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A Fistful of Charms: Library Edition - War in Iraq
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List Price: $84.99
Our Price: $84.99
Availability: Temporarily out of stock. Order now and we'll deliver when available. We'll e-mail you with an estimated delivery date as soon as we have more information. Your credit card will not be charged until we ship the item.
Manufacturer: Playaway
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Preloaded Digital Audio Player
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9781605146355
ISBN: 1605146358
Label: Playaway
Manufacturer: Playaway
Number Of Items: 1
Publication Date: 2008-03-15
Publisher: Playaway
Studio: Playaway
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Not quite as good as the first three.
Comment: I found myself confused with all of the back-stabbing and swapping of idols. I still don't know what really happened, but fortunately the ending cleared everything up a little.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Kim Harrison does it again!
Comment: Kim Harrison has easily charmed her way to the top of my favorite author's list ... a position which has been solidly held by one individual for over 18 years and is thus, no small feat! The first book had me curious, the second had me hooked, the third had me addicted and this book has me salivating for more. With each new title her writing abilities are soaring to new heights and her talents and depths to the story and the world which she's created are exploding off every page. I find myself using her "Hollows-centric" phrases such as "Go turn yourself" or "I'll kill him twice" in every day conversation. She's created a world so rich, so vibrant and so unbelievably complex, yet believable, that I find myself viewing the world from a multi-humanoid species perspective sometimes! If you've made it through the first three, don't hesitate! You won't be sorry you continued reading with this one. And if you're brand new to the series, PLEASE don't start here. Go read the first three first and then come back ... this book will be so much more precious to you if you follow along as the writer originally intended.
Move over Stephanie Meyers (no Steph was not my favorite author before Kim), there's a new queen of paranormal literature around and she's a sassy, brassy red head! HOORAY FOR RED-HEADS!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: It was a decent read...
Comment: But I definitely liked the first three better. As the series is going on, Rachel is slowly letting go of her naive, self-righteous, holier-than-thou attitude, which I definitely approve of. It was irritating to hear over and over and over again about how she would never let anyone suck her blood and how she was so incredibly independent (and yet managed to get herself into near-death situations all the time with very little caution, although we find out why here) and how she was only an earth witch, not a ley-line witch because she would never use ever-after although the ley line is clearly where her strengths lie. Yes, she's a flawed character, but her ideals and personality really bothered me because seriously, the world isn't black and white and she tends to view it that way. Not only that, but given her age and her experiences, her naivety was borderline stupidity and ignorance -she sounds more like a teen than an adult in most places and I'm a teen so I should know. To hear her whine and whine and whine and whine over and over again about how she was a freaking white witch and how she was sooooo good and that this black mark on her soul was so freaking awful that she was now satan reincarnated was incredibly annoying. JUST GET OVER IT. If it was a few pages, I wouldn't mind, but she spends a huge portion of the book doing it. She's living in a pretty dark urban fantasy world and while I can somewhat understand her feeling of pride in that she was still "pure", I really can't accept that an adult who has been through as much as she has would be so block-headed about right and wrong.
This doesn't pertain strictly to this novel itself but the series as a whole. Kim Harrison uses quite a bit of biology/genetic engineering in her novels and as a genetics major, it makes me cringe. Even discounting the fact that we're dealing with supernatural DNA, she fluffs up commonplace genetic lab-work to make it sound like it's unique and threatening and she just doesn't talk about biological materials correctly. It irks me because this can be remedied by a few hours of research. It's very basic genetics that could be used to make her plots more sound and factual and the explanation Trent gave at the end of the last book concerning his genetic research made me grit my teeth.
And the entire adrenaline thing -yes, those are basic scientific reactions, but your head doesn't hurt immediately from a rush of adrenaline. Adrenaline would decrease the amount of pain you feel if anything and hearing over and over again about how a rush of adrenaline hurt Rachel's head made me cringe because that's not what happens. Not only that, but it takes more than a few seconds to produce adrenaline
I've stuck with it so far because of secondary characters, who are more complex. I loved Jenks here and he's one of my most favorite characters in the series, alongside Trent (who, I was sad to see, didn't really have a part here) and even Big Al. Yes, I like Big Al better than Rachel. I loved how everyone's been developing and how we get to see more them. I can't get enough of Jenks and his snarkiness. The way he adjusted as a regular-sized being was funny and cute at the same time. I love Ceri as a character as well and I hope we delve more into her in the coming novels. We see a lot of her insecurities here and how her time with Al affected her (especially at the part where she [rightfully imho] snaps at Rachel near the beginning about marks).
I'm giving it about a 3.5 because I disliked Rachel's excessive obsession with the black mark and demon curses and her sudden willingness to give up to Ivy. Not only that, but I dislike her relationship with Nick. A LOT. Jenks more than made up for it though. Although this book dragged on for me, I'm still gonna read the next one. I hope it makes up for this!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Series
Comment: This series just keeps getting better and better. I love how the author writes Rachel and the humor that is put into every book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: continues with a full head of steam!
Comment: Fistful is probably the most 'streamlined' of the Hollows books to date (I know, I'm a bit late to the party!). While I enjoyed the previous three just as much, if not more in some cases, they tend to wander at times. Which is perfectly fine. While they have a central plot, many of the scenes are 'a day in the life of Rachael and her unusual assembly of friends', and it's great reading! Some of the day to day situations Harrison puts these colorful characters in are more entertaining than some books main plot by far.
Fistful does lean heavily on a central plot: Nick is in trouble. He stole an ancient artifact that could shift the power balance between weres and vamps in the hollows and cause a bloody war. Rachael, happy in her life but still fighting her own demons about how Nick seemingly left her high and dry decides that she's going to help out. There's one other thing that makes this even more personal for Vampiric Charms. Nick enlisted Jenks' oldest son, Jax to help out. Road trip for Rachael and Jenks! The run/rescue mission takes them up north, well out of the comfort zone of Cincinati.
There's plenty of action mixed in with some really great character development here as Rachael's inability to say no to a loved one (or ex loved one) has her crossing more lines than she ever thought possible. It's very engaging to see her work through her moral dilemmas, both with the type of magic she enlists to help people out of a bad situation as well as how she deals with a certain vampire who may want more than she can give. There are some scenes in the book that are truly heart wrenching.
This is really a great, action packed, thoughtful story. We learn a lot more about what makes Rachael tick, both good and bad. We see certain relationships moved forward on shaky ground and some come to unforeseen conclusions and all the while, Rachael is one mean runner, but is always entertaining and likable.
I'm excited to get into the next of the series to see what other surprises Harrison has in store for me. Four books in and so far so fun!
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