Review : Luckless by Cari Z.

Luckless by Cari Z. is a very different take on dragons than we normally see. In this dystopian novella dragons and their riders must defend the wall-off remnants of cities that regularly get attacked by strange creatures.

Denver is no longer a vibrant city, but one full of rubble and ruin surrounded by forest and things that scream in the night. The only thing keeping it from being overrun are its armed defenders and the few dragons who have bonded with humans. It is a precarious balance and the humans are barely hanging on.

Evan Luck, or Luckless as he is called, is one of the best fighters protecting the city, but he is hated and treated with contempt because his dragon died in battle and he didn't die alongside her. As a lower citizen, he is barely able to get enough food to eat or clothes to wear, though he spends all his time blacksmithing and fighting in battles. He isn't completely tossed out of the city though as he is one of the few people with the mental ability to bond with dragons. But Evan's grief over his dragon's death walls off his emphatic ability and prevents him bonding with another dragon.

Then a new citizen shows up. In a world without easy travel between distant city remnants, a new citizen is a strange and unusual sight. Lee Caldwell is tall and lean, mysterious an odd. He is also looking for someone to guide and nurture his son.

Jason Caldwell is an empath and will be expected to bond with a dragon when he's old enough, and Lee doesn't want him going into things unprepared. In Denver people don't usually start training to be a dragon rider and fighter until they have a dragon, but it leaves them vulnerable since they don't have enough time to train before being tossed out to fight. Lee doesn't want that for his son.

Lee wants Evan to be train his son and prepare him. He's been observing the city and notices that Evan is a good fighter and knows what he's doing, no matter how reviled he is by the population. Evan argues that he couldn't even protect his dragon, but Lee is confident in his choice and soon Evan is taking Jason under his wing.

The trio spend a lot of time together, eventually leading to Evan starting to fall for Lee. But strange dreams and the grieving over his dragon make it difficult for Evan to go further. When a deadly creature threatens Denver's very roots, Evan must decide if he is willing to go on a suicide mission to protect the family he's come to love.

This is a very action-packed story. Skirmishes with creatures and bullies alike fill the pages, with just enough room left for sweet, tender moments. The danger and drama level is pretty high, but the grieving angst is also there as well. Warning, there is no overt suicide talk, but it is definitely a hidden threat as Evan is very borderline in his grief. It is definitely a possible trigger for some people.

All three of the main characters are interesting, and while the secret Lee is keeping is fairly obvious eventually, it is still a neat surprise. Evan is so despairing and lost, yet just trying to get through each day that you just want to cuddle him close. Lee's own grief over his wife's death is just under the surface, but his determination to protect his son shines through even when he is mysterious and almost fae-like. And of course, Jason is very cute and sweet and needy.

Really, they are all needy, and obviously need each other. You can almost picture the hole each of them fill for one another. Each grieving, but slowly getting ready to be in each other's lives.

The setting is probably familiar with people who have been to Denver, but as one who hasn't it left me a little lost. Not quite enough description made it hard for me to picture the story.

It was interesting seeing how public opinions can affect lives, and how rumors can twist the facts into something unrecognizable. But also, how sometimes it seems everyone is against you, but there may be supporters you never noticed.

Overall, the story was very interesting and attention-keeping. It was shorter than I would have liked, but it also felt shorter because so much was packed into the pages. I'm hoping at some point the author will come out with another story in the same world as it was definitely worthy of it. I kinda want to already read it again and see things in a different light after the big secret reveal.

No hugely overt problems with editing, which is a relief after another book I recently read.

This is a very slow burn, not spicy at all book. Its primary focus is the world and characters and action, not sex. The two MCs are great together. Evan's obliviousness is very adorable when it's obvious Lee has set his sights on him. And Lee's determination and need bleed through every aspect even when he is being mysterious. 

A wonderful, well-thought out dystopian world; fantasy creatures; sweet, yet grieving characters; and a man determined to protect his family at all costs. Luckless is definitely worth a read.

Edit: And there are two sequels now! Click here to check them out!

Luckless

The Luckless Series Book 1

by Cari Z

Dauntless

The Luckless Series Book 2

by Cari Z

Reckless

The Luckless Series Book 3

by Cari Z

Review : Something Magic by Justine Taylor

For most of his life Caleb has dreamed of a wolf. A big, black wolf with red eyes who meets him in a meadow. Caleb can never move in his dreams of the wolf. He is held in place and can only try again and again to get to the black beast. Caleb feels more alive in his dreams than in his real life. He feels like he is where he belongs. But years pass, the dream coming randomly, only changing once when Caleb is younger, the wolf howling out in grief and no matter how much Caleb tried, he could not get to the wolf to comfort him. Young Caleb was so upset over that dream that his parents held him out of school for the day and he went to work with his father, the sheriff. It was there that Caleb saw the boy.

A glimpse is all Caleb gets when the boy and his twin sister are led into the sheriff's office by Caleb's own mother, an english teacher at the high school. Before Caleb is chased away from the scene he hears that the twins' family have all been killed. A decade will pass before Caleb sees the boy again. Distracted by his own mother getting sick and dying, then Caleb figuring out he is gay, then going to college, and finally getting a job in Seattle, Caleb has all but forgotten the scene he barely glimpsed when he was young.

But his dreams of the wolf still remain. They happen less than they did, but he is still left feeling like he should know what it means, he should know the wolf. One morning he wakes from the dream once again, feeling a need to bridge the connection between the two of them and acknowledge how much the wolf means to him. So, he does his best to draw out the wolf, his thick, black fur, his shining red eyes, then he finds the best tattoo shop in town and heads there with his art.

Triskele Tattoo seems staffed solely with stunningly gorgeous people when he arrives. Each have a certain something that catches the attention, and while they seem a little different he finds that he likes them and ponders whether he can be friends with an entire tattoo studio. He hands over his artwork to a real artist who seems a bit surprised by the image. She redraws it, capturing the essence of the wolf even more, then inks it on his skin, all the while getting to know Caleb and chatting about the tattoo artist who isn't there, a seemingly grumpy guy named Mack.

One month later Caleb goes to the tattoo shop for a touch-up and runs into the mysterious artist himself. Caleb finds himself drawn to the man, and while Mack seems a bit stern and is hard to read, he seems like he might be interested too.

Something Magic is a really good story with a simplistic plotline, but it is one of those that don't need to be convoluted. Split up by the murder of Mack's family, Caleb and Mack are reunited a thousand miles away from where they started, drawn together by their shared dreams. Dreams that Mack knows mean that the two are soul mates because that is what happens when a werewolf shares his dreams with another. Mack must explain to Caleb about wolf shifters and what the dreams mean, but first Caleb has to admit they share a hometown and small amount of history.

Caleb and Mack are perfect together. I really like the couple. Mack is a little gruff, while Caleb is at turns shy and flirty. Where one is unsure, the other is there to back him up. They just fit. They're both a little hipster; Caleb likes slouchy beanies and graphic tees, Mack is a Seattle tattoo artist sporting a bit of scruff. They like sitting around and smoking pot while discussing literature and offbeat music. And they have a lot of chemistry.

The pot smoking is a bit overboard. Caleb is a bit of a stoner and since pot affects werewolves while alcohol doesn't, Mack tends to smoke often too. Then again, it's set in the Pacific Northwest.

The book has a lot of pot and / or sex scenes, probably about half the book. The sex scenes are good and hot. The boys are both versatile unlike many shifter novels, so they tend to alternate a lot. There's some knotty heat going on as well once Mack confesses his werewolf nature and is able to top Caleb. I'm not usually a fan of sex scenes interrupting the story of a book, but the sex in this book is better than average.

It's kind of funny as another book I recently read and reviewed: The Other Half by Jess Whitecroft, is very similar in some ways. That book features the male of a male / female set of twins getting together with a small guy and spending a huge portion of the book hooking up and smoking pot. A bit of a strange coincidence to end up reading them back to back.

The flow of the story is fairly decent. We get a little insight into Caleb before he literally runs into Mack. Then there is the slow, getting together, followed by almost instant coupledom, and eventually the dramatic ending scenes that tie up loose ends. The ending works, but just try to not get nitpicky over it as logic applied will probably make it fall to pieces. It's a good scene, just missing some details that would make it make more sense and filling in holes. And it's a little abrupt and too quickly over and dealt with. Like I said, just read it and don't think about it and it's good.

In Something Magic the shifter world is somewhat like more modern shifters tend to be with a bit of old-fashioned werewolf style too. Humans don't know about werewolves. Werewolves are born, but can change people with their bites. They are not forced to shift on the full moon only, they can shift at any time but feel the urge to do so more when the moon is full. Alphas and a few others can knot their mates. They are hunted by werewolf hunters who sometimes only kill bad werewolves, but others kill every werewolf they can find.

It is a well-thought out world, which isn't a coincidence as this is actually Teen Wolf fanfiction. I like fanfiction and often find the writers better than many commercial writers. But...it's a little disingenuous to present something as an original work when the ideas belong to someone else. Using someone else's world as a starting point is fine, just give credit where credit is due. And the writer accidentally even left one of the characters names in, so it's pretty obvious to those who have watched Teen Wolf.

The writer captured a lot of good imagery in this story, from the tattoo shop to a boat trip that turns out pretty beautiful. Characters aren't described a ton, but enough to get a good idea for the main ones. It definitely feels like a fill-in your own ideas kind of book instead of the author telling you exactly what everything looks like, but that might be because of its origins of being based on something most people would know what the characters look like. For a good grasp on the setting it can be helpful to look up a few images to get a better grasp on the location. Many of the images associated with Seattle are easy to find.

A Triskele Tattoo


Looking for YA werewolf books at Elliot Bay Bookstore


Evening falls as the Seattle Ferry passes in front of Mount Rainier on its return from Bainbridge Island.


Where the book really takes a hit is the editing. Some misspelt words are easy to pass off, but others catch your attention more. And there are some major issues with the timeline. The wolf howling in grief in Caleb's dream supposedly does so at night while he is 12. But why would the wolf be howling the night before anything happened? And Caleb's age changes a lot in various parts of the book when he's talking about what happened to him and when. Major errors. Stop and page back to make sure you aren't remembering wrong sorts of things. The author really needs to grab a couple friends and make them read their books before putting them out.

Luckily, the story is good enough that the errors are just frustrating, not bad enough to stop reading. The plot and style make up for a lot. And of course most readers are willing to forgive a lot for some knotty heat.