Tag: c

Country of Beauties

  By

★★½
“Still a better movie than Wonder Woman 1984.“

This Taiwanese production takes place on an island where women have been separate from men for 23 generations, developing more or less your stereotypical Amazonian society. Men are rejected, male babies tossed out to see to sink or swim (typically the former) and they have build a giant, albeit largely unconvincing, statue of their founding ruler, which fires cannonballs out of its eyes. This is not inappropriate, since the current occupant of the throne, Queen Nadanwa (Yeung). has a harsh line in anti-male rhetoric (“All men are dangerous!”), accompanied by castration. Her subjects dress either in flimsy white robes or shiny battle armour, and engage in gymnastic or circus-related forms of entertainment.

Nadanwa’s antipathy initially seems not wrong, as the island is raided by rapist pirates, who are barely fought off by the women. However, it turns out there is another island nearby, occupied only by men – the survivors of the sea-dispatched male babies mentioned above. They’re more chill, and just want to get back to both sexes living in harmony. The ruler’s sister Chung Ah (Fong) has been having a secret affair with their leader, Lu (Wong). Needless to say, queenie is not going to be happy about this. However, she does eventually realize that some men might just have their uses, such as increasing the power of her eyeball cannons, in order to defend her realm from the pirates.

You may be thinking this could perhaps go through male rape for comedic purposes, a hunt for treasure, light lesbian canoodling and end in a mass battle between the Amazons and the buccaneers, with the island of men coming in to save the day. This will, in all likelihood, be accompanied by an upbeat and poppy soundtrack, which could not possibly be more eighties if it was sporting AquaNet and leg-warmers. Well, I’m not going to spoil it for you. Nadanwa also keeps a tiger as a pet, which fits with her general philosophy, I guess. Though it must be said, these Amazons do seem weirdly incompetent, needing male help not just in the armaments category, but when giving birth. You’d think they might have figured out the basics after 23 generations. 

There are some reasonable moments of scale here, though things like the battles against the pirates are more notable for the number of participants than their combat ability. The problem is mostly one of tone, and it’s hardly alone there, in Taiwanese productions from this decade. A lot of the attempts at comedy have not aged well, if they were ever funny to begin with. In a movie which also includes wholesale child genocide, sexual assault of both genders, and genital mutilation, you’re not exactly looking for light relief. Although Yeung is her usual reliable self as a leader, this falls short of the likes of Golden Queens Commando., and only just scrapes over the bar set at a height of “acceptable entertainment.”

Dir: Yang-Ming Tsai
Star: Fong-fong Fong, Don Wong, Elsa Yeung
a.k.a. Island Warriors

The Covert Guardian, by Liane Zane

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Literary rating: ★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆

Liane Zane’s Elioud Legacy trilogy, all three books of which I’ve previously reviewed, is supernatural fiction, written by a Roman Catholic author, and premised on the fictional conceit that matings between angelic beings (both fallen and unfallen) and humans have been going on since before the Flood, producing mixed-race offspring who are physically human but have certain heightened physical or even latent supernatural abilities. That trilogy focused on three strong and courageous young women, who when it opened were completely unaware of their angelic genes, and all of whom were both serving in the intelligence services of their various countries, and collaborating with each other on the side in a covert alliance to provide some special protection for the victims of sexual assault and trafficking. The Covert Guardian is the first volume of a projected prequel trilogy, set a few years before the opening of the previously-published one, which will tell the “origin story” of their friendship and alliance. Here, our protagonist is Olivia Markham, the trio’s unofficial ringleader, and we learn how, as a 20-year-old college pre-med student, she unexpectedly came to join the CIA.

Unlike the first trilogy, this one really has no supernatural elements. Readers who’ve read the former will suspect, from certain subtle clues, that a couple of secondary characters here may also be Elioud, and will remember the St. Michael medal (a gift from her sensei) that Olivia wears, which feels strangely warm at times; and she has a sort of instinctive sixth sense for approaching danger that her then-boyfriend rather snidely dismisses as her “spidey sense.” But none of this is obviously paranormal nor impossible to explain naturalistically. I’ve classified the book as straight-out, descriptive action-adventure and espionage fiction, and it will definitely appeal to fans of those genres whether they have any liking for supernatural fiction or not.

The previously-published books mentioned, as a painful experience in Olivia’s past, the murder of her cousin Emily when the two girls were 16; they were close, and the tragedy was a formative factor in shaping Olivia’s deep desire to protect the innocent victims of brutality. In the modern U.S., the wheels of the justice system grind very slowly, so the killer’s trial was delayed until the summer before Olivia was to become a junior at Brown Univ. (She’s New England born and bred, living with her family in a suburban town outside Boston.) When our tale opens, soon after testifying, Olivia’s been talked by her boyfriend into joining him in a vacation on Ibiza, a real-life Mediterranean island off the coast of Spain which is a popular tourist destination, as a supposed opportunity to rest and heal from the re-lived traumatic experience. Even at this stage in her life, she’s strong, physically fit and athletic, smart, brave and quick-thinking; and since Emily’s murder, she’s been taking serious martial arts training. (And then there’s that “spidey sense” I mentioned….)

These qualities will stand her in good stead when, just four pages into the narrative, a squad of Islamist terrorists hit the beach, bent on slaughtering the revelers. Fortunately, a CIA counter-terrorist strike force is nearby; but by the time the action is over, Olivia’s displayed enough mettle to get their attention. (As they’ll soon learn, it also doesn’t hurt that she’s fluent in several languages, and qualified for the U.S. Olympic team in archery while still in high school.) Before the summer is over, she’s training at a CIA-run camp in North Carolina, and she feels that she’s found her true calling. And as luck would have it, an attractive female college student might just fit the mission profile for getting close to a wealthy young playboy type suspected of funding global terrorist activities. But chicanery, corruption, and betrayal of the U.S. aren’t necessarily things that only go on outside of the CIA, and our heroine’s path to joining the Company may not be an easy cake-walk.

Although the books of the Elioud Legacy trilogy are all thick, at just 155 pages, this one is more novella length, and a quick read. Like the former books, though, it moves around geographically, in this case to locations on three different continents; and the author’s knowledge of the physical geography of all of these settings is impressive. She’s a skilled wordsmith, seasoned in the novelist’s craft and able to immerse the reader in the story, and there are some surprises up her sleeve. For readers who want danger, tension, and well-depicted action scenes, this yarn definitely delivers. It’s not characterized by profound ethical dilemmas or deep spiritual, philosophical or political content, being more straightforward in those areas (in the context of the espionage genre, Zane is more in the tradition of Manning Coles or Alistair MacLean than, say, John LeCarre’), but I don’t view this as is any sense a fault, nor will most genre fans. What readers –genre fans or not– do want in fiction, more than action and danger, is the human element, a central character(s) we can like and feel invested in enough to care about the action and danger in the first place. That test is amply met here. Olivia is a winsome, dynamic protagonist whom we get to know and appreciate, and this is a character-driven tale of her growth and maturation in various ways in the crucible of a testing ordeal.

As I’ve said before in reviewing this author’s work, it’s fiction written by a Christian, rather than the kind of commercially “Christian fiction” the book trade markets as such. Olivia’s a basically kind and ethical-minded person, and cares about right and wrong as she understands them; but by her own statement, here she’s still “not really a believer.” Bad language is a hair more prominent here than in the first trilogy, though it’s actually more prominent in the first few pages here than it is in most of the book. College-age Olivia herself is capable, when she’s angry, of thinking or saying some pretty bad words, including obscenity (in a couple of languages). And though there’s no explicit sex, we know that an unmarried sexual encounter takes place at one point. The author makes us completely understand the psychology behind it; it’s a case of allowing the character to be who she realistically is, and possibly to grow through all of her decisions, both the good and the misguided ones, into the person she’s finally becoming. (That’s what good authors do.)

Finally, a worthwhile question might be, does a reader need to have read the Elioud Lagacy books before reading this one? My answer would be no; having read those books will allow you to better appreciate some adumbrations of the future you can see here, but it’s not essential, and no knowledge of them is presupposed here. You could begin with this book as an appetizer for the corpus as a whole.

Author: Liane Zane
Publisher: Zephon Romance; available through Amazon, both for Kindle and as a printed book.
A version of this review previously appeared on Goodreads.

Casey Jones Mysteries Vol 1-3 by Katy Munger

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Literary rating: ★★½
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆

While omnibus editions of series are often a good way to pick up a large volume of content for a discounted price, they do have their downside. Especially for someone like me, who is basically bloody-minded and regards the dreaded Did Not Finish as a badge of failure. So even when a book is not that entertaining, I still find myself slogging on: and when there are three volumes in one, its a process which naturally takes that much longer. I think if I’d had just the one story here, I’d perhaps have looked upon this with a kinder eye. Three was tough, not least because the final story was the longest, occupying a solid forty percent of the set, and is also the least entertaining of the trilogy.

The heroine is a private detective – albeit rather unlicensed, due to a previous felony in another state – operating out of Raleigh, North Carolina. Because of her status, she works under Bobby D, a 360-pound eating machine in PI form, though it seems that Casey is a little on the well-built side herself. For example, one of her breakfasts is itemized as “A pound of grits and butter – never mind the fried eggs, sausage and biscuits,” or she describes herself as “chubby at first glance, and stocky at second.” This does not seem exactly to be reflected on the book cover (right), and gluttony isn’t the only one of the seven deadly sins of which she’s fond either. She has quite the wandering eye, and at times it feels as if there’s hardly a man who crosses her path – be they cop, suspect, witness, or merely a convenient to hand bar-tender – about whom she does not have carnal thoughts, to some degree. I mean, it’s a legitimate part of her character, but I’d prefer to have seen the same effort put into delivering action.

There too, the cover’s accuracy must be questioned, offering a level of gun-toting that’s never quite achieved.  Though at least in the first couple of volumes, the plot is decent. #1, Legwork sees a political campaign derailed when a corpse shows up in the driveway of one candidate’s house, for whom Casey has been working as a bodyguard. This job gets upgraded to finding the killer, which gets her involved in a murky conspiracy of real-estate corruption. It could easily have toppled over into needless complexity, yet Munger manages to keep everything clear and moving forward. Part two, Out of Time, has her trying to clear a woman who is on Death Row for murdering her detective husband, and there’s a similarly tangled web here, this time involving police misconduct. It does actually have a meaningful and reasonably exciting climax, in which Casey is hunted through the woods by a corrupt cop.

Then there’s the third part, Money to Burn, and that’s where scenario fatigue really set in for me. It’s perhaps also where the fact these are almost period pieces nowadays (the first volume was originally published back in 1997) hurt the books most, with a slew of elements which felt particularly anachronistic to a modern reader. A tobacco company scientist is murdered, opening the door to a mess of corporate shenanigans, rich familial strife, a serial rapist and a far too long description of the heroine’s attendance at some kind of debutante ball, about which I cared not in the slightest. There’s almost a class struggle subtext here too, with Casey repeatedly feeling her low origins when operating in the world of high society. It’s an unengaging mix between Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous with The Jerry Springer Show. I persisted, yet am now completely burned out on Ms. Jones. Wild horses probably could not drag me into reading parts 4-7.

Author: Katy Munger
Publisher: Thalia Books, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book
Book 1-3 of 7 in the Casey Jones Mystery series.

Chained Heat

  By

★★★½
“Peak women-in-prison.”

This may not be the best women-in-prison film, but it’s pretty much iconic. It certainly stamped the template from which almost all would follow. Carol Henderson (Blair) is sentenced to a relatively short 18 months in prison, for her involvement in a fatal car accident, only to find life on the inside is far, far harder than expected. Hazards to be navigated include those on both sides of the bars. There’s the predatory and drug-running warden (Vernon), who has a jacuzzi in his office – bit of a warning sign that. Then there’s his assistant Captain Taylor (Stevens), who is pimping out inmates with the help of Lester (Henry Silva). Meanwhile, a race war is about to break out among the inmates, between the groups led by Ericka (Danning) and Duchess (Tamara Dobson), with Carol caught in the middle.

It’s a stellar cast for an exploitation movie, also including the former Mrs. Russ Meyer, Edy Williams, and the insanely hot Monique Gabrielle as the first inmate to frolic with the warden in his watery play-pen, despite him being more than 30 years older. The nudity is copious, frequent and more explicit than you might expect, especially if you find an uncut version. There is at least one scene of sexual assault which even I found made for uncomfortable viewing. I’d prefer to have had more of the struggle for power between Ericka and Duchess, which is a lot of fun to watch, both women having screen presence to spare.

In comparison, Blair has trouble standing out, choosing to underplay her role, when all around her are going in the opposite direction. This is where the “pinky violence” films from Japan stand out, with their heroines who are prepared to do whatever it takes to survive, and defeat those who stand in their way. Carol doesn’t get there until the very end, if at all, eventually brokering a rather unlikely alliance that sees Ericka join forces with Duchess, when they realize Taylor is the real enemy, rather than each other. Even more unlikely is the way Carol comes into possession of a convenient videotape, implicating Taylor and her crony in murder.

Still, if you are here for the plot, you may have strolled into the wrong review. Blair may have had her regrets, the IMDb saying she “stripped naked because she felt she had no choice.” That seems like a “you” problem, Linda. I’m fairly sure the rest of the cast had no such qualms and, as noted above, she’s likely the weakest link in the characters anyway. Even though it’s twenty minutes before Carol gets through processing and into her cell, it is fairly consistently entertaining, albeit not necessarily for the right reasons, and will likely open your eyes to the important cause of women’s penal reform. Or perhaps just cause you to question certain elements of security procedures in this particular prison. They don’t make ’em like this anymore; especially not with this cast.

Dir: Paul Nicholas
Star: Linda Blair, Stella Stevens, John Vernon, Sybil Danning

Catch the Fair One

  By

★★★
“Down for the count.”

Quite often, in films featuring women who are supposed to be boxers, they simply do not look the part. Safe to say, this is not an issue here. That is apparent from the opening scene, in which Kaylee (Reis) is preparing for a fight. As she warms up with her trainer, the speed and power of her punches is clear, and not cinematic trickery. It’s unsurprising, since Reis is, at time of writing. the current WBA, WBO and IBO light-welterweight world champion. It’s just a shame this movie chooses not to make more use of her undoubted talents in the combat field, and is a tad too earnest to be value as entertainment.

Kaylee falls into a downward spiral after her sister Weeta (Borrero) vanishes, and is barely scraping by, but then receives information that Weeta was abducted by a sex trafficking ring. With the authorities unwilling to do anything – the number of indigenous women who suffer this fate, or are flat-out murdered is startling – it’s up to Kaylee. She infiltrates the ring run by Bobby (Henshall), only to find it’s a lot harder to get out than in, and that he isn’t necessarily the man in charge. If I may trot out a tired boxing cliche, she’s in for the fight of her life, as she seeks the truth about what happened to her sister, and whether Weeta is alive or dead.

Reis is the best thing this has going for it, and the makers know it. There’s a raw intensity which is utterly convincing, as she throws herself into a terrible situation in pursuit of Weeta. Though you do have to wonder why she apparently waited so long before trying to track down her supposedly beloved sibling, leaving the trail close to stone-cold. I mentioned “value as entertainment” above, and that should probably be stressed. This isn’t a Taken-style popcorn audience pleaser. It’s more of a descent into hell, which will leave neither Kaylee nor those with whom she crosses paths unscathed, to put it mildly. The heroine was already badly damaged going in: she sleeps with a razor-blade tucked in her mouth for defense purposes, a note that goes nowhere except as a character trait.

Much the same is true of her boxing talents, which never particularly come to the forefront, leaving me wondering why they made them part of the film. I did have to admire its relentlessly grim tone: there’s hardly a moment of light here, until the very end of the movie. Even then, the carpet of comfort is brutally yanked out from underneath the feet of the viewer with the final shot before the credits roll. I’m not sure if Reis has any future as an actress – or even whether she has an interest in such. However, if this proves to be the beginning and end of her career on-screen, it will still be better than many more accomplished actresses manage.

Dir: Josef Kubota Wladyka
Star: Kali Reis, Daniel Henshall, Kevin Dunn, Mainaku Borrero

Chess Game

  By

★★★½
“Queen takes king.”

I had to work quite hard to see this: while it is on Tubi, the subtitles there were only in Spanish, and so not much help (I’m still at the “Donde esta la biblioteca?” level). Fortunately, it then turned up on Vudu, and I bravely made my way through their crappy interface and frequent adverts to bring you this review. It was worth it. This is a solid slice of women-in-prison action/drama from Brazil, though perhaps less exploitative than I expected (especially given the country’s history in the sub-genre!) . I mean, Marins is a former model in Brazillian Playboy, so you’ll understand I had… certain expectations. Fortunately, the rest of the movie proved more than adequate to hold my attention. 

After a welfare fraud is discovered, Guilhermina Dos Santos (Fantin) takes the fall and gets a 16-year prison sentence, while the real mastermind, Senator Franco (Calloni) escapes consequences. Three years into her sentence, Mina has become top dog in the facility. After her parole request is turned down, the Senator decides it’s best if she ceases to be a problem. He pays the warden (Andrada), who bribes an inmate to shank Mina. The attempt fails, thanks partly to the intervention of new inmate, Beth (Marins), and Mina decides she needs to escape. With the help of a friendly guard, this is accomplished, with Mina, Beth and Mina’s lieutenant Martona now on the outside, where her sister, Juliet, offers her assistance. Mina kidnaps the Senator’s son, to force him to pay her share of the fraud profits. Yet not everything is quite as it seems, as things escalate towards a confrontation in a hospital.

Fantin, in particular, makes for an excellent heroine, especially when establishing her bad-ass credentials. There were points where this felt like an entry in the Female Prisoner Scorpion series from Japan – albeit less in terms of style, than Fantin’s attitude mirroring that of Meiko Kaji, and in its fairly cynical view of society in general. The plot is nicely handled as well, with the title proving quite appropriate, as Mina and Franco seek to gain the upper hand on each other. [I’ve also read that “chess” is a slang term for prison in Brazil, adding another layer of meaning] These twists continue until the film’s final shot, literally. However, the film does suffer from some pacing problems, e.g. a lengthy sequence where the escaped women shoot pool, drink and harass a man, brings things to a halt, just when it should be accelerating. I also have some questions, such as in regard to security in Brazillian jails, where it seems remarkably easy for multiple prisoners to waltz on out of there, with the help of just one guard. It’s not the only example of slipshod plotting, and it’s likely these flaws which stopped it from achieving a seal of approval, as it still does a lot in its eighty minutes. 

Dir:  Luis Antonio Pereira
Star: Priscila Fantin, Carla Marins, Antonio Calloni, Tuca Andrada 
a.k.a. Jogo de Xadrez

Code Name Banshee

  By

★★½
“Daddy issues.”

This looked considerably better in the trailer, which makes it look like quite an action-packed extravaganza. The reality is much less interesting, with a murky, and confusing plot, and what action there is, is often filmed in a murky and confusing way. It begins with an agent, code name Banshee (King), quitting the government agency for which she works. The handoff of an asset went wrong: one of the colleagues involved was her father, who vanished entirely. The other was Caleb (Banderas), who went off the grid thereafter. Five years later, Banshee is a private assassin, but her latest job is interrupted by Greene (Flanagan), who wants her to give up Caleb’s location. 

Naturally, she won’t, and tracks down Caleb herself to warn him and his teenage daughter, Hailey (Davis) – as well as, hopefully, find the truth out about what happened to her father. Before she can do so, Greene shows up, with an apparently infinite supply of minions, who appear remarkably oblivious to concepts such as “taking cover”. To get to this point, you will have to endure a script that doesn’t bother explaining almost any significant point. I’m not sure why Greene is suddenly and energetically going after Caleb, half a decade later. Or why Banshee also waited so long to visit the only man who knows what happened to her father. Then there’s the facile ease with which she is able to track down Caleb, based entirely on a fragmentary conversation from a long time previously. Mind you, running a bar is not exactly what I would call “going off-grid”…

It is a bit of a pity, since I liked most of the characters, and the actors do a fairly good job of bringing them to life. King and Davis have good chemistry, and  Banderas brings an effective world weariness to his role, as a veteran who now just wants to be left alone. The highlight though, is likely Flanagan, who hits the right balance, creating a larger than life villain, without going too far into the chewing of scenery. The lack of apparent motivation – we never know who he’s working for, or why – does limit his effectiveness. 

The first bit of action may be the best elevator lobby fight since The Matrix, and does a good job of establishing Banshee’s credentials, even if there isn’t much else of a similar standard the rest of the way. Indeed, as far as Banshee goes, there’s not much at all, until Greene’s curiously incompetent henchmen start to show up at Caleb’s house, attacking in small, conveniently handleable groups. For… reasons, it’s largely down to Banshee and Hailey to hold them off, the latter proving that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. So, two action heroines for the price of one. Yay. Just do not expect to learn the truth about what happened to dear old Dad, or you will be sadly disappointed. Actually, you may well be disappointed anyway…

Dir: Jon Keeyes
Star: Jaime King, Antonio Banderas, Tommy Flanagan, Catherine Davis

Claiming Her Legacy, by Linda Goodnight

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Literary rating: ★★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆

Evangelical Christian author Linda Goodnight is not new to the writing craft; she’s an established novelist with 160 distinct works to her credit, at least some of them best sellers. This particular novel was newly published early this year.

Our setting here is Oklahoma Territory in 1890. (At that time, the latter territory occupied the western part of the present-day state; the eastern part was the even more scantily-settled and lawless Indian Territory.) The author lives in Oklahoma (so writes about the setting with assurance); according to an online interview with her, this book was inspired by a photograph in the Territorial Museum at Guthrie, showing a lone pioneer woman toting a rifle in front of a tent as she stood guard over her claim in the 1889 Land Rush. Her spirit imbues Willa Malone, our heroine here.

30 years old, Willa sees herself as an “old maid.” She’s the eldest of three half-sisters, daughters of peripatetic ne’er-do-well Finn Malone, who outlived two wives (and was deserted by a third) in the course of his wanderings, which in 1889 led him to a homestead in the small community of Sweet Clover. Like many of the townsfolk, he was heavily in debt to conniving banker Theodore Pierce, and used his land as collateral. But he’s now recently dead, murdered after he took off on his latest quest for gold. At the moment, the farm isn’t productive; without him, the sisters won’t be able to repay the loan, and they’ll lose their home within months.

His killer, though, has been identified as notorious outlaw Charlie Bangs, rumored to be hiding out in Indian Territory, and there’s a $1,000.00 price on his head. When Willa, early on, conceives the idea of tracking him down and claiming the bounty, nobody can talk her out of it. The idea’s not as hare-brained as some folks think. Tough and practical, “tomboy” Willa’s a good shot with a rifle whose hunting skills keep her family supplied with meat; she can ride, and she’s got guts. As even she recognizes, though, the enterprise she’s contemplating is a deadly dangerous one. At the very least, she’ll need the services of an experienced trail guide. Enter one Gideon Hartley.

Gideon’s about 35; he’s fairly new in town, but the reputation that precedes him confirms that he’s highly competent as a trail guide in rough terrain –when he’s sober. But his reputation also suggests (correctly) that he drinks a lot. In fact, his alcohol abuse problem is longstanding and deep-seated. He and Willa meet in Chapter 1. Surprisingly (or maybe not, depending on how familiar readers are with “romance” genre conventions; this was published under the “Love Inspired” imprint, though I approached it as a Western, and it works on those terms) there’s some chemistry between them; but neither is looking for that sort of thing, nor inclined to nurture it. More to the point, Willa’s not thrilled with the idea of a “drunk” for a guide; and Gideon (who hasn’t done any guiding for about a year) is pretty well convinced that he’s not up to the job and that Willa would be embarking on a suicide mission anyway. But before long, it becomes clear to her that he’s the only prospective guide she’s going to get, and to him that she’s going whether he goes with her or not.

Goodnight gives serious attention to developing her characters (including the secondary ones, along with our H/h) and bringing the community to life, and she takes the time needed to do that in depth. We don’t get started on our actual quest until a bit more than 200 pages in (and the book has 363 pages). Some readers, who expect the adventure of the trail to be the main warp and woof of the tale, won’t like this aspect. However, I fully appreciated the textured, in-depth approach. Both main characters (who alternate as viewpoint characters, though third-person narration is used throughout) are fully round and three-dimensional. Gideon in particular has a lot of psychological baggage, which is believable, and gradually disclosed.

Western-style action, once it kicks in, isn’t stinted; there are plenty of jeopardies on the trail, and the climactic confrontation will test our leading couple’s mettle on more than one level. (Willa doesn’t actually have to fire her rifle, but she displays her action heroine moxie by handling a very physically challenging situation near the end with flying colors; I doubt if I’d been brave enough to do the things she did!) The author writes very well; her plotting is excellent, and her re-creation of the time and place masterful. (It features a cameo appearance by real-life person Bass Reeves, the first African-American deputy U.S. marshall.)

In keeping with the standards of the ECPA, this book poses no content issues for bad language, sexual content (we do have reference to prostitution, and to the ugly trade of sex trafficking, which is a very contemporary reality, but which goes back a lot longer than that), or ultra-gory violence. Christian faith (which both main characters were raised with, though Gideon’s faith has been long neglected) plays a positive role here, though the book isn’t “preachy” and delivers its spiritual messages by example.

I’d recommend this to fans of Westerns, Western romance, and clean (especially Christian) romance in general, as well as to fans of strong heroines. The story arc here is complete, and the book isn’t said to be part of a series (though I suspect that both of Willa’s sisters might eventually get her own sequel). Although some characters, such as Belle Holbrook, obviously have very intriguing backstories, I couldn’t find any indication that they were in prior books by the author. (But if they were, or if they eventually get prequels, I’d be interested in reading those books!)

Author: Linda Goodnight
Publisher: Love Inspired; available through Amazon, currently only as a printed book.
A version of this review previously appeared on Goodreads.

Crimson, by Arthur Slade

  By

Literary rating: ★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆½

The world of Illium has enjoyed a millennium of peace under its powerful queen Servilia. Though “enjoyed” might be the wrong word, since it has come at the cost of freedom, and harsh justice. A victim of the latter is 15-year old Fen, who four years previously, had her hand lopped off for stealing a trinket from a merchant’s stall. Worse follows, as she wakes up to find her hair has turned red, the sign of a “wildmage” – someone who has magical powers, an ability Servilia seeks to extinguish before it can pose a threat to her rule.

Fen is forced to leave her family, and seek sanctuary in the forest of Helwood which provides the only area outside the queen’s control. She meets another wildmage, Ithak, with the talent of invisibility, who brings her to the legendary Mansren, who lives in the centre of Helwood. History had told her he was evil incarnate, overthrown by the queen after a violent war, a thousand years earlier. But how accurate is that version? For he offers to help Fen free her sister from Servilia’s dungeon, if she helps him become whole again. But is the reward worth the cost – both personally to Fen, and for Illium?

This is a well-written page-turner, which I found myself looking forward to reading each night. It poses some interesting more dilemmas, without ever getting bogged down in them, such as the limits of personal responsibility, the veracity of the past (as Ithak says, “Those who win wars write the histories”) and the balancing of evils against each other. Fen is initially prepared to do anything to rescue her sibling; however, she gradually realizes that by doing so, she may have unleashed a more destructive force on the entire world. For Mansren’s mind has been imprisoned by Servilia in the middle of a lava lake for centuries, which hasn’t exactly improved his state of sanity, charming and eloquent as he may be.

I will say that the means by which the dilemma is resolved is perhaps a little bit of a stretch. Perhaps a greater emphasis on the powers locked within Helwood, and how Fen taps into them, might have been better. The setting also appears to be Chinese, though I’m not sure why; I was quite surprised when this suddenly cropped up. I certainly wouldn’t have guessed this from the cover, and it’s little more than window-dressing. However, the story does a lot of things right, bringing us along with Fen on her heroic arc, as she grows into her powers and learns that everything she has been told may not necessarily be the truth. Though she’s “just” a teenager, there are few of the obvious trappings of YA fiction, and it’s the better for it.

It is a little restrained on the action front, with Fen largely refusing to use her abilities against others, and in the final act, being more an observer up until the very end. However, these moral restraints help her character from becoming over-powering, and on several occasions, there’s a genuine sense of threat. With this being a stand-alone book, it is entirely possible it could end in her being forced to make a heroic sacrifice, and Slade handles that aspect particularly well. I was actually quite sad there are no further volumes, but it’s also nice to have a story which is entirely wrapped up in a fully satisfactory way. I’ll have to make do with perhaps checking out some of Slade’s other works.

Author: Arthur Slade
Publisher: Dava Enterprises, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book

Confessions of a Homicidal Prostitute: Demonatrix

  By

★½
“Nice title. Shame about the film.”

I must confess I have not seen Confessions of a Homicidal Prostitute, to which this is a sequel. It’s marginally possible, I suppose, that the character development, story and nuance were present there, and explain why these are all but entirely absent in its successor. I would not, however, be prepared to bet on it. I suspect the original was every bit as mean-spirited as this: and “suspect” is all I’ll ever do, because I won’t be making any effort to track it down. In fact, I probably wouldn’t watch it if my aged mother begged me to on her death-bed. Too harsh? Perhaps. Yet I don’t think I’ve ever seen a flat-out uglier film, in terms of largely repellent people being extremely unpleasant to one another, shot in a way that exacerbates its grimness. In its defence, that may be the point. Again: may. It could also just be torture porn of the lowest-rent kind.

From what I can gather, Lilith (Baun) is the titular hooker; I’m not sure if the weird contact lens she wears in one eye is a tribute to Christina Lindberg and her eye-patch in Thriller: A Cruel Picture? Anyway, she apparently got pushed over the mental edge by abuse, and responded to violence with violence. Here, she introduces gal pal and fellow prostitute Eve (Shenk) to the lair where Lilith carries out her torture and slaying. Eve is remarkably blasé about the whole, potential “accessory after the fact” thing, and politely declines to get involved, saying “I don’t think I could stomach it… Not for me!” This reluctance lasts about 30 minutes into the film, where she gets brutalized by the vicious Jackson (McGinnis). All of a sudden, she’s rather more gung-ho, a tendency encouraged by Lilith (“The empowerment you feel after you kill this bastard, will be indescribable”). After initially both being caught and tortured by Jackson, the pair are able to turn the tables on their captor, taking their revenge and sodomizing him with a metal pole.

They then begin a two-woman killing spree, washing the scum off the streets. There’s a montage sequence here, which is quite effective, and rescues the film from receiving the dreaded one-star rating. But otherwise, we’re dealing with content which is cheap and poorly-executed, and possesses little or no emotional impact at all. Weirdly, given the topic and grindhouse-oriented title, the only nudity present is extremely fake penises being abused. Otherwise, it’s remarkably chaste. Though, to be honest, I’m fine with the lead actresses keeping their clothes on. No worries there. I’m good. With special effects that are largely unconvincing, this doesn’t even work as a gore flick, and there’s no sense of development of plot or characters. I got to the end with no sense of.. well, anything. I was neither entertained, educated or appalled. Overall, it’s the kind of film where I wonder if I’ve spent more time writing this review, than was actually spent making the movie.

Dir: Emir Skalonja
Star: Casey Baun, Krystal Shenk, Paul McGinnis, Richard Ruiz