A review by katskinner
Shattered Illusions by Laura Greenwood

4.0

It’s not hard being the best hunter around… until being that good gets you on their radar. Then life gets interesting.

THE BLURB

Ashryn Barker is one of the best vampire hunters around. Raised within the Guild, hunting and killing vampires is her life. Until one fateful mission out to an abandoned house, without backup, to take out a nest of vampires. Everything she’s ever known about vampires is about to be shattered.

TONE OF THE BOOK

Shattered Illusions is quite light-hearted; there is plenty of humour throughout.

SENSITIVE TOPICS

This novel is aimed at young adults. The most sexual thing that occurs is kissing and a few lustful thoughts.

The novel has has limited gore but there is significant action with plenty of scenes of character’s sneaking through buildings, getting into sword fights and more.

The focus of the novel is on adventure. There is brief topics of murder.

SERIES SYNOPSIS

Shattered Illusions is the first novel in the Ashryn Barker series.

The novel is 126 pages long, making it a novella compared to a standard romance novel length (of 300 pages average).

Each novel in the series follows a different group of characters, so far in the series all between human women and alien men.

REVIEW

There is definite adventure feeling within Shattered Illusions, with much of the novel focused on meeting other characters or getting caught up in action. The tension seemed to slow down in the middle of the novel but picks up shortly after.

The world building that Laura’s established within the novel is both unique and solid. You will certainly believe that not all is as it seems at face value, and be left wondering what crazy adventure Ashryn will get involved in next.

Laura Greenwood’s has a wonderfully fun approach to writing. The novel is filled with humour and puns that will leave you chuckling. The heroine Ashryn has a quirky personality and inner dialogue that is refreshing to read, especially since so many romance novels can lean towards drama and heavy topics.

It’s like they want to be stereotypical. Nothing says vampire hunter like wearing stake holsters or carrying around holy water. And yes, I have to do that too.

My only caveat with this novel was it’s length. I would have loved to see some more world building within this novella, pushing it’s length a bit longer.

FINAL WORD

I enjoyed Shattered Illusions. It’s a very quick read, with three seperate novellas making a full length novel. I loved the humour and puns throughout, making it a light-hearted read.