Private Dancer

Mayan Ruins

by Ciar Cullen

Book One of the Mayan Epilogues: At the end of time and deep in the Mayan jungle, a Sergeant’s cold heart is melted by an enchanting recruit.

After “The End,” Sergeant Cliff Roman’s rag-tag unit trudges in the sweltering heat on a pointless mission. One in three people worldwide has already died of the virus, but troops are sent to likely hotspots to collect biological samples.

In the shadows of Mayan ruins, Private Dustin Huang is a fish out of water, drafted into hell. A skilled, artful ballet dancer, Dustin finds a little solace in the enticing form of his Sergeant.

Death itself seems to stalk the unit as they near the purported entrance of Xibalba, the Mayan Underworld. But a royal presence from antiquity intervenes to help save the mortals and usher in the next cycle for humanity. What mysterious force pushes Cliff and Dustin together?

Adult-content rating: This book contains content considered unsuitable for young readers 17 and under, and which may be offensive to some readers of all ages.

Genres: Military Fiction, Romance, Fantasy, M M Romance, Science Fiction, LGBT, Novella

51 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 5, 2012

About the author

Ciar Cullen grew up in Baltimore, Maryland. After working as an archaeologist for a decade in Greece and England, she settled in New Jersey, where she writes and works at a prominent college. Ciar is happily married with one cat. To learn more about Ciar Cullen, please visit www.ciarcullen.com, where you can send an email to her.
Her blog is at http://www.ciarcullen.wordpress.com and she often reviews books and hosts other authors.
Email her at ciar@ciarcullen.com

Reviews

[Dianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars - When a world-wide disaster strikes, a virus decimates massive numbers of the population, Mexico has been annexed by the United States and is under martial law. Military forces are brought in to try to keep order, but not all are cut out for that life, and if you were able-bodied, you were enlisted, one way or the other. A former ballet dancer is physically healthy, but not emotionally equipped for what he must endure as a soldier. Can his commanding officer give him the strength he needs to continue in the Mayan jungle as they search for ancient ruins that may hold the secret to a cure?

Private Dancer by Ciar Cullen lays a detailed foundation for further novellas in this series, and has the potential for being a full blown novel on its own! As a short read, it could be overpowering at times, but perhaps that was because the end was coming soon? Ms. Cullen has built a world that is crumbling in around itself with very human and very flawed characters who are together out of need, as opposed to desire in a nightmarish situation. I would definitely have liked to have seen more story to help absorb the information provided.

Publication Date: July 5, 2012
Publisher: Ciar Cullen
Genre: Adult Fiction/GL
Number of Pages: 94
My Rating: 3.5
Available from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

[Paul · Rating 1 out of 5]

Too short for me to care about any of the many characters that are introduced. A little too slow paced, especially for a post-apocalyptic story.

[Otis Downs · Rating 5 out of 5]

A decent read

Was a very catching tale, But way to short. Would love to read the rest of the story.
Please and Thanks

[Mr Pink Ink · Rating 3 out of 5]

The problem I have with scifi, this is also prevalent in a lot of military fiction, is that the backstory has to come in huge dumps of information, including military statistics and technological textbooks; I very nearly DNF'd this because of that.

I'm glad I didn't, though, because the story opens up after about a third of the way through and I absolutely loved it.

We follow a group of people, half military, half civilian who are on a mission to the Mayan ruins to discover what they can about the outbreak of the disease and if there is anything they can do about it, the Mayans having foretold a bunch of stuff in history and all that.

The absolute spark of romance and desire where there is nothing left but ruin and hopelessness, brought me joy; and I love how the title came together.

Definitely looking forward to more.

[Samuel Alexander · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the full review but for others and video reviews go here Reading Is My Drug

I honestly don’t know what to say about this book. I don’t understand what the plague that is killing people actually is. I couldn’t really dig into the characters. It didn’t seem to really lift for me. I just floated through this.

Something about the world and how it ended was not clearly defined. Since it’s a short story the POV wasn’t concise enough to get invested in it. It was laid out the way a full-sized story would be as if the author had time to dig into all the characters instead of just picking say 1 to 3 and overloading us in the short time we had with information specifically about the end of the world, about the task at hand, and allowing their relationships with each other to grow instead of just going from this thing inside their heads to this thing in the real world in the last chapter then it’s over.

Ultimately, nothing really happens.

Also, the deniability plotline is not one of my favs. I quit Lucifer the TV series after he got shot in like what the fourth episode and didn’t heal. When my google search revealed she wouldn’t find out who he was until midway through season 3, so basically over fifty episodes in the future, I quit right there. There are so many ways to deal with the supernatural without always going for the ‘they’re crazy’ or ‘this can’t be real’ route. Just being confronted with it raises so many avenues for Drama and tension it’s just overused at this point. My least favourite supernatural trope.

Also if one characters’ husband has spoken to a god before, why can’t they do it again. Why do two of them now have to give up their immortality to talk to humans when clearly it has happened before? The ending just threw so much at the reader in a rush plus expecting us to deal with the lead character disbelieving in the supernatural, and then a lovers spat the first day after they reveal their feelings to each other. Just so much to deal with and that was only the end of the story.

I just couldn’t connect with this. It needed a less is more approach to be a clean, precise and uncluttered short story, or commit to becoming an epic modern fantasy journey. As it is I finished it but it didn’t do anything for me.

So after some serious digging apparently there are two books set in this world, however, even though the very first book had a character name in the blurb I recognise this book clearly states it is the first in the Mayan epilogue series. If it isn’t the first it should say third, from what I’m seeing it isn’t and was supposed to be a new series set in a world the author had already created. All of that to say this story still reads like we are just dropped in the middle of a story instead of being part of a series, which again it can’t be because it says book one so even knowing this world exists still doesn’t magic away the truth that is this book is lacking on information and character development like more than a few readers have noted. All the bones for something good is here but it never quite makes it anywhere. Part of an established series or first of a new one there isn’t enough here for this book to stand on its own. Also it’s 2022 and there’s still no part two that I can find even after a deep dive into the net so who knows when it’s coming.

[Britney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I swear I think I am missing something. Is there another part to this story that I have not heard about or found? An actual beginning that would make half of this story make sense? At the start of this book we are thrown into a world that has so much detail, but not details that we need to make sense of the story. For instance, what is this "death" that has changed the world? How does it spread, what does it look like i.e. the symptoms? All I know about it is that it kills people. So maybe they don't know how it spreads or what causes it, the author could have at least mentioned that they did not know. I am not saying this is a bad story. On the contrary I thought it was a really good idea for a story, it just needs a lot of work. If the author writes the rest of the book (I cannot call it a sequel because there was no actual ending) I will definitely read it. I just think that the author needs to step back and look at the story as if they had not written it, as if they have no idea of the world that they created. If that proves to be impossible, maybe they could hand it over to someone who has never heard of the story before and they could try and help. Again, I liked this story, but I could truly love it if the author gave it the attention it needs to shine.

[Tammy K. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first book in the Mayan Epilogue series. As such there is a fair amount of time in the beginning devoted to character building, so much so that some sections read like information dumps.
Once the real story got started (about 1/3 the way through) the action and mystery began to build, finishing in a decent cliffhanger.
While the character building felt pushed, by the ending of this episode I felt that the main characters were fully fleshed out and relatable.
I gave this book 4 stars (better than average read) because I feel a desire to read on in the series to find out what happens on their journey on the road to Xibalba and into the realm of Cuchumaquic, the Lord of the gathered blood.
I will note that there are typos in this edition and that my edition (purchased from Amazon) has its chapter information on the last page and the synopsis of the other books in the series in front of the title story.

[Serith · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have to be honest; this was pretty confusing at points. It starts and ends rather abruptly so it kind of feels like a clipping from the middle of a book. You’re placed in a world that has a lot of interesting themes (Aztec, apocalyptic, a bit of military) but does not give much background to go on. And once the characters made a choice about embarking on a quest to save the world, it just stops right there.

I also would have liked to see more interaction between the two main characters before they fell in love. It just happened so fast that I was never entirely sold on them. They were still sweet, mind you, but I’m a real sucker for tension build up! That's what draws me to reading.

That all being said, I want to stress that these criticisms are more for the things NOT written then what actually is on the pages. The potential is indeed there, but it could use a bit of editing to fatten it up and roll it all out.

[Irissska · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5
this book is 3rd and not the last in the series. some people here complain it seems that we were thrown in the middle of some mess, but everything was quite clear for me and even didn't suspect there were 2 earlier books until i started searching for the next part (which does not exist btw at least so far).
Anyway, the beginning was better than the second half but the idea is quite good.

[J · Rating 2 out of 5]

Super short. Assuming it's a serial/series.

[Hildegart · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was waffling between a 2 and 3 stars for this book. There were some mistakes that were missed in editing. Not alot, though. Storyline could have used just a little more depth.