Hell for the Company (Brimstone #1) by Angel Martinez #LGBT #CoReview #SciFi

Marc and MtSnow review the audiobook version of ‘Hell for the Company’ (Brimstone 1) by Angel Martinez. The book was published by Mischief Corner Books on December 31st, 2013 and is about 82 Pages long. The audiobook version was published on November 17th, 2015, is narrated by Vance Bastian and is 2 hrs and 2 mins long.

RGR received a free copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Cover Artist: Freddy MacKay

Shax, the Demon Prince of Thieves, has reconciled himself to exile. He has a grand time careening around the galaxy as a high-end, intergalactic purloiner of pretties. Everything’s going just fine, thank you very much. All right, fine, the anti-gravity cows are a bit problematic and some of his buyers are bad for his health, but he manages until he comes across an injured angel in a psychedelic alien jungle.

He only rescues the wing boy for his golden feathers, but what Shax doesn’t know about angels could fill an intergalactic encyclopedia.

Buy Links: Audible | Amazon | iTunes | Add to Goodreads

*****

Marc’s thoughts –

The Title: As this story is about demons in space, the reference to hell works well.

The Cover: My first reaction to the cover: “WTF. Why is there a flying cow on the cover?”. It certainly caught my interest. After listening to the story, I think it fits perfectly and I want an anti-gravity cow balloon really bad. Floating cows ROCK! I must say that the spaceship looks a bit weird on the audiobook cover, though, due to parts of it being cut off.

The Narration: For me, the recording quality of this audiobook was a bit less polished than what I’m used to, but the narrator did an amazing job with the story and made the characters come alive. For me it worked really well.

The Story: I had no idea what to expect from this book, but I loved ‘Gravitational Attraction’ by Angel Martinez and wanted to find out more about her demons and cows in space. Reading the blurb, I wondered how this combination could possibly work, but surprisingly it really did. At first, I needed time to adjust. Having a real demon, with demonic appearance as main protagonist was different. I soon connected with him and the story, though, and I spent a lot of time smiling at the charming oddities of this universe.

Then Shax meets his love interest, an injured angel with golden feathers and a name too complicated for me to remember and the story started to be more than just charming and amusing. It captured my heart.

It is incredible, how much I was able to identify with a demon and an angel, but they are both incredibly likable. Shax is a ‘bad-boy’ with a golden heart and the wing-boy is heart-breakingly innocent. Their relationship dance warmed my heart. I really wanted them to bond to each other and be happy.

This band of charming misfits really reminded me of the Firefly crew (US TV Show) and their first adventure was super fun. I love the world-building and the humor of this story and can’t wait to continue this series.

The Rating: 9/10 Pots of Gold (90% Recommended). Compares to 4.5 of 5 stars

*****

MtSnow’s thoughts – 

The Title: With that crazy cover image, and the fact we are dealing with angels and demons, the title definitely made me want to look at the blurb, so it did its job.

The Cover: I thought the cover was a refreshing change from all the naked torsos, and many replications of the same models photoshopped into different images. It’s a bit haphazard, and the floating cows definitely caught my attention, the same as Marc, but with the way all the characters interact, it very much works, especially after seeing the continuing similar format in the rest of the series’ covers. And yes, floating bovines have their upside (sweet, big brown cow eyes anyone??)  and um, messy downside *snort*

The Narration: This particular narrator is new to me, and typically I notice if the audio quality isn’t that great as our genre has some pretty steep competition out there, but since I forgot to listen for quirks and background noises that typically bug me, and got lost in the story, I think this narrator did an awesome job, especially relaying the humor and variation in tone from comedic timing to some seriously scary situations.

The Story:  Let me just say, this was one heck of an enjoyable ride! Space pirates, demons, fallen angels *literally* and floating cows. I could never imagine such a combination would work so well for me, but it did.

Shax has such a laid back, unique view on things, and for someone that you would think of as evil.. I mean demon, right?! Well, he has one big heart. His snarkiness, jokes, ambiguous morality and care for his crewmates, including a drag queen computer navigator, fallen angel Ness (don’t even try to spell his real name) and cranky, and sometimes downright scary best friend Ver made this a very enjoyable book.

It ends with an HFN for both our demon hero Shax, and his sweet fallen angel Ness, but just makes you want to pick the next book up for more outer space adventure, and to see what will happen for our fallen heroes. Highly recommended!

The Rating: 10/10 pots of gold (100% recommended) equivalent to 5/5 stars

*****

While Angel Martinez is the erotic fiction pen name of a writer of several genres, she writes both kinds of gay romance – Science Fiction and Fantasy. Currently living part time in the hectic sprawl of northern Delaware, (and full time inside the author’s head) Angel has one husband, one son, two cats, a changing variety of other furred and scaled companions, a love of all things beautiful and a terrible addiction to the consumption of both knowledge and chocolate.

Where to find the author: Facebook | Facebook Author Page | Twitter | Pinterest | Website

Meet the narrator:

Vance Bastian loves being a professional storyteller. He writes urban fantasy about sandmen and reapers. He has grown his acting and voice background into a career performing voice-over work and narration for both radio and audiobooks. He is also a founding host of the WROTE podcast – bringing you interviews and news of authors who write, perform, and tell LGBTQ stories. When nobody’s looking, Vance is a complete sci-fi and fantasy geek.

For more on Vance, please visit his website: http://www.vancebastian.com/

 

*****