Josh Reviews: Ghostland by Jory Strong

Title: Ghostland Series: Ghostland World #1 Author: Jory Strong Publisher: Berkley Trade Format: Paperback, 341 pages Published: April 7th, 2009 ISBN #: 9780425226063 / 0425226063 Genre: Paranormal Romance My Copy: borrowed Rating: Buy: A dazzling urban fantasy romance from a fresh new voice whose bestselling e-books have put readers “in a constant state of arousal.”(Fallen Angel Reviews) Welcome to a postapocalyptic world, where the afterlife holds beings that only the bravest can summon-or dare to desire. Taken from her home and family, shamaness Aisling McConaughey must enter the “ghostlands” to save a wealthy man’s mistress. But there’s a price to pay for her power: She must summon the Djinn prince Zurael en Caym-and yield to his savage, sensual rage. Zurael intends to kill Aisling after she’s served as bait to find an enemy in possession of an ancient tablet. But the more he tastes her innocent spirit, the more he’ll use his fiery touch to keep her hungry for his mercy-even as they weave an erotic spell that he cannot escape…

Jory Strong’s enterprise into the post-apocalyptic scene comes as quite a shock. Why is there so much erotica in it? Why is said erotica better than the kind you’ll find in other books of that nature? It must be the allure of the exotic.

Jory Strong’s characters all have funky names like Aisling, Aziel, Zurael, and Iyar. Zurael, the Prince of the House of Serpents in the land of the Djinns (Jory Strong spares no expense in world-building), cannot couple with the woman who has summoned him. In fact, he must kill her. Aisling doesn’t want to die. All she did anyway was invoke the Djinn’s name which her rodent, Aziel, provided to her in the spirit world. I am going fast and so does Jory Strong.

As I was reading I spent a lot of time speculating what separated her writing from other paranormal romantics other than the quite obvious interest in the exotic. She flips between perspectives which I begrudge. But, at least, she keeps it between Aisling and Zurael. The thing I think that separates her from others is her use of paragraphing. All of them feel small and whip-snapping (although none of the main characters indulge in BDSM in this book, I should warn you that many of the surrounding ones do), so you fly through them, yet sometimes either because the transition didn’t seem clear enough or the sentence read so well, you are forced to go back.

As you can see, Jory Strong runs the fine line between making sense and making sensation. No surprise since the second book in the series is called Spider-touched. I, for one, enjoy the challenge that she presents.

Books in this series:

Recommendation:	Real ramshackle romp, gritty and auratic, lots of dyes
Like this, like that:	De Le Vega Cats series by Lauren Dane and the Demon Bound series by Anna J. Evans

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