Kiss of Skye

Kiss of Skye by Donna Grant
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I feel like I’ve been waiting for Mason’s story since the first time he was mentioned. Full disclaimer, if you have somehow started the series here - while I think you can do it, you should probably (at least) start at the first book of this series, if not of the whole world building adventure. I’ve read most if not all of the preceding books, and even I have a hard time keeping all the characters straight.

So, Mason - we have heard about him since his sister showed up on Skye. He has been investigating his parent’s untimely death while playing the part of dedicated member of the organization that may just have killed them. He even needs to act the part to his sister and friends, which obviously causes a rift between them. We meet Rowan in this book when she is taking a bit of a forced tour of the meeting they are having. She immediately knows this group is rotten, but can’t seem to escape fast enough. On her way sneaking out the door, she follows her instincts and ends up saving Mason’s life.

These two obviously end up in Skye, where they are rapidly brought up to speed on the many various evil doers, big battles, other paranormals, and open mysteries they are facing as a group. While this is going on, Rowan and Mason are both on a journey of magical discovery - Mason thinking perhaps he could be the Water pillar they are looking for and Rowan learning the enormity of her role in this world. Of course, there are smutty good romantic elements thrown in for good measure, with your standard misunderstandings, martyrdom and finally HEA. While the group is still facing about a thousand unknowns and bad guys, this was a good step in the right direction overall.

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The Lone Wolf Paradox

The Lone Wolf Paradox by M.J. Etkind
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book was super cozy and filled with your typical romance tropes, with a werewolf twist. Throw in talk of abortion, bisexual wolves, wolves born with incorrect human traits, and you’ve got yourself a nice update on the expected alpha wolf stuff.

Bea owns a farm and is a lone werewolf. She was married but made a decision to own her own happiness and struck out on her own. She has been struggling to make the farm profitable and her latest stop-gap measure is renting out the farmhouse while staying in the guest apartment. Lane has been a bit of a vagabond, but has massively stepped up for his niece and nephew while his sister is trying to find herself. His family is far from perfect, and living in the town he grew up in is not helping matters for the two young wolves. When they get kicked out of school, he makes the rather drastic decision to relocate and take a job in Bea’s town. Which means he also decides to rent her property, without even realizing the landlord is a wolf, too.

It was super fun watching these two dance around each other, navigate life with the twins, and generally grow as humans. Both really struggled to ask for help, no matter how hard life got. This romance was very cozy and satisfying. While I mentioned the topics up top, since it’s just part of the everyday life for them, it’s not treated as anything weird or worth fighting about. I enjoyed that element, too. We get a very satisfying HEA for everybody involved.

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Vagabond

Vagabond by Tim Curry
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

We listened to this audiobook on a long road trip. I’m a big fan of his, so this seemed like a definite win as far as content. While I learned a bit about him, he does make a big point of saying that he wasn’t going to talk about any relationships he had, and I think this ends up making it feel a little bit less in-depth than other autobiographies I’ve read. For someone so very much responsible for a lot of gender questioning/destroying gender norms, it feels like that doesn’t get enough air time. I also acknowledge that he is obviously not in perfect health, so perhaps he chose his focus areas to be less provocative and more of a documentation of his life. Either way, that’s why I would say this did not quite get the max rating from me that I would typically give a good autobiography.

Now, the content is really interesting - his life, how he ended up acting, signing, performing - and his family dynamic, upbringing, adventures. He addresses his health issues and it is very difficult at times to listen to him narrating - the struggle is very apparent. I ended up finishing this one with a bit of a sigh of relief because I struggled along with him at times. If you’re a fan of his work, you should obviously read this, but I don’t think I learned as much as I expected to.

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Witchy Sour

Witchy Sour by Gina LaManna
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m starting to sense a theme here - Lily keeps diving straight into trouble and/or kidnapping. This book, however, really raised the stakes and also built out the world of the isle.

So, for her first week on the isle, Lily managed to get herself into quite a bit of trouble. Now that she’s the official Mixologist, she is splitting her time between study and actually serving customers. Gus is still grumpy, but in this book we also get a bit more background on him but not all of it good. We also get introduced to a new secret society or two. One is a small group that is fighting against the Faction (the one that wants to have magical rule humans) and the other is some sort of Hogwarts-like wizard academy where they wear robes and colored ribbons indicating their proficiency in magic. One such robed person starts this book by asking for the Elixir, a potion that kills you, which sets off a number of wibly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff.

As far as the good stuff, Lily and X continue to grow closer, even going on a “non-date.” Her cousins continue to be in various sorts of trouble - Poppy is running out of her vampire potions which require a difficult to find ingredient and Zin is still determined to be the first female ranger. Both things get wrapped up in a nice way with only a little bit of hand waving (it just so happens Lily meets a new person on the isle who can procure hard to find ingredients). All in all, while Lily once again gets battered and bruised, this was a really great second book in this series.

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Hex on the Beach

Hex on the Beach by Gina LaManna
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m on a mission to read all of these intertwined stories from this author. While I have gotten a glimpse of this world through the side quests of other series, it is nice to fill in the blanks here.

Lily is a workaholic at a marketing job when magic ends up disrupting her career ladder climbing goals. One truly terrible presentation ends up with her fired and at her local bar, the only place where she gets to be creative in the form of mixology. It’s here that her long lost aunts find her and drag her (mostly) to the isle. It’s a magically hidden oasis filled with all manner of magic user. It turns out that her mom was the previous “mixologist” and now it is Lily’s turn to fill this role.

I really enjoyed getting to know everyone, learn about the magical quirks of this world, and see a budding relationship start between X and Lily. There is a mystery and some pretty high stakes, but overall this was a relaxing paranormal read with a little hint of slow burn romance to come.

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Crown of War and Shadow

Crown of War and Shadow by J.R. Ward
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I usually have a rule about not reading books with the same title structure as ACOTAR, but made an exception here because of the author. I’ve read about a thousand BDB books and have only been let down once on a spinoff. I rolled the dice and though this deviates from my typical focus (contemporary paranormal romance) it had enough mystery, sizzle, and interesting world-building to rope me in for more.

Sorrel is an outcast - she treats women with herbs and her own brand of life-saving magic, but is shunned by the same people who have benefited from said magic. She was taken in by a tavern owner, but it is a tenuous relationship at best. She only has one true friend in town and she is also an outcast of sorts. When the town’s hatred of magic comes to a head one night, it is the most unlikely of companions that ends up partnering up with her to help her escape. Sure, she promises to pay him in a manner of speaking, but they are still on a very treacherous adventure together.

“Merc” as she calls him because he won’t share his real name, has some incorrect assumptions about her from the start but they truly build a relationship through their various trials. It all leads to a rather shocking reveal and then follows up with an even more shocking reveal. I was caught off guard by both, and that says a lot. I won’t spoil anything, but this book ends on a sort-of cliffhanger, in that we are fresh off yet another reveal and who knows where this will take everyone in the next book.

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Dark Alpha’s Lover

Dark Alpha's Lover by Donna Grant
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I have read a lot of Donna Grant books, but have managed to miss a few along the way. I have read ahead, so I know how a few of the larger storylines end up playing out, but it was still nice to fill in some gaps in my Reaper backstory knowledge.

The stars of this book are Cat & Fintan. Cat is a halfling (half fae, half human) from a very powerful line of magic users. She, however, is the “dud” of the bunch. Her entire life she’s watched her family wield magic like it was nothing while she never presented any signs of being magical at all. When some big fae stuff happened in books previous to this one, her entire family was killed except her and her grandfather. She protects him but has accepted the fact that she may join her family or be ignored due to her lack of skills.

Fintan is a Reaper, and like all of his kind, he has a bit of emotional baggage around betrayal. He is obsessed with Cat upon first seeing her, but obviously ignores his feelings until they grow to unmanageable proportions. He takes up watch at first, curious why fae are so interested in her, but soon discovers she may have caught the big bad’s attention. Things take a few twists and turns, showing that Cat is both stronger and more powerful than anyone imagined (except, annoyingly, the big bad). I liked this one, showing Cat as less a damsel in distress and more of a power to be reckoned with. We still go through the standards misunderstanding, martyr motions, but it gets tied up nicely at the end.

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