Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Anna Windsor - Captive Soul

Her flame power nearly extinguished in a battle against the dark forces attempting to control Manhattan, fire Sybil Camille Fitzgerald is down but not out. Joining a new squad of warrior witches, she hopes to reclaim her fighting spirit and, with luck, her pyrotechnic mastery. Two problems on that front: a new army of cannibalistic demons and her superheated lust for John Cole, an unholy blend of demon and U.S. Special Forces agent now working undercover for New York’s Occult Crimes Unit.
John knows he can’t be trusted -- hell, he can’t trust himself. His warrior soul has entered a new, supernaturally fit body. Unfortunately, it’s a body belonging to the Sybils’ worst enemy, whose supernasty essence still lingers. But when John’s demon energy seems more alive than dead, it’s Camille whose scorching kiss keeps him human -- for now. All he’s got to do is master his dark side and save Camille and the Sybils from an army of satanic hellboys planning their ultimate destruction.

Comment: Well, this author has a good thing in her favour, she writes well. Her books have emotion and the sentences sound good, both in grammar and in a literay way.
The problem? The story is a little bit boring.
Camille isn't the most talented sybil, at least in the usual powers a sybil has. But she's still chosen by Bela to be part of a squad (the only squad in existence) and learns to cope with her lackings in order to help the team. In the end of the previous book she does a spell somehow and her soul touched the soul of John Cole, the "spirit" that lived in another chaarcter's head (can I say lol?). After that it's like they recognized each other and it's understood they will belong together.
It's not like I have many issues with the book, I don't, but as it is a bit boring, it obviously takes longer to finish it, which makes the book feel...well, not heavier, but more tiresome, so it clouds my judgement a bit. I'm not sure how this book could be better, the feel of it it's not easy banter or funny team work, but it's not high drama either, so...I guess the problem is there's exactly no fun in this. Even the dialogue - that usually provides the easier moments in the story - isn't as easy and funny as it could be, which makes the book too serious and one has to be paying attention all the time, it's like we can't rest from the problems...I can't explain why this feels like this to me, there are other authors who write in this way and I don't share this opinion about them, so...it's the author, I know, but in a way, this one just makes her chaarcters a bit more plain, a bit more boring, if you know what I mean.
Now it looks like I didn't like it, I did. But that's it, I just liked it, not loved it.
The romance is interesting but not super amazing as it should, considering the way things work out. The bad guys...how to not avoid them.. hum, I confess I just read a sentence here and there when they were "on"....yes, shame on me.
I think this books has all the problems of middle books in trilogies, we don't get enough new things and it's still too early to solve most of them. I'm confident the next one, the last of the trilogy, will be much better.
If I were to grade this one, I'd say a C. You read it but it's just a distant memory after a while.

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