Customer Reviews

Poison Sleep (Marla Mason, Book 2)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

A girl who can change reality into her dreams, a nightmare come to life that seems to be invincible, assassins following at every step, a sorcerer who is avoiding coming out of his lair, not to mention the city full of innocents who have no idea what or who lurks in the shadows...

This is the second Marla Mason novel and the first that is set in her beloved city Felport. Marla is a straight shooter with a clear head for leadership and instinct. She is also Felport's Head Sorcerer and now once again has to save the city from some interesting characters before it is too late and everyone gets stuck in their worst nightmare.

Pratt is incredibly inventive in her plot and characters. Sorcerers are specialized, new beings emerge and new tricks are introduced all through out her novels. Her heroines and heros have an edge that gives a depth that can be lacking in the genre. Poison Sleep is a great read and I look forward to the next book.

I found this better than the first book because it was less about trying to shock the reader, and more about telling a good story. Pratt still finds times to reference obscure porn, but it's more like an interesting footnote than a major chapter arc.

The book is set inside the city of Felport, though which state Felport is located in is unknown. Marla wasn't the deus-ex force of nature that she was in book one, and really glad that vibe was toned down. In this book she has a bit of romance, which I found rather silly, but it wasn't emphasized and so was bearable.

The plot revolves an insane sorceress who can reweave reality, and who is having a mental breakdown after being woken from her fifteen year long coma in an insane asylum. On the side we have some assassins, personal assistants, divination, and chaos magic. I really like how creative the author is in terms magic specializations, and unlike the first novel, the interesting mages aren't immediately killed off after they get introduced.

Overall what really put this into the 'I like it' territory were the quirky, unique ways of doing magic described inside this novel.

Wow. Wow. Wow. It's so nice to find an author that you can't put down. This book is as good or better than her first. For those of you who haven't read the first, the pacing in this book is very well done. Also, if you're interested in the medical/legal issues that surround mental illness, this book will give you a lot to think about, in the context of an action-filled, surreal fantasy. Pretty neat.

Marla Mason, chief sorcerer of Felport, has some major and minor problems. The major problems are someone is trying to kill her (again) and a very troubled and tormented young, psychic, woman has the ability to make her dreams and nightmares real. The side effect of this is Felport is experiencing all kinds of mayhem. Marla has to keep things from getting out of hand and try to stay alive at the same time. Her minor problems (relatively) are she is overworked and understaffed. She needs a personal assistant and, in addition, someone who can soften her abrasive approach to others in order to get as much cooperation as possible with the least amount of resistance.

The book moves along very well from the beginning. Some of the secondary characters are fascinating. I really enjoyed Zealand, Ted and, of course, Rondeau. It was impossible to predict who was going to survive, or not, in this book. An aspect I enjoyed even if makes me sad.

Marla is a kick-a** gal who is not inclined to be politically correct and is driven to protect the humans of Felport from those in her world who are up to no good. The reader is led to believe that Marla's job was hard won and not easy to keep as her powerful peers would overthrow her if they felt she was not doing her job or if she ticked them off too much. She is tough, smart, practical, dedicated, and does not suffer fools.

Yet she falls for one particular situation that, as far as this reader was concerned, was pretty transparent. Once readers, and eventually Marla, have a certain piece of information it was not hard to figure out this piece of the puzzle. Yet Marla did not, would not, until it was in her face and spelled out to her, too late to avoid the consequences. There is a reason given for this, but it did not ring true with me given how the character is written. I found this very disappointing and wondered if the author had run out of imagination and time.

It is for the above reason I gave it 3 stars and because I feel more character development is needed for Marla. If I knew more about her background and how she got to where she is, maybe I would have understood her "duh" moment. Although Blood Engines, the first book, was an excellent read, I missed knowing more about Marla and what makes her tick. I thought for sure I would get that in this book, but no such luck. Still I will probably buy the third book because Marla's world is fascinating.

I got the plot 'twists' like 6 chapters before they happened - the author screamed them at the reader... yet the main character couldn't figure out what was going on for 3/4 of the book. If I can get the twists 6 chapters beforehand how can the main character keep making the same mistakes over and over? Most of the characters were uninteresting and uninspiring. There is no way this main character can hold her position over all of the other sorcerer's because she is just not smart enough. I was so irritated at the main character that I couldn't even read the last chapter. I believe the reason this book has received so many 5 star reviews is because those reviewers read the first book and it carried the bad second book. Since this was my first book of this series it stood on its own for me.

About five months ago I read the Blood Engines by T.A. Pratt, first in the Marla Mason series. Don't remember well the details, but overall I enjoyed the read even though the book didn't grab me as it could have.

I just finished Poison Sleep, the second in the Marla Mason series, and I was thoroughly entertained by it. Can't tell why Poison Sleep worked for me more than Blood Engines, but it did. Full disclosure, I've never been a big fan of 3rd person narrative and multiple POV when I read Urban Fantasy. It simply hasn't worked that well for me, and this series is written from that perspective. Regardless, Poison Sleep hit all the right spots I was looking for.

The book is filled with what I call "what the f" magic, as in anything goes and weird magic (and crap) abounds. It's fast moving with some amusing dialogue and quite humorous at times. The key to reading the series is just to sit back and enjoy the ride, and not take it too seriously. Really like Marla Mason as a character, she's quite badass and has her own set of morals and priorities; she's a law (or government as she mentions in Poison Sleep) unto herself. Another thing I liked is that you're constantly switching on who you're rooting for, majorly because of the different POV and there's a lot of gray area to work with. There's no shortage of fun characters either.

My main complaint is that I felt like there wasn't a good exposition of Marla's magic in this book, something that I thought worked very well in Blood Engines. She was more of a hack and slash chick this time around. Another is that due to the nature of multiple POV, some of the twists that occur throughout the novel were spoiled.

Other than that, Poison Sleep was a very enjoyable book for me, and will certainly keep reading the series. As for whom to recommend the book to, I think non Urban Fantasy readers might find the book more approachable than what is usually out there in the paranormal spectrum, and one series I think is comparable in the nature of magic and tone of the books is Simon R. Green's Nightside series, which I know many have been entertained with.

Oh, and the cover is quite nice and very fitting.

I loved Blood Engines, the first Marla Mason book, so this one didn't quite live up to my high expectations. While the first book was engrossing from start to finish, this one started to really pick up for me somewhere at the halfway point. It was fast-paced and readable until then, but I wasn't really interested in what was going on. The "romance" part was kind of annoying, because it made Marla look a lot weaker than before. In the first book she was a bad a**. This one? Not so much. It was also a bit frustrating that it took Marla a hundred pages or so to notice something crucial (well, another character actually pointed it out to her) that the reader already knew. If she took a second to think about it, the bad things that were happening would have been over much sooner.

Overall, once it started to pick up halfway through, I really enjoyed this novel. Even though Marla wasn't as tough or smart as I remembered, the action was great and the magic was interesting.

I'm definitely reading the rest of the books in this series. I love the world the author has created and I do like his fast-paced, action-packed writing style. Hopefully Marla is back on track in the next book.

Who knew that sleeping could cause such a mess! Never a dull moment in this book. A definite add to my top 10 list.

In the field of fantasy fiction, littered with copycat ideas, preachiness and mediocre writing, Pratt is an outstanding new contributor. Marla Mason is a fun, original character, as are all the supporting cast. The action and plot developments are fast, amusing, and inventive. The 'personality' of the book is upbeat, cheerful, energetic and positive, in a cynical, real world, grown up way. There is nothing depressing or mean-spirited about this author (unlike George Martin, say). and last of all - becoming increasingly rare these days - there is no preachy anti-war or anti-violence message. I've read all four books and they are all good (although the latest one spell games, not as good). I really like everything about them.

Marla is a wonderful multidimensional character that I can't wait to find out more about. At first glance she is cold hearted and will kill anything that threatens her city. As we learn more about her, we find that that is not entirely the case. This novel scared me at first, we were introduced to all of the characters and it seemed like the mystery was figured out. We knew who hurt Genevieve and we knew who was trying to kill Marla and who hired him. Fortunately, there is much more to the novel than that. There are plenty of twists and turns, and a large dose of action. I can't wait to read more of this series! If you liked the first, you will like this one. The only bad thing is that the snake god isn't back yet, but hey it's early, there is still time for that. Yet another book that defines urban fantasy. This is what I consider to be urban fantasy-gritty, in your face, set in a believable world. More please!