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kathydavie's review against another edition
4.0
Second in the Alex Verus urban fantasy series set in London, Camden Town to be exact, and revolving around a mage who just wants to be left alone.
My Take
Luna makes me nuts. Huh, I guess that means her name is accurate and prophetic… She wants Alex to introduce her to this magical world, but she also refuses to accept anything he says that she doesn't like.
The arrogance of man provides so many possibilities. In this case, Jacka makes use of man's "superiority" to lesser creatures. Animals with magic abilities. After all, they're just animals incapable of thought, love, dreams.
There's a nice bit in here about how a monkey's paw works, its origin, and a list of worries about it. Hmm, Cinder is brighter than I thought. Oh, wow, then there's a nasty case of be careful what you wish for.
I do like this series. It still hasn't warmed up for me, but Alex's ideas of right and wrong are so perfect. He doesn't care about a person's words, he's more interested in their actions. You can declare yourself a Light mage, but its the actions you take that confirm or deny it.
I can definitely see lots of possibilities with Alex Verus, and I'm looking forward to reading Taken.
The Story
Two invasions of his shop, and Alex is caught. Desperate to remain independent, the Light and the Dark mages have their own ideas of how Alex's independence will work.
And they'll use his loyalty and sense of friendship to do it.
The Characters
Alex Verus is a diviner, able to see thousands of possible futures at a time, who just happens to run a magic shop in Camden Town. Until lately, he's managed to steer an independent course. Now, he's becoming an irritant.
Luna Mancuso is between sensitive and adept and very much wants to be a part of the magic world, so Alex takes her on informally as an apprentice. Only, he can't decide between friend, apprentice, or lover. Martin is Luna's new friend and a cocky, thieving little bastard. Starbreeze is an Air elemental with a very, very short memory and is "as dumb as a box of rocks". Arachne is a ten-foot-tall spider who both weaves and designs clothes.
Cinder is a fire mage working with Deleo, the former Rachel, is a water mage and a former apprentice of Richard Drakh's along with Alex. Meredith is an enchantress; she causes you to feel and want things. Jadan is a Dark mage who found a "foolproof" method of extracting magical energy from magical creatures. David Sonder is a time mage.
The Council is the ruling body of Light Mages. Remember, "light" is just a term. Vaal Levistus is a Council member very angry over what Alex caused him to lose in Fated; Belthas is a Council member who thinks he'll do better. Garrick is a magical mercenary; he works for the person who pays. Ilmarin is Council security.
Sensitives are a step up from normals. They can "feel the presence of magic". Next up are the adepts who can "actually channel magic in a subtle way". Then there are the mages. Arrogant, self-absorbed, if they see something they want, they take it. Elsewhere is a world not a place to which you can only travel in dreams. Where you can touch people through dreams, through their minds. It can be an escape or a trap.
Currency is flexible within the mage world: favours are a favoured method of payment and people may be sold (or taken) as slaves. Mages tend to specialize and exchange services. Items which can be sold include artifacts and components.
Shireen and Tobruk were apprentices under Richard Drakh who died.
The Cover
The cover is sparking in blues with London Bridge as the background.
The title revolves around Luna, for she is Cursed you know.
My Take
Luna makes me nuts. Huh, I guess that means her name is accurate and prophetic… She wants Alex to introduce her to this magical world, but she also refuses to accept anything he says that she doesn't like.
The arrogance of man provides so many possibilities. In this case, Jacka makes use of man's "superiority" to lesser creatures. Animals with magic abilities. After all, they're just animals incapable of thought, love, dreams.
There's a nice bit in here about how a monkey's paw works, its origin, and a list of worries about it. Hmm, Cinder is brighter than I thought. Oh, wow, then there's a nasty case of be careful what you wish for.
I do like this series. It still hasn't warmed up for me, but Alex's ideas of right and wrong are so perfect. He doesn't care about a person's words, he's more interested in their actions. You can declare yourself a Light mage, but its the actions you take that confirm or deny it.
I can definitely see lots of possibilities with Alex Verus, and I'm looking forward to reading Taken.
The Story
Two invasions of his shop, and Alex is caught. Desperate to remain independent, the Light and the Dark mages have their own ideas of how Alex's independence will work.
And they'll use his loyalty and sense of friendship to do it.
The Characters
Alex Verus is a diviner, able to see thousands of possible futures at a time, who just happens to run a magic shop in Camden Town. Until lately, he's managed to steer an independent course. Now, he's becoming an irritant.
Luna Mancuso is between sensitive and adept and very much wants to be a part of the magic world, so Alex takes her on informally as an apprentice. Only, he can't decide between friend, apprentice, or lover. Martin is Luna's new friend and a cocky, thieving little bastard. Starbreeze is an Air elemental with a very, very short memory and is "as dumb as a box of rocks". Arachne is a ten-foot-tall spider who both weaves and designs clothes.
Cinder is a fire mage working with Deleo, the former Rachel, is a water mage and a former apprentice of Richard Drakh's along with Alex. Meredith is an enchantress; she causes you to feel and want things. Jadan is a Dark mage who found a "foolproof" method of extracting magical energy from magical creatures. David Sonder is a time mage.
The Council is the ruling body of Light Mages. Remember, "light" is just a term. Vaal Levistus is a Council member very angry over what Alex caused him to lose in Fated; Belthas is a Council member who thinks he'll do better. Garrick is a magical mercenary; he works for the person who pays. Ilmarin is Council security.
Sensitives are a step up from normals. They can "feel the presence of magic". Next up are the adepts who can "actually channel magic in a subtle way". Then there are the mages. Arrogant, self-absorbed, if they see something they want, they take it. Elsewhere is a world not a place to which you can only travel in dreams. Where you can touch people through dreams, through their minds. It can be an escape or a trap.
Currency is flexible within the mage world: favours are a favoured method of payment and people may be sold (or taken) as slaves. Mages tend to specialize and exchange services. Items which can be sold include artifacts and components.
Shireen and Tobruk were apprentices under Richard Drakh who died.
The Cover
The cover is sparking in blues with London Bridge as the background.
The title revolves around Luna, for she is Cursed you know.
guppyur's review against another edition
3.0
Second entry in the series is still solid. Bit confused about one point in the epilogue, but I'm still enjoying the series. Kind of nice to have a little moral gray in a protagonist.
willrefuge's review against another edition
4.0
7 / 10 ✪
https://arefugefromlife.wordpress.com/2022/02/27/cursed-by-benedict-jacka-review/
Ever since the fallout with the Fateweaver, Alex has been keeping his head down, immersing himself in work at his Camden shop and doing his best to play mentor to an unorthodox apprentice. Yet neither has been working out too well.
Now that he’s on the Council’s radar, it’s only a matter of time before they come calling—so Alex has been picking up odd jobs from his contact Talisid, and planning for what happens if SHTF. Unfortunately, it seems he’s underestimated them.
Caught in the middle of a clash between Light and Dark, Alex signs on to investigate a rumor of mages harvesting magical creatures for their life-force—a process as dangerous as it is disgusting. As he doesn’t want the research to fall into the wrong hands (or any hands, preferably), Alex is set on destroying the process before any other magical creatures can die. But it seems he’s underestimated just how much some mages are willing to go for a chance at more power. And while they’ll happily kill him in order to gain it, is he willing to do the same in order to prevent its use? Or will he step aside while his new allies grow much stronger, and maybe him as well?
—
Sonder was looking in my direction as i walked back into the room. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
“I thought i heard a bang.”
“Rats.”
“And something that sounded like a scream?”
“Big rats.”
—
Better than the first one, albeit with a slower start and a slightly more divergent plot. Still, when it all comes together the story takes off. A couple missteps relating to later books and the blending of plot lines ruin what could’ve been a better sophomore effort, but I promise you, the series does get better the later in it one reads.
While a better read than Fated, Cursed is still not yet indicative of Jacka hitting his stride. The plot is certainly more intricate than the fairly straightforward fetch quest of its predecessor, but “more intricate” does not always mean “better”. Indeed, with a slower start and a more divergent plot, Cursed gets bogged down in expectation and ends up a muddle of threads and plot-lines—and something which confuses the lore come later books. That said, with far better character personality and development, it really gets the series moving from some pair of related books to something which one day might comprise a good series. And hey—it does.
Despite its quagmire of plot-devices and threads, Cursed is never a challenge to read—at least once past the 40-page mark. Make it there and you shouldn’t have any more problems. It’s not that making it through these first forty is all that difficult; it’s an interesting setup, building up the plot via lore that would’ve been nice in the first book. It’s just that, unlike the previous entry, Cursed doesn’t stamp on the accelerator and leave it to get the reader immersed. Instead, it builds events up a bit—then stomps down.
I really don’t have too many thoughts on this one. I mean, it shows the classic “sophomore slump” common to new series, but the “slump” isn’t any worse than the original. In fact in some ways it’s better. My recollection is still that the series only goes up from here, but I suppose I should amend that now. While I know that later books get to be the kind of thing you can devour in about a day—it’s not quite here yet. But “nothing after Fated gets any worse” doesn’t sound as good. Taken (Book #3), I remember as being really good, Hidden (Book #5) taking everything to another level. As for Books 4 & 6… well, I guess we’ll just have to see. Check back next month for the review of Taken, and for more on Benedict Jacka.
https://arefugefromlife.wordpress.com/2022/02/27/cursed-by-benedict-jacka-review/
Ever since the fallout with the Fateweaver, Alex has been keeping his head down, immersing himself in work at his Camden shop and doing his best to play mentor to an unorthodox apprentice. Yet neither has been working out too well.
Now that he’s on the Council’s radar, it’s only a matter of time before they come calling—so Alex has been picking up odd jobs from his contact Talisid, and planning for what happens if SHTF. Unfortunately, it seems he’s underestimated them.
Caught in the middle of a clash between Light and Dark, Alex signs on to investigate a rumor of mages harvesting magical creatures for their life-force—a process as dangerous as it is disgusting. As he doesn’t want the research to fall into the wrong hands (or any hands, preferably), Alex is set on destroying the process before any other magical creatures can die. But it seems he’s underestimated just how much some mages are willing to go for a chance at more power. And while they’ll happily kill him in order to gain it, is he willing to do the same in order to prevent its use? Or will he step aside while his new allies grow much stronger, and maybe him as well?
—
Sonder was looking in my direction as i walked back into the room. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
“I thought i heard a bang.”
“Rats.”
“And something that sounded like a scream?”
“Big rats.”
—
Better than the first one, albeit with a slower start and a slightly more divergent plot. Still, when it all comes together the story takes off. A couple missteps relating to later books and the blending of plot lines ruin what could’ve been a better sophomore effort, but I promise you, the series does get better the later in it one reads.
While a better read than Fated, Cursed is still not yet indicative of Jacka hitting his stride. The plot is certainly more intricate than the fairly straightforward fetch quest of its predecessor, but “more intricate” does not always mean “better”. Indeed, with a slower start and a more divergent plot, Cursed gets bogged down in expectation and ends up a muddle of threads and plot-lines—and something which confuses the lore come later books. That said, with far better character personality and development, it really gets the series moving from some pair of related books to something which one day might comprise a good series. And hey—it does.
Despite its quagmire of plot-devices and threads, Cursed is never a challenge to read—at least once past the 40-page mark. Make it there and you shouldn’t have any more problems. It’s not that making it through these first forty is all that difficult; it’s an interesting setup, building up the plot via lore that would’ve been nice in the first book. It’s just that, unlike the previous entry, Cursed doesn’t stamp on the accelerator and leave it to get the reader immersed. Instead, it builds events up a bit—then stomps down.
I really don’t have too many thoughts on this one. I mean, it shows the classic “sophomore slump” common to new series, but the “slump” isn’t any worse than the original. In fact in some ways it’s better. My recollection is still that the series only goes up from here, but I suppose I should amend that now. While I know that later books get to be the kind of thing you can devour in about a day—it’s not quite here yet. But “nothing after Fated gets any worse” doesn’t sound as good. Taken (Book #3), I remember as being really good, Hidden (Book #5) taking everything to another level. As for Books 4 & 6… well, I guess we’ll just have to see. Check back next month for the review of Taken, and for more on Benedict Jacka.
squishies's review
adventurous
fast-paced
4.0
I love Arachne - she's so knowing and cool.
Also, Sonder is kinda bad ass.
It was so obvious that she would be in danger after finding out that the barghest was drained of magic.
Definitely totally obvious that it would be because of Luna desperate to rid herself of the curse. Same that Martin was Bad News.
But I did not expect a dragon. A bit deux ex machina, though still kinda cool?
I'm glad Alex has worked out the whole mentorship vs romance thing with Luna.
Also, Sonder is kinda bad ass.
Definitely totally obvious that it would be because of Luna desperate to rid herself of the curse. Same that Martin was Bad News.
But I did not expect a dragon. A bit deux ex machina, though still kinda cool?
I'm glad Alex has worked out the whole mentorship vs romance thing with Luna.
lenalahe's review against another edition
It just didn’t catch me. The protagonist was unpleasant and every female character only seemed to be there to be rescued by him or to let him be a hero. While reading I got angrier and angrier with each page because of the wasted potential. It‘s very obvious that the female characters were written by a man. Will not continue this series.
bougle's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
lbelow's review against another edition
adventurous
tense
4.75
An excellent page turner that expands the facets of this world. I heartily enjoyed it, but I warn about the dicey consent slash rape in the first half of the book, when an enchantress uses her coercion magic to get him into bed. He doesn't seem to regret it or even realize it was rape but still, be aware.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Death, and Deadnaming
Minor: Rape