Three Days to Dead (Dreg City, #1) in SOS: Serious Overload of Series

Jul 19, 2010 Kati rated it liked it

Shelves: urban-fantasy, in-english, work-reviews, look-for-more, 2013

Quite an interesting book, full of action and intrigue, that had me interested enough to look up more books in the series. So, why only 3 stars?

During the first half, it was a 5 star book for me. Evy and Wyatt were kicking ass together and taking no names, they were equal partners but... as more details about what happened resurfaced, Evy turned from likable to bitchy with issues greater than everybody else's and Wyatt became a sniveling lovesick fool who could only moan and shuffle his feet. Se Quite an interesting book, full of action and intrigue, that had me interested enough to look up more books in the series. So, why only 3 stars?

During the first half, it was a 5 star book for me. Evy and Wyatt were kicking ass together and taking no names, they were equal partners but... as more details about what happened resurfaced, Evy turned from likable to bitchy with issues greater than everybody else's and Wyatt became a sniveling lovesick fool who could only moan and shuffle his feet. Seriously, Wyatt was her BOSS, for Christ's sake, yet he mostly just whined and wrung his hands while Evy ordered everybody around, even the Handlers of other Triads. And again, rape was used as tool for female "empowerment" *sigh* So suddenly, Evy was reborn and Gifted and kick-ass and the boss of everything in sight... No, just no.

And their relationship... most of the time, I felt that Evy considered Wyatt's love off-putting or downright annoying. Yes, it's perfectly okay for a woman not to reciprocate a man's feelings. But Evy... her moods almost gave me a whiplash. I never knew how she would react to him. Would she be annoyed? Or suddenly feel attracted to him again? Never once did I feel she actually loved him. Even her "he was the only one she cared about" despair felt... well, definitely not as love. If that was the author's intention, to make it obvious Evy didn't love Wyatt, that she was just succumbing to her new body's attraction to him, then yeah, she succeeded.

Also, the mythology was quite confusing. So many races - vampires, goblins, whatnot - and the author felt she needed to give every one of them her own twist, up to calling them Dregs, Bloods, Halfies, I-don't-know-what, and that got confusing quite fast, especially coupled with Triads and Handlers and Hunters and the alliance that was but wasn't... It was just overly complicated.

So yeah, I'm still interested in reading more about the world, I just hope that the author learns to balance out her characters better. I prefer men and women as equals, not one kicking ass, the other sniveling in a corner. ...more

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Apr 10, 2012 Kelly (Maybedog) rated it really liked it

Shelves: where-grr-mine, why-favorite-author, what-modern-fantasy, what-vampires, what-demons, why-favorite-series, what-female-protagonist, what-magic

I loved this but you might hate it. It's a lot of almost-dying and getting badly injured action with a lot of two dysfunctional people professing their undying love for one another in perilous situations, a lot of them blaming themselves for the other's dire predicament, a lot of talking about their intense feelings and how they can't go on without the other but they don't know how to get out of the situation. They are on a strict deadline but they always find time to hug or rest or wax poetic. ...more

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Jan 20, 2012 Christal rated it really liked it

Shelves: female-lead, urban-fantasy, shady-government-agency, magic, fae, vampires, mind-bullets, goblins-trolls-gnomes

This was an interesting, new world and I enjoyed reading this book. I don't feel like it had a lot of world-building at the beginning, but it didn't really need it. The book's world is very similar to our own but instead of gangsters, they have vampires. The author uses a good trick by having our heroine introduce the world to another side character and by proxy, the readers. I thought this was very clever and didn't feel too much like an info dump.

I liked the tone of this book. We learn much of This was an interesting, new world and I enjoyed reading this book. I don't feel like it had a lot of world-building at the beginning, but it didn't really need it. The book's world is very similar to our own but instead of gangsters, they have vampires. The author uses a good trick by having our heroine introduce the world to another side character and by proxy, the readers. I thought this was very clever and didn't feel too much like an info dump.

I liked the tone of this book. We learn much of the background in real time, which was very effective. Ms. Meding used a mix of present-tense flashbacks and past-tense narrative that really worked. It was a little jarring at first, but the present-tense voice allows you to connect to Evy and experience her emotions as she is recovering her memories.

Evy herself is a likeable character. She is thrown into a strange situation right of the bat and she confronts it with quick thinking and a bit of humor. She's also damaged and I think Ms. Medig did a good job of letting her just be instead of trying to "fix" her immediately. I did feel like she let go of the guilt about (view spoiler) a little too easily, but that is one small gripe that isn't that important. I really enjoyed reading her voice overall.

Wyatt is her romantic foil and he's kind of hard to pin down. Sometimes he seems almost passive and others, he's barely containing his rage and aggression. He is a good counterpoint to Evy; soft where she is hard, thoughtful where she is impulsive. I like the dynamic they have but I wonder a little bit about it turning from friendship to romantic. It is easy to see that he cares for Evy deeply, but I feel like their romantic attachment might have been born from the dire situation they were in, at least from Evy's POV. Only time will tell if they are really meant to be together.

The other characters in this world are very diverse: vampires, weres, gargoyles, goblins, gnomes, and fey among others. It makes for some interesting relations between the races. I hope to see the Fey Council and their impact on the human world discussed more in future books.

The plot developed at a good pace and, as I mentioned before, I thought the combination of narrative tenses was well-done. My only gripe was that I think some plot points came a little too easily. Occasionally a solution would come out of nowhere and it was just a little too convenient. Aside from this, I enjoyed this novel and thought it was a stellar starting point for the series. I will definitely be picking up the next installments. ...more

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