Soul Stealers
Contents:
The land of Falanor has fallen. The renegade hero Kell is being hunted by the machine-vampires, the Vachine. On his way to recruit reinforcements to launch the counter-attack, the mighty hero finds himself the prey of two beautiful but deadly vampire assassins. Their bronze fangs are coming for him. Andy Remic is a British writer with a love of ancient warfare, mountain climbing and sword fighting. Once a member of the Army of Iron, he has since retired from a savage world of blood-oil magick and gnashing vachines, and… More about Andy Remic.
It is an exciting, brutal novel, soaked in testosterone and paced like a roller coaster. The sex and violence is visceral and the action is non-stop. Also in The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles. Also by Andy Remic. About Andy Remic Andy Remic is a British writer with a love of ancient warfare, mountain climbing and sword fighting. Inspired by Your Browsing History. An Angry Robot Sampler. Daughters of the Storm. Before the Storm World of Warcraft.
The Book of Magic. Elizabeth Bear , George R. Martin , Garth Nix and Scott Lynch. Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra. A big thing, right off the bat, even in the parts I enjoyed: The summary on goodreads implies a world like our own, where 'demons of legend' integrate into society- but this is a fantasy world, and demons have always existed in the public's mind.
They potentially used to be at war with the humans, but it is never clear- it's certainly been about a century at least. And a big thing, for me: Lex doesn't sell her soul. It would have been so much better if she had, if she had broken taboo and her own morals, and sold her soul in a desperate attempt to find her sister- but she doesn't. She wakes up and is Marked. She had no consent in the matter, nor is there any way to break it. The demon who did it wasn't even in the same room as her, and it's never quite explained how this happened.
It removes a good deal of agency Lex has, or could have had- she has no power in this matter, and as mentioned, no real choice. Instead of a tough decision of her own prejudice and morals VS having to save her sister, she Lex similarly isn't 'bound to a beast'. We do see mild hints of demons being bloodthirsty, but certainly not the one she is bound to who we never in fact properly meet. Her handler, who works for her new 'master'- he perhaps is the beast in this scenario.
But no, not really either. He's quite well behaved, attractive, and nothing about him is 'beast-like'. And she isn't on borrowed time, either. When the contract ends, she isn't due to die, nor does she lose her immortal soul, nor does she have any time limit.
See a Problem?
In fact, she is in no hurry. Lex is not at all in threat of becoming a soulless monster. There's no hint of that being a problem for the contracted humans, and certainly it isn't something Lex worries about or considers. And lastly, this book does not explore prejudice, or justice, or consequences, or really even family.
But her handler Sebastian is a demon, and she gets over that very quickly. In general, her hatred of demons rarely manifests in any meaningful way, and there isn't one moment of 'maybe I was wrong'. The issue is just entirely a non-issue. She is rude to demons, sometimes, but is generally okay dealing with them. Demons are kinda evil, too. We never meet a 'nice' one. Lex's handlers- Sebastian and Verity- are both good, but still killers, still with mild psychopathic tendencies.
Otherwise, every demon we meet is evil, involved in crime, one of the bad guys For a story about integration, there is nothing about Nothing about regular demons who actually want peace, or demons trying to live a normal life. No mentions of what day-to-day life is like in the city when there's two very adverse populations trying to coexist. On the subject of theming, as mentioned, I'm not sure 'justice' or 'consequences' really comes up either. I can't remember anything that's be relevant to the two.
Family may be about the bond between Lex and her sister To get down to the biggest problem with this book, the root of all error, the reason it lost all esteem in my mind: We're talking about k. I'd always thought it was one of those rules: Certainly not for a debut. And certainly not in a genre like urban fantasy. This is NA, but you still rarely see books go over k unless they're epic fantasy. The book has no need to be this long either. The plot is so stretched out, so meandering. You could easily cut k from it- there's so many short scenes that go nowhere, so much bulk and bloat to no real aim.
At some points, the plot felt like it was episodic. I even sketched out a brief hit map of how events would play out: MC is tracking some suspicious man 2. MC spends some time getting ready 3. MC is not very strong, is beaten up or nearly killed or actually killed 5. Lex is constantly investigating things, going to balls to sus out suspects, staking out locations Instead of a solid mission plan- here's what we know, here's how we're going to find the sister Shellie- things just.
Lex investigates human trafficking, spends a lot of time instead learning about a serial killer, kills him, and That's a large chunk of the book, essencially useless. We're thrown scene to scene, and Lex always seems to know what's going on, why she's there- but we rarely do. And never, even towards the end, did I really feel she was that focused on finding Shellie. Instead, she's focused on whatever is happening now. And what is happening now is often bizarre, and even more often, unimportant.
A whole side plot about status and wealthy girls drops out past the halfway point. A charming but enigmatic childhood friend seems to cease to exist after the serial killer plot is through. We meet and befriend a lady cop, a wealthy housewife, the demon bar owner- only for them to not reappear for hundreds of pages, or at all. It feels like it might as well have been two books, but even if you'd split it serial killer half, and um The seeming pull of the story should be Lex looking for her sister while having to deal with demons, and being Marked.
I'm not sure what it is- the book is far too bloated to have theme or cohesion. Characters come and go for scenes that have no importance. Lex angsts about the same things time and time again. There's far too many characters in general. Plot threads are picked up and dropped freely, some never coming back Matt, from her team, is a good example of someone shows up once to be mysterious and important, only to never appear again, or be explained.
There is absolutely no overarching urgency at all, and any that there was quickly depleted past the pages mark. Because of the bumpy, near episodic quality, there is no rising action towards the climax. The climax is, in fact, just another mission. There's no stakes, no urgency. No falling action, and certainly not a good ending. It felt like a page was missing. From a standpoint of 'things happen', things are, at least, always happening. It's an easy enough read will cover the writing later on , and it does move along.
It's just rare it seems to be moving towards any certain goal.
Soul Stealers (Clockwork Vampire Chronicles #2) by Andy Remic
It's not a bad thing to have a fantasy story with minimal exposition; many people complain that most books have too many. But it has to then be clear within the text if it isn't going to be explained. While I could guess what most things were, I was never certain. There was barely any worldbuilding at all, and with how long this book is, you'd think there would be a little room.
Demons have 'levels'- unexplained. Soul stuff- barely explained. There is no worldbuilding, no effort put into developing a culture for a city that dearly needs it. The text is very lax on descriptions, too, so I cannot tell you much more than that. There's a countryside area near a river where the rich people live. I presume there's skyscrapers. We really only learn things right when they become important, which leads to an explanation of half-bloods coming comically late.
Demons have a king- that's a late revelation.
Soul Stealers Series
It seems like demons have several rulers, actually, one for each country? But that's never really explained! Demon kings have their right-hand men fight on their behalf to deal with civil complaints? That's another thing introduced a page before it comes into the plot, and never really explained further. When I think of various countries, a city, I think of cultures. What are people like in this country compared to the neighbors?
What is the political climate? We know there's a president, a congress, a senate What's the history there? Do people speak other languages? How big is this country anyway? They must have varieties. How are they adapting? How does their culture clash? What are demon children like? Where is the demon 'homeland'? There's mentions of Catholics, churches. People say 'God' and mention Heaven.
So how does religion cope with demons? What is a real life religion Catholicism doing in this fantasy world, again? There is really so little worldbuilding, it's nearly mind-boggling, especially for how long the book is. Same with the main character, Lex: She knows people, but won't tell the reader how. She knows about the world, but doesn't explain anything to us. It gets remarkably frustrating very quickly.
She sees a man at a party- Damien! Why does he seem to know her? Why does she know him? We only learn what is plot relevant at the time Which ruins many late game 'twists', where I flatly didn't know how the revelation mattered, or what they meant. The entire book, no one tells Lex a goddamn thing. They refuse to, repeatedly, and while Lex gets upset There isn't even a good reason for this refusal. It's all plot motivated, to keep her in the dark.
Even by the end, she doesn't have all the answers. Verity and her lollies, anyone? Not even in a 'save it for the sequels' manner. Major plot questions are completely unaddressed, and she basically doesn't get any answers, at all.
Night of the Soul Stealer
There are many, many things Lex's demon handlers seem to know about that they will not tell Lex about, and you know? Notes on end game revelations: Even a smaller reveal about halfway, about Sebastian, relies on information the reader had not been informed of before that point. I won't spoil it, but this is true for everything we learn at the end about what was going on- it's so messily plotted, it's hard to follow, but what there is is only things we'd just been informed of a page before. But the demons are very, very powerful, and also, her main foe. How can she possibly square up against them?
A Clash of Kings: I saw the ending fairly early, but it did not diminish my interest by much. The series lacks a Main Villain character, so there seems like a lack of focus Elixia, am I a cannibal? But liked the last book. He's quite well behaved, attractive, and nothing about him is 'beast-like'.
And that'd be okay, if she wasn't so darn determined to try, anyway. Lex starts off being a fighter who isn't top of her class, but good. The rest of the book, she acts like a weapon-obsessed badass with one flaw: She repeatedly is beaten to the ground, shot, stabbed, injured. She survives about three explosions. She should be dead, but her contract prevents her from dying- and she has Sebastion, an extremely powerful demon with healing powers, on her side. He or Verity, the other demon save the day. Basically, we have an action-focused protag who can't actually do anything action-focused, and instead has to be constantly saved.
Despite all her love for knives and guns, Lex isn't capable of anything. Lex seems to be sold as the tough, badass action girl Still, for a book this long, you'd think Some changes, or arcs, for someone? Lex at the beginning and Lex at the end are nearly the same person, some plot revelations aside. Sebastian does not change, nor does Verity- and neither seems to warm to Lex either. The other characters come and go so frequently and unreliably it'd be asking too much for them to be developed.
The route for Lex should have been easy, right? An Agent presumably like a police officer in this world, it is unclear who hates demons, but is forced to work with them. She's weak and has to rely on them, and also solve mysteries in an effort to save her sister from a mysterious fate. In theory she'd learn more about demons- learn about their culture, accept and change her prejudice- as well as strive to become stronger, and adapt to her powerful foes.
This book is waves of the same, over and over again, including the same character beats. Lex angsts a little. She is determined to figure things out, frustrated no one is telling her things. She gets into a fight. She is saved by her demon pals, but then annoyed that they fail to answer questions. The scene ends and we move on.
Every single paragraph seemed to sport at least one of each. There is a semi-colon on nearly every page- over in total. This is something that is liable to change in final edits, I need to note, but I am surprised it got this far. Never have I ever read something with that quantity. It was jarring and unsettling, honestly. The writing style is short and snappy the entire time.
While this means there isn't any sloppy, flowery prose to wade through, it becomes tiring soon enough. For action scenes, short sentences help convey urgency. For regular scenes, they often become awkward and stilted. The writing was very to the point, as well. There weren't any moments that stood out as a lovely bit of prose, a nice bit of insight- you know, the sort of thing you might quote on an aesthetic post.
While I found it very easy to read, and at first enjoyed it, it definitely lost its appeal as time went on. The general gist of this review does come down to the book being so long. There was a lack of description and exposition, as well and as covered. Scenes were often mostly dialogue, with a lot of emphasis on character movement and Lex's internal thoughts. There wasn't much scene dressing, or atmosphere building- just dialogue and action.
And the action was Generally I got the gist: A few scenes were well done, interesting, to a degree tense. As it went on, more seemed to simply happen, not play out, and I wasn't very engaged in it. It feels like it needs another round of edits- if 60k were to be cut, several characters, several plot threads I think for now I can just say: As unfortunate as it was, there were too many things that failed me in this book. The lack of worldbuilding, the repetitive action, the lack of drive, the lack of urgency- it seemed to meander until it came to a jarring, tired end.
In some ways, I am confused by this book, which clearly could have been good after a few more edits. In some ways, I've even been hoping there was a mistake- that I'd accidentally been sent the first draft, not final. As nice as it'd be, no. And I hate to leave reviews like this, but it appears I have to. Can you still enjoy it? I've been very intrigued to see hyped five star reviews for this already.
I'd like some people to.
I just can't recommend it to anyone. It's too long, too sloppy there is one explicit plothole Mar 30, Dark Faerie Tales rated it really liked it Shelves: Solid start to a new series that has a feel of urban fantasy, alternate history and science fiction. A Soul to Take by Emily Taylor is a promising start to a crazy new trilogy about demons and the humans who have to deal with them walking freely in the world. I really liked the idea that humans knew about demons in this dark, dreary and quite rainy world. I would recommend this story for those who like reading from authors from other countries that use their lingo and slang.
I love experiencing other cultures this way especially since I will probably never be able to travel there. In this case, the author is Australian, at least that is what Goodreads says.
Elixia has a grudge against demons. This grudge has fueled everything that she has done in life which includes joining the Agency, a job that lets her track down demons within the law because demons now have rights like all human beings. Elixia is in the middle of an assignment when a demon derails her job by killing her and kidnapping her sister, Shellie.
Soul Stealer is a graphic novel written by Michael Easton, with art by Christopher Shy and published by Black Watch Comics. It was named Graphic Novel of the. A soul eater is a folklore figure in the traditional belief systems of some African peoples, notably the Hausa people of Nigeria and Niger. Belief in soul eaters is.
As a Marked, she is under a contract with a demon who keeps her alive until she can get whatever task that she made a deal about is done. Shrouded in a bunch of secrecy, Elixia is led down a path that forces her to look to her past if she wants to get her Mark removed and her sister found. The story that follows has Elixia dealing with deceptive humans, sadistic demons, terrifying humanoids and stolen souls.
Elixia is heir to a Media Empire that has her sitting pretty but she is no socialite.