lapetitepritt posted: " Hello, bookworms! Happy April 1st and happy April Fool's Day. Please don't make too cruel jokes, today, you never know how people could react, some of us have anxiety. Aside from that, thank God is Friday, today we are here with a review I wasn't "
Happy April 1st and happy April Fool's Day. Please don't make too cruel jokes, today, you never know how people could react, some of us have anxiety. Aside from that, thank God is Friday, today we are here with a review I wasn't sure if I were going to post.
More or less two years ago, I requested an e-ARC of the new Kerri Maniscalco book, since the Stalking Jack the Ripper is one of my all times favourites. However, for I don't even know what reason, I did not start it until this year. At some point, I know I started to wait for Juls, because they wanted to read it in Italian and we were waiting for a translation, but in the beginning I don't know why I procrastinated it so much. Anyways, I am happy to finally have read Kingdom of the Wicked. Of course, I have read the final version and not the ARC version, because I was aware that Kerri Maniscalco had corrected some historical/geographical mistakes she had made and I wanted to read the finished copy. So, even if I received an e-ARC two years ago, this is not an ARC Review by any means.
About the book Title: Kingdom of the Wicked Series: Kingdom of the Wicked #1 Author: Kerri Maniscalco Publisher: JIMMY Patterson Books Publication date: 27 October 2020 Pages: 372
Plot, as stated on Goodreads Two sisters. One brutal murder. A quest for vengeance that will unleash Hell itself… And an intoxicating romance.
Emilia and her twin sister Vittoria are streghe - witches who live secretly among humans, avoiding notice and persecution. One night, Vittoria misses dinner service at the family's renowned Sicilian restaurant. Emilia soon finds the body of her beloved twin...desecrated beyond belief. Devastated, Emilia sets out to find her sister's killer and to seek vengeance at any cost—even if it means using dark magic that's been long forbidden. Then Emilia meets Wrath, one of the Wicked—princes of Hell she has been warned against in tales since she was a child. Wrath claims to be on Emilia's side, tasked by his master with solving the series of women's murders on the island. But when it comes to the Wicked, nothing is as it seems…
My rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Review First things first: I am Italian. Did I feel insulted by the "misrepresentation" of my culture in this book? Absolutely not. I don't know if you are aware, but here in Italy people started complaining about the representation of Italy and Italian people, as if it were something horribly done in this book. While you can totally see the American-ness of the author, I think she did an okay job and you can feel she cares about Italy, as much as a non-Italian can. I firmly believe the energy people put into complaining about this rep, should be instead used towards authors who actually disrespect minorities in their books. I won't be discussing names in this article, but if you know you know. It's far worse to give bad representation to an opressed category than misrepresent Italians in the 1800s, I think.
Now, aside from that, I am a bit disappointed. Before starting the book, I knew I wasn't going to like it as much as Stalking Jack the Ripper, because it's a bit too of a fantasy and a romance for my current reading taste, but I hoped to enjoy it and have a bit of fun.
My main hope was for the romance, to be honest. One of my favourite things in SJTR is the relationship and banter between Audrey Rose and Thomas, so I hoped to feel invested in Emilia and Wrath's relationship as well, especially since everyone seems to love them. Sadly, I couldn't care less about their romance. I would hardly call it a romance, to be honest. I know it's just the first book in a trilogy, but I was hoping for something more. I don't know if I'll ever read book two, because I am not particularly interested in the general plot, but I'll admit that I am curious to see how the relationship evolves. If you have read Kingdom of the Cursed, please let me know what I should expect romance-wise, so I can decide.
As I said, the plot was not particularly interesting to me. I also think that by the end the author added too many things and creatures, so I am worried about how it would translate in a second installment. Which is why I'm not sure if I will go on with the series.
art by morgana0anagrom
What I can salvage from this wreck of a book are the food description, that made my mouth water — as Sarah J. Maas would say. I cannot say the style alltogether, because the dialogue sounded extremely fake and cringeworthy to me, especially when Emilia and Wrath were supposedly bantering. There's a difference between laughing with the characters or the banter and laughing at them. I was laughing at them because I was bewildered.
I can see why people like this book and the series in general, I really can, but I think I am not the audience for this one, because it's like a younger version of A Court of Thorns and Roses with witches, demons and whatnot instead of faeries. I think if you enjoy that kind of book — Sarah J. Maas and Jennifer L. Armentrout come to mind, but also Sue Lynn Tann with Daughter of the Moon Goddess — I believe you could really like this one. As I said, I am not sure if I'll continue with the series, but if you've read book two please let me know, based on my review, if you think I could enjoy it more than book one.
This is all for today, I'll talk to you very soon with the promised review of Rise to the Sun by Leah Johnson and then with the first article of a new series!
Bernadette posted: " I followed my little black cat Mimi into my neighbor's yard, just across the fence line, no fence, from our yard, and looked up at the tall maple tree that I see out my back windows all the time. What a great view, all those colors and shapes and litt"
I followed my little black cat Mimi into my neighbor's yard, just across the fence line, no fence, from our yard, and looked up at the tall maple tree that I see out my back windows all the time. What a great view, all those colors and shapes and little bits of sky, I guess I'll sketch it. So here it is.
This is sketched in mixed soft pastels on multi-media paper, just enough tooth to hold pastel but no real finish.
Get a print of this artwork
Register for an account and get a free matted print
The featured artwork also becomes one of the New Member Gifts for the month it's featured as well, so if you've been waiting to register for an account, here's another good reason. This New Member print is a signed digital print of my pastel painting "From the Ground Up". Prints are made in archival inks on acid-free Epson art paper. This print is 8" x 10" and matted with a white mat to fit an 11" x 14" frame.
Wallpaper calendars are free to download. You'll find them below along with instructions.
If these sizes don't work for your device, or if you have problems, please let me know. Often I can troubleshoot the reason an image won't download or won't load on your device, but if I just can't figure it out I can just email it to you and hope that works.
How to download and use your desktop calendar
Click on one of the images below that matches the dimensions of your monitor to open the image in a new page.
For desktop computers and laptops, right-click on that image and on a desktop computer choose "save as desktop wallpaper" or "save as background" or whichever option your operating system gives you to be able to do this. You may also simply save it to your hard drive and set it as your background from there.
For mobile devices, press on the image to bring up a menu and choose "open in new window". Go to that window and press until a menu appears and choose as "set as wallpaper" or "set as lock screen" or whatever you'd like—this is slightly different on all devices.
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Horizontal and HD monitors and screens
Desktop calendar 2560 x 1440 for HD and wide screens.
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Square monitors and screens
Desktop calendar, 1280 x 1024 for square and laptop monitors.
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Small Mobile Devices and Tablets
Desktop calendar, 600 x 800 for large mobile devices and tablets.
Each month I feature a piece of artwork or a photo from the archives to the present day, tell its story, and set it up as a free downloadable desktop calendar for just about every electronic device available.
Rebecca C. posted: " Warmer weather and Easter are part of April. Are you ready to grab your camera and make memories? If you need inspiration, check out the following photo prompts for April. Photo by Brett Sayles on Pexels.com New month, new selfieApril showers (Rain"
Warmer weather and Easter are part of April. Are you ready to grab your camera and make memories? If you need inspiration, check out the following photo prompts for April.
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