• Home
  • About Me
  • My Books
    • In Progress
  • Review Policy
  • Reading Challenges
  • PenTober Challenge

Meri's Corner

~ A Writer's Thoughts and Reviews

Meri's Corner

Monthly Archives: December 2020

Book Review: Rogue Huntress by Thea Atkinson

30 Wednesday Dec 2020

Posted by MBenson in Reviews

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

amblogging, amreading, books, creativity, discoveries, enjoy, inspiration, pack struggle, review, reviews, Rogue Huntress, Rogue Huntress Chronicles, Thea Atkinson, thoughts, update, Urban Fantasy, werewolves

Author: Thea Atkinson
Publisher: Thea Atkinson
Series: Rogue Huntress Chronicles
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Release Date: July 6, 2016
Rating: 4 Stars

Find Rogue Huntress on Goodreads

Brief Synopsis

Shana, an assassin for the Beo pack, has been taken hostage by her foster brother, Caleb, after he kills her father, the alpha. By pack law, Caleb is now the alpha of the pack, but Shana and her brothers are a threat to his leadership and he’ll do what he can to force Shana into submission with the lives of her brothers.

Can Shana fake submission long enough to turn the tables on Caleb and take her pack back? Or will the human mercenary Caleb’s brought in be too much of a distraction that she’ll lose it all?

Review

The book starts off right in the thick of everything. We don’t start before Shana’s capture to get to know any of the characters, but with Shana already captured, trapped in the manor she called home. Caleb, her foster-brother turned captor wants her to submit to him and be his mate, but naturally Shana doesn’t want to mate to the man who had killed her father and put her essentially in a cage, even if her wolf thinks the idea of mating to such a powerful wolf isn’t a terrible idea.

A lot of the backstory about Shana and Caleb comes to us through Shana reflecting back on the past and both who she thought people were coupled with what Shana has gone through to make her the woman she is today. She thinks several times that she’s not sure who this Caleb is, because he wasn’t the man she’d grown up with, trained with, and knew as a brother. Though short of those comments we aren’t ever shown that juxtaposition against the Caleb we see keeping her captor and wanting her to be his. It’s a lot of telling in that respect.

Throughout the book, we’re teased back and forth with Jeb, the human mercenary that helped Caleb take over the pack and had been helping keep Shana captive. He seems cold and calculating, but then there are glimpses where we think we can maybe trust him, that he’ll be there and come through to help Shana take Caleb down and free her pack from his influence.

The worldbuilding that exists is good, because we’re mostly kept at Shana’s manor and the surrounding woods and ravine around it there isn’t too much to have Shana describe or see to us. But the descriptions of the old trees, the roots that in some scenes are large enough for Shana to duck under or around, the bramble bushes with their pricklers are described nicely to be able to visually see what Shana is going through. Even the description of the halls of the large manor as we’re taken through it in the different scenes left me fairly confident I knew about where things were from walking the halls with Shana.

The characters are mostly well thought out. Shana, being the main character feels the most alive, and her inner thoughts, motivations, and drive are well written. She’s very much a well flushed out character. As were the others over all. I don’t know if I’m over thinking it too much, but the only piece of the puzzle I feel like I’m missing is Caleb’s motivation for killing Shana’s father and taking over the pack.

Throughout the book Shana’s telling us that this isn’t the man she grew up with, and yet Jeb mentions at one point that this had been years in the planning. And Caleb didn’t take the pack over by way of the normal trial by combat normally associated with an alpha battle but crept in the shadows and took the wolves he knew he couldn’t beat fairly by deception and blind surprise. It leads well to why some of the pack wouldn’t follow him because it reeks of cowardliness despite the strength Shana’s wolf tells us Caleb has.

While I liked the book over all, it’s the lack of understanding Caleb’s motivation for turning on the people that had welcomed him in as a family for centuries if Shana’s offer of growing up with him is caught correctly is what leaves this more at a four star read. The story does hook you, and I followed it happily. I am also considering picking up the next book to see where Shana goes. However, even after I read it, I still have the serious, but why did he do it, nagging at the back of my head. There were also quite a few noticeable errors in spelling and punctuation being funky that while it didn’t completely pull me out of the story, were distracting.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout in exchange for my honest, unbiased opinion. All thoughts are my own, and were not colored for receiving a free copy.

2020 – Looking back at the year

28 Monday Dec 2020

Posted by MBenson in Personal Thoughts, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

amblogging, amediting, amreading, amwriting, balancing, books, creativity, discoveries, end of year, enjoy, fantasy, goals, inspiration, life, looking back, musings, online presence, original fiction, original work, possible wip, ramblings, real life, reflection, thoughts, time, time management, update, what do, WIP, word count, writing

So 2020 has been quite the year. I’m not going to rehash what all happened, because let’s be honest. Unless you’ve literally been living in a cave since February, you know, and if you have been living in a cave, well, you’re likely not reading this blog.

It brought a lot of change, which while not great in the how it did, change that will hopefully move us better for the future and the coming year. But that’s not why I’m writing this post. This post isn’t about the future, but about looking back at the year from my goals as an author and seeing where exactly I lined up with them. Maybe digging into a little of the why, though I know a big portion of the why already wtihout needing too much reflection on that part.

So let’s remind ourselves of the goals I’d put into motion via a post on this blog back in January:

  1. Publish at least 2 short stories in 2020
  2. Publish one full-length novel in 2020
  3. Read 50 books in 2020
  4. Relaunch jewelry shop
  5. Sticker shop – create and open

Okay, so let’s go through each and every one of these together and see how I did.

1. Publish at least 2 short stories in 2020? Accomplished! I was able to publish two shorts this year, so woo! go me!

Treasure of the Deep follows Kari, a headstrong Princess that loves to explore the ocean floor for treasure. But her heart ends up at risk when she saves a diver from a shark attack.

On the Clock is a super short read that follows an office tryst.

2. Publish one full-length novel, which did not happen. I’ve got it in editing still, though I am hoping to get some headway in it over the week between Christmas and New Years because I have it off from my 9-5 job that has gotten demanding. – Failed

I can say that I didn’t have the time, or that things came up, which feels true in most senses. But part of it has been I’ve been having trouble focusing on words as a whole. There’s not one thing that I can narrow it down to, but I will say that work has stressed me out more and I’ve found more than one night where I was working on things well past 6pm from home because I needed to make sure something gets done by a certain time. Which after the stress is gone has left me literally wanting to sleep more than anything.

Here’s hoping that getting elbows deep into the editing will mean I can get it polished and out by end of January, maybe mid February at the latest.

3. Read 50 books in 2020 – Failed

I’m gonna be completely honest, this is another fail. I haven’t had time to write, and that also leads to haven’t had time to read much. I think I read like three books this year. I’m in the middle of one that I’m finishing for a review coming Wednesday. But mostly, I’ve been using my time for crafts instead of writing or reading because there’s an instant gratification  of having it done like an hour later and it’s been really fun and made me smile.

4. Relaunch the jewelry shop – Accomplished

This one is technically accomplished. The etsy shop is up and running, though I need to dig into some serious work on getting it back to where it was. A lot of that is involving sitting down and doing a hard inventory and cleaning, but I did get the shop up and it has some items listed on it, and we did make one sale for 2020. So I count it as a win!

5. Start a sticker shop – Kind of accomplished?

So this goal kind of changed after a little while. After really working on stickers, I decided that the time it takes to design them, lay them out, cut them, make sure the print and cut is correct, that it’s time I would rather put into trying to write or read or do other crafts that I enjoy a little more. Like, it was a fun experiment. I made stickers for about two months for my self. I use my cricut machine like crazy still for other things.

But trying to keep up with designs for every week and month is a lot of work. Like full time job work. And if I’m going to put that much work into something, I’d much rather put that time and energy into my author stuff.

Now, I know you’re looking at it though and going, but Meri, you marked it as kind of accomplished. Why is that? Because deciding not to start a sticker shop isn’t technically accomplishing that goal, it’s technically more taking it off the table. Well that’s because while I didn’t open a sticker shop, I did open MBenson Creations on Etsy.

My original jewelry shop is fine gemstone jewelry. Real stones in a sterling silver or 14K gold setting.

MBenson Creations is going to be more of a catchall for my non-fine gemstone jewelry stuff. So I have some acrylic pour necklaces up right now. I’m looking to list a few bookmarks I’ve made, as well as some resin keychains I’ve made. Once I finally get books that are large enough to make into books that can be published on demand I can offer signed copies through this Etsy shop as well. A place for all my creative creations to go up on.

I could have listed them all through the same shop technically, but at the same time I personally wanted a difference in branding for the two. So it made sense to separate them.  But because I did actually create a new shop for that stuff, while not a sticker shop, I count it as an accomplished goal because it revolves around the same goal.

So looking back over, I’ve accomplished three out of five goals. Which in the grand scheme of things, is actually fairly good.

I’ve also jotted down new ideas for some shorts or novels depending on where they go once I get to writing them. I’ve started a joint novel with a friend, and she’s determined to push us to get it out by the end of next year, so goals you’ll be seeing in my next post regarding that.

While 2020 has been crazy, it’s also been a somewhat productive year between the 9-5 stress I’ve been handling. So all in all, while it hasn’t been the easiest year to deal with and learning to work at home has been interesting, more in the I’ve learned that I have problems walking away after I’ve technically clocked out and am not getting paid for the work I’m doing now, I’ve made some good strides as a whole.

Hopefully, looking back on your 2020, you’ll find some bright spots among the cloud that’s been hanging out over the year and can find some reasons to smile, take a deep breath, and move toward 2021 with your head held high and your optimism next to you.

Happy Holidays!

23 Wednesday Dec 2020

Posted by MBenson in Personal Thoughts

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Holidays

Happy Holidays!

Whatever holiday you celebrate, may you and your family have a wonderful one. And if you don’t celebrate any holiday specifically, may your week be wonderful.

This year has been a long one. But the year is coming to a close, we’re wrapping things up the same way we wrap the presents this time of year.

May the new year bring us light, good memories to create, and less stress as a whole.

The end is coming…

15 Tuesday Dec 2020

Posted by MBenson in Personal Thoughts, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

amblogging, amediting, amreading, amwriting, balancing, creativity, discoveries, enjoy, fantasy, goals, inspiration, life, musings, new year, online presence, original fiction, original work, ramblings, real life, thoughts, time, time management, update, what do, WIP, writing

By end, of course I mean the end of the year. We have 17 days left in this calendar year if you count today as well. I’m not even sure where most of it went, if I’m being honest. I feel like it should still be closer to like July or August, not rolling into 2021 shortly.

I didn’t get as much writing, editing, or reading done as I’d hoped to accomplish this year. I always seemed to be doing the, I’ll get to it soon dance and of course, as in most cases when that word is involved, soon never came.

And while the pandemic did keep us at home, keep me working from my desk with my cats, I was still working the job that pays the bills. Something which took an ever increasing time out of my day because while it’s been nice to not have to commute, to snuggle with a fur baby when the day is getting long and frustrating, and I could sleep in just a little more. Because I was moved into a different position at work, one that came with a lot more work, it meant that my balance was thrown off in everything too. Where normally I knew I had time during certain parts of the day, I no longer had them, and where I normally rolled out of work at 5pm, because things needed to get done by certain times, I now found myself rolling out of work closer to 6/6:30pm.

I have been writing. I have a few stories in the fire at the moment that I’m working on. Some shorts, editing my faerie novel, and working on a Norse Mythology based thing with a friend. All things I’m excited for and all things that are slow going as I work out the time to get them done.

Truly, if there were a way to get things straight from my brain and onto paper in a quick, flash motion, that would be fantastic, because I have so much in my head and so little time to get it onto paper. And then of course there’s the issues where occasionally things get lost in translation from my brain to my fingers, which I never understand. If I had it in my brain perfectly before I fell asleep, and my dream of it was vivid, why is it such a pain to get it out onto paper.

And with it being the Holiday time of year, I’m getting gifts and cards and things together. And of course I decided I needed to do home made gifts for my family, which takes what little time I have and blows it up again. But hopefully people will like their gifts and everything.

How is your end of the year going? Are you ready for Christmas? Are you sending gifts to family members? Cards to friends?

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Check Out What I’m Currently Reading

Rogue Huntress by Thea Atkinson

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets

@MerisCorner on Instagram

Recent Posts

  • And time vanishes
  • 2021 – Forward We Move
  • Book Review: Rogue Huntress by Thea Atkinson
  • 2020 – Looking back at the year
  • Happy Holidays!

Categories

  • Blogging 101
  • Cover Reveal
  • NaNoWriMo
  • New Release
  • OwlCrate
  • Personal Thoughts
  • reading
  • Reviews
  • TBR
  • Uncategorized
  • Writing

Archives

  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • October 2016
  • April 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • January 2013

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel