Customer Reviews

Black Wings (Black Wings, Book 1)

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

top six reasons to love this book
1. very likable female protagonist who becomes an alpha female who is not above having the occasional cry fest when the situation is warrented.
2. lots of fallen angels... always a cool topic and she had a great take on it that still left a lot of unanswered mysteries about this world to look forward to in future books.
3. the pace of this novel was great... always much action and sluething.
4. romance was not what the plot was centered on ... but there is one that is set on slow boil which i love. i dont need everything to happen in 1 short book... it keeps me looking forward to the next.
5. i really enjoyed the secondary characters and look forward to learning more about them and their motives.
6. any book that ends with lucifer declaring that the main character will be paying back a debt in the future is always a good thing.

top four reasons not to love this book
1. it is obvious that this a first book in a series. it seemed to me that this was an exceptionally short full novel. many of the secondary characters were not fully developed and seemed 2 dimensional.
2. a 30 year old virgin... in chicago... in present day? really? even when i feel it didnt really make a difference in the plot. the main character even said it herself that she had the emotional development of a 3 year old. i hope i didnt just read a YA book. yikes!
3. maybe a few too many plot lines for the length of this novel... which lead to maybe a few too many coincidences. i feel like this book has been edited down to its bare bone essentials.
4. the romance sub plot: the male lead is a little too omega for my tastes. an alpha female needs an alpha male. i hope he will get more of a backbone in the next book. also i think she is getting more love interests than her personality warrents. and if she so hot it seems like she wouldnt still be a virgin since it sounds like she would have been more than willing if an opportunity in the past would have presented itself.

i really enjoyed this book and will read the next one when it comes out. i am hoping that i will learn more about the characters and unanswered world building questions. this book had all the elements of a great book but the main characters seemed a little flat because of the length of the book. i really felt this would have a spectacular novel if it was 1/3 longer and i could have developed more of a relationship with the main characters. at times the plot felt rushed.

This book has some fairly high starred reviews, don't fall for it. If you are a fan of really well written urban fantasy by authors such as Illona Andrews, Jim Butcher, Mike Carey, you are going to be greatly disappointed in this book. One reviewer said it better than I could "feels like it's been edited down to the bare bones". I agree wholeheartedly. There is an interesting story to be told here, and the size and scope of it should have taken at least 3 books to unfold in its entirety. Instead it's all packed down to one book, with so many characters coming and going that I can't keep track of them all; and not one, nor two, but three suitors for our kick-ass heroine's fair hand. Unfortunately, she's not all that kick-ass.

She's poorly constructed, too many contradictions that just don't add up. Going in the space of four days to no recognizable powers and magical talent to god-inspiring magical talent and almost the ability to control it was just to much to believe. Then there's the job - soul collector. I had no problem with that, and the "bureaucracy" of it all, that was actually humorous. But seriously, we have to believe there are far less agents to collect souls than there are people who die, so how could an agent have any real free time at all, much less days between assignments? It's simply not a mathematical probability. There would have to be non-stop soul collection. And supplements her income by food articles for magazines? That just stuck out, did not feel at all right nor add any value to the story at all.

The only thing I really enjoyed about this book was Beezle, the gargoyle. Other than that, it's a great premise, and I had high hopes, but this author is not there, and this series is not one I'll stick with.

A fresh take on urban fantasy and a highly enjoyable read. Read it in one day and it was the perfect way to spend the day after Thanksgiving. The heroine is gutsy and funny, the love interest is hot and heavenly, the talking gargoyle is a curmudgeonly lovable sidekick; and we can all relate to her having an anal retentive boss that works your last nerve. The plot moves at a nice quick pace and the story is well developed with enough background information to explain the event but not overwhelm the current action. If you are tired of the same old vampire or shapeshifter stories rehashed over and over then this is the book for you. Maddy Black is an Agent of Death whose job is to escort souls to the after life (not a single vampire or shapeshifter in the book - yeah for originality!!!!).

I have nothing but good things to say about this novel. It's about a woman called Maddy who is an Agent, a person who escorts souls of the dead to the "door" to make their choice. The mythology in this book mainly revolves around angels, demons, and nephilim. There are mention of vampires, werewolves, faeries, etc but I believe that is just set up for future novels as there are none in this one. Throughout the book Maddy is learning to control her new found magical powers and constantly getting her butt kicked, and occasionally kicking some butt herself. The best part of this book is her best friend and protector Beezle, a gargoyle. Beezle provides great comic relief all throughout the book and is definitely what moves this book from 4 stars to 5. I'm looking forward to the next novel to see how much more trouble Maddy can possibly get into.

This book was just flat out boring & very surface, IMO.

I also couldn't stand Maddy (the MC) & the secondary characters were two dimensional as well. It all felt a bit forced & the dialog robotic at times (esp. Gabriel).

I read a bit over 50% then fast forwarded a few chapters..skimmed & jumped straight to the end. Yeah...no big surprises & Maddy was still just as stupid (lipping off to Lucifer? Come on).

**SPOILERS**





My #1 issue off the bat? I had a very big problem with Maddy's non-reaction to Patrick dying. I just couldn't get over the fact that the author left out that minor detail & from then on, it plagued me the entire time. With each passing chapter - the lack of care about it, just told me this book is not for me.

Just a few pages before Patrick died, Maddy was lamenting over her lack of friendships & relationships in life, then goes on to explain that Patrick though, is her best friend & felt very lucky for it. The next scene is her finding a soul sucking demon hovering over an already dead Patrick.

The day after, she makes a pact with herself to find out who stole his soul but that was about it. There was no crying, no angst, no clips of remembrances, no sadness over losing her one & only friend. Her "BEST" friend. It's like it didn't happen!

Instead she's lusting over her new tenant Gabriel. She's also continually getting beat up, put back together/healed by Gabriel & then whining about how often she is getting beat up. I found it all very, very simplistic & repetitive.

She is snarky & relatively dumb b'c she makes reckless choices that really shouldn't get her very far. Yet...Henry let's her get away with it all.

Also..she's a freaking virgin...at 30!! For god's sakes just stop it already. What is the purpose of this?

I also couldn't help but think Henry's, initial overall concept was ripped off from the ex-Showtime series Dead Like Me, which was much smarter in it's execution IMO.

So yeah...didn't like it. It was just...whatever. No great shakes. There are much better UF & PNR's to read. I would have skipped this one had I known

The summary of the plot has been done so I'll skip it. I'm not sure if there 2 versions of this book going around b/c I found this book to be a complete disappointment. I think Ms. Henry needs to take a class in character development....Very little world building, what was done was rushed and confusing.....The writing was techincal at best.

Trying not to to be spoilery here...but as an example, one character is introduced and killed off in less than one chapter...this person was supposedly VERY important to Madeline, yet no grief, nothing. The romance interest was so underdeveloped it really was nothing more than a 'who cares' for me.

I gave this book 2 stars. Most undeveloped book I've read in a long time. Not sure if I'll bother to give the next book a chance.

Maddy inherited her career as an Agent from her mother. She gets her weekly list of people who are going to die, and meets their souls to hopefully usher them to the Door. Behind this Door, Maddy has no idea what lurks. But she knows her boss J.B gets really angry with extra paperwork, and if the souls choose not to enter the Door and become ghosts, there is a lot of extra paperwork. Maddy is a very petite, cute girl, so sometimes it is hard to look imposing when trying to convince the souls the Door is the right option. If the souls are asked three times to go the Door and they refuse, they become a ghost to haunt the world forever. To get to all the locations Maddy needs to go, she has wings that sprout out of her back. Flying is much quicker than taking the bus, and most mortals can't see her when she flies.

Due to Maddy's crazy work schedule, she has not had a lot of time to date. She does have her trusty gargoyle Beezle that lives with her and keeps her company. When the very handsome Gabriel wants to rent the downstairs apartment from Maddy, she is happy to have a new tenant and rent money. But Gabriel isn't any ordinary tenant.

When her good friend and co-worker is killed by a demon, the same one that killed her mother, Maddy wants revenge. She soon discovers the past is going to play a very important part in her future.

Black Wings is the debut book by author Christina Henry. We dive into an urban fantasy world filled with demons, nephilim, Lucifer and all sorts of evil bad dudes. I wanted to like Maddy as a heroine. She is very independent and sassy and I think I would have liked her if more things would have been explained. Or if we got past the surface and really learned more about her. When her good friend dies, it feels like she doesn't even mourn. A few chapters after his death she has a few tears, but even then, the grief is totally missing from her character. Many things are not explained about her either - for example her wings. She tells us, "I don't really understand where they go - I just know that they unfurl when I need them..." What kind of explanation is that? Later, she has all this unexplained magic. While there is an eventual explanation, what bothered me is that her new powers always work when needed, and always only affect the bad guys. While the intensity of her power is out of control, otherwise, it seems to fall too easily into place.

The other part lacking in this book is her relationship with her boss, J.B. Although cranky and all around hard to get along with, J.B. is also god-like in his appearance. I really think an opportunity is missed with snarky banter and wit between these two characters. Further, at the end of the book, a love triangle is kind of thrown at us, but I wish more sexual tension would have been built up during the book to make the love triangle believable.

There are aspects I like. Maddy is a heroine who comes to learn of her past and it is nicely woven into the story. Her relationship with Beezle, her gargoyle is very cute. We also get a lot of Lucifer and demon mythology which I find fun to read about. Gabriel, her neighbor and eventual love interest is a character that intrigues me. His history and conflict with starting a relationship with Maddy is well done. I love his character and think there is lots to explore with him and Maddy in the future.

Black Wings reads well, and I think this world has potential. I just think more explanations and more character development would have really benefitted this story.

Though she does have big black wings, Maddy's not an Angel of Death--she's an Agent of Death, a mortal with the special ability to help souls scoot along to the afterlife. If the soul neatly goes through the "Door", then Maddy has no problems, but it if doesn't, she's got to deal with a pesky ghost. Interestingly, Maddy has no idea what's behind the Door, or whether what awaits is different for each person. She simply does her assigned reaping and avoids asking questions, until her BFF Patrick is attacked by the same demonic creature that killed her mother. Maddy summons up some blue fireballs from nowhere, and learns that she may have more powers than simple soul-escorting, and her background might be more supernatural than her mom led her to believe.

I like how Maddy's a very cute girl, because it means that she has to work extra hard to get people to take her seriously. Some urban fantasy heroines are physically imposing, and people just naturally know that these gals mean business, but Maddy is 5 feet nothing and fond of wearing sloppy outfits, so even deceased souls don't immediately fall into line when she tells them to. Her adorable stone gargoyle Beezle adds to the cute image--who could fail to love a little stone creature who keeps Maddy safe and has a fondness for donuts? I also like Maddy's unusual living situation, where she owns her own little duo of apartments because her mother left them after her untimely death. Maddy's love interest is Gabriel, a standard heart-stoppingly handsome supernatural UF guy. He has perfect manners and dresses really nicely and expensively, which made him seem a little too perfect for me to fully appreciate.

I had a few plot/character issues. Maddy doesn't always follow basic courtesy. She rushes one person's moving-on process and doesn't really explain to the crazy old Mrs. Luccardi that if she doesn't cooperate with Maddy, she'll be stuck as a ghost forever. And why does Maddy cheat the old lady out of a solid chance at a decent afterlife? Because Maddy has an important appointment with a potential tenant. In my view, either these souls are important and valuable or they aren't, and this scene is confusing in either case. The very existence of Maddy's job implies that it's vitally important for souls to move through the Door, but Maddy's rushed, half-hearted attempt at convincing her client to go through the Door contradicts this idea. And Maddy's friend Patrick passed up on the same job because he had a date, so in just the first chapter, part of the fictional world of the book is discredited for me. Maddy also doesn't mourn very much when her best friend is eaten alive. I love strong heroines, but there are times when a short emotional breakdown is in order.

Also, the rules regarding Maddy's magic seem too flexible. Maddy doesn't know exactly how it is that her wings disappear when she doesn't need them, which seems like something she ought to know, since she's the one with the spare body parts. She says that no one but the dead can see her wings, except for the mentally ill, people using hard drugs, and some children. Having the mental patients and children see her wings makes it sound like "innocents" can view her, but then what does that make the drug users? Maddy says that the ability to see her wings has something to do with being open to the possibility of magic and wonder--because kids who are overly interested in technology can't see her, but kids who are daydreamers and readers can-- but I still couldn't fully connect the dots.

And Maddy's strange dreams of the girl Evangeline weren't something I enjoyed. They felt too Romantic and dramatic, and weren't in the same writing style as the rest of the book. I know that they had to be written in a different style because they are dreams of the supernatural past, but the Evangeline-writing felt a bit amateurish while the rest of the novel did feel like it was done by a professional.

Despite the parts that didn't work for me, I still feel that the world of this story is fairly cool, though not cool enough for me to read book two.

I found the imaginative storyline very interesting, but I never really engaged with the characters. I give the author credit for keeping the action coming so rapidly, but it should not be at the expense of characters development. Maddy pretty much had no personality, or a very uninteresting one. Maddy not getting upset when her best friend died was not believable. Every male in the book wanting her is so tired. The only great thing about Maddy is that she has crazy super powers from her demonic ancestry. Also having Maddy get her ass kicked every minute only to be magically healed and going back at it again was just too much. Gabriel was so yawn worthy that I failed to understand why he is a romantic lead. He may be pretty and have a protective streak, but he's acts exactly like the thrall he is. Yuck. Grow a pair. J.B. was pretty much a non-character, so for him to be into Maddy at the end felt tacked on and contrived. I loved the gargoyle sidekick, he was my favorite character. Basically I loved the world building ideas, but the characterization was terrible. I was so irked the whole book that I will not be buying the next installment.

As some others have mentioned, the characters seemed a tad under-developed. The writing was just a little raw, but honestly I enjoyed the book very much. I'd like to see the heroine manage to get her beloved for herself, but the conflict of it being forbidden does add a nice touch. I look forward to the future books, and would like to see the characters AND the world fleshed out and expanded. I've got high hopes, so here's to the author not letting any of her fans down :)