A sweet, sexy story about healing and love.
One of the last remaining unmated human women on an ice planet hopes to stay single.
Tiffany was one of a group of women kidnapped from Earth by evil aliens intending to traffic and enslave them. Their ship crash-landed on a small, icy planet where they were saved by a welcoming community of kind blue aliens consisting mostly of men. In order to survive the unbearably cold temperatures, both blue aliens and humans must implant themselves with a symbiotic creature called the khui, which has a secondary function of “resonating” when two people are a perfect match. It’s now 18 months after the crash, and almost all of the women have found mates and started having babies. Salukh is different from the other men fiercely competing for Tiffany's attention because he treats her like a friend instead of an object to be won. He's patient, kind, and sure that Tiffany is his mate even if they haven’t yet resonated. However, she is terrified of being mated after having been sexually assaulted by the aliens who kidnapped her. For Tiffany, the very thought of resonating and being forced to accept a mate is abhorrent. She’s tired of her choices being taken from her and is determined to learn how to survive on her own. Tiffany’s journey involves letting herself recover at her own pace, which includes slowly trusting Salukh with both her story and her body. Salukh, like most of the aliens in the series, is a perfect fantasy of a romantic partner, willing to patiently provide whatever his lover desires. Dixon’s world continues to evolve, with the newly blended community of human women and alien men struggling with the problems of feeding and housing their growing clan. Tiffany and Salukh’s romance shows how even in a world of fated mates, consent and willingness to enter into a relationship are still important.
A sweet, sexy story about healing and love.Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2023
ISBN: 9780593639450
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2023
With an aura of both enchantment and authenticity, Bardugo’s compulsively readable novel leaves a portal ajar for equally...
Yale’s secret societies hide a supernatural secret in this fantasy/murder mystery/school story.
Most Yale students get admitted through some combination of impressive academics, athletics, extracurriculars, family connections, and donations, or perhaps bribing the right coach. Not Galaxy “Alex” Stern. The protagonist of Bardugo’s (King of Scars, 2019, etc.) first novel for adults, a high school dropout and low-level drug dealer, Alex got in because she can see dead people. A Yale dean who's a member of Lethe, one of the college’s famously mysterious secret societies, offers Alex a free ride if she will use her spook-spotting abilities to help Lethe with its mission: overseeing the other secret societies’ occult rituals. In Bardugo’s universe, the “Ancient Eight” secret societies (Lethe is the eponymous Ninth House) are not just old boys’ breeding grounds for the CIA, CEOs, Supreme Court justices, and so on, as they are in ours; they’re wielders of actual magic. Skull and Bones performs prognostications by borrowing patients from the local hospital, cutting them open, and examining their entrails. St. Elmo’s specializes in weather magic, useful for commodities traders; Aurelian, in unbreakable contracts; Manuscript goes in for glamours, or “illusions and lies,” helpful to politicians and movie stars alike. And all these rituals attract ghosts. It’s Alex’s job to keep the supernatural forces from embarrassing the magical elite by releasing chaos into the community (all while trying desperately to keep her grades up). “Dealing with ghosts was like riding the subway: Do not make eye contact. Do not smile. Do not engage. Otherwise, you never know what might follow you home.” A townie’s murder sets in motion a taut plot full of drug deals, drunken assaults, corruption, and cover-ups. Loyalties stretch and snap. Under it all runs the deep, dark river of ambition and anxiety that at once powers and undermines the Yale experience. Alex may have more reason than most to feel like an imposter, but anyone who’s spent time around the golden children of the Ivy League will likely recognize her self-doubt.
With an aura of both enchantment and authenticity, Bardugo’s compulsively readable novel leaves a portal ajar for equally dazzling sequels.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-31307-2
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
A tragic and grotesque romance that will enchant fans of dark fantasy and horror.
Redheaded Wyatt Westlock returns to her family’s farmhouse following her father’s death; she’s there to burn it to the ground.
But she finds Peter, her childhood friend, chained in her basement. Wyatt releases him, unaware of his secret: He’s immortal and has been ritually sacrificed by generations of members of Wyatt’s family in order to keep hellish monsters from invading our world. His only escape from the cycle of death and rebirth is to kill Wyatt, the last Westlock. Although each of them can only survive if the other dies, their unspoken love for each other keeps them locked in an uneasy truce. Without Peter’s bones, the darkness in the forest creeps closer, bringing with it terrible creatures and eldritch horrors. The couple must explore Wyatt’s own wild magic if they hope to save their doomed romance. Andrew delivers an emotionally intense story of star-crossed lovers whose story unfolds against the backdrop of an isolated farm that’s visited by terrifying birds, menacing hooded figures, and a creature that uses powers of mimicry to hunt. The farm is so vibrantly described that it thoroughly connects the characters to the setting both physically and emotionally, reflecting the bleakness of the choices Peter and Wyatt face. The rot, mold, and mildew that creep over the farm are almost tangible; so too is the longing Peter and Wyatt feel for each other. All characters read white.
A tragic and grotesque romance that will enchant fans of dark fantasy and horror. (Dark fantasy. 14-adult)Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781338885071
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
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