A well-judged and absorbing mix of genres with strong characterizations.
A young woman suddenly gains potent psychic abilities and grapples with an inappropriate romantic attraction in this debut novel.
Enjoying a rare vacation at a ritzy Panamanian resort, Amanda Griffith is set on relaxing with her best friend, Lydia Shelby. They’re ready to celebrate after finishing medical school and will soon be busy residents, Amanda in anesthesiology and Lydia in psychiatry. Or that’s the plan until a solar flare changes their lives drastically. They’re attacked by a smoky black column of pure evil that renders Lydia unconscious. Acting instinctively, Amanda zaps the entity with a surprising blast of energy from her fingertips. The mystified Amanda learns from Matt Chadwick, a young man at the resort who had tried to help, that solar flares can cause some people, called Sentinels, to quickly develop formidable psychic talents that last 10 years. The Committee, an old and secret organization, directs Sentinels in battling evil, for which they’ll be well paid. Both women turn out to be Sentinels, but Amanda is the most powerful type, a Sentinel 10. As such, she’s given especially cushy compensation, yet the work comes easily for her once she begins. More difficult to handle is Amanda’s explosive confrontation with her inner darkness and a potentially ruinous romance. Valenti, in her engrossing novel, at first seems to be offering a familiar plotline about discovering supernatural abilities to fulfill a special destiny. But Amanda isn’t a young adolescent, and the story’s true focus is her love triangle with a ruggedly handsome but emotionally unavailable pilot and a psychopath who can feel normal emotions only when he’s with her. The author nicely ties the plots together and skillfully establishes the psychological groundwork for her characters that makes Amanda’s dilemma believably wrenching, helping to counterbalance her considerable powers, beauty, and wealth.
A well-judged and absorbing mix of genres with strong characterizations.Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-77742-730-6
Page Count: 258
Publisher: Brigid Book Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
This time-travel romance doesn’t live up to its intriguing setting.
While in Japan to learn more about her family history, a young Scottish woman is transported 128 years into the past, finding herself on the brink of the Satsuma Rebellion.
Born and raised in Scotland, Isla MacKenzie has traveled to Japan to learn more about the Japanese branch of her mother’s family. She hopes to discover whether family lore is true and she’s descended from a warrior who served alongside legendary rebel samurai leader Takamori Saigō. When a strangely out-of-season typhoon hits the town of Kagoshima, where she’s staying, Isla gets caught in the blinding rain and wind; she stumbles across a white torii gate, but as she approaches, hoping to find shelter, things begin to feel weird. As the storm subsides and Isla looks around, her surroundings seem foreign—Kagoshima’s busy streets and cafes have been replaced by woodlands. When a woman sees Isla and screams, claiming to have discovered a demon in the forest, samurai Maeda Keiichirō is one of the first to answer the call. He’s the voice of reason, recognizing Isla as a young woman, not a demon, even if she looks bizarre. As Isla figures out that she’s been transported back in time, she comes to realize she’s on the cusp of the deadly Satsuma Rebellion, which lasted nine months and ended in the death of its leader, Saigō. While she adjusts to life in the 19th century and searches for a way to make it back to the 21st, she grows closer to Keiichirō, her de facto protector. Like the protagonists of many time-travel romances, Isla struggles with the lack of modern comforts and with growing close to a man she may have to abandon. Also, of course, she knows how the rebellion ends, and is conflicted about using her knowledge to potentially change the course of history. There are the bones of an interesting romance here, especially given the fascinating time period. Unfortunately, the writing feels unpolished: Nine months doesn’t seem like enough time for our leads to make a meaningful connection, but also, not much happens in that timespan. Balancing historical context with a romance that possesses both cultural differences and an impending deadline is a tall order, and Kuroki doesn’t quite manage it.
This time-travel romance doesn’t live up to its intriguing setting.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9780063410879
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 9, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
Sink your teeth into this delightful paranormal romance with a modern twist.
A vampire and an Alpha werewolf enter into a marriage of convenience in order to ease tensions between their species.
As the only daughter of a prominent Vampyre councilman, Misery Lark has grown accustomed to playing the role that’s demanded of her—and now, her father is ordering her to be part of yet another truce agreement. In an effort to maintain goodwill between the Vampyres and their longtime nemeses the Weres, Misery must wed their Alpha, Lowe Moreland. But it turns out that Misery has her own motivations for agreeing to this political marriage, including finding answers about what happened to her best friend, who went missing after setting up a meeting in Were territory. Isolated from her kind and surrounded on all sides by the enemy after the wedding, Misery refuses to let herself forget about her real mission. It doesn’t matter that Lowe is one of the most confounding and intense people she’s ever met, or that the connection building between them doesn’t feel like one born entirely of convenience. There’s also the possibility that Lowe may already have a Were mate of his own, but in spite of their biological differences, they may turn out to be the missing piece in each other’s lives. While this is Hazelwood’s first paranormal romance, and the book does lean on some hallmark tropes of the genre, the contemporary setting lends itself to the author’s trademark humor and makes the political plot more easily digestible. Misery and Lowe’s slow-burn romance is appealing enough that readers will readily devour every moment between them and hunger to return to them whenever the story diverts from their scenes together.
Sink your teeth into this delightful paranormal romance with a modern twist.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9780593550403
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
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