Hello everyone!
So every once in a while, I like to move away from what my usually-prefered books are (those would be history, mystery, vampires, and potentially thrillers, but it depends on the author really), and go for something I'm going to cry my eyes out over (I'm looking at you, Sparks), or something I don't have to hammer my brain into submission for (As in, Julie Garwood and her unusually modern heroines sometime in the 17th century, probably in Scotland, too).
And then sometimes, I end up with something that bizzarely reminds me of Twilight.
Okay, maybe not so bad, but I think you'll get the idea.
I think I saw Colleen Houck's books in a bookstore while shopping once, but I can't be sure, although I DO know I definitely got an email about a translation that was recently published here. The tiger on the cover was what did it for me (I have a thing for tigers, or at least recently I do), and so I ended up looking up her Tiger Saga, which consists of five novels (of which the last has yet to be written) and a prequel novella: Tiger's Promise, Tiger's Curse, Tiger's Quest, Tiger's Voyage, Tiger's Destiny, Tiger's Dream. It was said to have tigers, Indian culture, romance, and the books aren't too long.
To start off, I read the novella first; Tiger's Promise tells the origin of what we, as readers, later see in the main five books, and how it happened. Basically, in a time when India was divided into many smaller kingdoms, a warlord named Lokesh (aka the bad guy) wanted to marry his beautiful daughter Yesubai into the royal family of another kingdom. She was betrothed to the older brother, Dhiren, but fell in love with the younger, Kishan. Get it yet? In any event, Lokesh only wanted parts of an amulet, the Amulet of Damon, which was supposedly a gift from the goddess Durga and had mystical powers if brought back together (pieces of it had been scattered across India). To do so, he manipulated the brothers and his daughter, although Yesubai died in the conflict and, in rage, Lokesh cursed both brothers to transform into tigers, only to change back into men for twenty-four minutes of a twenty-four hour day.
Tiger's Curse starts of with Kelsey, a teenage girl who accepts a two-week job at a travelling circus while they're in town, and she gets to care for a large, white tiger named Dhiren (I sincerely hope you're following). This leads to her travelling to India and learning about the curse (after traipsing through the jungle after said tiger) and the revelation that she is Durga's 'chosen one', who will be able to help the brothers. Further, this goes on so we also meet Kishan, a black tiger shifter, and hop along while Dhiren and Kelsey set off to complete the first of four tasks they must get through in order to break the curse. This first one is finding the 'golden fruit of India' (which is a mango), and after completing it, they realize the tigers may now shift for six hours every day.
Also, did I mention that both Dhiren and Kishan are quite handsome?
Of course I didn't. Dhiren is described as the leaner of the two (still muscular though!), with blue eyes and dark hair, whereas Kishan is burlier, with golden eyes. And then there's Kelsey, brown haired, brown eyed, perpetually complaining about something ... you know it's love.
She falls in love with Dhiren; he falls in love with her. Kishan is a bit of a brat of a younger brother, but he generally doesn't want to make a second mess in his brother's love life. But that's okay, since Kelsey does it all on her own, pushing Dhiren away because she thinks, him being a prince and all, that he's way out of her league and he'll dump her anyway, so she might as well break it off first.
Yeah, my thoughts exactly.
In any event, the book ends with her telling Dhiren he needs to learn how to live without her, and she returns to the States (crying, might I add).
So, first off, yes, I plan on finishing the series (even though a preview from Tiger's Dream makes me wonder whether Kelsey has a multiple-personality disorder). I liked it enough, and was intrigued enough, to do so. Writing, however, could have been a bit smoother. Most of the time, I felt like there were two distinct storylines: one was the mythology and the curse of the brothers, a lot of it historical and depicting India (which I need to do a factual check of), and the other was the obvious love story between Kelsey and Dhiren (and apparently there will also be Kishan, but more on that in a moment). The connections, however, were rough and seemed disjointed more often than not. They could use some more smoothing, to make it seem like it's not two stories hastily mashed into one.
Not to mention, Kelsey's reasoning only really got fleshed out at the very end, even though she'd been nudging Dhiren away from her for about ... say ... the whole book? I mean, the man was NOT subtle at all (then again, a handsome Indian prince? I'm not sure I'd have the girl's strength).
And on that note: no, I am not a fan of Kishan.
If I understand right, the prequel was only written after the first few main books, but since I read it in chronological order, I see him as the brat who basically caused all the trouble, easily. Stealing your brother's fiancée? Not cool, Kishan, not cool at all. And for that reason, along with several others (as in, him being rude at times, too pushy, definitely too many descriptions of how muscular he is), I really can't like the character. And the second book's cover is the black tiger, so I'm afraid Kelsey's going to do something even more stupid than breaking things off with Dhiren - she's going to fall for the idiot of the two brothers.
Sigh.
I also couldn't help myself with the Twilight comparisons, although admittedly, at least Jacob always did like Bella, and didn't want to just steal her to piss Edward off (which Kishan seems to be very good at!). The writing style and circumstances seemed very similar, like the tiger liking Kelsey (Jacob and Bella), travelling in style (Cullen's money, anyone?), the house in the middle of the forest (jungle in this case), the number of fast cars, Dhiren's overprotectiveness (oh yes, Edward, you have competition now) and anger issues. And last but not least - a very mournful roar as Kelsey is being driven away that sounded suspiciously like Jacob's howl as the newlyweds head off into the sunset.
Oh well. It's still entertaining though. Even if I feel like I might want to slap sense into Kelsey.
xx
*image not mine
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