Marked

I wasn't expecting Jane Austen, but I do have my standards even for trash. The paper thin characters have an emotional depth that is slightly below the Barbie and Ken level. And reading such an incredibly original piece of dialogue as « I know modern women aren’t supposed to like to cook, but, well, I do » made me feel like I was betraying the whole female sex just by reading this. I did smile at some of the reactions of a 21st century woman suddenly confronted with Greek gods and heroes, but I'm not sure the humor was intended, and even if it was, the genuine potential of the situation was woefully under-exploited. I only finished this one because I'm a romance addict.

Marked
3 Stars

Like so many series, Marked suffers from first book syndrome. The world building based on the story of Jason and the Argonauts from Greek mythology is original and compelling. However, it has a tendency to overshadow the plot for most of the book, and readers unfamiliar with this particular tale might find themselves a little lost as there is very little exposition on the myth itself and an overabundance of characters to sort out.

The romance is satisfying but predictable as is the resolution of the prophecy storyline. Theron is NOT my idea of a hero despite his ancestral connection to Heracles. He is arrogant, manipulative and prejudiced, and is not above using mind control to coerce Casey into doing his bidding - loss of show more free will is NOT a turn on in a romance novel.

Casey is an engaging heroine and her reactions to the strange developments in her life are realistic and believable. Nevertheless, she is too accepting of the non-answers and partial explanations offered by the hero and her damsel in distress routine gets a little old - my preference is for kick-ass heroines who rescue themselves rather than waiting for Mr. Wonderful to come along.

The secondary characters have potential, especially Isadora and Demetrius, but the villain comes off as pathetic rather than threatening. Although there is one disturbing scene with her son, which suggests that there might be more here than meets the eye.

All in all, not too bad and the developing war is promising for the series. show less

AUTHOR: First time reading a book by Elisabeth Naughton. She started slow talking in what I consider "boring baby talk" and all of sudden revved up the engine. She's good. Has great timing on how to go from adventure to romance, adventure to romance. She knows how to tease you with the romance (it builds and builds and builds and then BOOM).

SYNOPSIS
** Six levels of people: (top to bottom): gods, Argoleans; Argonauts (Argolean warriors) ; Misos (half Argolean/half human); Humans; Daemons (the bad guys controlled by a bad female)
**The typical male falls in love with female.

SEX SCALE: Of the following (5) : (NOT very descriptive and requires imagination); (WILL make you wiggle a little); (WISH it was me); (OH boy, do not have to use my show more imagination at all); (EROTICA and well over the top) ****** this book gets a WISH IT WAS ME rating******

LEAST FAVORITE PART: Reading about how weak Isadora is considered.to be.

FAVORITE PART: Discovery of a group of people no one knew about

YOU WILL LIKE THIS BOOK IF YOU LIKE: Mythology. Bad guys chasing and trying to capture a good guy. True love threatened by a forced loveless relationship. Is it passion or is it love? Oh, gotta' love His body. She's strong and won't take any crap. Mystery behind what will really happen if 2 females meet each other eye to eye. Leaves you with a feeling of....."Hurry, get me to the next book"

WHY DIDN'T THIS BOOK GET FIVE STARS? Love the book but I have read other books by other authors that totally captured me and sent me off the deep end. show less

Listened for Review/Read for Fun (Tantor/Kindle)
Overall Rating: 4.25
Story Rating: 4.25
Character Rating: 4.25

Audio Rating: 4.00 (not part of the overall rating)

Note: Things I might have done while reading this book:

1) Made sure that a certain couple were going to get a book (not saying who as it would be spoilerish--even if I am the last person to read this series): Book 3
2) Made sure a certain hot biker dude got a story --- not yet but Elisabeth said he is the next book.
3) Made sure that she wasn't ending the series soon--it was just so darn fun

First Thought when Finished: Marked has me hooked on this series. I can't wait to continue!

Story Thoughts: Argonauts! Demons! Halflings! This was a deliciously great read for a fan of mythology. show more I love how the Greek characters from stories we all know/love were woven into this world. Theron, leader of the Argonauts, was stuck between a rock and hard place, as all good heroes need to be. Casey (his rock) was not only the women who intrigued him but the one he surely was leading back home to die. I loved the push/pull that went on between them where the story was concerned. There was only one thing that really bugged me (him not being honest with her about why they needed to go to his home) but it all worked out in the end.

Character Thoughts: I really liked Theron and Casey! I think they had good chemistry and despite the lack of honesty from Theron, I believed in his intention to do the best by her that he could. What really sold me on the series is the side characters. I can already tell that I want book 3! Let's just say the chemistry between that couple is already off the charts in this story. I really want Nick's book and I might have cried when another character died (can't give that away either). Nick was my favorite character overall so I am hoping we get to see him in the books to come since he doesn't have his own yet! Side characters are what sold me again. Darn IT!

Audio Thoughts:

Narrated By Elizabeth Wiley / Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins

Overall I really liked Elizabeth's narration. Her voice was so familiar that I had to go look up if I had heard before but I had not. I think she sounds a bit like Tonya Eby. So if you like her narration, I think Elizabeth will work for you. She has great pacing, emotion, and character tendencies (you could tell the characters thoughts from the way she was reading the dialogue). Her male voices are pretty good and I think she was pretty good at Casey. The reason the rating is not higher actually has to do with production. The CDs just immediately went to the next part when switching disks. It often made me feel like I missed something so I would pick up my kindle copy to make sure I had not. That was distracting during the listening process for me.

Final Thoughts: This is going on my Seriously Series reads for 2014! show less

I’ve been looking for a new series to read so I went to Goodreads to look up paranormal romance series that might interest me. I only read series that have six or seven books already written because I like to read one after the other and not wait a year for the next one. This one had a lot of the requirements that I desired like mythology mixed with romance. I decided to try it out.

This is the first book in the series so I knew the story would suffer a little while the author did some world building and character introduction but I think Elizabeth Naughton did a pretty good job of it while keeping me interested in the story and romance. This book is based off the story of Jason and the Argonauts or rather the seven original Argonauts show more and a realm called Argolea that Zeus created for them to live in along with their descendants. Argoleans can go between their world and the human world through portals but it is dangerous because their enemy, Atalanta, sends out her daemons to hunt and kill Argoleans and the Argonauts who guard them.

Theron is one of the Argonauts who guard Argolea. He is from the line of Heracles or Hercules as the humans call him. He goes to the strip club where Casey works as a server to retrieve the ailing Argolean princess who ran off from the castle in Argolea. The princess is there watching Casey for some reason.

Acacia or Casey as her friends know her works as a server at a strip club in a small town in Oregon. I liked this part because I live in Oregon. The town is obviously made up, at least I think it is, because I have never heard of it. When she leaves early from the strip club because she hasn’t been feeling well, she almost runs over what she thought was large animals eating something but then she realizes that the animals are actually evil looking creatures with animal-like heads and human bodies. They are attacking a man; the same man that bumped into her in the club and left with the petite blonde. She manages to save him. He refuses to go to a hospital so she takes him to her home to care for him and from there the world, as she knows it, turns upside down.

Theron is attracted to Casey and almost sleeps with her until he sees a birth mark on her. He realizes she is the chosen one from a prophesy which may mean that she has to die to save his people.

The story introduces a lot of people and even some gods like Hades and Persephone. It was a good read and I am curious to see what happens with the other Argonauts and the Argolean princess. I will probably read more of these books but I’m going to continue my search for a new series for now. I have a few other contenders that I am going to check out.

www.paranormalromanceslut.com show less

Elisabeth Naughton made me fall in love with her with her Stolen Trilogy and now she's just upping her game all around. I really liked the world building here and all the history you get with the Greek mithology involved in the plot. I LOVED Casey and I learned to really care about Theron too by the half of the book. I'm so excited to read how all these sexy Argonauts are going to turn now from this point on.

I grabbed Marked off of the KDP free list just because the cover is so tempting. The main character, Theron, lives up to it too. The book reminded me A LOT of J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood, though I don't know which series came first. The Eternal Guardians has the same leather-clad, hulking alpha-males oozing testosterone all over the place and falling hard for that certain female. But hey, that's why we read these types of books to start with, right? It's all good.

I liked Casey's strong spine and Theron's dedication to his duty. The Greek pantheon makes for an interesting casting too. Though starting with a little knowledge of the mythology will probably help. For example, I misremembered Persephone and Hades' relationship at show more one point and was confused when she was excited to see him. The book does present the mythological history, so no worried if you don't know it.

Other reviewers have commented on the random placement of sex scenes and it's true. The first one seemed to especially come out of left field. It generally bothers me to find character thinking about sex when their circumstances are life threatening. Seriously, who thinks about getting down and dirty when they're running for their life? I'm fairly sure some aspect of Maslow's hierarchy of needs comes into play here. The steamy nature of the same scenes kinda makes up for it though.

While it didn't top my favourites list by a long shot, I enjoyed it enough to buy the second and look forward to he third. (Demetrius was was one of my favourites.) So I have no real complaints. It amused me for an evening and therefore served its purpose. show less