***10/31/2020 REREAD***
time to enjoy this series again before the year ends. I need some light-hearted urban fantasy this Halloween ( )

Clean Sweep by Ilona Andrews
Innkeepers series #1. Paranormal urban fantasy. Originally published in serial format.
Dina Demille runs a Victorian Bed and Breakfast in a small Texas town. It may look normal on the outside, but neither Dina, not the inn remotely normal. Dina is an Innkeeper with a magic broom that she uses to protect her guests. The Inn itself is almost sentient and can provide what it thinks is needed. The grounds and home are open to otherworldly travelers as a safe place to visit. Dina’s ultimate goal is to find out where and how her parents disappeared. In the meantime, she must protect her home and neighbors from danger. And in this case, something with wicked claws and deep water teeth are hunting and killing at night in her neighborhood. Instead of standing back, she investigates with the help of Sean Evans, a werewolf and ex-military man and a Arland, a vampire soldier.

An intriguing start to the series. A lot of world building here as expected plus intros to Dina, and two potential future something’s. We learn of an oversight board that Dina doesn’t want to get on the wrong side of as well as Dina’s own strength of character to not just sit back and let someone else take care of her problems.
Some fun pieces from the book include a broom that can be battle ready, Dina’s ability to move and arrange rooms to her needs, and two handsome men that promise future intrigue. And this is the second book for me this season where Costco has more hidden dangers than expected. 🤣 ( )

Lighthearted and entertaining. I didn't think it was my kind of thing at first, mostly due to the power dynamics between the werewolf and the innkeeper.Fortunately, that didn't last long, and fortunately, the innkeeper more than stood her ground. After that, it became highly entertaining. Looking forward to reading book 2! ( )

Really enjoy the book (and as an audio this was awesome). I'm just gonna sit over here smacking my forehead though...


Just so we're clear I own this three different ways - audiobook (read by Renee Raudman), dead tree copy (because of course I need to) and e-book (cause why not). It has the distinct honor of being one of only three books I own three different ways (THE WAY OF KINGS and WORDS OF RADIANCE by Brandon Sanderson being the others). For the purposes of this review I both read my dead tree copy and listened to the audiobook.

As I've said in the past, Ilona Andrews' books just speak to me. Not just the Kate Daniels' books, but their shorter more outside the box stories (such as SILVER SHARK or SILENT BLADE) also interest me quite a lot. CLEAN SWEEP is a purely self-pubbed novel, first in the Inkeeper Chronicles, that the Andrews' originally published chapter by chapter on their website. Which I'm sad to say I didn't read as it was posted because I honestly have no patience for serial stories (its torture to only have a few pages here or there). Once finished they touched it up and slapped it up on Kindle for sale more or less as an experiment.

As I understand it the book did phenomenally well and they're hard at work on Book 2 (amongst their other many projects).

In this more cut loose sort of style you can tell the Andrews' special brand of different writing. Its hard to point to the specifics of what I mean, its more of a feeling. The characters are just a shade not your customary urban fantasy archetypes and the world building is a mash up of urban fantasy, science fiction, magic and mystery. As Dina explains (paraphrasing here), advanced technology looks as like magic to the unadvanced as to be undifferentiated.

I had more trouble getting along with the characters in this book. Partially I think because Dina grated me the wrong way and partially because Renee Raudman (the audiobook narrator, who also does the Kate Daniels books) had a different twang to Dina's voice then I was hearing my head. Dina spoke more like Sandra Bullock in Hope Floats in my head (which I have no idea how accurate that accent is for the South, the few folks I've met from the South all had flat accents more like the Mid-Atlantic where I'm from). Then also Dina was just so...southern.

Born and bred in the north I find the South to be so laid back as to be practically sleeping next to the way I'm used to life. Why do one or two things when you can accomplish four tasks for the same amount of effort and time? Why does every meeting have to be a long conversation about how that person's family is getting on? I know its cliche'd but by golly whenever I'm in any southern state I feel this jittery energy to get stuff done. It used to amuse (then piss off) my friends down in Georgia.

Dina is the South personified. The amount of courtesy chatter and pot boiler chit chat that occurred made me want to rip my hair at times.

That said I'm so thoroughly intrigued by the universe I paid extra hard attention to everything. I'm still a little iffy on the particulars, but I loved Her Grace (who is played by Helen Mirren in my head and no one can convince me otherwise understand?) and the rivalry of Sean and Arland. Khahn, in her review, remarked that their rivalry with each other outweighed their interest in Dina is so very true. Yes they both like her, and yes she's attracted to them, but these two would fight over anything if it meant beating the other. Dina literally says at one point she's got bigger things to worry about then who she wants to sleep with.

Book two is currently being serialized on their website (here - SWEEP IN PEACE) which I'm waiting for the complete book before I dive in. All in all I enjoyed this romp through a new world and I'm interested to see how things pan out. ( )

I never really started this series for some reason, even though I've had it for a while. So yay for BSB for giving me the push... it feels like this is going to become one of my favourites! But then again, pretty much everything the author wrote/writes is :D

Worldbuilding:
I really liked how the stage was set and how the information came to us. It wasn't an information dump but rather a slow and steady information stream. We learned about the world, the inn, Dina's role as she came across issues that needed the info.
As always, the environments and scenes were well described and clear.

Character development:
You have to love Dina; I mean... she is intelligent, funny, kicks ass with the help of the inn and Beast :D and is just so much fun to read about! We've gotten to know a bit about her past, her family and what she wants: to find her parents.
Sean and Arland made me chuckle (and facepalm) pretty often. Put the two of them together in a room and just enjoy the show, I would say :D I really hope to see a lot more of them in the following instalments as they both bring a lot to the table (and to Dina *wink* *wink*)
I love how the characters feel so alive, so real and believable, and not only the main characters but also the few side characters that we encountered.

Pacing and flow:
You pick up the book, get the lay of the land and then it grabs you and doesn't let you go, like... at all! So, of course, I read this book in one sitting as I just couldn't put it down (who needs sleep anyway, right?).
Great flow and balance between the action and the conversation.

The book:
The book is well written with no (noticeable) errors. There is no sex described (if that is important to you).
It has 225 pages, spread over 16 chapters and is told from Dina's point of view.

Final thoughts:
I loved this first book of the series! The setting was great, the characters were awesome and overall... it just made me want to continue the next book immediately! :D ( )