June 2010

If you’re tired of the common tropes of the traditional fantasy genre, you can’t do much better than turning to Jim Hines’ books about Jig the Goblin. This has been hands down one of the more entertaining fantasy trilogies I’ve read in some time.

Jig is the smallest, scrawniest, runtiest goblin in the entire goblin lair–and he’s nearsighted to boot. He’s constantly harassed by the bigger and stronger goblins, and made to do all the worst chores. So it just goes to figure that he’s the one who winds up getting captured by a party of adventurers, two human princes, a dwarf cleric, and a young elven thief, all of whom are looking for the fabled Rod of Creation. Jig’s fast-thinking claim that he could guide them deeper into the caverns keeps him from getting killed on the spot by the arrogant prince leading the party, and he has to spend the rest of the book frantically trying to find a way to keep from getting killed by not only the adventurers, but everything else they encounter and fight along the way. He’s even desperate enough to commit to following one of the Forgotten Gods, if that’ll keep him alive. And to his surprise, that Forgotten God is in fact listening.

This is pretty much a D&D adventure from the goblin’s point of view, and it’s quite charming. I especially liked Jig’s forming a tentative… if not friendship, really, than at least less hostile alliance… with the young thief who’s just as much a captive of the adventurers as he is. His partnership with the Forgotten God Tymalous Shadowstar’s also a highlight, since Shadowstar’s so desperate for worshippers that he’ll even take on a goblin, the lowliest of the low. And overall, the goblin society is just hysterical, refreshingly straightforward in all its backstabbing, cowardly chaos. Four stars.

ETA: Correcting the first sentence, since I’d said “can’t do much worse” when what I really meant was “can’t do much better”. PhrasingFail! Thanks to ariaflame for the catch.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect going into this novella, Doranna Durgin’s shortest installment in her Sentinels paranormal romance series. The description of the story makes it sound like it’s erotica, since the main character, Tayla Garrett, must be initiated by another Sentinel before she can gain full command of her abilities. And by “initiated”, I mean “she needs to have sex with another Sentinel”.

In this case, that other Sentinel is Mark Burton, after whom she’s been pining for ages. Burton is pretty much ordered point-blank to initiate Tayla by none other than Nick Carter, the male lead from Wolf Hunt. Cue the obligatory “wait you’re only having sex with me because you were ordered to” angst on Tayla’s part.

However, the story is more than just that, happily. Yes, these bits are there–but as is the case with all of Durgin’s writing, it’s nicely low-key. And there’s a larger plot in play as well, one which relies upon Tayla’s specific abilities as well as on the fact that Mark is a rare Sentinel who does not in fact change shape. (Something I liked about him, in fact; he was described a lot with leonine imagery, despite the fact that he’s not a shifter at all.)

Plus, the short length of the story, a mere four chapters, meant that what angst there is here just doesn’t have time to get too drawn out and therefore overbearing. Instead, it blows over very quickly, letting the story get on with it. Very much appreciated, that. Three stars.

Aw yeah, now we’re talkin’. Doranna Durgin’s Sentinels series, in Books 1 and 2, was only mildly entertaining me–but with Book 3, I jumped up to actively enjoying it. This time around, we have the story featuring one of the characters only passingly mentioned in the first two books, Nick Carter, who leads the Sentinels of his part of the country. He’s a wolf-shifter–and the Atrum Core want to take him down. They do it by sending in Jet, over whom they have a strong and urgent hold, and giving her orders to immobilize Nick with an amulet that will poison him.

It’s not much of a spoiler at all to say that Jet, unlike every other shifter character we’ve met so far, is not human–she is in fact a wolf forced into sentient human shape by Atrum Core magic. This comes out very quickly early on in the story, and it’s a trope Durgin’s done before with great effect in her fantasy trilogy about Dun Lady’s Jess. I found her refreshingly blunt and straightforward, lacking a lot of baggage that someone who’s been human from day one would have; in short, I totally bought her as a wolf forced into bipedal, thinking shape. Moreover, I also very much liked her chemistry with Nick, and how she immediately realizes that the Core have pulled a fast one on her, by trying to convince her that the amulet wouldn’t “harm” Nick.

Most of the story is therefore about the two of them having to deal with the aftermath of her initial, failed assault, and how they can turn this to their advantage to take down the Core. At the same time, there’s a nifty little subplot involving traitors in the Sentinels’ midst, one who’s having deep second thoughts about what she’s being asked to do, and one with no repentance whatsoever! I liked the repentant one, and seriously would expect her to be the next in line to have a story starring her, if Durgin does more.

All in all this was good fun, and I do hope there will indeed be more on the way. Four stars.