Top 5 Sundays #41 - Best Book Sidekicks!

Ah, sidekicks. They aren't the ones to save the day or get the girl and if a villain targets them it's more because the villain's looking for an indirect strike against the hero than as a proactive move against a real threat. Yup, it's a hard role, that of the sidekick, but also more important than you'd think. After all, When you're not being held captive or threatened, you're supporting the hero (or heroes) in a whole slew of ways, including emotionally, physically, and, yup, even comically. Not everyone can be a sidekick, it takes a special kind of person, one with the sort of personality that can shine through to the bright side even when tied to a chair with a sword blade to their throat.

Which brings us to this week's Top 5 Best Book Sidekicks!

#5 - Finn Lane from The Elemental Assassin series by Jennifer Estep

He's not just Gin's brother, he's her source for all the gossip and cold hard facts she could ever hope for on her targets, a crack shot, and better-than-reliable back-up. Add to that the fact that Finn well and truly understands his sister, that he supports her unconditionally yet isn't afraid to call her on her BS and, really, what more could a first class assassin ask for?

#4 - Ilianna and Tao from The Dark Angels series by Keri Arthur

I could tell you about how this trio has a awesome relationship of many forms; they're business partners in a restaurant, they're roommates, they're friends, they're family. I could tell you about how they have complimentary skill sets and a stronger-than-steel bond. But, really, what makes Ilianna and Tao such great sidekicks is their willingness to have Coca Cola at the ready when Risa returns from a hard day of butt kicking.

#3 - Jess, Marc, Tina, Sinclair, Nick, Antonia, Garrett and more from Betsy Taylor, Vampire Queen series by Maryjanice Davidson

In the beginning, it was just Betsy and her best friend Jess. Then she saved Marc from his almost-suicide. And then she fell in love Sinclair who came as a matched set with his majordomo Tina. And then the werewolves found out about her and sent one of their own, Antonia, as a sort of ambassador-cum-babysitter-cum-spy. And  then Antonia fell in love with Garrett, a slowly recovering vamp savage. And then Jess got together with Nick. And on it went until her house had more in common with the Hotel California than 1313 Mockingbird Lane.

#2 - Cookie from Charley Davidson series by Darynda Jones

Technically, she's Charlie's assistant. And next door neighbour. And best friend. And cheerleader. And fan club president. And alibi. Okay, so the list goes on a bit long. Putting up with a boss/friend/neighbour/so on who is the Grim Reaper and frequently targeted for death is no easy thing, but Cookie pulls it off superbly.

#1 - Pony from Elfhome series by Wen Spencer

When he first pops up in  the first book, he's just a random elf assigned to guard the newly elfin Tinker. By the book's end, however, he's become so much more, willingly binding himself to Tinker in ways that are still being made clear two books later. He's an awesome blend of big brother, best friend, and sexual tension, all wrapped up in a pretty package with a gooey, golden-hearted centre.

Top 5 Sundays #39 - Favourite Female Book Characters

The heroes makes us swoon, no question, but more often than not it's the heroine who gives the story its voice, who acts as our eyes and ears within a story, who we most relate with. Her sarcasm, humour, seriousness, and opinions set the tone for the story and can be the difference between a reader connecting with a book and get stuck on the outside. And, of course, we all have our favourites.

So, without further adieu, I present this week's Top 5 - my favourite female book characters.

#5 - Risa Jones (of Keri Arthur's Dark Angels series)

She's snarky, she's powerful, she's loyal, she's kickass, she's brave, she's unbelievably complicated and the best part of all? She's addicted to Coca Cola. She drinks it like other people drink coffee and, OMG, she has her friends trained to pour her glasses of coke following any emotional upheaval or  bad guy skirmish. That alone is an incredible feat - I can barely train mine to keep an emergency bottle in their fridge, should I drop by. That's a heroine anyone can get behind!

#4 - MacKayla Lane (of Karen Marie Moning's Fever series)

She starts off a bubbly, sun-loving, fun-loving blonde and over the course of the book she's...well, she's like a blade being forged in fired; she goes through hell, literally in several instances, and comes out the stronger for it. She's not as bubbly at series end - suffice to say the darkness has rubbed off her more than a bit - but she's still sun-loving and fun-loving and, hey, even blonde. She's a real inspiration on several levels.

#3 - Jane True (of Nicole Peeler's Jane True series)

From the beginning, Jane has been a woman who has been confident about her own identity. Sure, she has an intricate support system and she may not believe herself capable of saving the world, but when it comes to who she is - and what she is - Jane is a character who makes no apologies and simply is as she is, take her or leave her. I took her. She's worth it.

#2 - Kate Daniels (of Ilona Andrews' Kate Daniels series)

She's the daughter of a man so powerful that he's been worshiped as a god more than once over the centuries. She's the spouse of a man who can take the form of a prehistoric lion and who leads a pack of almost two thousand shapeshifters. She's sent gods running with their tail between their legs, or at least those gods she let live. She's got buckets of attitude, loads of spunk, and enough power to cow the powerful...and somehow still ends up in situations you would've have thought toddlers knew to avoid. Epic.

#1 - Charley Davidson (of Darynda Jones' Charley Davidson series)

She's the Grim Reaper - a lost soul magnet and portal to Heaven. Every demon this side of Hell wants to get their hands on her, every other ghost wants her help in some way or another, and her love life? Well, her love interest in the son of Satan. Need more be said? What I love most about her though is her sense of humour and the healthy helping of sarcasm that comes along with it. Charley, simply put, is the most-like-me character I've ever read...super powers aside.

Top 5 Sundays #9 - Favorite Fictional Families!

This week's Top 5 list focuses on favourite fictional families. These are the cohesive units bound by love and sometimes blood that provide our heroes and heroines with support, with lifelines, with sound arguments for claims of insanity. Some families are more involved, some are less in the know, but to be considered a real family the one thing they all have in common is love. Whether their son is a vampire, their sister sees dead people, their best friend's in love with a reaper or their in-laws vacation in Hell, the love binding this ragtag group of misfits together is undeniable and unconditional.

So, without further ado, here are my Top 5 Favorite Fictional Families!


#5 - The Davidsons from the Charley Davidson series by Darynda Jones

In the first book, you're introduced to a successful, stuck-up, brainiac sister, a step-mother with buckets of prejudice and nothing short of hatred (born from jealousy no less) for her second step-daughter, a loving albeit passive father and a protective detective uncle Charley assists with murder investigations. By the end of the second book, however, it becomes clear that first impressions couldn't be more wrong.

#4 - The D'Artigo Sisters from the Otherworld series by Yasmine Galenorn

When this series starts off, three sisters - a witch, a cat shifter, and a vampire - live together in a large Victorian house while investigating magic based crimes on behalf of the Fae crown in another world. And then Camille, the eldest, falls in love and subsequently marries a dark elf, a youkai demon and a dragon. Delilah has a failed relationship with a detective - who ends up with the Elfin Queen's niece, a doctor, later on down the series - before settling in with a dragon halfbreed for a fiancee. Menolly has a committed relationship with a puma shifter. Iris, Camille's coworker at the start of the series, moves in with the girls and recently married a leprecaun. Rozurial, an incubus, pops up while hunting a rogue vampire in the third book and hangs around to fight the Big Bad. An dream demon jumps sides at another point and takes refuge with the girls. Shamus, their cousin, comes to stay after a harrowing experience in the Otherworld...and it goes on!

#3 - The Jenson-Moore Pack from the Riley Jensen series by Keri Arthur

Riley and her twin brother Rhoan were kicked out of their birth pack for being halfbreeds - half vampire, half werewolf. For a long, long time they were all each other had in the world. Fast forward to their happily ever after glimpsed in the spin-off series, Dark Angels, and you've got both Riley and Rhoan happily mated - her with husband Quinn, him with long time boyfriend Liander. Thanks to Liander's sister volunteering to be their surrogate, Liander and Riley have five children: Ronan, Liana, Darci, Kian and Nika. For a couple of unwanted pups, Riley and Rhoan have done more than well for themselves, don't you think?

#2 - The Price-Healy family from Seanan McGuire's InCryptid series

This is a family of cryptozoologists. Verity is the main character, an ambitious dancer and dedicated monster observer. She has a brother, Alex, and sister, Antimony, and the three of them are descended from not one, but two (at least) long lines of renegade monster hunters who had the whacky idea that just because something wasn't human didn't mean it didn't deserve to live. Protective, loving, and supportive this family not only helps each other out with everything from monster research to relationship advice, they also provide pearl after pearl of hard earned wisdom. In Verity's own words, 

“Growing up in my family meant ambushes on your birthday, crossbows for Christmas, and games of dodge ball where the balls were occasionally rigged to explode. It also meant learning how to work your way out of a wide variety of death traps. Failure to get loose on your own could lead to missing dinner, or worse, being forced to admit that you missed dinner because your baby sister had tied you to the couch. Again.”

#1 - The Ranger Corps 2.0 from Kelly Meding's MetaWars series

You know that saying about blood being thicker than water? Turns out shared experiences trump blood. As children, Teresa, Gage, Renee, Ethan and Marco went through hell - literally. Their parents were superheroes which meant two things; one, they all inherited superpowers themselves and, two, supervillains were always trying to kill them. And then one day, in the middle of the battle that orphaned them, all the superpowers vanished. Skip ahead fifteen years and all of the sudden back the powers come and those five kids find themselves grown up and back together, doing the best they can to unravel the mystery, get a handle on long lost gifts and find their place in the not-so-friendly world they find themselves in. And they're doing all of that just like any family would - together.


And there you have it - my Top 5. Tune in next week for more. Ciao!

REVIEW: Darkness Unbound by Keri Arthur

Book: Darkness Unbound

Author: Keri Arthur

Series: Dark Angels (Risa Jones)

Publishing stats: September 27, 2011 by Bantam Dell (USA)

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Cover Blurb: Being half werewolf and half Aedh, Risa Jones can enter the twilight realms between life and death and see the reapers, supernatural beings that collect the souls of the dead. But she soon makes a terrifying discovery: Some sinister force is stealing souls, preventing the dead from ever knowing the afterlife.

Reapers escort souls—not snatch them—but Risa is still unnerved when a reaper shadows her in search of someone Risa has never met: her own father, an Aedh priest, who is rumored to be tampering with the gates of hell for a dark purpose. With the help of her “aunt”—half-werewolf, half-vampire Riley Jenson—and an Aedh named Lucian who may have lost his wings but none of his sex appeal, Risa must pursue whatever shadowy practitioner of blood magic is seizing souls, and somehow stop her father . . . before all hell breaks loose.

First line: I've always seen the Reapers.

What I liked: Well, right off the bat I love that, as a sequel to Keri Arthur's Riley Jensen, Guardian series, you get to see how life's turned out for Riley, Rhoan, Quinn, Liander and their pups, not to mention Dia, twenty years later. What's even better, you're introduced to new and never-before explored elements of Riley's world through a whole new perspective. Heap on top of that a brand new cast of characters - with fun and unexpected connections to past characters - and an engaging, tantalizing new narrator and this book quickly marks itself as something distinct and unique compared to its mother series, despite its shared world and back story.

What I didn’t like: You know what's worse that a stupid hero or heroine? A hero or heroine who says, straight out, what they should be doing, who agrees wholeheartedly with the advice given to them by others, who refers to the disastrous decisions of old and the wisdom learned from them...and then proceeds to ignore it all because, dang it, they simply can't stand the thought of their loved ones being harmed. Don't get me wrong - I can get behind that sentiment - but to then run headlong into danger yourself...it's just another brand of stupidity. Because, yay, you've spared your loved one physical harm on your behalf and instead they just have to cope with your injuries and potential death knowing that it was incited to spare their own. Yup, that's much better. Cue eye-roll here.

Overall: Hands down every bit as good as the original series. I can't wait to see how the story develops from here - especially when Risa has such hunky potential love interests fluttery about. Plus, I want to know Riley's youngest two children are named (The eldest set of twins - Liana and Ronan - are training to be police officers, the middle daughter - Darcy - is the only non-twin) and get more snapshots of her pack's happy home life.

Would I read this author again: Yup, no question. Between the futuristic setting of these series and the depth of Arthur's world-building, these books are pure addiction in pulp paper packaging.

My rating: ♥♥♥♥♥/5

To purchase the book for yourself, you can find it at Chapters.Indigo.ca, Amazon.ca, Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. Enjoy!