Author Heather McCorkle

Cloud Atlas meets Dune in this unique take on life after death. The world building is on an epic scale, worlds upon worlds, within worlds actually. I haven't read anything this complex and well developed in a long time. It's the kind of book you can read over and over and catch new things each time. I love that about it. The writing is an excellent blend of description and dialogue that keeps it flowing along nicely.  But, where I loved Cloud Atlas and the Dune series deeply, this one didn't quite hit the love stage for me. The characters failed to pull me in. I just couldn't find sympathy for them. Perhaps it is the oddity of the world, in that they cannot die and have no respect for life, but I think it was more than that. It is tough to put my finger on, just one of those things that didn't hook me as well as I would have liked it to. Unfortunately for me, it's one of those truly important things, which was why it earned three stars instead of five. Re...

The excitement and buzz drew me to this novel but the story and the writing is what kept me with it. You may have heard of it, if not, I have a feeling you will very soon. This is one that is destined for big things. From the first page I knew I would love it. The characters are rich and three dimensional and the world is so well developed you feel as though you're there. The perfect balance of description, action, and dialogue make for an excellent book. For the first one hundred pages I was held enrapt, swept away by the mystery and hardships of life on Mars. Then the story shifted to an academy of sorts where the students played at ancient, primitive war games that felt more like I had gone back to eleventh century Earth. Which would have been fine if that's the type of book I wanted to read, but I was deep into~and excited about~a sci-fi novel, not a military historical. There were still bits of sci-fi sprinkled in with the overseers of the school interacting now and ...

I downloaded this for free on B&N, then forgot where I got it. I opened and read it thinking it was a traditionally published ARC from NetGalley. Only when I went back to NetGalley to provide feedback did I realize it was an indie title that I hadn't gotten from there. It was that good! I give it:  A hint of magic, powerful women warriors, and a mystery. I was hooked! The story flows in a writing style that carries you along, getting you caught up in the characters and the world. It is reminiscent of Stormdancer but I would dare to say, better written. This first tale of Lark promises a great series on the way, and at free, you can't go wrong. I would recommend it for fans of fantasy. It is a novella that reads like a serial~which is to say the beginning of an ongoing tale. I'm coming to love serials because they fit quite well into my busy lifestyle. You won't regret fitting this one in! Goodreads / Amazon / B&N

I'm a bit ashamed to say that I had no idea who Susan Krinard was, so when I chose this the fact that it boasted she was a NYT Bestseller bore no weight with me. I chose it because of this bit of description toward the end of its synopsis online: Mist’s normal world is falling apart. But thankfully, Mist isn’t quite so normal herself. She’s a Valkyrie, and she’s going to need all her skill to thwart Loki’s schemes and save modern Earth from the ravages of a battle of the gods. A Valkyrie in modern day San Francisco, how could I resist? And I'm glad I didn't because there was a lot to love about this book. It started out several hundred years before, which though I loved this part, the book could have done without. It bore no weight on the rest of the story. I kept waiting for it to but it just didn't. There is a lot of Norse mythology woven throughout (and admittedly sometimes 'info dumped') and as a fan of Norse mythology, I really enjoyed that part. Many...