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3.65 AVERAGE
3.65 AVERAGE
Also available on my blog: http://neverkissandblog.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/review-knight-awakened.html
I love Coreene Callahan’s Dragonfury series, love love, love it. I enjoy the way that the characters are all smart like normal people. Everytime I expect the heroine or hero to do something absolutely stupid to move the plot forward…. they don’t and it’s such a relief. Knight Awakened, book one of the Circle of Seven series however I wasn’t sure about. It appeared to be a straight historical set in medieval Transylvania. But it isn’t it’s a paranormal historical.
Afina Lazar is the High Priestess, in hiding from Vladimir Barbu who needs her to approve him as the rightful ruler to get access to the coffers and throne. Afina can’t and won’t do that because he isn’t the rightful ruler.
Xavian Ramir is a former assassin and tracking Afina for Vladimir when he realises that the baby she’s looking after is a former comrade of his. Unable to betray the last request that was made to take care of the child Xavian kidnaps them both to take back to his castle, in order to keep them safe from Vladimir.
This definitely skews toward the paranormal side of a paranormal historical. Not that I’m complaining, I enjoyed it immensely. There are assassins, dragon-shifters, goddesses and all sorts of fun. Despite the medieval-ish time period it’s really feels like a lot fun, and the magic sort fits with the setting in a way I liked.
I thought the subplot about Bianca not being Afina’s biological child and Bianca and Bogdan were sadly not really dealt with. I mean Xavian does find out that Afina’s a virgin and so obviously not Bianca’s mother, which makes him flip out over the “lies”, but the connection of Bogdan and even the question of who is the mother never gets mentioned.
Some of the background elements weren’t prominent enough, like the Al Pacii’s assassin trainer and leader Halál, who acts in a way that moves the plot forward but doesn’t really do anything but sit around being evil. Shay is interesting and I look forward to learning more about him. I am really interested in Henrik, why does he also have the goddess’ mark, is he meant to be the High Priest? Does it mean anything? I like Xavian and Afina, they were actually really sweet together and the way they stumbled into the love that they shared was really endearing.
In summary, it wasn’t as strong as the Dragonfury series, but it was still excellent and I look forward to Knight Avenged.
I love Coreene Callahan’s Dragonfury series, love love, love it. I enjoy the way that the characters are all smart like normal people. Everytime I expect the heroine or hero to do something absolutely stupid to move the plot forward…. they don’t and it’s such a relief. Knight Awakened, book one of the Circle of Seven series however I wasn’t sure about. It appeared to be a straight historical set in medieval Transylvania. But it isn’t it’s a paranormal historical.
Afina Lazar is the High Priestess, in hiding from Vladimir Barbu who needs her to approve him as the rightful ruler to get access to the coffers and throne. Afina can’t and won’t do that because he isn’t the rightful ruler.
Xavian Ramir is a former assassin and tracking Afina for Vladimir when he realises that the baby she’s looking after is a former comrade of his. Unable to betray the last request that was made to take care of the child Xavian kidnaps them both to take back to his castle, in order to keep them safe from Vladimir.
This definitely skews toward the paranormal side of a paranormal historical. Not that I’m complaining, I enjoyed it immensely. There are assassins, dragon-shifters, goddesses and all sorts of fun. Despite the medieval-ish time period it’s really feels like a lot fun, and the magic sort fits with the setting in a way I liked.
I thought the subplot about Bianca not being Afina’s biological child and Bianca and Bogdan were sadly not really dealt with. I mean Xavian does find out that Afina’s a virgin and so obviously not Bianca’s mother, which makes him flip out over the “lies”, but the connection of Bogdan and even the question of who is the mother never gets mentioned.
Some of the background elements weren’t prominent enough, like the Al Pacii’s assassin trainer and leader Halál, who acts in a way that moves the plot forward but doesn’t really do anything but sit around being evil. Shay is interesting and I look forward to learning more about him. I am really interested in Henrik, why does he also have the goddess’ mark, is he meant to be the High Priest? Does it mean anything? I like Xavian and Afina, they were actually really sweet together and the way they stumbled into the love that they shared was really endearing.
In summary, it wasn’t as strong as the Dragonfury series, but it was still excellent and I look forward to Knight Avenged.
Lyrical Descriptions and Great Story
Mayhap it was one of the better fantasies I’ve read recently. Mayhap I will purchase the rest of the series, since the world and the characters sucked me in. Mayhap you’ll like it, too. Mayhap my overuse of mayhap has become annoying? Quite right, but it’s courtesy of Callahan’s overuse of the word that has driven me to this (not just spoken but in their thoughts, too). About a third of the way through, I’d been mayhap’d enough to last the rest of the month and spent the rest of the time thinking of easy ways Callahan could have avoided using the word. Fingers crossed her next novel won’t be so cursed.
And yet, I gave it 5 stars. Why? Because even with this foible, I loved the story, the world building, the characters. Coincidences *aren’t* since the Goddess is actively working in their lives (she visits them a few times).
One of the things I liked the most was the flawed characters. They’ve done some terrible things, but sadistic adults who should have taken care of them as children are the cause of most of their pain. And as the barbarism is revealed, you really aren’t surprised by anything but the fact that these children grew up and kept their goodness intact.
One of the main baddies gets his, but there’s still other villains to come and I look forward to seeing how our characters and the Goddess deal with the challenge. Mayhap they’ll mayhap them to death. Nah, that’s not what assassins do. They sharpen their knives and slide out of the shadows to take care of things. So much the better! No mayhap about it.
Be warned; this story does contain explicit content of both the violent, head-lopped-off and the steamy kind.
Mayhap it was one of the better fantasies I’ve read recently. Mayhap I will purchase the rest of the series, since the world and the characters sucked me in. Mayhap you’ll like it, too. Mayhap my overuse of mayhap has become annoying? Quite right, but it’s courtesy of Callahan’s overuse of the word that has driven me to this (not just spoken but in their thoughts, too). About a third of the way through, I’d been mayhap’d enough to last the rest of the month and spent the rest of the time thinking of easy ways Callahan could have avoided using the word. Fingers crossed her next novel won’t be so cursed.
And yet, I gave it 5 stars. Why? Because even with this foible, I loved the story, the world building, the characters. Coincidences *aren’t* since the Goddess is actively working in their lives (she visits them a few times).
One of the things I liked the most was the flawed characters. They’ve done some terrible things, but sadistic adults who should have taken care of them as children are the cause of most of their pain. And as the barbarism is revealed, you really aren’t surprised by anything but the fact that these children grew up and kept their goodness intact.
One of the main baddies gets his, but there’s still other villains to come and I look forward to seeing how our characters and the Goddess deal with the challenge. Mayhap they’ll mayhap them to death. Nah, that’s not what assassins do. They sharpen their knives and slide out of the shadows to take care of things. So much the better! No mayhap about it.
Be warned; this story does contain explicit content of both the violent, head-lopped-off and the steamy kind.
This is a start of another series by Coreene Callahan. It has a much more epic feel than her dragon fury books. It has a historical tinge to it, being set in the 14th century in Romania. Magic, adventure, dragons, and romance. Only vampires are missing, but you won't miss them.
I liked it, but there were moments where Xavian reminds me of Edward Cullen (and please realize that is not a compliment). Also, the dialogue seemed like it was British and this is supposed to take place in Transylvania. Maybe that's how they actually sounded back then, but it seemed odd.
This book was amazing. It took me to places I didn't even know exist, and I ship Xavian and Afina A LOT. So what happens in the book is that Vladimir needed Afina because he wants to be ruler of Translyvania...really, bro? Really? So he sent Xavian to get her and the child Sabine...but Xavian didn't mean to fall in love with her, take Afina's virginity, save her from slavers, try to protect her from dragons (which I got happy about...I mean DRAGONS people!!), oh and the original idea for Afina was to make her his healer at Drachaven, but then he fell in love and now she's the Lady of Drachaven.
Afina also met her brother Henrik, whom she thought he was dead, but he wasn't :) Also I loved the magic in this story and I really wanna read more from this book series now. I really do recommend this book because it's awesome and amazing and I did end up crying at some parts of the novel.
Afina also met her brother Henrik, whom she thought he was dead, but he wasn't :) Also I loved the magic in this story and I really wanna read more from this book series now. I really do recommend this book because it's awesome and amazing and I did end up crying at some parts of the novel.
2.5/3
TW: murder, death of family members (before events of book), torture, mention of rape, sexual assault, human trafficking/slavery, mention of sexual abuse, mention of past child abuse (both by a parent and adult), animal death
I think I saw this recommended by Katee Robert who's books I love. Won't lie, it was the promise of smut that had me picking this up more than anything and I kept reading mostly because of that and it gave me something to do.
The plot was okay. Magic not really that explained or fleshed out but what are you gonna do. The whole "tearing her barrier" thing will never not annoy me. Virginity is a construct. The hymen doesn't tear when there is penetration, whether that's from a penis, a finger, a sex toy, or whatever. This whole being a virgin is considered pure schtick can also sod off. Don't need it, don't want it, don't care for it.
Even though this had it's problems, I'm interested enough in Henrick's book to read it. That and it's free to read on kindle unlimited and I want to get my free trial's worth.
TW: murder, death of family members (before events of book), torture, mention of rape, sexual assault, human trafficking/slavery, mention of sexual abuse, mention of past child abuse (both by a parent and adult), animal death
I think I saw this recommended by Katee Robert who's books I love. Won't lie, it was the promise of smut that had me picking this up more than anything and I kept reading mostly because of that and it gave me something to do.
The plot was okay. Magic not really that explained or fleshed out but what are you gonna do. The whole "tearing her barrier" thing will never not annoy me. Virginity is a construct. The hymen doesn't tear when there is penetration, whether that's from a penis, a finger, a sex toy, or whatever. This whole being a virgin is considered pure schtick can also sod off. Don't need it, don't want it, don't care for it.
Even though this had it's problems, I'm interested enough in Henrick's book to read it. That and it's free to read on kindle unlimited and I want to get my free trial's worth.