A RUSH OF WINGS: Final Review

Here is Raven's last installment of her as-she-reads-it review of A RUSH OF WINGS.

When I first started reading A RUSH OF WINGS, I was prepared to go either way. I was intrigued by the premise, but given who the main characters were (a wounded male rocker and a female FBI agent), I figured a romance was going to be central, and many stories that center around romances don't work for me. Well, the romance wasn't really central, and it was handled very naturally. The book as a whole was more than just a good read. It blew me away.

I did have a few small quibbles, so let me get those out of the way now. One or two things were set up but never referred to again. For instance, near the beginning Dante is summoned to appear before another New Orleans vampire, but that vampire never resurfaces. And on the level of story and believability, at two different points two different characters (both important to the story) escape death when I was fairly sure they wouldn't have been left alive. In one case the character who survives wonders why she wasn't killed, but she never gets an answer. In the other case, a justification is provided for letting the character live, but I didn't completely buy it. Also, one of the villains has murky motives which are never entirely clarified.

But an amazing book can be forgiven a flaw or two. I rarely gush about books because I rarely find one I absolutely love and can't put down, but with this book I found one.

Not all the story threads tie up at the end, which isn't surprising considering this is the first in a planned four-book series. But the main storyline does get resolved, resulting in a satisfying conclusion while still leaving enough open ends to lead into the next book. I think the main - and most interesting - questions involve Dante's past (and what his future will be). Dante is really the star of the book, with the strong, no-nonsense Heather as a terrific supporting character. Dante is full of contradictions, he's capable of being a creator and a destroyer, and Adrian Phoenix delves into his mind unflinchingly. As I mentioned previously, Phoenix doesn't pull her punches. Bad stuff happens to her characters. Lots of it. Dante takes it the worst, which gives Phoenix a chance to really show the reader who this character is. He's extremely compelling.

I loved the voices Phoenix created for her characters. Nearly everyone's speech has a distinctive flavor, which helped me keep the multiple viewpoints straight. Dante's voice is down-to-earth, slangy, a little foul-mouthed, and sprinkled with Cajun words and phrases. Heather, the put-together FBI agent, is slightly more formal and sounds very authoritative and professional when she's in agent mode. The incredibly creepy villain known as E has the habit of assigning nicknames to the people he's dealing with. His voice was part of what made him so creepy. He sounds friendly, almost loving, and yet his idea of love is to carve up living people while reading them poetry. He's so realistic that I'm not sure I'm ever going to be able to read his scenes again. Most of them are pretty tough emotionally.

In general I found the good guys more compelling than the bad guys, probably because there were so many shades of gray in the good guys, particularly Dante. The main villains tended to be, well, villains, and they stayed that way.

Although I've never been to New Orleans, the New Orleans setting felt very real to me. I loved how Phoenix managed to infuse the book with a sense of place without hitting the reader over the head with it. She referred to street names, mentioned the muggy air, gave many of the characters French-derived names and sprinkled Cajun through their dialogue. It resulted in a sense that this particular story and these particular characters belonged in this setting.

The vampire lore is intriguing, and Phoenix has woven in religion and mythology. Any good vampire story has to include its own twist on the traditional lore, and I liked the direction Phoenix took this. I'm curious to know more, and I'm sure I'll get more details in the next three books.

The story itself is a fairly standard mystery, but Phoenix doles out suspense expertly, so the reader is always kept guessing. That and the superb characterization make this book what it is. In short, A RUSH OF WINGS is a keeper. I'll be finding a home for it on my bookshelf (books I don't like get carted off to the library), but I'm sure I'll be taking it down often to reread my favorite parts. I can't wait for the sequels.

Links!
All Adrian Phoenix posts
Original Debut Announcement (with even more links)
Adrian Phoenix website
A RUSH OF WINGS at Amazon USA, UK and Canada

A RUSH OF WINGS: Rushing Toward Conclusion

Here is Raven's latest installment of her as-she-reads it review of A RUSH OF WINGS.

I'm now more than three-quarters of the way through A RUSH OF WINGS. Tension is high, Dante's in more trouble than ever, and everything is converging toward the ultimate showdown.

One of the things I'm really enjoying about this book is that Adrian Phoenix doesn't pull her punches. If her characters walk into a bad situation, nobody bails them out. They have to rise to the occasion. And nobody gets spared anything. Basically, whatever the characters are desperately trying to avoid will happen to them. This is great for tension and creating emotional connection to the characters.

I still have absolutely no idea how the book is going to end. I know who the final confrontation will be with (unless the story takes an unexpected turn), but I still don't know the bad guy's complete motivation or the whole truth about Dante. Phoenix is good at doling out information bit by bit. At first when she jumped into the bad guys' viewpoints I was afraid she might give away too much too soon, but she's avoided that trap. She's keeping me guessing, and I can't wait for the conclusion.

A RUSH OF WINGS: Thoughts at Mid-Read

Raven has sent me two updates on her progress through A RUSH OF WINGS. Here is her first installment.

At 256 pages into A RUSH OF WINGS, I find the story has grown deeper and more complex, but the solution to the mystery remains just as far off.

I literally cannot put this book down. Heather is trying to find out exactly what all the bad guys want from Dante, but meanwhile Dante himself is struggling with the dark secrets of his past, and Adrian Phoenix does a great job of making the reader feel how wounded he is and how much he's hurting.

To make matters worse, Heather and Dante have each developed doubts about certain people they used to trust, so right now they're both operating without much backup. Of course, this puts them in even more danger as they try to stay alive and solve the mystery. Incidentally, the reader finds out some of what's going on before Heather and Dante do, because we're privy to what the other viewpoint characters are thinking and doing.

But the central mystery of who Dante really is and what his true identity means for him and for everyone remains, well, a mystery. I can't wait to see how Adrian Phoenix resolves it.

A RUSH OF WINGS: Initial Impressions

Raven is providing her as-she-reads-it impressions of A RUSH OF WINGS.

I'm really enjoying A RUSH OF WINGS so far. I'm about 70 pages in (the book is approximately 400 pages long), and I'm hooked.

I'm loving Heather Wallace. She's not one of those heroines who suddenly starts acting like a wimpy twelve-year-old anytime the hero shows up or is mentioned. I can't stand heroines like that. Supposedly they're sharp, mature professionals, but you'd never know it once Mr. Right comes on the scene. But not Heather. She really is sharp, mature, and professional, at least so far. In one amazing scene where she gives the hero, Dante, his comeuppance, I was grinning in delight and cheering her on.

Although the back cover gives the impression that this is going to be a mystery, the mystery is really more about why than who. That's okay. I have a feeling those whys are going to be pretty riveting.

So far I have only two minor quibbles. The first is that there are so many viewpoint characters. In just 70 pages Adrian Phoenix has already plunged us into the minds of at least seven different people. It's a few too many for me, especially since I don't find the villains as compelling as I find Heather and Dante and their associates. Phoenix does it well, though, and I haven't had any problems keeping everyone straight.

The other quibble (presumably not Phoenix's fault) is that the glossary is located at the back of the book. Phoenix has adapted or invented non-English terminology to use for some of the non-human types of characters in her story, and I have no problem with that, but the terms are presented in the text without definitions, and with the glossary being at the back of the book, readers might not find it until they're done reading. I only discovered it by accident.

But I'm impressed so far, and I can't wait to read more.

New Featured Debut - A RUSH OF WINGS

Although I'm still reading and enjoying Across the Face of the World (see the post below), I may not finish it before Wednesday or so. In the meantime, since Raven is enjoying A Rush of Wings by Adrian Phoenix so much, I am making that novel the Featured Debut, and I'll post her initial impressions later today. Over the next week or so, I'll intrude from time to time with a few debut shout-outs (I still have two from ClassOf2K8 to post) and miscellaneous announcements. Next weekend, I'll post my final impressions of Across the Face of the World, plus hopefully an interview with the author, Russell Kirkpatrick.