Fired Up – Jayne Ann Krentz
January 3, 2010 in Reviews
More than three centuries ago, Nicholas Winters irrevocably altered his genetic makeup in an obsessionfueled competition with alchemist and Arcane Society founder Sylvester Jones. Driven to control their psychic abilities, each man’s decision has reverberated throughout the family line, rewarding some with powers beyond their wildest dreams, and cursing others to a life filled with madness and hallucinations.
Jack Winters, descendant of Nicholas, has been experiencing nightmares and blackouts-just the beginning, he believes-of the manifestation of the Winters family curse. The legend says that he must find the Burning Lamp or risk turning into a monster. But he can’t do it alone; he needs the help of a woman with the gift to read the lamp’s dreamlight.
Jack is convinced that private investigator Chloe Harper is that woman. Her talents for finding objects and accessing dream energy are what will save him, but their sudden and powerful sexual pull threatens to overwhelm them both. Danger surrounds them, and it doesn’t take long for Chloe to pick up the trail of the missing lamp. And as they draw closer to the lamp, the raw power that dwells within it threatens to sweep them into a hurricane of psychic force.
Apparently whilst looking at the cover of Fired Up, I failed to notice where it says BOOK SEVEN in the Arcane Series. I did see BOOK ONE in the Dreamlight Trilogy & figured when I opened the book, since it’s a spin-off there will be some sort of explanation if there’s past events or characters that have anything to do with this series. Boy was I wrong.
Reader’s new to the Arcane Series, will immediately have a big issue. Even though this is the start of a trilogy, Ms. Krentz skips over what has happened in the Arcane Series, failing to explain what a Dream-Reader is until page 37 of the novel. Needless to say, I was left extremely confused even with that description, the basic gist is:
Dreams create energy which is a part of each persons aura. The waves made from those dreams can be seen only by a dream-reader.
Are you with me? That really didn’t help my understanding at all, if anything it just confused me more. The description for me, was hard to interpret and what I have quoted above is my understanding of what was written. Still, I carried on reading to see if I could try and gain some more insight into dreamlight.
While the details and plot were rich and the writing was good, I still had a very hard time as a new reader. New readers MUST read the Arcane Series first, as a spin-off this book cannot stand without the other series. It just doesn’t make a lot of sense to a new reader because there are so many faucets of the Arcane from organizations to characters.
My rating for the book is going to have to be different than how I normally rate, based on the lack of stand alone this book offers. As a reader new to the series, I will have to rate the book low. I would like to give the Arcane Series a try when I have some time, so that I can re-review this book as I do feel a bad about giving the book a low rating now knowing it doesn’t stand alone.
My Rating 2.5/5 (based on the lack of stand alone)
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What a shame you didn’t realize this was the 7th book. I’ve had that happen a few times on impulse purchases. It’s really disappointing.
I feel horrible giving it a low rating, but I figure if it’s a part of a trilogy there should have at least been a quick recap at the beginning!
I agree, a recap would be nice. There are so many books that are part of s series that can stand alone. It’s a shame this one fell flat.
The thing is, it’s not the character that need the recap, it’s the whole definition of the book, I still am confused on the Dreamlight thing!
As a reader who has read all the books in the series, I can honestly say that this novel continues the major plot arc of the Arcane Society vs. Nightshade (good guys with paranormal senses vs. bad guys with paranormal senses), gives us a strong suspense plot, and two interesting romantic leads with a good love story.
I definitely can see how jumping into this book without the back story would be difficult, but if you get a chance to read the previous books, I highly recommend it! It’s one of my favorite series.