....
Will the undead gang will save the vampires, were-creatures, reapers and demons from fates worse than death without Black Magic cocktails?

Black Magic = 1 1/2 oz vodka, 3/4 oz Kahlua, dash lemon juice. Served in a Collins glass with ice.



I give this book an A for being funny, witty,  fast paced and full of great cocktail recipes. Pick it up so that we can toast to more stories of Amanda's night life.

Queen Victoria hunts demons wearing lacy undies

Recently, I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and I liked it. 

I had avoided 19th century stories based in the United Kingdoms since taking British literature in High School. 

I just didn't think the themes and such applied to anything that I have experienced as a Black woman. The Regency and Victorian eras seemed very foreign to me.

All that changed when I read Soulless by Gail Carriger.   It is set in the Victorian era.  I finally saw the connection to the themes and customs of that era to those of this one amid a vampire/werewolf romance story.  As a former anthropology major (for a year), I could appreciate the social nuances of class, sex, ethnicity, etiquette, propriety, fashion and courting of that era and relate it to my 21st century experiences.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies aided me in understanding the Regency era in the same manner.  

Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter  taught me the politics involved in being the reigning monarch in England while a demon horde ravages the lands and vies for the throne.  There was  some interesting xenophobia and bawdy jokes about Germans.  There is historical reference to the reform movement and real events in the life of Queen Victoria.  Cool.

As I read the novel, I found that it paced like a SyFy movie just developed a little more.

The book jacket  promises a story about a newly crowned queen who receives an arsenal of demon hunting weapons in addition to her crown and scepter.  Not exactly true. It is a conspiracy thriller.  There you go. 

The book actually follows the Queen as circumstances lead her to become a demon hunting monarch and mother of two.  A sequel to this books would undoubtedly chronicle her blood and gory exploits during her reign but this novel did not.  This is not to write that there were monitored descriptions of death, flesh eating, bloody katanas, and other atrocities.  The author has a fine style to describe gruesome scenes with vivid imagery, ingenious quips, and evil villains all with a dash of romance. 

For example: 

'Sir, it's the zombies, sir,' Perkins managed, breathing heavily.

There was a crack of lightning from outside, a rumble of thunder.

'Yes?' said Quimby, still irritated. 'What about the zombies?'

'Sir, they're eating the prostitutes.' 

That paragraph introduces a hilarious scene of flesh eating debauchery. 

The characters to note are Phillip, Victoria, Maggie, Melbourne, and Quimby.  Quimby provides the comedy in the story.  Maggie moves the action along.  The evolving relationships between Melbourn and Victoria and Phillip and Victoria provide both conflict and intrigue.  The evolution of Victoria's character from third in line to the throne to a demon hunter is really slow.  

The first half of the book bored me except for the chapters dedicated to the antics of Quimby and his faithful zombie servant Perkins.   Even so, the book could have added another 100 pages or so to the second half and I would have been perfectly pleased.  The second half contained quite a bit of blood and gore.  Perfect scene staging for a Saturday night movie. 

You should read this book if you like action, plot twists, zombies, coach chases, hand to paw combat,   monster rats, demonology, visits to the lunatic asylum, and discussing the role of state sanctioned torture for political prisoners.  

C+ with  potential in a sequel

Another reviewer recognized some similarities between the characters and action of the book to the Aliens movies.

Boneshaker: Was this a teen book?

Last Sunday, I read Boneshaker by Cherie Priest all in one day.  Impressive right?  It's not a short book either.  416 pages. And it was full of all sorts of fun stuff.  A steampunk vision of a Civil-War era Seattle.  Zeppelins.  Crazy machines.  A gas seeping from underground that makes people into zombies... I mean what more could you possibly want.

But the fact that I read the book in one day makes me suspicious.  Did I just unwittingly read a teen novel?  Was I fooled by DPL's faulty book organization into reading a book written for high school students?  Or did this fun, if a little awkward, book meet its intended audience in my charming readership? 

Well, I suppose there must be a way to determine this.  First off, it was published by the SyFy conglomerate.  So, someone at SyFy thought this was an appropriate story to attract their viewership to the written word. People who watch SyFy are not necessarily a certain age, they just have a certain group of interests.  Fair enough, so this is inconclusive.

I guess we want to believe that teen novels should be a little tamer than adult novels... which is not necessarily true.  I can bet you that the first sex scene I read was from a "teen novel." I am also pretty sure that there was nothing in this novel that wouldn't be found in an adult novel or a teen novel. There was violent death, there were creepy characters, there were dysfunctional families, and there was evil.  The protagonist was a single mother who had to venture into the walled off city of Seattle which was ensconced in a poinsonous gas they called "the Blight."  The Blight had been unleashed by her deceased husband by his crazy invention, the Boneshaker.  If you breath too much, you die and then sometimes reanimate.  They called the zombies "rotters".  So the mother goes to rescue the son.  The basic structure of the story is "family friendly"; it could easily be made into a Disney film. There is nothing so harsh and cold and evil about the story that I could not end up in the teen book department.  Also, no sex.  Because there is NOTHING romantic about have to wear a mask at all times to keep the Blight out and there is nothing romantic about have to be quiet so the rotters don't catch wind of you.  Nobody was getting it on.  Too dangerous, not enough clean air.

If it is considered an regular novel for adults, it's awful tame. I kind of think that it might have done better on the teen market regardless.  The only other reason I think it might be a teen novel is because I was able to read it in one day.  It was fast; the words were pretty large (they were also printed in dark brown ink instead of black, which I think is cool and show-offish at the same time.)  So, I'm pretty much decided that this is a teen novel.  It's like a coming of age story for the son, and while he's not the "main" character, he does go through finding out that his father was not blameless when it came to the Blight accident.

Sad day.

My last question is about the picture on the front.  Do you think that's the boy, young boys look like girl sometimes?  Or the mother, who really shouldn't be that young looking? I can't figure it out.  I start to lean towards the mother, but then I'm like it could be the son.  Oh bother.

As for whether I liked the book, well I did, but the writing could have been smoother.  I felt like I was reading the awkward examples in writing textbooks on how to create believable dialogue.  It got better as the book went on.  But you can tell this is her first "real" novel.  The cover says "break-out novel".  I think she should write a sequel, in which the son figures out how to either stop the gas and restore Seattle or tame the rotters and take over Vancouver.  Bother are good choices as far as I'm concerned.  If you are tired of your paranormal romance, try this steampunk romp on for size, but don't expect to find it challenging.  Just sayin'.

Savor Me Sexy Killer

“Savor me Slowly” is the fifth installment in the Alien Huntress series by Gena Showalter

The series highlights a female who is hunting bad aliens on post-alien war Earth.  The female can be human, alien, hybrid or cyborg.  That is all I am giving you.  JFGI if you want more information about the series.

In this novel , the hunter is human, alien and animal with a clever chip implanted in her head.  Mishka Le’Ace.  She can communicate with the chip to enhance her assassin skills; in turn the chip keeps her a slave to whoever controls its self-destruct or pain inducing function.  

I want to mention that she has always been controlled by a man. All this leaves her a little whiny and needy in private and a kick ass huntress in public. 

Mishka is a dangerous woman not permitted to explore her emotions.  Expressing any leads to severe punishment.  Yet, the emotions have not been completely removed from personality.  She longs to be treated like a person, to be loved, to be trusted.  Being a spy and an assassin makes relationships impossible to cultivate when she may have to kill or betray her friends and lovers. 

Her current assignment is to gather information about a new alien race attacking women.  Each attack leaves them infected with a zombie virus.

There I wrote it.  When you read the book, you will know that the author is describing a zombie making virus despite never naming it.  The concept of zobmies and zombie making viruses have been in our science-fiction culture long enough so that  authors do not have to explain the phenomena to the reader or create a new name for it.  Geez....

Note to the author:  Just write, "the Schön were infecting beautiful, sexy human women with a zombie virus."  The readers will know EXACTLY what you mean.

The Zombie-strain STD having aliens are called the Schön, and both Alien Investigation and Removal (AIR) and Mishka Le'Ace's boss want them investigated, captured and killed. 

Checkout this excerpt http://genashowalter.com/excerpts/21/savor-me-slowly/

Then there is the assassing,Jaxon. The cool AIR agent who has also been tracking the new aliens.  He has been captured and tortured for information about their habits.  He does not talk.  He will not talk.  The people who capture him admit their failure and hire Marie.  

Jaxon is introduced to our protagonist as Marie, the sexy, new torturer who always gets the information.

Faced with the prospect of enduring more torture from this breathtaking femme fatale he proves his loyalty to AIR and determination to remain silent by telling her

“Come sit on my lap and I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

At this point, I did not give a rat’s arse about Mishka.  I wanted more Jaxon.   I did not care if she got him at the end of the book or died trying, I just wanted to know more about the character.

She flirts with her captive, her intended victim

“You won’t even give me a tiny little hint?” she beseeched, her long lashes fluttering, beckoning him deeper into the black sea of her gaze.  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

I was hooked. 

Finally, a silver lining to his ravaged face.  He couldn’t see clearly enough to discern her clothing, which meant, in his mind, she was wearing lingerie.  Black, like her eyes.  With sheer lace.  She had small breasts, but they were soft and pink-tipped. 

Despite his condition, his dick lengthened, thickened, hardened.

I loved it.  This guy is B R O K E N before she arrives, he knows that she is replacing his previous 6 tormentors who liked to work together, and his peen still has enough energy to respond to her.

I wanted to date this guy. 

We soon learn that Marie is Mishka undercover. 

I read some more text.  These two are completely and immediately attracted to each other. So much so, that they each constantly think of each other when apart.  To the point of daydreaming.  

What self-respecting alien assassin daydreams on the job? I really found it difficult to ignore this plot device to explain their attraction to the reader. 

Oddly both of these guy do but manage to survive until the major conflicts of the story.

The two try to collaborate in their efforts to repel the Schön from Earth.  

Unfortunately all of his friends at the AIR  hate her by reputation and experience.  It is no Hatfield and McCoys since she has no friends but the hate is real.  

I was a little put off when Jaxon's best friend decides to take a break during a major battle to kill Mishka.  Like who takes a time out during a gunfight with hard to track aliens to kill the new girlfriend? But at least it kept her from daydreaming about her man's sexy body during the scene. 

In conclusion, I have to admit that a man who is willing to shoot his best buds with a flame thrower if they don't accept his woman is sexy as hell.  

If the author can maintain a good balance between alien violence and true-love romance, I will continue to read the series.