Audio Sunday: How to train your dragon + Bloodring

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III is a truly extraordinary Viking hero known throughout Vikingdom as "the Dragon Whisperer" ... but it wasn't always so. Travel back to the days when the mighty warrior was just a boy, the quiet and thoughtful son of the Chief of the Hairy Hooligans. Can Hiccup capture a dragon and train it without being torn limb from limb? Join the adventure as the small boy finds a better way to train his dragon and becomes a hero!

My thoughts:

Not much to say really. I listened to the audio and it was nothing like the movie...well they were vikings and there were dragons. 

David Tennant narrated the book and I did enjoy listening to his voice, but then who wouldn't? ;) He was the sole reason for me listening.

The story itself was also fun as Hiccup tried to train his whiny dragons and then something BIG happens, and then something BIGGER. So a nice world all in all.

Oh and it was like 3,5 hours long, awesome.

cover

eh

Audiocd, 208 pages
Published February 12th 2004 by Hodder Children's Books (first published 2003)
How to Train Your Dragon #1
MG / fantasy

No one thought the apocalypse would be like this. The world didn't end. And the appearance of seraphs heralded three plagues and a devastating war between the forces of good and evil. More than a hundred years later, the earth has plunged into an ice age, and seraphs and demons fight a never-ending battle while religious strife rages among the surviving humans.

Thorn St. Croix is no ordinary neomage. All the others of her kind, mages who can twist leftover creation energy to their will, were gathered together into Enclaves long ago. There, they live in luxurious confinement, isolated from humans and exploited for their magic. When Thorn's powers nearly drive her insane, she escapes - and lives as a fugitive, disguised as a human, channeling her gifts for war into stone-magery and the pacific tasks of jewelry making. But when Thaddeus Bartholomew, a dangerously attractive policeman, shows up on her doorstep and accuses her of kidnapping her ex-husband, she retrieves her weapons and risks revealing her identity to find him. And for Thorn, the punishment for revelation is death....

My thoughts:

I am torn over this one. It was good, but audio...it worked but if I did something else for a second then I got confused. I am sure I missed a ton of things in this book.

But the premise was so cool. Angels came down, killed humans and destroyed shit. Then suddenly they fought alongside humans cos evil spawns came forth. But the cool thing was, were they really angels, or aliens? Ohhh. 

What was left was a post apocalyptic world in an ice age. So the world was truly good.

Thorn, the heroine is a neo mage...would have wanted more stuff there. Anyway, she always seemed to be in heat. People showed up, ugh this is why I need short audios! I know 12 is not long, but too long for me.

I would rather read the next book than listen.

Cover

meh

Audio, 12ish
Published November 7th 2006 by Roc Fantasy
Rogue Mage #1
Post apocalyptic /urban fantasy /sci-fi

Paranormal Friday: x3 short reviews

Elizabeth Phoenix once used her unique skills as a psychic to help in the Milwaukee Police Department’s fight against injustice. But when Liz’s foster mother is found viciously murdered—and Liz is discovered unconscious at the scene—her only memory of the crime comes in the form of terrifying dreams...of creatures more horrific than anything Liz has seen in real life. What do these visions mean? And what in the world do they have to do with her former lover, Jimmy Sanducci?

While the police question Jimmy in the murder, Jimmy opens Liz’s eyes to a supernatural war that has raged since the dawn of time in which innocent people are hunted by malevolent beings disguised as humans. Only a chosen few have the ability to fight their evil, and Jimmy believes Liz is among them. Now, with her senses heightened, new feelings are rising within Liz—ones that re-ignite her dangerous attraction to Jimmy. But Jimmy has a secret that will rock Liz to her core…and put the survival of the human race in peril.

My thoughts:

What to say? It did not work for me and I started skimming...a lot. I just never connected to the world or the characters. In UF that is important for me. For some reason I can read PNR and feel eh, but UF, no!

Stuff happened, the heroine did things, yawn. Honestly it failed for me. The reason is connection and that I just do not care or have anything more to say. It had promise, just not for me.

Conclusion:

I did see that later books have better ratings so many it improves, but for me it will be too late.

Paperback 352 pages: Published November 4th 2008 by St. Martin's Paperbacks: Phoenix Chronicles #1: Urban fantasy: Own

Jane Yellowrock is the last of her kind—a skinwalker of Cherokee descent who can turn into any creature she desires and hunts vampires for a living. But now she’s been hired by Katherine Fontaneau, one of the oldest vampires in New Orleans and the madam of Katie’s Ladies, to hunt a powerful rogue vampire who’s killing other vamps...

My thoughts:

I do not know what made this one just ok for me. It might have been that it was on audio. The narrator was not bad, but I just felt that the book did not work on audio.

Again I have nothing to say. Jane was cool, there was interesting stuff going on. But then there were other things, the first person narration, beast talking, the ways she said French names, and I did not like the French accents.

I am also sure I missed half the book when I was half asleep at times. Not a good sign. Good audio will keep me from missing things.

Conclusion:

But it was ...ok, but I'd rather read it and see if I still find it ok.

Audiobook, Unabridged, 12-15 hours, I can't remember: Published April 13th 2010 by Audible Frontiers (first published May 22nd 2009): Jane Yellowrock #1: Urban fantasy

Sullivan Quinn didn't travel 3,000 miles from his native Ireland and his wolf pack just to chase rabidly after the most delectable quarry he's ever seen. Quinn is in America on a mission--to warn his Other brethren of a shadowy group willing to use murder and mayhem to bring them down. But one whiff of this Foxwoman's delicious honeysuckle fragrance and he knows that she is more than a colleague or a conquest…she is his mate.

Anthropologist Cassidy Poe is a world-renowned authority on social interaction, but the overpowering desire she feels around Quinn defies every ounce of her expertise. Working by his side to uncover The Others' enemies poses risks she never expected--to her own safety, to those she loves, and to her heart, as every encounter with Quinn proves more blissfully erotic than the last…

Now, with no one to trust but each other, Quinn and Cassidy face a foe that's edging closer every day, threatening to destroy the life they've always known, and the passion they've just discovered…

My thoughts:

This one was horrible, it was boring, I could care less and pretty soon I skimmed and then I mostly just jumped over pages to get to the end.

Not the book for me. Do not ask me to say more..sigh.

Fine ok something... Quinn was totally rapey at first. The girl whatever her name was, was lame. I mean what the? Stand up for yourself and kick him in the nuts or something.

Then some blah blah was going on. Dunno what happened but I never connected to anything at all.

Conclusion:

Not my kind of book

Paperback, 336 pages
Published May 2nd 2006 by St. Martin's (first published March 2nd 2006)
Novels Of The Others #9
Paranormal romance
Own