On the outside, Dina Demille is the epitome of normal. She runs a quaint Victorian Bed and Breakfast in a small Texas town, owns a Shih Tzu named Beast, and is a perfect neighbor, whose biggest problem should be what to serve her guests for breakfast. But Dina is...different: Her broom is a deadly weapon; her Inn is magic and thinks for itself. Meant to be a lodging for otherworldly visitors, the only permanent guest is a retired Galactic aristocrat who can’t leave the grounds because she’s responsible for the deaths of millions and someone might shoot her on sight. Under the circumstances, "normal" is a bit of a stretch for Dina.
And now, something with wicked claws and deepwater teeth has begun to hunt at night....Feeling responsible for her neighbors, Dina decides to get involved. Before long, she has to juggle dealing with the annoyingly attractive, ex-military, new neighbor, Sean Evans—an alpha-strain werewolf—and the equally arresting cosmic vampire soldier, Arland, while trying to keep her inn and its guests safe. But the enemy she’s facing is unlike anything she’s ever encountered before. It’s smart, vicious, and lethal, and putting herself between this creature and her neighbors might just cost her everything.
-- Goodreads.com description --
Clean Sweep is the first book in The Innkeeper Chronicles by Ilona Andrews. After starting the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews and loving it, I decided to check out some of the other books written by this husband and wife duo. I picked Clean Sweep, and I didn't regret it. Ilona Andrews publishes this series on their website chapter by chapter and ultimately they self publish it. I didn't think much about that before, but I did have some problems with Clean Sweep. I do believe they could have done a better job with an actual editor. The book was riddled with mistakes like for example "solider" instead of "soldier" and several mistakes in the structure of sentences, often missing a word or more. Since the book is relatively short and therefore quite expensive, I did not appreciate all those mistakes, in fact they really got on my nerves. I'm not exaggerating when I say that in almost every chapter a mistake is to be found. I could forgive the occasional oversight but this was more than that.
Furthermore, I did feel like the structure of the entire book didn't really work. The characters could have been more developed and Clean Sweep did feel more like a collection of chapters rather than a book as a whole to me.
However, I still liked the story and the characters, but I just expected more of Ilona Andrews. The world building is amazing, though, and the illustrations make for a wonderful reading experience.
All things considered I still give Clean Sweep 4 out of 5 stars. I'm currently reading the second book in the series, Sweep in Peace and I'm liking it so much more! I've still come across a few mistakes but not as many as in the first book.
