Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 23

 

Wicked Deeds on a Winter's Night by Kresley Cole

Immortals After Dark

Bowen MacRieve, of the Lykae Clan (third in line for the throne, fancy), lost his mate a long, long, long, long time ago. Nix (*holds up sign that says I 💗 Nix*) tells him that he'll find his mate if he enters the Talisman's Hie. So he does. While on a task he comes across Mariketa the Awaited, a witch.

Bowen thinks Mariketa put a spell on him to make his Instinct be all "Look Bowen! Mate! Our Mate!" (not sure why I picture The Instinct as an over-excited puppy... Cause that doesn't fit with the writing, but I do...) Bowen ends up trapping Mariketa in a tomb with some others from the Lore. She blasts him with a spell that turns off his regeneration right before he traps them, though.

In Bowen's defense, he assumed with two demons and three fey, the witch could get out fairly quickly.

They do not get out fairly quickly.

Weeks later, a war is brewing because Mariketa hasn't returned and she's the leader of the Witches. And they're pissed at Bowen.

So, he has to go fetch her and bring her home. 

They have to jump a bunch of hurdles to get back to New Orleans. And then a couple more hurdles happen after they return to New Orleans. 

In the end, things work out and they get a happy ending. 

Lovely book. Lovely characters. Lovely all around.

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 22

 

Vittorio, the Vampire by Anne Rice

I spent a lot of time while reading this book rolling my eyes at Vittorio. Because teenagers thinking they know best is apparently not a modern trope.

When Vittorio was 16, his entire family was slaughtered by vampires. An attractive female vampire, Ursula, allows him to live though. Which... Stupid...

Vittorio travels to a town, trying to find a way to have his revenge on those vampires. After a nightly visit from Ursula (when I think they had sex...), Vittorio learns that the town gives their undesirables to the vampires.

So, Vittorio goes vampire hunting.

And fails.

The vampires capture him and feed him a bit of vampire blood, which, I think Ursula did before... Anyway. It's a vampire court... A Satanic vampire court.

Ursula begs Florian (the leader) to turn Vittorio. Which doesn't happen. Instead, Vittorio passes out and wakes up in Florence (I think it was Florence...) where, holy shit, he can see angels now! At first, he just sees Fra Filippo Lippi's guardian angels. Then another angel. Then finally his own guardian angels. He convinces the angels to help him destroy the vampires. They agree, with the vow that he will kill all the vampires.

The angels take him to the vampire's castle, help him enter their daytime resting place. Where he slaughters the vampires. Well... All but Ursula.

He tells the angels that he's going to redeem Ursula's soul.

Ursula wakes up and tricks Vittorio and makes him a vampire. Because of course she does.

Together they slaughter the captive humans at the castle and most of that town that Vittorio stayed at before. 

They make their way back to Florence (I think...) where, hey, it's the angels! Since Vittorio broke his promise to the angels, they punish him by making it so he can see people's souls. 

And, that's the book.

I enjoyed it, but... I had some issues. Mostly the Vittorio and Ursula romance. He meets her when she is trying to steal away his younger brother and sister. Then the next night he's all "Monster! Let's kiss!" And the next night they're all "I love you!" Seems... Weird to me... But whatever.

Good side story to the Vampire Chronicles.

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 21

 

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl: Squirrel Meets the World by Shannon Hale and Dean Hale

This book was super cute and funny. 

Doreen Green is an average, optimistic 14-year-old girl who has a squirrel tail and squirrel powers. 

In the book, you follow her as she starts a new school, makes friends, and takes down a supervillain wannabe.

Two friends that Doreen makes are Ana Sofia and Tippy Toe.

Ana Sofia is a super-smart deaf girl that has mad detective skills.

Tippy Toe is a squirrel. What else would you expect?

There are chapters in Doreen's point of view, as well as Ana Sofia, Tippy Toe, and the super-villain wannabe. All with footnotes from Doreen.

Like I said before, the book was super cute. Wonderful characters and some cameos from other Marvel characters. Fun and enjoyable read from beginning to end.

Stephy Reading Challenge - Book 20

 

Twice Bitten by Lynsay Sands

An Argeneau Novel

This was not the book I had planned for T. I had a Star Wars book planned. Even started reading it, but got cranky for reasons I won't rant about here. So, I dug out another Argeneau book, cause they make me happy.

This book focuses on Elspeth Argeneau and Wyatt MacKay.

Elspeth moved to Canada to get away from her controlling mother. She rents a room from Meredith, a sweet old lady. Everything seems to be going well until Elspeth is stabbed and comes home to find her mother and younger twin sisters have invaded her home. Made that stabbing not the worst part of her day. Then she meets Wyatt, Meredith's grandson. The thing is, she's met Wyatt before. She just doesn't remember it. And then someone keeps trying to kill her. Things seem pretty shitty for Elspeth. But hey! She met her lifemate! Again...

I really liked Elspeth and Wyatt. Elspeth was a tough character but also caring and kind. Wyatt took everything calmly, which was refreshing. No panic about any of it. 

Also, G.G. is fantastic and I love him.

As always with this series, great read.

I didn't much like Martine (Elspeth's mother) for what she did, but I enjoyed seeing another side to the immortals. She wasn't evil. She didn't do what she did to hurt her children. She is just a long-lived woman who suffered a great loss and did not cope well. I don't agree with her choices, but it was interesting to read. 

Random Stephy Thoughts About Marvel's Netflix Shows

When I say Marvel's Netflix Shows I'm talking about Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, The Defenders, and The Punisher. Which I binged in February when it was announced they were leaving Netflix. Three days after I finished all of them it was announced they will be moving to Disney+. Which I already assumed might happen, but I am overly paranoid and was afraid Disney might edit them so I wanted to get through a watching before Disney could mess with them. Which, I am not saying that will happen. I am saying I am weird and think of all sorts of worst-case scenarios for everything.

I was going to do a detailed summary of each season of each show in order with thoughts and opinions, but… Well, I binged them all and they’ve all smooshed together in my head. So instead, I’m going to do just a list of random thoughts and feelings about the entire series of shows. Spoilers for all, obviously. Also, fair warning, I had very little previous knowledge of any of these characters. I knew the most about Danny Rand and Luke Cage and just cause they were both in a Spider-Man cartoon that was on Disney a few years ago. Oh, and I knew a little about Daredevil from the Ben Affleck movie… But… Yeah… Here we go.

• Not a huge fan of The Punisher. I don’t hate him or anything. I just don’t really dig him. Both seasons of the show were pretty good and worth the watch. But I’m not gonna run out and start reading all the comics. 

• Jessica Jones is fantastic and I will be running out and reading all the comics about her. 

• Claire Temple is a goddess and deserves much praise.

• When Colleen told Danny that he was sleeping in the corner of her dojo, I automatically sent him to the corner anytime I thought he was doing something stupid. This carried over to all the characters. Anytime someone did something stupid I would send them to Danny's Corner. But by the end, it was no longer Danny’s corner. It was Trish’s corner cause she did some of the stupidest fucking shit out of all the shows. 

• Seriously, though. What the fuck, Trish?

• I really wish we got another season of Iron Fist. Mostly I just wanted to see Ward and Danny off on an adventure and finding themselves and being bros. 

• Also want a Misty and Colleen show. 

• I really wanted Vanessa to turn on Fisk. Sad it never happened.

• Why do the psychopaths in these shows end up with smart, beautiful women? I mean, it only happened twice, but that is still two times too many… Especially since none of the "heroes" got a relationship happy ending.

• At the end of Punisher season one, Frank fucking destroys Billy’s face. Destroys it. I was very angry about the lack of scarring on Billy in season two. Yes, there was scarring, but, in my opinion, not enough for what was done to him. Or for him to fucking whine about it for half a godsdamn season. 

• Fucking Turk, man. Every time I started a new season of one of the shows I was immediately thinking “Wonder what Turk will be doing this time.” My favorite was in the first season of Luke Cage when he was “Where’s my money” at the fucking worst time possible. Second was playing golf by the river.

• Danny could have been better written, at least in season one. He was naïve to a point of it being annoying. I expected him to be a little too trusting and naïve after returning from K’un-Lun, which he was and it worked. But sometimes he acted like a little kid and that didn’t work for me. 

• Hogarth went off the fucking rails, didn’t she? She started out as a stereotypical slimy lawyer, but by the end, I was just sitting here shocked at the shit she was doing. 

• I really wanted Jessica and Luke to get together and have their daughter, like in the comics. And for the third season of Jessica Jones I just wanted it to be them doing some crime-solving or something while the rest of the regulars from all the shows come in to baby-sit. And all the episodes just be focused on that. Come on. Picture Matt Murdock with a baby in a pouch and walking through the city. Misty panicking because she has no idea how to deal with babies. Danny trying to get little Dani to meditate. Just fantastic.

• I really did not like the series finales for Luke Cage or Iron Fist. I think if there were another season for each show I would have been fine, but the endings I got were shitty. I feel like while the Daredevil finale left some questions unanswered and things were a little open-ended, it was still a satisfying enough ending to please me. 

• I thought Danny and Colleen were an adorable couple. I loved the scene where they’re trying to cook dinner and are both just confused and making it up as they go along. 

• Loved when Danny showed up in Luke Cage. Their team-up was just fantastic. I wished they would have done more team-ups or other appearances from each other in the shows after The Defenders. Even something small like when Luke showed up in Jessica Jones, season three. I would have even been happy with some name-dropping. Like, that scene where Hogarth tells Jessica that Trish will need a new lawyer since Trish doesn’t want Hogarth’s firm to represent her anymore. I would have loved for Jessica to make some comment about calling Nelson & Murdock or something. 

• David Tennant was fantastic as Kilgrave. Actually, all of the actors playing villains were fantastic. Vincent D’onofrio gave off such fantastic serial killer vibes. All the actors were great, really. I can’t think of a single actor that made me go “really? Couldn’t have cast someone better?” Also, I am aware of the complaints that Finn Jones was cast as Danny Rand, that an Asian or Asian-American actor would have been better. Which, yes. Okay. I can agree with that. But Finn Jones did a good job as Danny Rand, in my opinion. I’m just talking about the acting skills of those involved. 

• These shows did a good job at making their villains sympathetic. I didn’t agree with them, but shit I felt bad for the shit they had gone through. 

• I almost felt bad for Shades. Dude just wanted to help run a nice little criminal empire and he surrounded himself with people that have major family problems. And those family problems just keep causing trouble.

• Was it just me or did Frank Castle’s voice have a Christan Bale as Batman vibe? 

• I really liked Micro in season one of Punisher. Was pretty sad that he didn’t return for season two. 

• Aside from my previous issue with season one Danny Rand, the characters were all well written.  

That's all I got. Since the shows will be on Diseny+ soon, I will probably do a rewatch at some point and might do that nice organized season-by-season summary and review. But this is what y'all get for now.