Justice Calling

Annie Bellet

Jan 2015 · The Twenty-Sided Sorceress Book 1 · Doomed Muse Press

About this eBook

Gamer. Nerd. Sorceress.

Jade Crow lives a quiet life running her comic book and game store in Wylde, Idaho. After twenty-five years fleeing from a powerful sorcerer who wants to eat her heart and take her powers, quiet suits her just fine. Surrounded by friends who are even less human than she is, Jade figures she’s finally safe.

As long as she doesn’t use her magic.

When dark powers threaten her friends’ lives, a sexy shape-shifter enforcer shows up. He’s the shifter world’s judge, jury, and executioner rolled into one, and he thinks Jade is to blame. To clear her name, save her friends, and stop the villain, she’ll have to use her wits… and her sorceress powers.

Except Jade knows that as soon as she does, a far deadlier nemesis awaits.

Justice Calling is the first book in the Twenty-Sided Sorceress urban fantasy series.

 

Key Themes: Magic, Shapeshifters, Urban Fantasy, Sorcerer, Witch, Werewolf, Romance, Paranormal, Fantasy, Native American, Strong Female Protagonist, Shifter, Nerd, Gamer

Ratings and reviews

Abysmal in a funny way, but not funny enough to be good. The characters are boring. Most of the characters have very similar, if not the same, personalities. The only difference is how they are described in their introductions. The main character is annoying. Half of the time, what she thinks just makes me cringe. The other half, I just want her to get to the point. It feels like the author is trying too hard to make the characters seem nerdy/geeky, throwing random pop-culture references into almost every interaction. It's annoying and distracting. And the romance is just awful. Mr. Tall Dark & Sexy has the personality of lukewarm water. He goes from being the apparently scary and imposing badass peacekeeper guy to being a strong love bug at the end. He falls in love with the MC out of nowhere, and it's really weird. Overall, I think the biggest issue is that the story tries to be too much in too little space. It's like 70 or so pages, when it needed more to flesh it out.

7/10 stars. It was enjoyable but a tad too short. The overall plot and telling were good and the sequel seems potentially interesting.

A surprisingly fun read. Well-written without being too preachy and too condescending to the reader and preachy (i.e. sufficient enough details to get the reader hooked). Good world-building and how magic works, and the characters are fun. Only thing I'm not a fan of is the adult romance aspect, which reminds me of the stereotypical romance novels (e.g. a deep, tall, charming hunk. Our eyes locked and he was my perfect dream man blah blah).

About the author

Annie Bellet is the author of The Twenty-Sided Sorceress, Pyrrh Considerable Crimes Division and the Gryphonpike Chronicles series. She holds a BA in English and a BA in Medieval Studies and thus can speak a smattering of useful languages such as Anglo-Saxon and Medieval Welsh.   Her short fiction work is available in multiple collections and anthologies.

Her interests besides writing include rock climbing, reading, horse-back riding, video games, comic books, table-top RPGs and many other nerdy pursuits.  She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and a very demanding Bengal cat.