re3 - Soulless

I'm not sure what made me desperately wanted to reread the first book in the Parasol Protectorate, Soulless, by Gail Carriger. It's been on my mind that I wanted to reread it for the last year or two but I seem to become desperate to find time to reread this and see if it was as fun as when I first read this back in 2013 (I had to backtrack through the blog to double check my dates but yes, I first read this nearly ten years ago!)

So, for those of you curious, Soulless is set in an alternative, steampunk London where vampires, werewolves and Alexia Tarabotti exist. Alexia Tarabotti has no soul - literally, though you wouldn't see it. All you would see is a spinster with Italian blood and speaks her mind. How very unladylike. 

But when Alexia is attacked by a vampire and accidentally kills it, breaking all social etiquette, she thinks it can't get worse. Boy oh, it does, as the handsome, gruff (and Alpha werewolf) Lord Maccon is sent to investigate by Queen Victoria. 

For you see, vampires are disappearing and new, rogue vampires are appearing. For some reason that no one seems to understand, Alexia keeps herself in trouble because of it. Something is afoot and whether Lord Maccon wants her help or not, Alexia is going to get to the bottom of it with her trusty brass parasol and a good cup of tea.

eNovella Review - Marine Biology

I only came across this by fluke. I was randomly listening to a podcast called Breaking the Glass Slipper and on one episode, they had Gail Carriger on. She was talking about writing comedy is fantasy/sci-fi genre. This reminded me that, years ago, I read one of her novels, Soulless (review's here. I went back to find it - and it was back in 2013!) and really enjoyed it. At the same time, I saw a book blogger pal of mine, Sarah from Feeling Fictional read and added this to her Goodreads and I thought "Perfect. Can read this super fast as it's a novella and decide if I want to go back and reread Soulless."

In this novella, Alec is a marine biology with secrets. He's a werewolf that doesn't fit in with his fellow pack members and he's gay. But when his Alpha asks him to liaison between two merfolk over a possible criminal activities due to the selkie mafia, he can't exactly say no. And with one of the merfolk being Marvin, an outrageous flirt, Alec might have his work cut out.

This is a easy, fun, cute M/M read. It's not too taxing and I was smiling while reading it. Because it's a short novella (around 11,000 words), these wasn't much fleshing out of characters/mythologies but this does serve neatly as a get-in into the San Andreas Shifters series with the first, The Sumage Solution, coming out in the next few weeks.

Not sure if I will read The Sumage Solution but this novella was a nice change for me as, the last few weeks, been reading quite long, heavy books. But I kinda want more... maybe I will have to check The Sumage Solution out...

GoodRead - Etiquette & Espionage

I had this in my To Read pile for quite some time. And after reading Soulless, the first book in Gail Carriger's adult series, The Parasols Protectorate (review here for you), you would have thought I would have read this sooner. Well, yes and no. I have my reasons. First, I was never ready for it. Not sure why. But I wasn't sure if I wanted to get into another series. And second, surely I should finish the Parasol Protectorate series. I mean, I have the second book in the series, Changeless, on my kindle.

So why did I pick this up? Well, I had tried to read another book and I just couldn't warm to it. I got around 50 pages in and went, "Nope. Not in the right mindset for this." so put it down and, after picking a few books at random, I read the first chapter of this and just kept reading late into the night.

Set around 25 years prior to the Parasols Protectorate, this new series follows Sophronia who is forced, by her mother, to enroll in Madamoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality. But this finishing school isn't exactly what Sophronia's mother thinks it is. For this finishing school teaches these young ladies how to finish... well, everything. They learn to curtsy, dance and etiquette. But they also learn diversion, how to use a weapon and espionage. All in the politest way possible, of course.

But something is happening. Something Sophronia might be able to help. That is... if she figure out where exactly the "prototype" is...

This was fun! I like my fun reads at the moment (not sure why. Because Summer is here... kinda...) so this was nice fit for me. And it was steampunk, something I want to read more of, so it felt a perfect fit. And this story had a feel to it that reminded me of the first Harry Potter book, and that's rare! I enjoyed how the mystery of the prototype wasn't the main focal point of the story and I enjoyed slowly slipping into this new world that Sophronia had found herself in. Also, there are tiny nods to the Parasol Protectorate series which fans of Gail Carriger will spot and smile at.

But, this does feel like a first book in the series so there are things when you feel that Gail is setting things up for later books or she was writing this book to make us get use to the setting, characters and situations. And, while I enjoyed the day-to-day life at this school, I know some of you guys will read this and go "There's no plot!". This might be same with fans of the Parasol Protectorate.

But I really enjoyed it, and I will be waiting to see what happens next in the Finishing School series. Or maybe I should just read Changeless...

GoodRead - Soulless

I went away for a week earlier this month. And as I knew I wanted to read from my Kindle, I went to Twitter and asked them to choose my next read. Which was fine... until I got a tie between Soulless by Gail Carriger and Demon Eyes by Scott Tracey. So, after slight panicking, Twitter saved me and picked Soulless (though I am reading Demon Eyes now) so I read this while I was away from real life. 

In a steampunk Victorian London, Alexi Tarabotti has a lot to deal with. Not only does she have to deal with the social etiquette of being a spinster and being half Italian, she's also soulless. And then a vampire tried to attack her. All she did was defend herself, but now she has a dead vampire on her hands and Lord Maccon (loud, Scottish, sexy, and, oh yes, an Alpha werewolf) has to investigate this and investigate unexpected vampires appearing and expected vampires disappearing on behalf of Queen Victoria. With Alexi always seem to be caught in the middle of this weird mess and the strange heat between her and Lord Maccon, the next few days are going to be interesting. But first, tea and treacle tart.

This was a fun read! I completely adored it! It was the perfect read for a holiday - it was sexy, fun, fluffy. It just worked. It might take a few pages (or, as I read this on my kindle, a few clicks) in for some readers to get the formal language as most of the characters were always full name. 

But, I completely enjoyed it. I got halfway through the eBook, knowing I was going to read the rest of this series and Gail's YA series, Finishing School. Yep, that's how much I enjoyed reading this. It was steampunk that didn't take itself seriously compared to other steampunks I have read (and would I really lass this as steampunk? I know some of you would, but am on the fence on how to class this). 

Anyway, I loved it! And I have already bought the sequel, Changeless, on my Kindle and a few weeks ago, Atom sent me a copy of Gail's first YA series, Etiquette and Espionage (why, thank you Atom!) so, yeah, I might get a bit obsessed with this author in the coming year. Sorry in advance, loyal readers. 

Tiny sidenote, but will trying to Google image a image of the author and the book cover, Google threw up an image of the actor Jamie Dornan (aka the Huntsman from Once Upon A Time). Is he fan's choice for Lord Maccon? Anyway, will show you the pic as... well... because this is my blog and I can!