Second Bookses

Sable Grace's Ascension is a book I picked up either for free or for $0.99: one you hope will be great, but don't have a lot invested in. Billed as an urban fantasy, it's sort of have UF, half paranormal romance, and can't quite ever make up its mind between the two.Kyana is half vampire, half werewolf, which are called Lychen for the purposes of this world-building. As I couldn't help but picture lichen every time I saw the word, this didn't much help me. There's a complicated mythology in which the Dark Breeds -- the vampires -- are loose and have caused what's pretty much the apocalypse, so I guess you could also call this book dystopian as well. Due to complicated mythology, Kyana is charged by the Fates to find the key to Hell, which will send all the Dark Breeds back there to stay.She has to accomplish this task, including finding out who stole the key in the first place, with the aid of Ryker, a demigod she has somewhat of a past with. The combination of vampires, werewolves, witches, and Greek mythology gets a lot complicated, and when you add in a backstory for these characters that happened before the book, you feel like this is a book later on in a series rather than the first book. Kyana and Riker are attracted to each other, but one half of Kyana's heritage is known to love 'em and leave 'em while the other half mates for life, and apparently Ryker is only attracted to the half that mates for life. So, UST. But there's this whole task-based UF/dystopian thing going on and it's the beginning of a series that will likely features these two and...There's just a lot going on. Tons of characters, complicated mythology, and a book that can't really seem to pick a genre. It was a decent read, but I don't see myself seeking out the rest of the series any time soon, either, even though the book felt like it ended mid-story, as so many of these "first in a series" books seem wont to do.