Blaze Ignites Scourge Survivor Series: Book 1
JL Madore
Genre: Paranormal/Fantasy Romance
Word Count: 107,000
Today, I reviewed JL Madore's "Blaze Ignites", a Paranormal/Fantasy Romance novel.
Book Description:
"Blaze Ignites blends strong, clever women and tough, sexy men in a fast paced, volatile cocktail of action, seduction and wicked humour."
I would say that on the Paranormal/Fantasy Romance spectrum, the novel was more Fantasy than Paranormal. I am a hard-core Paranormal Romance reader and have only dabbled into the Fantasy Romance side, but I enjoyed the different read.
World building: At the beginning, I struggled a tiny bit as I wasn't used to the fantasy world painting. The series of Para-Rom's that I read take place in our world, where Miss Madore explores a world different than ours. The fantasy world that was created was very interesting and very unique as I've never read a book that featured elves (especially hot elves). The world building was very intricate from the history of why the elves were banished. I also enjoyed the jump into our society, including the streets of downtown Toronto, Ontario.
Characters: At the beginning, the heroine, Jade Glaster seemed almost too hard-core, too alpha-female and I was not as sympathetic towards her until moving past the first few chapters, where the reader learns the reasons for her attitude/personality. I liked her more once I could see the reasons for her boundaries. The cast of characters were three-dimensional and very interesting. I loved the use of the exiled Elves and before I read this book, I'd never thought of elves as sexy, until reading about Galan. The characters are unique and interesting from Jade's best friend Lexi to her ex-boyfriend Samuel and the adopted father, Reign. She made very good use of the different personalities of the characters and everyone was truly one of a kind.
Pros & Cons: As I mentioned above, I am a Para-Rom reader so this was one of the first Fantasy Romance novels that I read so it did take me a little bit to get used to the high level of description. I now realize that when creating a fantasy world, it is required to give the reader an overall landscape of everything from the settings, surroundings to the variations in paranormal creatures. The novel was very long (107,000 words) and it required more "conscious" reading in order to understand. I also found that the story started off a little slow, but I recommend that readers stick with it because it gets better and better!
Fresh Factor: I'm not a true judge of the fresh factor as I am new to the fantasy world, but to me, I found it fresh. I loved the elf world and the magical Realm of the Fair. As a Canadian living about an hour from Toronto, I was also super excited to see the real-world setting in Toronto. I found that fresh as I haven't seen the city used in many books.
Overall: I enjoyed the read and for fantasy fans, I would recommend this. The actual writing of Miss Madore is very well crafted. The world that was created was interesting and the characters are awesome. I would give the book 3.5 stars and will look for Book 2 to come out.
About the Author:
Almost four years later, after dozens of workshops, reading hundreds of books, joining a writing community and two critique groups, I've won two writing scholarships and believe I've got a handle on what I’m trying to say and the voice with which I want to say it.
Currently, I am working on the five book Scourge Survivor Series as well as a darker, erotic/romance paranormal series currently called Watchers of the Grey.
Website: www.jlmadore.ca
Facebook Fan Page: https://www.facebook.com/#!/JLMadore
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jlmadore
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17833323-blaze-ignites
1 comment:
Thanks for your kind words and for introducing Blaze Ignites to the followers of The Speculative Salon. All the best,
JL
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