Tempest Unleashed (Tempest Series #2) by Tracy Deebs

Tempest is not setting in well as the merfolk’s saviour. She misses her home, she misses her family and, most guilt causing of all, she misses Matt, her human ex-boyfriend. Something she hopes to keep from Kona, her Selkie current boyfriend – and a prince no less.

To make matters worse, she and Hailaine, merQueen, keep butting heads and can’t seem to agree with anything, least of all the many many things that Hailaine thinks she needs to learn.

But Tiamat is still out there and still plotting to take down both Kingdoms and dominate the Pacific – and Tempest doesn’t feel even close to ready to face her.

I protest most strongly to the name of this book.

Tempest Unleashed is a terrible description of the events recounted within. I propose a better title: Tempest Mopes. Or maybe Tempest Monologues. Or Tempest Naval Gazes.

For much of this book not much happens and there isn’t much pretence of a plot. We open with Tempest worrying about her human family (somewhat reasonable) who she had to abandon. Which quickly turns into worrying about Matt, which turns into worrying about Kona because blah blah love triangle, blah. She doesn’t get on with the merQueen because REASONS (more on this later) and this causes more musings. Then musings about whether she and Kona can ever be together.

New character Sabyn shows up to train her, he flirts with Tempest, he and Kona don’t get on, Tempest spends pages talking about this. There’s lots and lots of conflict with Kona over boyfriend issues.

Tiamat is in the background doing bad evil stuff which everyone talks about… but doesn’t do anything about.

An event eventually drives Tempest back to land where she… sits around and has lots of angsty arguments and discussions. I don’t think there’s much else she could have done in the situation, but it adds on to the general inaction that permeates this book to be incredibly frustrating. It would have probably helped a lot to see Tempest more deeply involved in training, seeing what she learned etc. Or maybe her spending more time with the merQueen, learning what’s happening in the realm, how they’re resisting Tiamat, training, making plans etc – at least then there would have been some actual concrete action taken by Tempest in the face of the overwhelming threat

Instead we had pages and pages of discussion, arguments and moping, discussion argument moping over and over again – I reached over half way and realised that absolutely nothing had actually happened in the book.

Finally the action hits, Tempest swims off, pulls a super power out of her arse and TA-DA day is saved. Does that count as a spoiler? Because, really, it’s pretty weak.

Fangs for the Fantasy Episode 84

This week we discuss Alphas and Misfits.

We also discuss Kevin Hearne’s novella “Two Ravens and One Crow” and our book of the week “Tempest Rising” by Tracy Deebs

We also discuss the importance of spotting trends across a whole series rather than single books or episodes. And we discuss the changing nature of the novella due to ebooks.

Our next books of the week

17/9-24/9:  Masque of the Red Death: Bethany Griffin  
24/9-1/10:  Lies Beneath: Anne Greenwood Brown  
1/10-8/10: Hexed Anthology
8/10-15/10: Into the Woods: Kim Harrison

Review of Tempest Rising by Tracy Deebs Book One in the Tempest Series

Tempest has a boyfriend who really adores her, a family that supports and loves and her and has the ability to spend her free time doing what she loves most - surfing.  At almost 17 years of age the world should be filled with adventure for her but instead her seventeenth birthday represents a date with destiny that she would dearly love to avoid. On her 17th birthday Tempest will have the choice of becoming a mermaid and following in the footsteps of her mother, who abandoned her family six years ago, or stay on land and live out her life.

Though her father has told her repeatedly that there were complicated reasons why her mother left and that he bears her no ill will, Tempest is filled with feelings of extreme anger. She does not see becoming a mermaid as an incredible gift but an excuse to abandon one's family.  No matter her desire to stay human, the sea constantly calls her and there are times when she is sure that the intent is nefarious.  In the sea a selkie named Kona waits for her filled with nothing but love for her and on land there is the steady and every so human Mark.  So not only is Tempest drawn between land and sea but to men who care for her.

Tempest Rising in not an inclusive story whatsoever or even remotely progressive.  Tempest worries about how her brothers will be treated when the come of age as mermen because the mer society is matriarchal and apparently males of other species give mermen a hard time over that.  The women are supposedly revered but from the conversation between Kony as his brothers it appears that their appeal is not their power or skill but the fact that they are attractive.  The characters largely read as decidedly White with exception of Kona who could potentially be a of pacific Asian descent but this is a guess based loosely on his description. There are no GLBT characters and no disabled people.  It always amazes me when authors prove they're imaginative enough to create a world different from our own, but somehow cannot take the leap far enough to make their stories inclusive.