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juliamarkovic

Read Fragment

I'm a co-blogger at All Things Urban Fantasy, while Read Fragment is where other genres wash ashore.

Currently reading

Angel & Faith: Live Through This
Christos Gage, Rebekah Isaacs, Phil Noto, Joss Whedon
Rooftoppers
Katherine Rundell
Carniepunk
Kevin Hearne, Kelly Gay, Jackie Kessler, Nicole Peeler, Kelly Meding, Hillary Jacques, Allison Pang, Jaye Wells, Delilah S. Dawson, Rob Thurman, Rachel Caine, Seanan McGuire, Mark Henry, Jennifer Estep
A Stitch in Time
Amanda James
The Demon's Lexicon
Sarah Rees Brennan
The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie (Mackenzies Series)
Jennifer Ashley
On Midnight Wings - Adrian Phoenix With this fifth book in the series, The Maker's Song has firmly tipped from shadowy organizations to the boundless magic of vampire and Fallen kind. The last, sick machinations of the Shadow Bureau scramble to destroy Dante and Heather, but while I struggled with the endless agents in past books, this time around the balance falls towards mystery and myth.

The Maker's Song series has always suffered from an over abundance of drama, all of which engendered very little real emotion for the characters. Five books of betrayal, flash after flash of the rape, torture, and abuse Dante suffered as a child, and always some shadowy organization plotting his death, activation, or downfall. Drama to the point of melodrama, the comedic weight of opposition stacked against poor, damaged Dante finally crashes in this book. The endless repetition of child abuse and death that beats in Dante's head coalesces from fragments into a whole, and while the last few chapters had me racing to finish, my biggest emotional reaction was hope that Chloe, and the images of rape and abuse she brings with her, could finally rest in peace.

Phoenix's world is thick with betrayal and intrigue, and fans of the dark, dark drama of Lilith Saintcrow's Dante Valentine or J. R. Ward's LOVER AWAKENED will have lots of pain and angst to enjoy. For myself, however, Dante Baptiste has so many characteristics it's hard to see him as a character. Vampire, angel, sociopath, maker... in early books his myth smothered the story; he existed only as a reflection of others' reactions. In this story, at long last, as the long foreshadowed secrets and events come to a crescendo, all I hoped for was an end. An end to Dante's pain, and end to the government's plots, and one last magical super nova to make all of this noise and angst worth it. ON MIDNIGHT WINGS certainly takes the story to a precipice, but I don't know if I have one more book in me.

Full Review to Follow.

Sexual Content: References to child abuse, rape, and sex.