J. A. Cipriano

I loved it! Like the first reviewer, I accidently read my first Lillim book out of order and was super confused. However, I really liked the book and went back and read the first one, then the next and the next and - you get the idea. Once I got the whole Dioscuri mythos, I could totally see why our Lillim was running around unsupervised (like any teen over 15 is supervised any more anyway!)
I don't do technical reviews unless the writing prevents me from getting into the story or yanks me out of it, so I'll just say I love J.A. Cipriano's "voice". I actually sink into the story and can see and feel with the characters... (which makes me super pissed at the end of this book, btw, JA). I'm really glad JAC writes almost as voraciously as I read… (more)

This was interesting to say the least. A werewolf has been sent back to ancient Egypt to rescue his friend's soul. How and by whom is never made clear. Somehow in doing this, a group of particularly heinous mummies have been released from the underworld, also back into ancient Egypt where they are able to take corporeal form. Our hero Thes, and Aziza the mummy in charge keeping the other mummies incarcerated, are hunting the mummy Kufu who is hunting the Staff of Ra, to do who knows what, but probably bad stuff with it. What follows is a quasi journey through the Egyptian Book of the Dead with Egyptian deities, divine creatures and mummies causing havoc.

The premise of this story is terrific and enough to keep the story through some small issues. I am assuming the copy I have is an ARC so the intermittent misspellings and other small mistakes can be forgiven. The beginning of the story is a cold opening with lots of action already having taken place before the story. It reads like it should be a second book in a series and it takes most of the book to find out most of what happened. This is an interesting way of doing it, but does cause a little frustration when all the characters know what is going on and merely hint at it at a bit at a time. I would dearly have loved to have gone into this story with a bit more background, even a prologue, explaining the backstory and a little more about werewolf clans as they don't seem to follow typical canon.

That said there is much that is good about this story. As I said, the premise alone is an interesting twist. Anyone with a bit of knowledge of Egyptian lore will appreciate the modern take on it. This take on werewolves is also quite interesting. There seems to be an interesting society involved with Thes and his kin. Most of the book flowed easily. I would be interested in reading the next book just to see where it goes.

4 stars

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review
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Have you ever wondered what would happen if you could make any replica from your favorite movie/comic/TV show into the real thing? Annie is an Animator that can do exactly that.

Annie has spent the last 10 years hiding from the werewolves who are sworn, by blood feud, to kill all Animators on sight. The werewolves have killed all her people including her brother and master. When a customer shows up to his appointment to hire her as a Reader she is surprised to find out that he is a famous B movie star...and a Prince of the werewolves.

The werewolves need Annie to read the object from a murder to help them solve the murders of several members if the werewolf royalty. As she learns more it appears the murders are being committed by an Animator intending to use a spell to wipe out all the werewolf royalty. Will she betray her people and save the werewolves or allow a massacre to occur?… (more)