Reviews: Blood Fugue and Witch's Nocturne by E.J. Wesley

Blood Fugue by E.J. Wesley

ebook, 47 pages

Published: Sept 24th, 2012

Source: Author

“Some folks treated the past like an old friend. The memories warmed them with fondness for what was, and hope for what was to come. Not me. When I thought of long ago, my insides curdled, and I was left feeling sour and wasted.”

Jenny Schmidt is a young woman with old heartaches. A small town Texas girl with big city attitude, she just doesn’t fit in. Not that she has ever tried.

Life has pummeled her heart into one big, lonely callus. She has no siblings, both parents were dead by sixteen, and her last grandparent—and caretaker—was in the ground before she turned twenty-one. She’s the last living member of her immediate family. Or so she thinks…

“We found my ‘grandfather’ sitting at his dining room table. An entire scorched pot of coffee dangled from his shaky hand. His skin was the ashen gray shade of thunderclouds, not the rich mocha from the photo I’d seen. There were dark blue circles under each swollen red eye. A halo of white hair skirted his bald head, a crown of tangles and mats. Corpses had more life in them.”

Suddenly, instead of burying it with the dead, Jenny is forced to confront the past. Armed only with an ancient family journal, her rifle, and an Apache tomahawk, she must save her grandfather’s life and embrace her dangerous heritage. Or be devoured by it.

 This is a very fast read, as it's a novelette of only 47 pages. I don't often read short stories as I feel I don't get the opportunity to know the characters or the world and don't have time to get attached. That's not the case here though. First of all it's a series, so as each one comes out we get to know a bit more about the characters and the world. I also felt like I got a pretty good idea about the characters and the world from this first story. It may not have had time to get real in depth, but it was just enough. And I'm intrigued! The characters are fantastic. I love characters with a bit of OOMPH and Jenny was definitely a character with OOMPH. She has a purple mohawk (AWESOME!) and is a big gamer (that's what we hear, but don't see, cause that would be boring) she's also totally kick ass, she just doesn't know it yet. Or I guess... didn't know it yet.
The writing is superb. I actually don't have any problems with it at all, not one negative thing to say. Not that it was actually perfect, but the errors I saw were minor formatting ones like not extra spaces after a period and stuff. It was only in a couple places though and it never took away from the story or the writing.
I know that some aren't in love with the cover, so I encourage you to look past that (if that's your issue) and consider giving this one a read cause it's definitely worth the 45 minutes or so it takes to read it.
Also, this is more of a new adult book and I think is appropriate for mature YA readers.  There's a bit of bad language (not much) and some gore, but I have read some YA that's much worse.

Witch's Nocturne (Moonsongs #2) by E.J. Wesley

ebook, 73 pages

Published: Dec. 2012

Source: Author

After receiving an ancient tribal journal from her grandfather, Jenny is sent on a mission of discovery in an attempt to unravel clues to her family's monster hunting past. The journey becomes more than academic when she is asked to confront a coven of dangerous witches who plan to cast an insidious spell on the plains of West Texas.

Witch's Nocturne is the second of the Moonsongs Books, a series of paranormal-horror-action novelettes by author E.J. Wesley. These stories contain language and content better suited for mature readers.

One thing I wan to point out that I really love about this series so far is with such a short story we get the important stuff.  There's no droning on about stuff.  We don't sit there waiting for her to figure certain things out, etc.  Most of that was done between the previous book and this one and we know what all happens, but we are getting the meat of the story.  And while each story stands on it's own, it's definitely a series you want to read in order just to get a back story.  There was also an introduction of something in this one that I believe will carry on to future books, or at least I would expect so.

This one is a tad longer than the first but I still read it in under an hour.  I could have read both of these stories back to back easily.  It's so easy to read and has constant action, but not too much action.  We have enough time in Jenny's head as she does stuff that we don't feel like we're thrown in the middle of a crazy bit of action and then thrown out again when it's done.  It is done in a way that feels right.

I mentioned this for the previous book, but I want to mention it again, E.J. Wesley is a brilliant writer.  The writing is as good as a traditionally published book and I found little to no errors (I don't recall noticing any).  And somehow he brings us everything we need in a story but in a shorter time frame.  I feel like I know Jenny and her closest friend as well as the town she lives in and the people she interacts with.  The story just all fits together very well.  And if I were to complain about anything I would say that I want more now!  I don't want to wait for more of Jenny!  But don't worry, the next one will be coming out in early 2013, so it's not like it's a long wait between books.

I definitely urge you to give these a try!  I would recommend them to fans of urban fantasy, paranormal and horror.  But they aren't really very scary.  I'm the biggest chicken ever and I actually read them before bed with out any issues (and trust me, I scare so easily!).

Disclosure: I received these books for review free of charge.  All opinions expressed are my own and I was not paid or influenced in any way.

I am putting together a tour for these books for February.  Watch for the tour page and sign up to host a stop or email me at candacesbookblog(at) yahoo(dot)com