Hanna Dare

4 Stars

I think I must have Firefly goggles on….

Apparently, I’m a fan of space and smugglers and a motley crew of outcasts with their own code of honor and their own brand of family.

This time around, the focus is on Captain Sebastian Garcia (aka Captain Mal Reynolds), and I dug his charming personality, his on-the-fly ability to adapt to any situation. Though he may project he’s all about nonchalant charisma with nary a care in the universe, Sebastian holds deep inside all his failings show more and regrets. He’s not a bad person per se, but he’s done some not so nice things.

One of those things was charming a prince and relieving (ok, really stealing) him of his ship, for all good intentions and purposes of course. Prince Ren comes looking for Sebastian, not necessarily for revenge but for help. Someone stole a priceless artifact from his home planet, and Sebastian’s loose morals, profiteering self is just the guy for getting it back in return for not going to jail.

This was not as serious and gritty as the first installment and sadly, nowhere near as smexy. WTH Ms. Dare? WTH? Anyhoo, this had a good romantic progression filled with longing and doubt, as Sebastian and Ren try to resist caring for one another again.

What this excelled at were the lighter funnier moments, the action and suspense - with me holding tight to those goggles I’ve been wearing in the useless hope of ever seeing a Firefly revival in my lifetime. However, this pretty much scratched that itch for the time being.

Obviously, I was entertained, especially relishing every scene the ship’s crew was in, slowly building everyone’s background adding layers to this quirky onion. I really enjoyed their misadventures of planning to do wrong but always ending up doing right. Looks like bounty hunter Xin, and high ranking Commonwealth agent Jonathan, are up next! Woot! show less

This isn't a first book in a series so much as one book in (as far as I can tell) three parts. It follows Conor, an 18 year old high-school senior who auditions for a singing competition slash reality show and, while waiting for the results, starts (in)voluntarily hanging out with the local high-school bully and all-around jerk, Derek.

I wasn't sure I was going to like a bully romance (and there are some bullying scenes between the MCs), and I'm still not sure I like it - bullies usually show more have to do some serious work to become redeemable in my book, and that is yet to happen here.

But I do like Conor, and seeing how the story is from his POV, the focus is more on his coming of age, and the writing is good - I don't mind continuing the series or at least finishing the rest of the installments of this book and seeing where it goes. show less

This was... Interesting. I enjoyed it, but there is a coarseness to the prose that reminded me of adventure stories from my childhood, if those stories had included sex scenes. A few times I thought of it as built from Legos; limited, not quite right. The scale's wrong. Many readers can gloss over these things, reading for content and ignoring the missing detail.

I've seen this compared to Firefly, and that is...close-ish. There was a lot more cleverness in Firefly. Still, the plot is okay. show more The resolution is satisfying. I don't know that I'll continue on to the next book, but it's not out of the question. I do wish that second sex thing didn't follow the first one without a shower in between the two acts. That was perhaps the worst part of this book. show less

This installation was more coming of age than romance. Conor entered a brand new world of competitive performing, made some good friends, made some mistakes that could have turned really ugly (but didn't, with help from said friends), and in all grew as a person. There wasn't so much romance as there was sexual exploration and Conor trying to figure out what he wants. He was naive, but not over the top or in an annoying way. He was just... a kid, mature for his age, figuring things out.