Kiss Me Dead, By Dale Ibitz

Hello out there! It seems like it's been a terrible long time since I last got a review posted, as well as an update. I was able to enjoy a brief vacation at the end of May, ya know... right after I finished the Dreamland - Part Two first draft. Yeah? Is that the crowd roaring I hear out there? Good, good. Enjoy that little bit of excitement there, cuz the editing is already underway!!

So, not only do I have that taking up blogging time, but Game of Thrones just totally sucks me in. This season has been astounding, and I've honestly found it hard to think about anything else. With the show surpassing the books, and us long time book readers finally getting some answers, I can think of nothing else! I mean, on one hand I can write a blog post, but on the other, I can read another crazy fan theory how Ned and Lyanna Stark are somehow still alive and hiding in the swamps!! Oy. It's not even a conscious decision, it just happens. I am looking forward to the end of this season, where I plan on cracking open my post from last year and seeing what theories got shot to hell.

Aside from that, I have still been reading and listening to my audio books. I've started Harry Potter (again) and have a couple other indie novels I need to get reviews up on. I'll get back into the swing of reviewing with Kiss Me Dead, by Dale Ibitz.

I picked up this book after going on a mad search for Angel mythos. I did find a few that dealt totally with our feathered friends, but somehow Ibitz caught my eye with this tale about a reaper-human hybrid. The book doesn't have many reviews, so if you do pick it up and take a fancy to it, please do a fellow author a favor and smack a review up there on Amazon or Goodreads, or your platform of choice. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, good reviews mean the world to us!

Now, on to this juicy little tale and my three star review.

This book was really delightful. I know that the three star review might seem a little low for a book I like, but it is a really good story, and it is also told well for the most part. There were just a few issues that I wasn’t able to overlook that I hope my review can be constructive on.

As I said before, this is the book I chose to fill the void that’s been deepening for angel lore, and I think it was a taste of what I wanted. It mostly deals with reapers and reaper mythos, which Ibitz gives us enough to really sink our teeth into. There was not a lot to the angel side of the story, just a few bits sprinkled in here and there, but it was well crafted to what the story needed. The two found a really nice balance and fit perfectly together.

The book is structured really well, too. Ibitz grabs our attention right off the bat with two points of view intricately woven together during two separate time periods. We get Christian the reaper from 1938, and Brooke from present time. The chapters alternated between the two, giving us a parallel story until it finally met in the middle. I have to say, the way these two individual arcs lined up and fell together at the end really kept me turning the pages.

The way Ibitz knitted these stories together really showed her skill as a writer and was one of, if not THE, high point of the book for me.

Now, let me explain why some of those stars didn't get filled in.

My first issue was due to the overuse of flowery prose. Now, some flowery prose is needed and refreshing in a book or manuscript, but there were several instances where it felt the prose went a little bit overboard. Everything was flowery, and it was sometimes hard to decipher descriptions which led to an exhaustive read for something that should have been simple. Prose needs to be changed up some. Highs and lows, ebb and flow. Flowery and simple. A book needs them both.

Never underestimate the use of simplicity. "It was cold."

Need to be a little bit more descriptive? "It was cold."

It’s simple, but the emphasis gets it through to the reader. Then the flowery statement of how the MC or POV is handling this coldness can follow. Not every noun needs to be personified with a feeling of its own to describe the scene. Like I said, it got a bit exhaustive. The flowery prose was good, just a little overdone.

The next issue I had was heartbreaking. 

So, as I mentioned before, there were two point of views for this book. One of those POVs had a climactic scene that was building, and building, and building and then… Nothing.

We find out what happened by way of someone telling another character. We didn’t get the fulfillment of seeing the scene play out in front of us, and the culmination to that storyline was extremely unfulfilling. I don’t think it did the characters justice.

I guess this should go along with my first nitpicky review, but I also had an issue with how everything was just so intense for anything the main characters were feeling. I guess this was mostly Brook, but every thing she felt was just mega intense. It resulted in a lack of space for her to crank up the emotion when the really big confrontation finally happened. It left that scene a little bit underwhelming.

This book was good enough that I immediately checked the author’s page to see if I could find out any more information on another book in the series. Unfortunately, there isn’t one yet, but there is one in the works. Yay!

I followed Ibitz on Amazon. Her work is definitely worth it, and a preview of Kiss Me Dead is below for your convenience. Gives it a clicky and see what you think!

That's it for my review and now I'm only two books behind on reviews! Double yay!! That is, until I finish reading my next book... Oopsie.

Welp, all you Game of Thrones fans out there, hold on to your butts for Bastard Bowl next week, and I'll be back soon with my thoughts on this season!

Until then, Happy Reading!!! (and... watching?)