Queen of Shadows by Dianne Sylvan

Having enjoyed Dianne Sylvan’s nonfiction in the past, I was thrilled to see she had an urban fantasy coming out. I wasn’t sure if Queen of Shadows would live up to the high expectations I’d set up in my head, but I was definitely curious to find out. My expectations were met and then some. Queen of Shadows is my favorite book of 2010 so far.

Ironically, this makes it a little hard to review. When a book reaches in and grabs me emotionally the way this one did, it can be hard to separate the reviewer from the fangirl and articulate why other people might like it too! So to get a few fangirl-type things out of the way, things that resonated with me but might not necessarily translate to every reader: First, apparently Miranda Grey and I have the same taste in music, and so the scenes where she sings are given added emotional weight by the fa... Read More

Shadowflame by Dianne Sylvan

Shadowflame is a book that will polarize readers. The previous Shadow World novel, Queen of Shadows, was classified as urban fantasy but also worked as a romance. Having read Shadowflame, I think I may have lead some readers astray by calling Queen of Shadows a romance. Thinking of this series as romance may cause disappointment in Shadowflame. The conventions of romance dictate that, once the hero and heroine are fully committed, the author doesn’t mess their relationship back up. Here, David does something monumentally stupid and hurtful that threatens his and Miranda’s marriage of three months.

Obviously, when writing a series about an established couple, an author needs to create conflict betwe... Read More