Category: Paranormal

E. J. Frost-Capricorn

Okay, so yeah, I said that I would update once a week at least, but I didn’t last week. That’s because I was doing special projects for work, and that took up all of my puny brain power. On the other hand, it meant I made more money, so you know, priorities. Then we had three storms in 6 days, which meant 20 plus inches of snow in those six days, and now we’re gearing up for some really cold weather for Friday and Saturday. Now, I live in the Great White North of the US, so I am used to cold weather, but my house is heated by a heat pump, which it doesn’t work as well when you get down to 10°, and we’re looking at -20 Fahrenheit which for you civilized people is -28. That’s not counting the wind chill, which is supposed to get down into the negative 50s, which again for civilized people, is- 45. So yeah, it’s going to be cold and I have chili that I’ll be making in the Crock-Pot and ham and beans that will be making in the other Crock-Pot, and stew at some point. But none of that is really pertinent to today’s book.

Today’s book is Capricorn, by E. J. Frost. Now this book has an interesting position. It is part of the Masters of the Zodiac series, which is a shared world series. It is also a spin-off/continuation/sequel/something, to the Teddy’s Boys books. I am not 100% sure on how to classify it. It does contain all the the main characters from the Teddy books, but they aren’t the main focus. The Mr Black, Evan Lord, from the book is, along with his baby girl Rachel. But, you know how Teddy and her boys are, they do push their way in quite well. There will be some possible spoilers for Teddy’s books in this, so be aware.

Capricorn starts 7 years after Quaternion. Evan is in wizarding jail, for something he may or may not have done. Evan was Rachel’s Daddy, but he released her when he was in prison. However, that hasn’t stopped her from writing him letters. On this particular day, Evan gets called into the warden’s office where a Fae prince is waiting for him. It turns out that Evan is now being released.

When Evan gets released, he ends up going to the Capricorns. It is a special club for those people who were born in the Capricorn star sign. The Capricorns are in charge of protecting the ley lines. Problem is, several members of the Capricorn have been murdered. When Evan gets there, it turns out he is now the leader of the Capricorns, and has to figure out who did the killing. So yeah he’s going to be busy. He ends up staying in fairy with Teddy, her three husbands, their children, and Rachel. And oh yeah, the king occasionally shows up, and for occasionally understand all the time. Evan tries to either forget that he was Rachel’s Daddy or try and become her Daddy again. While Rachel wants it, she is also now a fairy Knight, with a sword and all. She has also become a bit bratty.

So, Evan and Rachel go out to figure out what the problem is. They, of course, run into a lot of issues. And Evan gets to watch Rachel fight and enjoy how good she is at that. They also manage to work through their issues and get their relationship back on track.

This is as far as I’m going to go and describing the book, because if I go much further I will be getting into the meat of everything. There are so many things I like about this book though.

I like the place where Rachel is. She has undergone a lot of stuff since we met her at Bevington, and most of that she did, not quite on her own, but without the rock that Evan had become for her. She always had Teddy, they have become really sisters. But that is different from having her Daddy with her. But she has really grown, and become stronger, physically, emotionally, and mentally. She knows exactly what she wants and she will go out and get it.

I think that Evan starts out on the back foot. As far as I can tell the book takes place in current year. So he’s gone from let’s say 2015 to all of a sudden 2022. Imagine how much difference we’ve seen in 7 years, and all of a sudden he gets all of that. There are a few lines in the book about people wearing masks all the time, so you know, plague. But even without the plague, there have been a lot of changes going on, including Rachel transitioning from a young woman to a fully fledged and realized adult. It takes him a minute to figure out everything. And he’s got this new leadership of the Capricorns and all these murders that he has to figure out all at once. So, it’s no wonder why he’s a little confused sometimes.

But, even with saying all of that, he catches up to everything fairly quickly, and figures out what he needs to do. Of course, it does take some help from everyone, but he is more than willing to take that help.

The climax of the book really got to me. I was impressed with what happened, and saddened by it. And I think that I will carry parts of that along with me for a while.

Okay, that is all for this one. I recommend that you go check it out. You can probably enjoy it without having read Teddy’s Boys, but you will enjoy it better if you have. Happy reading!

E. J. Frost-Quaternion

Okay, I know I said I would be back on Wednesday. You know what helps to be able to come back on Wednesday? Knowing what day it is. The holidays have thrown me off quite badly, and this week I haven’t been sure what day is which. But, I’m back now, and I have E J Frost’s last book from Teddy’s Boys. Quaternion picks up from right where the last one left off, so there are going to be spoilers. I will try to not spoil as much as possible, but we all know that’s just the nature of the Beast. Everything is on Amazon, so you can go read it before you read this blog post if you want. You have been warned.

When we last saw Teddy, she and her boys were drawing a lot of magic through her. While this may have seemed like a good idea, it really wasn’t. It threw Teddy forward in time to the timeline she’s been visiting. Not only that, it appears to have burned out her magic, so she’s stuck. She may be stuck in the future with her husbands, but she still trying to get back to the past to her own time and to her boys there. She is doing a lot of studying and research and gets to see a lot of old friends, but she still is having issues. When she finally manages to make it back, thinking that she’s going to see Charlie, Gabe, and Darwin, it doesn’t turn out that way.

The only person there when Teddy gets back is Charlie. Gabe should be there, but isn’t. And Darwin isn’t quite bonded into their quaternion yet. Teddy gets really angry because the one thing she asked is that if something happened to her that Gabe not abandoned Charlie, but he appears to have done that. Especially since he’s currently in Darwin’s room. Which earns Darwin a black eye. Let’s just say that there is a lot of pain and anguish on everybody’s part right now.

Eventually, as the title suggests, the four of them get together and seal their bond. That’s pretty cool, and it gives them a lot of power. All that power is useful for trying to figure out who committed the murder. That looks like it’s going to be harder and harder, especially when Fate gets in the way.

I like Teddy. I just do. I have liked her throughout this whole series. Of course, that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have her faults, because she does. She jumps to conclusions quickly and doesn’t always get all the information before she acts. Some of that is just the fact that she is still fairly young, and she still needs time to mature. I think she’s like 19 or 20 in this. But, Teddy does have a very definite sense of what is right and wrong, and she is determined to make things right. She is also very loving, even though she’d like to come off as tougher than she is. She has a marshmallow inside.

We get to see Charlie start to come into his own in this. He has spent a lot of time just going along to get along. I don’t think that he has been unhappy, I just think that he is very mellow, and there has been a lot of drama with Gabe and Darwin. But, with the two of them gone at the beginning of the book, we get to see Charlie. We also get more about his feelings than we have before.

I understand why Gabe did what he did. It kind of made me mad, and it kind of made me sad. Gabe has a gentle nature, and sometimes it gets the better of him. I don’t think he’s fragile, per se, but Darwin did a number on him when he took Gabe away from Teddy. And he just hasn’t really bounced back yet. So, like I said, I understand why he made the choices he did.

I absolutely did not like Darwin at the beginning of the series. I wanted to punch him out myself. But EJ did manage to save him and actually make him likable. Does that mean he’s not still an asshole? Yeah, he’s still an asshole. But now he knows that he’s an ass, and he’s working to not be as much of an ass. He does have a lot of trauma in his history, and we’d learn about some of that. I had some of that, really I don’t blame him for it, it would upset me. In fact, it did upset me as I read it. And I read it twice. What’s as EJ sent it to me and then again in the book. Luckily, Teddy is pretty bound and determined to have her way about everything, and Darwin now has her on his side.

I really enjoyed the series. I got really invested in Teddy and her boys. I’ve also enjoyed reading Capricorn, which I will blog about next week. We get to see some really interesting things in that book.

So, that’s all for today. I’m losing my voice, so dictating is turning hard. Go check out this entire series and see what I liked it so much. Happy reading!

Minette Moreau-Wicked Rage

Minette Moreau may sound like a new author to me and the blog, but she’s not. She’s actually a new pen name from Raisa Greywood. Minette is Raisa’s paranormal nom de plume, so if you go looking for the previous 2 Wicked Magic books, make sure that you are looking under the right name. But, we’re not here to talk about those books, we’re here to talk about the newest one, Wicked Rage. And check back later on this week to catch Raisa’s other release.

This is the 3rd book in the series, and it’s Rizan and Feather’s story. Feather is a half bear/half mage young woman, and Rizan is an ancient dragon, and brother to the current dragon king. And oh yeah, he’s Feather’s mate. But, he made a deal with everyone that he would let Feather go to college before they sealed their mating and their familiar bond. So far, all he really does is lurk around her to keep an eye on her. But the book starts out on Feather’s prom night, and she’s helping her best friend get ready. Feather isn’t going, for many reasons, but one of which is the fact that Rizan would do grievous bodily harm to any male touching Feather. Somehow, Rizan finds out how important prom night is as a milestone, so he surprises Feather at her house with a beautiful dress, jewelry, shoes, and a 1951 Jag. (BTW? Somehow=Feather’s parents)

That night, Feather and Rizan do alllllll the traditional prom activities, and it is magical, quite literally. Then it’s time for graduation and for Feather to leave. She’s leaving her tiny town in Arizona to go to college in England and Rizan is counting down the hours. She also suggests to Rizan that he figures out something to do while she’s at school for the next 5 years.

College isn’t all that Feather thought it would be, and there are troubles in the UK. Feather finds out about the problems, and moves to do something about it, but before she can, bad things happen.

Meanwhile, back in the US, Rizan has decided that he’s going to join the Army. He does, and joins two natured unit, headed by a kick ass tiger, who promptly kicks his dragon ass, which I loved altogether. A few weeks into training, he found out that his mate has disappeared. He goes to find her, along with a crack team.

Five years later, Feather is still missing, and Rizan is now counting down the days until his stint in the Army is done so that he can go search for her. He and his team have searched for her, but nothing yet.

I like Rizan. He’s got a really interesting journey through this. I think that the military was good for him. It knocked sense into him when no one else really had yet. Feather made some impressions on him, but Kali made more. I think that he really grew up, which yes, is weird to say about a dragon that has been alive for millennia and survived hundreds and hundreds of years in a hellscape, but that doesn’t change my opinion.

Feather is really smart, really powerful, and incredibly fierce. She has strong allies, apart from Rizan, and she did a lot in the big war. I think that some of that gave her a slightly lowered sense of personal danger. So far, between her own power and all of the powerful beings she knows and loves, there hasn’t really been anything that she can’t handle, so she feels like she can handle just about everything. Which, TBF, is also a trait of a teenager, and she’s only 18, no matter how much she’s been through and what she’s done. She just doesn’t have the same amount of life experience behind her. She has a lot of loss from the war, but there’s still a weird spot that she falls in.

Feather’s journey is a particularly painful one, and I teared up about it more than once. Raisa is occasionally mean to her characters. Well, I say occasionally… I’m not going to say that good things came out of the pain, because I think that it diminishes both the sheer level of pain she went through as well as the results thereof. I know that growth needs struggle and often pain and all, but I feel like it dishonors her suffering. Does that make sense? It does in my head, at least.

Anyway, that’s all for this one. You really should go pick it up and give it a read. Happy reading!

Hailey Turner-A Veiled & Hallowed Eve

This is the 7th book in Hailey’s Soulbound series, and it is absolutely, positively NOT a standalone. You 110% have to have read the other 6 books in the series before you read A Veiled & Hallowed Eve. I highly recommend this series, I mean, very highly. It’s an MM series that has shifters, dragons, mages, and gods who walk among us. The world that Hailey created is beautiful, deadly, and feels oh so very real.

OK, so we have Patrick. He’s a combat mage who survived a previous god war. Because of damage taken in that war, he is no longer in the military, but works for a branch of the government now. It’s like the FBI, but for supernatural things. He’s based in NYC, with his boyfriend, wolf shifter Jono.

The past 6 books have been one battle after another. Each book has had its own unique battle, but they are all tied together in one overall storyline. And now, we have come to the end. I am going to be very careful with spoilers here, because pretty much everything I say could be a spoiler, so the synopsis is going to be really broad. Go read the books, trust me, all the ins and outs are worth it.

It’s nearly Samhain, the day that the veil between this world and all others is thinnest. It’s also the time that the Dominion Sect is going to make their big move. It has to be Samhain when it happens, because the bad guy wants to turn himself into a god and bring all the hells to Earth, and the hell dimensions will be closer that day.

Jono and Patrick are both exhausted. They’ve been fighting for such a long time, and right now they are fighting a war of attrition against hunters and demons. And it’s still weeks until the big day.

I really like Patrick and Jono, together and apart. Patrick is a very good man who has had a bunch of shit handed to him in his relatively short life. He’s been taught and trained as a weapon, and been used as that for the majority of his life. He’s self-sacrificing and the majority of the higher powers and authorities in his life have taken advantage of that fact. People have lied to and for him for most of his life. There are reasons why many of those lies have been told, but that doesn’t mean that the truth isn’t going to hurt him when if/when he finds out about it. I understand the reasoning behind why they have done what they have done, but it doesn’t mean that they ever had Patrick’s best interests at heart. Frankly, I think that there is only one adult in Patrick’s younger life who had his interests at heart, and I think that person kept him centered as much as they were able to.

Then there’s Jono. Jono will always make sure that he has Patrick’s best interests first. He will make sure that Patrick will take care of himself even if he doesn’t want to. Jono makes Patrick a better person, in all the best ways. Jono’s life hasn’t been perfect, but he had a better start than Patrick, and he’s determined to make sure that Patrick knows how valued and valuable he is and how much he is loved. Jono is a loving, caring person, who is very loyal to his friends. He will make decisions based on that loyalty so that he can protect those who are important to him. I think that he and Patrick really complement each other quite well.

I have loved every book in this series. They have all kept me right on the edge of my seat, and I gobbled them up. I was really sad to see this series end, because of just how good it was. Because we follow one main couple and their friends and family through the whole series, we really get to know Patrick, Jono, and all their associates.

This one has a lot going on. But it’s not an overwhelming, even though there is a lot of action. It does nicely tie everything up in a very satisfying way. When I was done reading it, I just sighed a very happy sigh, because I was really happy with what happened.

Nia Farrell & Claire Marta-Rory

So, hey! I’m back! I had a nice break, watched a lot of TV, read a lot of books, played some games, and got high. Living in the land of legal weed and medical weed delivery is nice. I feel more like myself, and I have more energy than I’ve had in a couple of months. My husband has gotten both his shots, my son and I have both gotten our first shots. I’ve sprinkled wildflower seeds over part of my backyard, outside my kitchen, so I can stare at them while I’m working. And I can order Vanilla Coke from the grocery store again. Now that all that’s been said, let’s talk about today’s book, shall we?

Rory is the first book, sort of, in the 2nd season of Guarded Hearts. We first meet them in the Twisted Steel MC anthology. I haven’t read that story yet, but I just bought it, so I’ll be reading their story sometime today. I think that I was fine without having the backstory, but I think that it will just make things better to have read that.

So, Quake is a member of the Hell’s Fury MC. They are The Order of the Dragon, another cadre of gargoyles. Instead of being artisans and cloistered the way that the last set of gargoyles are, these guys are a motorcycle club. That comes along with a lot of drinking and fucking. The boys visit a strip club/brothel that is full of shifters, so they have a group of women who they aren’t keeping in the dark. One of those women is called Magenta, because of her hair color. She and Quake really hit it off well, and eventually they have some kind of relationship. But, some evil jackal shifters kidnap her and do terrible things. After that, she runs away, while Quake is away. She spent some time in rehab because she couldn’t control her shifting, and she met Sydney there. Sydney became her best friend and together they started a lingerie and sex toy business called Lady Chatterly’s Lover.

It’s now been a year. Rory, AKA Magenta, is living her best life, mostly. She is living with Syd, and her baby Quinn. She still has flashbacks to things that happened, and she still does have security on call, headed up by Guy. She is planning on living for Quinn, and to hell with everything and everyone else. Then Quake shows up. And all of a sudden, her best life ain’t all that great any more. She immediately tells him to leave her alone and calls her security so that she can be protected.

Quake is in New York with some of his brother, visiting the Order of the Phoenix when all hell breaks loose. In the wake of that, he discovers where Rory is working and goes to see her. He’s shocked to find out that she wants to have nothing to do with him. He follows her to her house and finds out that there is a man and another woman there, along with a baby. He figures that the kid is the child of the woman holding him, which would be Sydney, and that the man is the baby daddy, that would be Guy. With that “evidence” in front of his face, he decides that Rory is in some kind of triad with those two.

They manage to stay apart for a while, right up until Quinn gets kidnapped by the trusted nanny. Quake steps in with his brothers to help find Quinn.

I like Quake, but sometimes I want to just knock his head into a wall because he’s being a stupid asshole. I know that he’s trying to do his best, and he’s trying to be a good man, which he is, I think, but he just lets his assumptions get the better of him. Because he lets that happen, he sometimes makes some really huge mistakes, which is when I want to just smack him and tell him to stop, look, and use his brain. He really is a good guy. He has such a good heart, and we get to see it over and over in this. He is really loyal to his friends and his family. He’s also really strong and is willing to stand up for a lot of people.

Rory is remarkable. She has overcome a whole lot and has managed to put herself back together and build herself up. She is really strong, she’s a loving mother, and she’s a good friend. I really like her. I really admire her and think that she deserves all the good things.

I am seriously mad at Sydney and Guy. They can just fix themselves.

OK, that’s all for this one. Go check it out!

K Webster-Shift of Morals

There is a collection called the Kingdom of Wolves. They are all about shifters, and they are all standalones. They are not all MM, but some are. Shift of Morals is one of those books. It exists in the same world as K’s Brigg’s Ferry Bay books, and we get to see some of the characters from those books. But, keep in mind, those books are contemporary, and this one is a PNR.

So, we have Cyrus. He is a park ranger at a small park outside of Brigg’s Ferry Bay. He’s also the alpha of a small shifter pack. When I say small, I mean very small. There are only a handful of them. One of the members of his pack is Remy, who has just turned 18. Remy is constantly butting heads with almost everyone in the pack, but most especially Cyrus.

Years ago, Cyrus and his pack found a young boy who was bloodied and torn laying next to his dead and mutilated mother and sister. Remy survived, mostly, but he can’t speak because of throat damage. And a total fuck ton of anger issues. Right now, he wants to have some freedom. He hasn’t gone to school, he doesn’t have a lot of contact with the outside world. Cyrus and the rest of the pack has kept him safe and away from everyone, especially since they don’t know who attacked him. But, that protection makes Remy really angry. He knows why they want to keep him safe, but he wants them to give him some freedom, and I don’t blame him, at 18, you want that.

Some new people move in down the road, and things start to change, including the fact that Cyrus and Remy now are drawn together, strongly.

To be honest, this isn’t my favorite K book. I like the story, I like the premise, and I liked the characters. But, there are a few places that I felt like there were some shortcuts taken that didn’t quite work. I actually have no problem with shortcuts, and there have been plenty of times in which the same kind of shortcuts have worked really well for me, but in this one, I felt like they didn’t work well and they kind of left me blah.

Will I reread this one? Probably. I enjoyed the read and I can understand why K went the route that she did, I think, and as the author that is totally her right. I will never tell an author how they should or shouldn’t write their books. Their books are their art, and I wouldn’t want someone to tell me how to write if I were in their place. All I can do is talk about how I feel about any particular book, and try to do it in a way that doesn’t spoil the book for anyone else.

Anyway, that said…

I like Cyrus, he really is very protective of his entire pack. I like the fact that the pack has this psychic link that keeps them all in touch with each other, because we get to see how connected and caring they all are towards each other, even Remy.

I did want to smack Remy a couple of times, but he’s 18, angry, and kind of stupid. We’re all kind of stupid at 18. Remy does know how bad the world is, but even knowing that he wants to explore his boundaries, and I think that Cyrus should’ve let him do that.

That’s all for this one. Go check it out! Happy reading!

Susi Hawke-The Devoted Alpha

We very recently had a Susan Hawke book on the blog, and today we’re back to Susi, her mpreg MM omegaverse name. The Devoted Alpha is the 3rd book in Susi’s West Coast Wolves series. These are best read in order, because they really do build on each other, so you’ll miss stuff if you don’t read them all. But that’s OK, they are good books, and they are all in KU, so you can read them that way.

As a quick brief on this world, it’s a shifter omegaverse with mpreg. Wolf packs are divided into alphas, who lead, and then betas, deltas, gammas, etc. And omegas, of course. When a ruling alpha has more than one alpha child, they have all the heir they need, so they kick all the following alpha children out at 18. The theory is that it’s impossible for more than 2 alphas to get along. But Nick and his friends proved that wrong. The 4 of them, all alphas, got together in a motorcycle club and all was good. Then Matty got called back to his birth pack, and became the alpha of the pack, and they found out that there were omegas that had been stolen from families. So, that’s the basic plot of the first two books. So, let’s talk about Nick and Tom.

Tom was stolen as a baby and his family were told he was stillborn. He was raised with his “brothers”, all omegas in the same state. When he was rescused, he stayed with the pack that saved him, since his brother mated the alpha. On an incredibly dramatic day, Tom helps out at the tasting room of the winery the pack owns, when he meets Nick.

Nick was given a pack when his friend Matty had one pack too many. He’s been trying to help out his pack, but there are all kinds of things going on that he has to maneuver around. Luckily, the territorial alpha has been helping out, and approves of Nick’s plans. So, after he manages to make things happen, he meets with the territorial dude in order to make sure everything is ready to go, but then they find out that the need to go to the winery where one of Nick’s brother alphas has become alpha. When he gets there, he senses Tom and fireworks.

I really like Tom. I like how he doesn’t have problems saying what he thinks about certain things. He doesn’t want to be that omega that anyone one walks over, he’s had too many years of everyone telling him what to do, thing, be, and he’s not going to do that anymore. I think that he’s really strong. He has such a sweet and loving heart too.

Nick. Nick is twisty af. He thinks about 13 steps ahead of everyone else. He thinks about everything that someone else could do and he makes a plan to counter that and to make the other person do what he wants. He knows all the laws and rules and regulations, even the really obscure ones, and he has no problem using them to get what he wants. I wouldn’t want to cross him. I love how patient he is with Tom and how he has no problem letting Tom take the lead.

These two are going to be a massive power couple. I can’t wait to see where the world is going to go.

Lee Savino-Mastered By the Berserkers

It’s been a while since we got to see some of Lee’s hot and hunky Berserkers, so I’m really happy to get back to it with Mastered By the Berserkers. This is the latest one in the Berserkers Bride series, which started by taking spaewives from a nunnery. This one runs concurrently with some of the other books (if I am recalling the timeline correctly, I didn’t go back and reread the entire series). (I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong.)

SSo, we are finally getting to Sister Juliet’s story. She was the only one of the nuns to try to protect the young women in their care, and she got taken too. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that she’s a spaewife, just like all the young women under her care are. When they got taken, there were a couple of Berserkers who paid her a lot of attention, Jarl and Fenrir. Any time that they saw that she needed something, that thing would just magically show up where she is. Once they finally got to the Berserkers’ mountain, many of the spaewives, especially the younger girls, live in one long house, under the care of Sister Juliet, who is a devoted Christian and who is deeply devoted to making sure that her young charges are safe, warm, and fed. Meanwhile, she’s hiding the fact that she is starting to feel the things that the other spaewives do.

Jarl and Fenrir know that she is their mate, but they’ve been careful aboout how they go about dealing with her. Their Alphas have made it very clear that the Berserkers aren’t to be just grabbing any spaewife that they want, it has to be the woman’s choice, and if things don’t happen that way, there will be hell to pay. So, they’ve been waiting for Sister Juliet, but one night, things come to a head, and they spirit her away. They take her far away to the other side of the mountain where they have built a house for her. Jarl and Fenrir are going to make her theirs now.

Like I said before, Juliet is a devout Christian, I mean, nun, right? Because of that, she has some issues with being with any man, let alone two men. Celibacy is a thing, and it’s a thing that she’s sure that she has to stick to, because she made a vow to her God. I think that she is a very good person. She really wants to stick with her beliefs, but Jarl and Fenrir have made it really obvious that she is their priority and that they really want her. She spends a lot of time really torn over how she feels over everything, and I can understand why she feels that way.

Jarl and Fenrir show just how much they have paid attention to Juliet, and how willing they are to give her what she needs and what she wants. I am really impressed by the measures that they are willing to go to so that Juliet will be happy. I truly approve of that.

I can’t wait for the next one in this series, because the Berserker Saga books were some of the first books I read when I started getting into indie books and romances back several years ago now. When I was a young tween, I read romance a lot. Harlequin was my friend, but I pulled away from that for a while, but now I mix romance in with all my other reading, in case you haven’t noticed, LOL.

I do think that the Alphas are just a teeny tiny hypocritical in this, and I’m glad that they get called on it, because they really should’ve been.

OK, that’s all for this one. Go check out all these books, they are so awesome. Happy reading!

Renee Rose & Vanessa Vale-Ruthless

Renee and Vanessa are back with another Wolf Ranch book, Ruthless. And all I have to say is yay! (Well, I have a little more than that to say, otherwise it would be a really short blog post.)

Two years ago, Old Man Sheffield died, leaving his ranch, which is next door to the Wolf Ranch, to his niece, Natalie. In the past, Willow, who mated to Rob Wolf, pretended to be Natalie, but she got busted. But now, after 2 years, the real Natalie is back, and she’s going to live on the ranch. She’s just gotten her master’s degree in music, and she’s a concert violinist, but that just doen’t make a lot of money in LA. So, she has a free ranch, she might as well go live there. Which she does. And she’s stuck trying to come up with the money to pay for the repairs to the house, which it really needs. Meanwhile, she’s just going to keep slinging drinks at the bar, earning what money she can, and try to figure out how to make more money. And oh yeah, keep the secret that her neighbors and many of the people who live on the mountain are shifters. She learned the secret many years ago, when she saw Rand change, and her uncle told her about it. Not only is she keeping the secret from the world, she’s also keeping the secret from the shifters.

Then there’s Rand. He’s now a contractor, but back in the day, when he was a teenager, he worked on the Sheffield ranch helping out. One day, a tractor fell on him, so he just shifted so that he could work his way out from under it. What he doesn’t know is that the 10 year old little girl who was visiting her uncle saw him. What he does know is that the last couple of months have been difficult for him. He’s been edgy and grumpy. One night, on the full moon run, he smells something, something tantalizing, wonderous, and addictive. He follows the smell down to the swimming hole on the Sheffield ranch and sees Natalie, swimming in the moonlight. She stands up and spots him, as a wolf, and meets his eye. That’s when he realizes she’s his mate.

I like Natalie. I love her determination. She has obviously had to have a lot of determination to get through college and do it the way that she did. She also has a lot of determination about living in Montana on her uncle’s ranch. She feels like she’s there for a reason, so she’s determined to find out what that reason is. I think that she also tries hard to be practical and realistic within the framework of the knowledge that she has. I do like her. I like her sass and her fire. She keeps Rand on his toes for sure.

Rand is definitely a wolf. He’s bossy, possessive, dominating, and knows what he wants. So, just like every single other guy in this series. The nice thing about Rand is that he has the benefit of everyone else screwing up, including his brother, and the benefit of all the other human women he can ask for assistance when he’s trying to figure stuff out. I think that helps him at times, because there are a lot of times when he falls on his face and needs some help.

OK, that’s all there is for today. Nothing below the pic today. Go check it out! Happy reading!

Nikki Landis-Devil’s Ride

Nikki is back in the RBMC world. As a quick reminder, the there are several authors who have written in this shared world, each author is able to put their own spin on the world, as long as it has the Royal Bastards MC in it. So, Nikki puts a paranormal spin on her books in this series. So, let’s talk about Devil’s Ride.

The books starts 18 year in the past. Grim, not yet known as Grim, has been trapped by the bad guys along with his pres, Keys and another brother, Lockjaw. The guys aren’t treated well, at all, to the point that Lockjaw is dead when they go to escape, and Keys dies on their way to safety. Grim nearly dies, but at the last moment, he’s offered a deal with the Devil. And when I say deal with the Devil, I mean the literal devil. After he makes his deal, Grim, now using that road name, gets hit by a car. Out of that car comes a young girl, who gives Grim her teddy bear, Cuddles, because Cuddles always makes her feel better, and it’s obvious that Grim needs help. All Grim knows about her is that she has the most beautiful aura.

Fast forward 18 years. Trish is working as a bartender at a local bar, trying to take care of her drunk father, and dealing with her scummy step-brother, who is prospecting with a local MC (not the RBMC). He really wants in her pants, she really wants him not in her pants. So much not in her pants that she is more than willing to break him in pieces to keep that from happening. Trish tells her friend and roommate Suraya about the weird interaction she had with a severely injured biker back in the day. She’s never seen him again, at least until he walks into her bar one night. She recognizes him instantly, but she’s pretty sure that he doesn’t recognize her, until he meets her eyes and heads over to talk to her.

Grim recognizes her aura, and he is so drawn to her. There’s just something about her and her aura that gives him some peace and some light, which isn’t anything that he’s had before.

This was a huge fucking roller coaster of a ride. It knocked me right the fuck out. Sometimes I think that Grim and Trish are too toxic to each other to stay together, but other times I thought that their souls truly belonged together and that keeping them apart would hurt the two of them more than help. I think that the truth actually falls somewhere in between the two. They aren’t always good for each other, especially in Trish’s cases, but she has all these feelings for Grim.

I think that Trish is strong and independent. I think that sometimes she’s too independent, and that caused some of the problems. Now, I’m not victim blaming. I’m not saying that B happened to Trish because she did A, but it may have been a part of the reason that B happened. Or, maybe more like it gave B an opening to happen. Does that make sense? I think that Trish has every right to feel the way that she does about MCs throughout the book. It has to be a hard place for her to be.

Grim. Hmmmm. I don’t know what to say about Grim. I thinkk that I like him, most of the time. I understand his actions. His actions are really kind of just plain and straight forward. He doesn’t really have a lot of twists and turns going on, and WYSIWYG. At least mostly. He is keeping one big secret (other than MC business), but beyond that…

I found the Suraya/Sasha storyline to be really interesting and sad.

OK, that’s all for this one. Go check it out! Happy reading!

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