#Review - A Killer's Code by Isabella Maldonado #Mystery #Thriller

Series: Daniela Vega # 3
Format: Paperback, 348 pages
Release Date: January 21, 2025
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Source: Publisher
Genre: Mystery / Thriller

A dead man’s riddles—and secrets—thrust an FBI codebreaker into a deadly cross-country race for justice in a propulsive thriller by the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Cipher.

During a recent undercover sting gone bad, hit man Gustavo Toro died in the arms of FBI Special Agent Daniela “Dani” Vega. But Toro had secrets he refused to take to the grave.

In the event of his death, Toro left behind a video that promises to expose a mysterious mastermind who has been operating with impunity for decades. But there’s a catch. Dani’s team must follow Toro’s cryptic clues on a cross-country hunt for justice, and piecing together his past is more twisted than Dani could have imagined.

But as Dani and her team race to gather the evidence, it’s clear this powerful adversary will stop at nothing to keep their secrets—including eliminating those who threaten to reveal them.

A Killer's Code is the third installment in author Isabella Maldonado's Daniel Vega series. During a recent undercover operation, hitman Gustavo Toro died in the arms of FBI agent and former military codebreaker Daniela “Dani” Vega, who had been on pins and needles waiting for the end of her career after she went rogue. Toro sends a video to FBI Director Franklin. In the video, Toro sets out – in the form of a puzzle – the whereabouts of hidden information that will lead to the identity of a man responsible for serious crimes that have been ongoing for decades. 

As Vega, Special Agent in Charge Steve Wu, analyst Sanjeev Patel, and NYPD Detective Flint traverse the country following Toro’s coded clues, they start to piece together his past. Vega and their team must interpret clues, leading them to another place and further interpretive challenges until they find what they’ve been looking for. As an added incentive, they discover that lives are at stake and that their time to complete the task is severely limited. As a former US Army Ranger, Dani's elite military training in pattern recognition, crypto analysis, and counterintelligence are key to solving the case. 

This story alternates between a bunch of players like Dani and Toro in the past and Wu and includes the villains. Villains who seem to be killing off key players who may have important information that could be worth billions. This leads Vega and her team to find Dr. Tina Castillo, who disappeared around the same time Toro died. It’s a wild goose chase back and forth across the country following the clues and every lead they follow almost gets them killed. Someone else is following the same leads and beating Dani and the team and doesn't care if they are federal agents.

It would behoove you to ensure you are taking notes or are very good at keeping things in your memories. The main reason I continue to read this series is the background of the author. Isabella Maldonado wore a gun and badge in real life before turning to crime writing. A graduate of the FBI National Academy in Quantico and the first Latina to attain the rank of captain in her police department, she retired as the Commander of Special Investigations and Forensics. Over two decades on the force, her assignments included hostage negotiator, department spokesperson, and precinct commander. She uses her law enforcement background to bring a realistic edge to her writing. Maldonado loves her trilogies, and this is probably the end of the Dani Vega series. 

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#Review - A Sea of Unspoken Things by Adrienne Young #Mystery #Thriller

Series: Standalone
Format: Hardcover, 288 pages
Release Date: January 7, 2025
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Source: Publisher
Genre: Mystery / Thriller

James and Johnny Golden were once inseparable. For as long as she can remember, James shared an almost supernatural connection with her twin brother, Johnny, that went beyond intuition—she could feel what he was feeling. So, when Johnny is killed in a tragic accident, James knows before her phone even rings that her brother is gone and that she’s alone—truly alone—for the first time in her life.

When James arrives in the secluded town of Six Rivers, California, to settle her brother’s affairs, she’s forced to revisit the ominous events of their shared past and finally face Micah, the only other person who knows their secrets—and the only man she has ever loved.

But as James delves deeper into Johnny’s world, she realizes that their unique connection hasn’t completely vanished. The more she immerses herself in his life, the more questions she has about the brother she thought she knew. Johnny was hiding something, and he’s not the only one. The deeper she digs, the more she is compelled to unravel the truth behind the days leading up to Johnny’s death. Ultimately, James must decide which truths should come to light, and which are better left buried forever.

A Sea of Unspoken Things, by author Adrienne Young, is the story of a woman who investigates her twin brother's mysterious death while confronting the ghosts of her own haunted past. James and Johnny Golden were once inseparable. For as long as she can remember, James (a 37 year old female) shared an almost supernatural connection with her twin brother, Johnny, that went beyond intuition—she could feel what he was feeling. 

So, when Johnny is killed in a tragic accident, James knows before her phone even rings that her brother is gone and that she’s alone—truly alone—for the first time in her life. After 20 years away, James Golden returns to Hawthorne, a remote town nestled within Six Rivers National Forest, to settle the affairs of her twin brother, Johnny. His death has been labeled a hunting accident—a stray bullet—but the story doesn’t sit right. 

Johnny’s camera and notebooks, essential to his work documenting rare owls in the forest, are missing. When James arrives in the secluded town of Six Rivers, California, to settle her brother’s affairs, she’s forced to revisit the ominous events of their shared past and finally face Micah, the only other person who knows their secrets—and the only man she has ever loved. But as James delves deeper into Johnny’s world, she realizes that their unique connection hasn’t completely vanished. 

The more she immerses herself in his life, the more questions she has about the brother she thought she knew. Johnny was hiding something, and he was not the only one. The deeper she digs, the more she is compelled to unravel the truth behind the days leading up to Johnny’s death. Ultimately, James must decide which truths should come to light, and which are better left buried forever. As she asks uncomfortable questions around town and follows Johnny’s trail through the forest, she starts to suspect his death is tied to that long-buried tragedy. 

And yet, the closer she gets to the truth, the more she becomes part of the same story, unsure of whom she can trust. Even Johnny’s ghost seems to be nudging her toward answers she’s not certain she wants to find. James has always balanced Johnny’s darkness. Was Johnny involved in something that got him killed? Whenever Johnny created chaos, James was always there to clean up the mess and take the blame. This has been their dynamic since a tragic event drove James to leave town to pursue her artistic talents, never looking back. Was Johnny involved in something that got him killed, or was he killed to hide yet another secret that the town doesn't want to be uncovered?

Overall, this book requires a bit of patience. It takes time to move forward, and once it does, you begin to ask questions as to who is trustworthy and who is likely a murderer. Also, there are actually two mysteries in this book that you need to pay attention to. I will say that I think the ending was fitting after all that James and Micah go through in this book. 

One

We were made in the dark. I used to hate it when Johnny said that, but now I know it’s true.

Sunlight flickered on the windshield as I turned the wheel and the road curved, tightening. Trees pressed in like a wall on both sides of the cracked asphalt, making the old highway that snaked through the Six Rivers National Forest look impossibly narrower. I could feel that cinching in my lungs, too, the air squeezing from them just a little more the deeper into the forest I drove. I’d expected that.

From above, the little blue car would look like an insect between the giant, towering redwoods, and even just imagining it made me uneasy. I’d never liked the feeling that I couldn’t see into the distance, like the whole world might have ended on the other side of those trees and I wouldn’t know it. I guess, really, it had.

There was no world without Johnny.

The thought made the ache rising in my throat travel down my arms, into the fingers that curled around the smooth leather of the steering wheel. It had been three and a half months since I got the call that my brother was gone, but I’d known at least a day before that. The part of me that wasn’t constructed of bone and blood had just . . . known. Maybe even down to the minute.

I glanced at the duffel bag on the passenger seat, the only luggage I’d brought for the two weeks I’d be in Six Rivers. I couldn’t remember now what I’d even packed. In fact, I hadn’t even been able to think of what I might need. In the twenty years since I’d seen the tiny, claustrophobic logging town, I’d done my best to forget it. I’d avoided these winding mountain roads, using every excuse I could think of to keep from coming back to this place. But there was no denying that leaving Six Rivers and never looking back had come at a cost.

Only days after I turned eighteen, I left and never returned. I’d spent my youth hidden in the labyrinth-like forest before I’d all but clawed my way out into the light. Now, my life in San Francisco was exactly what I’d made it, as if I’d painted it onto a canvas and conjured it to life. The days that made up that version of me were filled with gallery openings, poetry readings, and cocktail hours—things that made me forget the sun-starved, evergreen-scented life I’d left behind.

But that cost—the unexpected conditions for that disentanglement—wasn’t just the home I knew or the memories I’d made there. In the end, the price I’d paid had been giving up Johnny. There was a time when I thought we could never truly be separated, because we weren’t just siblings. We were twins. For half of my life, there was nowhere I existed without him, and it didn’t feel like we were knit together by only blood and genetics. We were connected in places that no one could see, in ways that I still didn’t understand.

There had always been a kind of blur that existed between us. The anecdotal stories about twins portrayed on viral social media posts and afternoon talk shows weren’t just entertaining tales that skirted the line of the supernatural. For me, they’d always been real. Sometimes, terrifyingly so.

It wasn’t until I left that I felt some semblance of separation from Johnny. In a way, it felt like he had slowly been scraped from the cracks of my life, just like Six Rivers. In the beginning, he would make the trip down to the city on visits that were hardly ever planned. I would come home to find him cooking in my kitchen or standing fully clothed in the shower with a wrench to tighten the dripping faucet. He would just appear out of nowhere before vanishing like a ghost, and he never stayed long. He was a creature of quiet, unnerved by the buzz of the city and the twinkling lights it cast on the bay. The visits became less and less frequent, and he hadn’t shown up like that in years now.

Johnny wasn’t one for phone calls or emails. Half the time, he didn’t even respond to text messages. So, my only window into his quiet life in Northern California was the Instagram account he kept updated. From 349 miles away, the bits I got to see of my brother’s existence in the redwoods were through the lens of the old analog camera we’d found sitting on top of a neighbor’s garbage can when we were six-teen years old. Twenty years later, he had still refused to switch to digital, and after he started the Instagram account, it soon became filled with those little bits of the world that only Johnny seemed to notice. Sunlight gleaming on dewdrops. A swath of lace-like frost clinging to a pane of glass. The owls.

Always, the owls.

Even when we were kids, I knew that Johnny was different. He’d always found comfort in places that most deemed lonely, disappearing for hours without a word, and I would feel him go quiet. That stillness would settle right between my ribs, and when I couldn’t stand it anymore, I’d go and find him lying on the hot roof of our cabin or tangled high in the branches of a sixty-foot tree. He’d been pulling away from the world for as long as I could remember, but when the photographs of the owls started popping up on his feed, I remember the cold sensation that filled me. He was drawn to them—the secretive creatures that only came out in the darkness. And deep down I knew that it was because he was one of them.

If you’d have told me when we were kids that Johnny would end up a photographer, I probably would have thought it was both surprising and not at all. Growing up, I was the artist. My hands itched for pencils and paintbrushes the way Johnny’s mind itched for the quiet. In the end, both Johnny and I wound up trying to capture moments and people and places. Me with my canvas, him with his camera. But eventually, the drawings that filled my notebooks felt like the blueprints of a prison—a way for me to plan my escape. And eventually, I did.

Johnny had spent the last two years working remotely for a conservation project documenting five different owls in and around Six Rivers National Forest. The opportunity had seemed so serendipitous that I should have known there was something wrong with it. Johnny had never been lucky. Stars didn’t align for him and opportunities didn’t just drop into his lap. So, when I heard that Quinn Fraser, director of biology at California Academy of Sciences, was looking for someone to cover the Six Rivers area, it should have felt off. But only two weeks after I’d sent Johnny’s work to Quinn, Johnny was hired.

I hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that in a way, that made all of this my fault. The project was the first job Johnny ever had that wasn’t logging, and at the time I’d thought that maybe, finally, it would be the thing that got him out of Six Rivers. But only weeks away from the study’s end, Johnny was out on a shoot in Trentham Gorge when a rogue bullet from a hunter’s gun slammed into his chest.

My fingers slipped from the steering wheel, instinctively finding the place two and a half inches below my collarbone, where I could still feel it. I rubbed at the phantom ache, pressing the heel of my hand there until the throb began to recede.

The image unfurled, replacing the view of the forest outside the windshield. In my mind’s eye, tree limbs bent and swayed, creating blurred shapes of light that punched through the forest canopy high above—a flashing glimpse of the last thing Johnny had seen as he lay there on the forest floor. The rendering had been cast across my mind on a loop, making the connection between me and my brother more than just a sense or a feeling. Now, it was something that felt tangible and tactile. Now, it was too real.

Accidental firearm deaths weren’t unheard of in the wilderness that surrounded Six Rivers, especially during the elk season that brought hunters from all over the country to town. I could remember more than one that happened when me and Johnny were kids. But I also knew that accidents didn’t happen in that forest. Not really. There was almost nothing that was random or by chance because the place was alive—intentional.

It was that feeling that had compelled me to pack my bag and drive to Six Rivers. It had rooted down into my gut, twisting so tightly that it made it almost impossible to breathe. Because the link between me and Johnny wasn’t just intuition or some cosmic connection. I’d felt the white-hot heat of that bullet pierce between my ribs. I’d seen the forest canopy swaying in the wind. I’d also felt that bone-deep sense that had been coursing through Johnny’s veins. That despite what the investigation had uncovered about what Johnny was doing out in the gorge that day, he wasn’t alone. More than that, he was afraid.

I returned my hand to the steering wheel, watching the blur of emerald green fly past the window. I’d grown up feeling like the trees had eyes, each tangle of roots like a brain that held memories. I could feel, even now, that they remembered me.

I read once, years after I left, that they could actually speak to one another. That they had the ability to communicate through the network of fungi in the ground over miles and miles of forest. And I believed it. They knew what happened the day my brother died. They’d watched as he grew cold, his blood soaking the earth. And that wasn’t all they knew.

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#Review - The Courting of Bristol Keats by Mary E. Pearson #Fantasy #Romance

Series: The Courting of Bristol Keats (#1)
Format: Hardcover, 560 pages
Release Date: November 12, 2024
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Source: Library
Genre: Fantasy / Romance

After losing their parents, Bristol Keats and her sisters struggle to stay afloat in their small, quiet town of Bowskeep. When Bristol begins to receive letters from an “aunt” she’s never heard of who promises she can help, she reluctantly agrees to meet—and discovers that everything she thought she knew about her family is a lie. Even her father might still be alive, not killed but kidnapped by terrifying creatures to a whole other realm—the one he is from.

Desperate to save her father and find the truth, Bristol journeys to a land of gods and fae and monsters. Pulled into a dangerous world of magic and intrigue, she makes a deadly bargain with the fae king, Tyghan. But what she doesn't know is that he's the one who drove her parents to live a life on the run. And he is just as determined as she is to find her father—dead or alive.

The Courting of Bristol Keats is the first installment in author Mary E. Pearson's The Courting of Bristol Keats series. There are multiple POV chapters, not just the FMC and MMC but also other side characters which gives readers more depth to figure out what is happening. After losing their parents, Bristol Keats and her sisters Harper & Cat struggle to stay afloat in their small, quiet town of Bowskeep. After receiving mysterious letters, she meets with a supposed aunt named Jasmine and subsequently agrees to go to the world of Elfhame. 

She makes a bargain with the fae king Tyghan - she will attempt to seal a portal in exchange for his help finding her father, who may not be dead. Tyghan is days away from a major event where a new leader will be crowned. He is also desperate to find a way to rescue his brother, who has been taken by a dangerous Fomorian King. Bristol's journey to a land of gods, fae, and monsters is eye-opening. She's pulled into a dangerous world of magic and intrigue, and she makes a deadly bargain with the fae king, Tyghan to find and close certain portals. 

Bristol doesn't understand what happened to her parents, or why they were forced to live on the run. Meanwhile, Tyghan is just as determined as she is to find her father—dead or alive since they were once best friends. What if what your parents told you was a lie to hide the actual truth about what really happened? What if your parents went on the run because they fell in love, and ran away to prevent them from being caught by powerful forces? What if you suddenly realized that everything you've known for the past year has been lie after lie, and you are not who you thought you were?  

Bristol also starts changing—to the point where she has magic and friends. While she works to discover the depths of her own magic, she discovers that even her sisters have been keeping secrets. If her father is still alive, not killed but kidnapped by terrifying creatures to a whole other realm—the one he is from—then Bristol needs to leave her world behind and enter a much darker and more dangerous one. While Bristol discovers a new path and fate, she and Tyghan grow closer. But can the lies and the truth keep them from becoming enemies?

This book is full of secrets and betrayal and fae and gods and shifters. It's got hidden identities and enemies to lovers that try so hard not to fall for each other. I don’t enjoy the miscommunication trope, but characters deliberately withholding information is worse by far. So much of this plot hinges on key people in the FMC’s life, including her own sisters, withholding important information from her. This book ends on a cliffhanger. I think I will end up finishing this series just to see if Bristol gets the ending she thinks she deserves. 

CHAPTER 1


At the end of Oak Leaf Lane, dawn arrived fifteen minutes early. Most folks didn’t notice, as they rarely did about such things, but eagerness circled the air like a hungry buzzard, watching and waiting. Wild grass shivered; droplets of dew danced to the ground. The earth trembled as low whispers tumbled over hummocks, making geese startle into the sky. Something was about to happen.

But Bristol Keats slept soundly, oblivious to the long-fingered light prying its way through her drapes at such an early hour. Nothing could wrestle her from her bed but a good night’s rest. Drool dampened her pillow, and her arm hung limply over the side of the bed. She had worked late. Her tips lay in a satisfied heap on her nightstand, a ruffled monument to her determination.

Finally, midmorning, she stirred, groaning, then rose from her rumpled bed and shook herself into her jeans. As busy as Friday nights were, festival days were busier, which was a good thing for Bristol. The late notices were stacking up. At the top of the pile lay the electric bill—forty days past due, and shutoff was imminent. Bristol’s tips that day, combined with those from the past week, would take care of that one and leave a little extra for groceries.

With sleep still in her eyes, she sniffed her hair for the oily scent of the parlor, then swiped it into a quick messy ponytail, unaware that the day would be anything but ordinary. It wasn’t something you could see, but as she splashed her face with water, then brushed her teeth, her head turned slightly to the side, a strange velvety warmth filling the air, though it was only a vague sense that she couldn’t name. She didn’t even realize she leaned into it, like a cat arching its back against a doorway.

A doorway. Yes. That is what she leaned into.

But she didn’t know it yet.

* * *

Bristol whisked back her drapes and shielded her eyes from a sun that already glared over the trees, too eager to remind her of the day. It had been one year since she returned home. For her, it seemed far longer. A lifetime was packed into the past weeks and months. The year bulged like an overstuffed suitcase that couldn’t be shut.

Home. Even now, it was a hesitant word on her lips, foreign and new, a word she toyed with in fits and starts. A word she was afraid to love. Run. Move on. Those were the words ingrained in her like dirt beneath her nails.

She turned from the window and riffled through a basket of clean laundry on the floor, pulling out a black tank top, then slipped it on. Her figure smoothed out the wrinkles.

“Bri!”

Harper’s voice bellowed up the narrow stairway like she was a six-foot bouncer instead of a skinny fourteen-year-old still waiting for a growth spurt. What Bristol’s little sister lacked in stature, she made up for in volume.

“I’m up,” Bristol called back, getting down on her belly to search for a missing shoe under her bed. She was certain she’d kicked them both off beside the bedpost last night, but it was late, and she had been exhausted.

“Bri!”

She paused from her shoe search. That wasn’t her sister’s usual wake-up call. Maybe a spider in the kitchen sink? Besides paying the bills and mowing the front yard weeds when she had time, Bristol was the designated spider retriever. Or maybe, worse than a rogue spider, another pipe had busted? Damned old house. Bristol rested her forehead on her fist for a moment, willing it not to be that. The balance in her head tipped and swayed, waiting for disaster to fall. They couldn’t afford another plumbing bill.

Rushed footsteps pounded up the stairs and Bristol stood, bracing herself as her bedroom door flew open. Harper’s cheeks glowed with a deep rosy hue, and her glasses hung crooked on her nose. Bristol’s stomach squeezed at how young she seemed, how urgent everything was to her. There were seven years between them, but they may as well have been a century.

Harper held a letter in her hand. “We got another one!”

Bristol pulled Harper into her room and closed the door. “Is Cat gone?”

Harper nodded and Bristol eased out a sigh. At least something was going right. She didn’t want Cat going into another tailspin over a simple letter. Technically, Cat was older than Bristol by ten months, but strangers usually guessed Bristol was the older of the two. Something about her reserved demeanor. Bristol was admittedly more calculating, weighing options before revealing her moves, while Cat was reactive. She felt everything passionately and didn’t hold back. Bristol loved that about her sister, her passion, except it also made her rants long and passionate, and she had no time for a high-pitched tirade today. Cat’s last rant came with tears when Bristol said she planned to drop her classes and search for a full-time job. Cat went on for a full hour. Are you crazy? Daddy paid good hard cash for those classes. He’d want you to see it through. Cat always knew the buttons to push, and their father was one of those buttons.

Bristol took the envelope from Harper, shrugging to prove her disinterest, and casually flipped it back and forth like it was junk mail. She did a lot of things for Harper’s sake these days. When it was too obvious, Harper’s jaw would jut out and she’d say, You’re not my mother. And then Bristol would snort, and they’d both laugh at the absurdity of it all, laughter its own strange release from their reality.

At least Harper had brought the letter to Bristol instead of Cat, who thought the letters were worse than junk mail and had squeaked like an injured mouse at the previous two. She proclaimed them a scam and ordered them burned. Bristol suggested the garbage would suffice.

“Aren’t you going to open it?” Harper asked.

Bristol rubbed her thumb over the smooth vellum envelope. It was the same expensive stationery as before and, again, no return address, but the handwriting was different from the previous two letters. This time it was heavy and bold, as if to say, Pay attention! It had the same red wax seal as the others—another pay-attention gimmick. In her years traveling the fair circuit, witnessing spinning wheels and last-chance deals, Bristol had seen them all. Still, she opened it, the wax cracking and falling to the floor. She rolled her eyes as she pulled the letter free, additional proof for Harper that it was only a transparent scheme that wasn’t fooling her at all, but inside, her heart sped up. A third letter. They aren’t giving up.

Her parents’ instinct to run that had governed her entire life kicked against her ribs like a last warning from them. Harper pressed close, reading the letter too.

Dearest Bristol Keats,

Your great-aunt Jasmine is sorry you were unable to accept her previous offer to meet for tea. She offers another invitation, but this time at a location closer to you, the Willoughby Inn on Skycrest Lane just outside of Bowskeep. Please come and meet with her at 4 o’clock today in the tearoom. She has many warm memories of your father she wishes to share with you, as well as a gift—a rare piece of art that might help you and your sisters, similar to the art your father acquired not long ago. Please come alone. Your aunt’s health is fragile, and she shuns crowds.

Sincerely,

Eris Dukinnon, Counselor DN

Whoever wrote the letter was certainly trying harder. Dearest? They knew nothing about her father either. He didn’t have an aunt. He didn’t have so much as a scrap of a relative anywhere on the planet. He was abandoned as a toddler and grew up in foster care, bouncing from one home to another. A social worker gave him his name. Logan. There were no “warm” memories for any fictitious aunt to share.

But the offer of rare art was a new angle, one that hit closer to home. A chill tickled Bristol’s spine. They were digging, finding things out about the Keats family.

Harper nudged closer. “Do you think it’s possible—”

“No,” Bristol said, too harshly, and hoped Harper didn’t notice. A single sharp word from her could instill all kinds of worry in Harper. “No,” she said again, this time with practiced boredom, reluctant to meet her sister’s gaze. A disappointed breath hissed through Harper’s teeth. She was the brainiest of the sisters, her nose always in a book, but she was also the most softhearted and hopeful of the three. She still believed in happy endings, and, some days, that terrified Bristol. It wasn’t something Bristol could deliver. Harper took after their father in almost every way, from his warm brown skin to his straight black hair. She also had his big dark eyes rimmed with thick lashes that could disarm anyone. Their mother had been fond of saying that his eyes cast a spell over her from the day they met. Harper’s eyes had a different kind of power over Bristol—they made her wish she could set everything right for her, that she could undo all the wounds of the last year.

Secretly she shared Harper’s curiosity. Didn’t everyone wonder about who and where they came from? It was a question that never went away. Their father’s origins were a mystery. Ever since Bristol could remember, she and her sisters had ventured every possible guess. But his answer had always been the same: I don’t know. Her mother’s past was just as enigmatic, but unlike Bristol’s father, she simply refused to talk about her family other than to say they were rotten. If pressed about what rotten meant, she left the room. Something about it was too painful for her to discuss, and their father would shake his head, silently signaling the sisters to drop it.

But dropping the subject didn’t make the questions vanish. Even now, when she passed someone with warm brown skin and beautiful dark eyes like her father’s, she wondered, could they be a cousin or uncle? Likewise, when she passed someone with pale skin and shimmering copper hair like her mother’s, she wondered, could they be one of those rotten relatives?

Cat took after their mother, with the same green eyes and hair the color of a summer poppy—and then there was Bristol. With medium brown hair and height, she didn’t look like either of her parents.

Maybe that was why the ancestry question still poked at her. Even her eyes were a color somewhere between the two of them—hazel—a catchall name for a color that couldn’t decide what it was. Greenish? Brownish? Goldish? It was as annoyingly noncommittal as her parents were about their pasts.

Instead of fading away as memories should, her parents’ origins pricked her thoughts more often these days. Maybe it was the psych course she was taking at Bowskeep Community. Something her professor said burrowed into her head, and she couldn’t shake it out again: Our past is a shadow that follows us. For better or worse, it shapes us, and sometimes it controls us.

That was what it was like. A shadow tracing her footsteps. Just when she pushed the past out of her mind, a shitty letter like the one in her hands would arrive, stirring up old questions again. Who were the faceless monsters that had made her parents run? Did she look like any of them?

“Bri?” Harper waited for her decision.

Bristol crumpled the letter into a ball and threw it onto her already overflowing trash can. It tumbled to the floor, and Angus, their ferret, scurried over to sniff and investigate. He loved to shred paper, and snuck out the door with it.

“It’s only a scam, just like the others,” she said, but Harper’s eyes still drilled into her, dark clouds heavy with questions. Bristol grabbed her hoodie from her bedpost. “Gotta run, Harp. Today’s going to be crazy. Sal will kill me if I’m late.” She rushed out the bedroom door.

“But they’re not asking for something,” Harper argued from the landing as Bristol hurried down the stairs. “They only want to give us something.”

“Something that comes with a catch,” Bristol called back.

A catch they couldn’t afford.

People who lied about who they really were always had an angle, something they were working that, in the end, would cost you more than you could afford. And the Keats sisters had already lost too much.


CHAPTER 2


A gust of air blistered across the floor, a thousand stinging nettles warming Eris’s skin. The counselor’s long silver hair billowed behind him, caught in the tempest. Seconds later, heavy boots echoed off mirror-smooth black floors.

Tyghan was back. He rounded the corner and met the counselor’s gaze.

The young man’s face was laced with a fine spray of blood and his black wind-tangled hair was caked with mud.

“It didn’t go well,” Eris ventured.

“Glad your observational skills remain sharp.” Tyghan continued down the hallway. “My suite.”

“After you’re cleaned up, we can—”

“Now.”

Eris followed without comment. He understood the stress the young man was under. He hadn’t seen him rest in months.

Once in his suite, Tyghan stripped, flinging his clothes to the floor, then walked into the shower basin. He cupped his hands, catching water streaming from the golden spout, and splashed his face but flinched when the water hit his back.

Eris eyed the swollen slashes across Tyghan’s shoulder. Blood trickled in rivulets down his muscled back and thighs. “Shall I summon a physician?”

Tyghan didn’t respond, only focused on removing the blood that spattered his face. “Two of ours are dead,” he finally said. “Or worse. We couldn’t retrieve the bodies.” He was methodical as he described the encounter that turned into an ambush. “Three months. That’s all we have left—”

“Three months is still—”

“Not enough.” Tyghan’s reply cut the air like a cleaver. “I’ve spent fourteen years in training. So have my officers. The rest of our ranks, at least five. Three months is laughable.”

Eris answered quietly. “It’s all we have. We’ll make it enough.”

Tyghan went back to scrubbing. “Any more responses to your inquiries?”

“A few. I’ve expanded my search. I have someone coming in from Paris, and another from Lon—”

“Paris? Dammit, Eris! There must be someone closer!”

“The meager skills we need have become distant and rare, through every fault of our own.” Eris knew it was not what Tyghan wanted to hear, but it was true.

Tyghan shoved his face back into the stream of steaming water. The marble basin swirled with dirt and blood. “Not rare enough, unfortunately.”

Unfortunately. It was an understatement of epic proportions. Eris understood his frustration, but it was more than today’s loss that seethed through him. Betrayal was a bitter wound that still held Tyghan captive, a wound Eris feared he would never recover from. He weighed his next words, unsure if it would be welcome news or not. “I’m meeting with another potential candidate today—if she shows up. She ignored my previous two letters, although I provided ample incentive.”

“If she’s too stupid to take advantage of a valuable gift, she’s useless to us. Search elsewhere.”

“Or it could be she is too clever.”

Tyghan turned. He wrapped a towel around his waist and dried his face with another, his hair still dripping onto his shoulders. “How so? You haven’t even met her.”

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#Review - Breath of the Dragon Shannon Lee & Fonda Lee #YA #Fantasy

Series: Breathmarked (#1)
Format: Hardcover, 352 pages
Release Date: January 7, 2025
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Source: Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Fantasy / Epic

A young warrior dreams of proving his worth in the elite Guardian Tournament, fighting not only for himself but the fate of everything he loves in the first novel in a sweeping YA fantasy duology based on characters and teachings created by Bruce Lee!

Sixteen-year-old Jun dreams of proving his worth as a warrior in the elite Guardian’s Tournament, held every six years to entrust the magical Scroll of Heaven to a new protector. Eager to prove his skills, Jun hopes that a win will restore his father’s pride—righting a horrible mistake that caused their banishment from his home, mother, and twin brother.

But Jun’s father strictly forbids him from participating. He believes there is no future in Jun honing his skills as a warrior, especially considering Jun is not breath-marked, born with a patch of dragon scales, and blessed with special abilities like his twin. Determined to be the next Guardian, Jun stows away in the wagon of Chang and his daughter, Ren, performers on their way to the capital where the tournament will take place. As Jun competes, he quickly realizes he may be fighting for not just a better life, but the country's fate and the very survival of everyone he cares about. 

Breath of the Dragon is the first installment in authors Shannon Lee, daughter of legendary Bruce Lee, and Fonda Lee's Breathmarked series. Inspired by ancient China, this secondary-world setting draws on Bruce Lee's teachings. Ten years ago, 6-year-old Jun made a terrible, boastful mistake when he was a child, one that forced him and his father into exile, while his mother and his incredibly blessed twin went on to a life of privilege. A war and wall soon created a permanent divide between Eastern and Western Longhan. 

Jun is now sixteen, an arrogant young martial artist determined to compete in the brutal championship to become the Guardian of the realm. Jun dreams of proving his worth as a warrior in the elite Guardian’s Tournament, held every six years to entrust the magical Scroll of Heaven to a new protector. Eager to prove his skills, Jun hopes that a win will restore his father’s pride—righting a horrible mistake that caused their banishment from his home, mother, and twin brother.

But Jun’s father strictly forbids him from participating. He believes there is no future in Jun honing his skills as a warrior, especially considering Jun is not breath-marked, born with a patch of dragon scales, and blessed with special abilities like his twin. Determined to be the next Guardian, Jun stows away in the wagon of Chang and his daughter, Ren, performers on their way to the capital where the tournament will take place. Little does he know that this year's tournament is not what he was expecting.

As Jun competes, he quickly realizes he may be fighting for not just a better life but the fate of the country and the very survival of everyone he cares about. Jun becomes aware of a rebellion against the current military leader (who controls the child emperor in the West). A fascist leader who changes the rules of the Challenges before they even begin, which sends many of the hopefuls home without a chance to fight. Jun and his former classmate Yin Yue fight for their lives with the winner likely to become the new guardian, while the losers face death. 

Jun is not breathmarked. He struggles to find a way to be important and carve out a place for himself without a special ability. In fact, every year since the East and West divided, there have been fewer breathmarked those born with a special power. Jun is irritating and definitely arrogant. Because of his arrogance, he doesn't seem to understand that everything he does has consequences. Consequences like having his twin brother excel while he and his father struggle. 

The best parts of this book were the fight scenes because I have always loved martial arts movies. I loved Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, and Jet Li. Heck, even Chuck Norris, David Carradine, and Jean-Claude Van Damme were good. The book ends on a stunning cliffhanger, and I hear the good news is that this is actually a duology, not a series, which means the next book should be capable of wrapping up things and giving answers to readers. 

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