Jordan Price's Reviews > Grave Peril

I loved aspects of this story and hated others. I adored the magic, the description of how power worked, how Harry created his spells. I also loved how he got put through the wringer and had to really be willing to sacrifice himself for the survival of the people he loved.

I hated the female characters. I hated that their breasts were described at every available opportunity, particularly the villains. During a climactic fight scene, a female villain was "distracted" by a vampire sliding his hands under her top, and I thought, "Yes, of course the story had to go there." Susan, the girlfriend character, walks into danger and puts everyone else in danger with such willfully ignorant and selfish motives I could scream. (She is supposed to be smart, so why does she do something so moronic?) I feel like the women are all selfish sex objects.

The writing technique is mostly clean and conversational with a few dips into purple prose, but I noticed the tendency to hurtle up to a tipping point, end the chapter, and then draw way, way back into a philosophical musing at the beginning of the next chapter rather than continuing with the action. I would have liked that on occasion, but not chapter after chapter.

So even though I rated it a three (because of the icky representation of women), I really loved certain elements of the book, and reading the way it was worded and constructed helped me wrap my head around the way I approach writing myself, what works for me and what doesn't.