#Review - Hard Rain by Samantha Jayne Allen #Mystery

Series: Annie McIntyre Mysteries (#2)
Format: Hardcover, 352 pages
Release Date: April 18, 2023
Publisher: Minotaur Books
Source: Publisher
Genre: Mystery

In shock and found clinging to a tree branch, Bethany Richter is pulled from thrashing floodwaters that have decimated the town of Garnett, Texas and killed a dozen others.

Six months after solving the murder of a local waitress, Annie McIntyre is working as an apprentice P.I. when she's handed her first solo case: uncover the identity of the man who rescued Bethany before he was swept downriver.

When Annie's search turns up a different victim—shot dead, not drowned—Annie questions if the hero they seek is actually a killer.

Flexing her new skills while relying on the wisdom of her eccentric, ex-cop grandfather, the case leads Annie into a web of drug dealers, preachers, and wayward drifters trying to make sense of life after a disaster. Annie's own convictions are put to the ultimate test as long-held secrets, corruption, and violence are exposed like the ruin that lies beneath receding waters.

Hard Rain, by author Samantha Jayne Allen, is the second installment in the authors Annie McIntyre Mysteries series. After an intense flood hits their small Texas town of Garnett, Bethany Richter, the wife of the local pastor, and best friend of her cousin Nikki, is nearly swept away after falling into the river only to be rescued by an unknown savior who disappears. Two weeks later, Bethany approaches Annie McIntyre who is working towards getting her own Private Investigator license so she can replace her grandfather Leroy. 

Six months ago, Annie shocked everyone by solving the murder of a local waitress who was pretty much written off by almost everyone. Now she had to locate the man who saved Bethany's life, while once again getting fully immersed in the secrets of Garnett which might come back to fight her if she doesn't watch her own back. The case gets muddied when the trail leads to a woman who is found dead in her truck, floating in the river. But she didn’t drown — she was shot. As the investigation progresses, the missing man is beginning to look more like a murderer than a savior.

Annie gets caught up in a web of drug deals, pill abuse, preachers, and transients while trying to find the nameless man who saved Bethany. With each step bringing her closer to the identity of the stranger, her investigation becomes more and more dangerous to Annie while spiraling into directions not safe to go. She also has to sort out a major issue that has developed between her own father and her grandfather years ago but seems to be festering. 

Even though this story can be read as a standalone, you would be better served by reading the books in this series as they are released. I am looking forward to the next installment in this series to see what happens next to Annie and her new profession and where it takes her.

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

#Review - Dark Angel by John Sanford #Thrillers #Suspense

Series: Letty Davenport # 2
Format: Hardcover, 384 pages
Release Date: April 11, 2023
Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
Source: Publisher
Genre: Thrillers / Suspense

Letty Davenport, the tough-as-nails adopted daughter of Lucas Davenport, takes on an undercover assignment that brings her across the country and into the crosshairs of a dangerous group of hackers.

Letty Davenport’s days working a desk job at are behind her. Her previous actions at a gunfight in Texas—and her incredible skills with firearms—draw the attention of several branches of the US government, and make her a perfect fit for even more dangerous work. The Department of Homeland Security and the NSA have tasked her with infiltrating a hacker group, known only as Ordinary People, that is intent on wreaking havoc. Letty and her reluctant partner from the NSA pose as free-spirited programmers for hire and embark on a cross country road trip to the group’s California headquarters.

While the two work to make inroads with Ordinary People and uncover their plans, they begin to suspect that the hackers are not their only enemy. Someone within their own circle may have betrayed them, and has ulterior motives that place their mission—and their lives—in grave danger.

Dark Angel, by author John Sanford, is the second installment in the authors Letty Davenport series. Letty Davenport, the tough-as-nails adopted daughter of Lucas Davenport, who appeared regularly in the authors Prey series, takes on an undercover assignment that brings her across the country and into the crosshairs of a dangerous group of hackers. Letty is an inspector for the Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security, while also working for US Senator Christopher Colles of Florida. Letty Davenport’s days working a desk job at are behind her. 

Her previous actions at a gunfight in Pershing, Texas—and her incredible skills with firearms, has drawn the attention of several branches of the US government, and makes her a perfect fit for even more dangerous work. She also gets a unique invitation to join a group of Women, including Jane Longstreet, and Barbara Cartwright, who have been around the block a time or two, and who have survived using their skills, and of course, their guns. Most of the women are either military trained or specialized law enforcement or consultants.

After all, Letty has a rather impressive body count to her name from the time she was an orphan, to her time in Pershing. The Department of Homeland Security and the NSA have tasked her with infiltrating a hacker group, known only as Ordinary People, that is intent on wreaking havoc. The NSA tells her the hackers are nosing around natural gas distribution systems and they think the group intends to shut down the natural gas supply of a northern city in a ransomware attack which could, in the dead of winter, cause civilian fatalities.

 Letty and her reluctant partner from the NSA, Rod Baxter, pose as free-spirited programmers for hire and embark on a cross country road trip to the group’s California headquarters. While the two work to make inroads with Ordinary People and uncover their plans, they begin to suspect that the hackers are not their only enemy. Someone within their own circle may have betrayed them, and has ulterior motives that place their mission—and their lives—in grave danger.

To make matters even more dangerous, there are Russians involved. Russians who are targeting the Ordinary People who hacked into their network and caused major troubles which now that Russia is on the cusp of invading Ukraine, needs to be taken care quickly. Letty takes after Lucas in several ways including her proficiency and knowledge of guns and her love of fashion. Baxter is somewhat stereotyped in the beginning of the novel, but he's the character who experiences the most dramatic changes in attitude and outlook as the story unfolds. Baxter is not your typical good looking, athletic hero like Letty's partner, Kaiser. Nope, he’s overweight, hairy and not an agent who's spent any time in the field. 

I enjoy reading stories by Sanford. He challenges readers to suspend belief in most areas, but in this case, if hackers really could bring Russia to a standstill, and prevent a war between the US, China and their new friends in Moscow, so be it. After all, Chinese hackers, as well as Russian and North Koreans, have been compromising our military and infrastructure for years. It is time to rally some good White Hate Hackers to fight back and save our country.

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

#Review - Someone is Always Watching by Kelley Armstrong #YA #Thriller #Suspense

Series: Standalone
Format: Hardcover, 368 pages
Release Date: April 11, 2023
Publisher: Tundra Books
Source: Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Thrillers & Suspense / Psychological

Blythe and her friends—Gabrielle, and brother and sister Tucker and Tanya—have always been a tight friend group, attending a local high school and falling in and out of love with each other. But an act of violence has caused a rift between Blythe and Tucker . . . and unexpected bursts of aggression and disturbing nightmares have started to become more frequent in their lives.

The strange happenings culminate in a shocking event at school: Gabrielle is found covered in blood in front of their deceased principal, with no memory of what happened.

Cracks in their friendship, as well as in their own memories, start appearing, threatening to expose long-forgotten secrets which could change the group’s lives forever. How can Blythe and her friends trust each other when they can’t even trust their own memories?

Kelley Armstrong's Someone is Always Watching is a story about a group of teens at a school with connections, a failed experiment involving memory suppression, and high-stakes action will keep readers turning the pages. Blythe and her friends Tucker, Tanya, and Gabrielle go to a school called Coeus Medical Technologies which is a STEM School. Ever since "the incident," Blythe has had migraines as well as changes to her memories. But nothing could prepare Blythe for what happens next.  

When Gabrielle starts muttering that someone is always watching and her parents are not her parents in a manic manner which is massively out of character for her, the last thing Blythe sees is Gabrielle attacking and killing an administrator before waking up to a different memory of what really happened. It seems that only Devon Sharpe, Tucker Martel, and his sister Tanya are aware that something really bad happened and Gabrielle is lucky to be alive.

To make things every more twisted, Blythe’s sister Sydney has been having vivid nightmares and then someone calling themselves Veritas, keeps sending Blythe emails about a boy who slit another kid's throat and hinting that it is someone she knows and trusts. When Devon admits that he is remembering things that supposedly didn’t happen, it has the whole group wondering what is happening and whether they can even trust their own memories or each other.

After the so called "incident", Tucker and Blythe have been forced apart by their parents. However, when Blythe starts having memory issues--as do her other friends--they, along with Tanya, decide they need to get to the bottom of what is happening to them. Since they are not sure who they can trust, they turn to each other to peel back the layers of lies and deceptions in their lives. 

This is a mystery that is layered in twists that you won't see coming until the final chapter. Even then, you will ask yourself if what you read actually happened and if you are seeing thru the eyes of unreliable narrators. The characters in this story might be crazy or who might be paranoid for a reason. There are shady scientists, doctors, institutions, and even parents may have their own secrets. Not knowing who among your friends might be a plant or a spy, characters who are not sure they can trust even themselves.

 

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

#Review - A Door in the Dark by Scott Reintgen #YA #Fantasy

Series: Waxways # 1
Format: Hardcover, 368 pages
Release Date: March 28, 2023
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Source: Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Dark Fantasy

One of Us Is Lying meets A Deadly Education in this fantasy thriller that follows six teenage wizards as they fight to make it home alive after a malfunctioning spell leaves them stranded in the wilderness.

Ren Monroe has spent four years proving she’s one of the best wizards in her generation. But top marks at Balmerick University will mean nothing if she fails to get recruited into one of the major houses. Enter Theo Brood. If being rich were a sin, he’d already be halfway to hell. After a failed and disastrous party trick, fate has the two of them crossing paths at the public waxway portal the day before holidays—Theo’s punishment is to travel home with the scholarship kids. Which doesn’t sit well with any of them.

A fight breaks out. In the chaos, the portal spell malfunctions. All six students are snatched from the safety of the school’s campus and set down in the middle of nowhere. And one of them is dead on arrival.

If anyone can get them through the punishing wilderness with limited magical reserves it’s Ren. She’s been in survival mode her entire life. But no magic could prepare her for the tangled secrets the rest of the group is harboring, or for what’s following them through the dark woods… 

A Door in the Dark, by author Scott Reintgen, is the first installment in the authors Waxway's series. The series is set in a fictitious world known as Kathor. In this world, the entire city's magical supply comes from underground. Unfortunately, the city's supply of magic is nearly depleted and society is on the brink of collapsing even though the 5 major Houses refuse to acknowledge the impending doom of their society. The story is told in the first person narrative by Ren Monroe.

Ren, who comes from the lower class, has been attempting to gain access to one of the 5 Houses. She's spent four years proving she’s one of the best wizards in her generation. But top marks at Balmerick University will mean nothing if she fails to get recruited. After Theo Blood's failed and disastrous party trick, Theo’s punishment is to travel home with the scholarship kids. Which doesn’t sit well with any of them.  

A fight breaks out in what's called the Waxway, the portal spell malfunctions. All six students (Timmons Devine, Theo Blood, Avy Williams, Cora Marrin, Clyde Winters and Ren Monroe) are snatched from the safety of the school’s campus and set down in the middle of nowhere. And one of them is dead on arrival. One who will eventually come back to haunt the remaining survivors. If anyone can get them through the punishing wilderness with limited magical reserves it’s Ren. 

She’s been in survival mode her entire life because of her upbringing and her scholarship status. But no magic could prepare her for the tangled secrets the rest of the group is harboring, or for what’s following them through the dark woods. Ren is torn between her ultimate revenge plan and her staying true to herself and her best friend Timmons who has the unique ability of enhancing a person's magic. The world building and magic system were both explained thoroughly without making the pace drag at any point of the story. The characters are easily separated even though we meet most of them all at once. 

As this is the initial installment in this series, there's plenty more to come. Ren has to do some serious soul searching, and she has to make sure that the Houses don't step on her hopes and her dreams before she can get revenge for what happened to her father, and her mother. 

Chapter 1

1

Wind prowled wolflike through the waiting crowd, sinking its teeth into exposed necks and bare ankles. Ren kept her hood up and her eyes down. Still, it found every threadbare hole and feasted. There was an unspoken camaraderie to how everyone in line huddled closer together as it howled. On the first day of every month, Ren left her dormitory on Balmerick’s campus and traveled down to wait in line in the Lower Quarter.

She knew the place by memory now. The patterns on the stone walkway. How decades of passing boots had rounded its edges. The rows of windows that were always boarded shut. Even the other people who waited in line with her, assigned to this particular magic-house.

Sunlight might have warded off the chill, but there wasn’t sunlight in this section of the Lower Quarter. Not at this hour. Not in her lifetime. Ren couldn’t resist looking up.

The Heights hovered magically overhead. When she was a child, it had been a marvel to her. An awe that only grew when she studied the actual magical theories involved. It was no small task for the Proctor family to create an entire neighborhood of glinting buildings in the clouds. Her favorite part had been the relocation of Balmerick University. The building’s foundations had proven rather tricky. Decades of residual magic had made the walls more or less sentient. It turned out they liked where they’d settled down in the Lower Quarter. A team of wizards had used veracity alteration spells to convince each individual rock that the sky was actually the earth. Ren liked to imagine them spending hours underground, lying to the stones.

“Eyes ahead, dear.”

Ren startled. She’d allowed a gap to form in the line. Two strides brought her back into position. She glanced at the woman who’d spoken, an apology ready, before recognizing her.

“Aunt Sloan.”

Not her real aunt. Her mother was an only child, just as Ren was an only child. But every woman who lived in their building was an aunt. Every man an uncle. The other kids were all cousins, until they were old enough to start flirting and figuring out where they could sneak kisses without being seen. Aunt Sloan lived up on the third floor. She worked on the wharf.

“Little Monroe,” she said. “How’s your mother?”

“Doing well. Strong and happy and willful.”

Sloan laughed. “Of course. I hate that our shifts changed. It’s been too long since she and I sat down to play a few hands of barons together. About four years now. Agnes was always such a good time, too. It’s a shame she’s all alone these days.”

Barons was a rotating card game that Ren’s mother loved. It involved seven suits, and the winner was usually the one who got away with the most cheating. Ren quietly took note of the other implications hidden beneath Aunt Sloan’s words. She kept her tone neutral, polite.

“I will tell her you said hello.”

Sloan nodded. “It’s kind of you to stand in line for her.”

Her aunt gestured to the bracelet hanging on Ren’s wrist. It was a memorable piece. A little loop of dragon-forged iron. Smoke black except for the rivulets of flickering fire that boiled in the metal’s depths. Ren’s father had bought it for her mother as a wedding gift. It was for the woman, he’d said, who bent to the will of no one. And a nod to the fire she brought out in him.

Sloan kept prattling on. “… my boys. Too busy to stand in for me. Both of them landed jobs in Peckering’s workshop. Making ends meet. You know how it all goes, dear. Or you did. Before you went off to live in the clouds and do your… studies.”

There it was. The neighborhood’s favorite slice of gossip. Ren knew the others always wondered how she’d gotten into a private school like Balmerick. What trick did the Monroes have up their sleeves? They always praised the achievement to her face, but she knew exactly what they said behind her and her mother’s backs. Reaching for the stars, isn’t she? Bound to come back empty-handed.

The line moved. Ren used it as an excuse to drop the conversation. She kept her eyes forward and waited patiently until it was her turn. A pair of doors were propped open. The building to which they belonged was hunched and industrious, singular in its purpose. A government official sat at a table. His hair was slicked back, eyes narrowed in meticulous calculation. He offered the barest of nods when Ren stepped forward.

“Vessel?”

“I have two that need to be refilled, sir. One is mine. One belongs to my mother.”

She slid off her mother’s bracelet and set it on the table. Next she reached for the wand hanging from the loop on her belt. Her own was shaped like a horseshoe. Both ends curved to sharpened points, but the central section offered a crude handle for her grip. She preferred this style to the aim-and-point wands. She’d found it far easier to control the range of her spells.

The government accountant briefly appraised both items.

“Listed under Agnes Monroe and Ren Monroe.”

He ran a finger down the list of names. She saw him pause and knew the question he’d ask before his lips even moved. “And what about Roland Monroe?”

The name shivered down her spine the way it always did when a stranger spoke it so casually. Ren saw a brief vision of his body, bent in all the wrong ways. Every time she came to collect her monthly allotment, they would say his name before tracing the line across to see the explanation for his absence. Ren spoke the word before the man could. The smallest of victories.

“Deceased.”

He tapped the notation in front of him and nodded. They never showed sympathy. Never whispered a condolence. It was just a status that determined how the rest of the transaction should go. This particular arbiter didn’t even bother to make eye contact.

“Very well. I’ve got you listed for an allowance of one hundred ockleys per vessel. The law requires I inform you that another magical stipend will be avail—”

Ren cleared her throat. “I’ve got coin to add more. If that’s okay?”

“How much?”

“Just twenty mids. I earned a few tips this week.”

He hunched back over his list to make another notation. Ren had learned never to add too much. A big down payment could earn unwanted attention. Sometimes the government would investigate. Cut off your welfare entirely. She couldn’t afford for that to happen.

“Twenty mids convert to about two hundred more ockleys.”

If you want to be precise, it’s 201.32. But Ren only nodded at the approximation. An ockley was the exact amount of magic it took to use a single-step spell. Named for Reverend Ockley, who Ren knew had come up with the original and very incorrect equation. His math had been honed by far cleverer wizards, but he was the one in the history books. Sometimes, being first was all that mattered. Ren looked up and realized the accountant was staring at her. He repeated himself.

“Which item do you want them added to?”

“The bracelet,” she answered. “My mother could use the extra spells.”

A well-worn lie. It fit like an old shoe at this point. Her mother hadn’t used any of their magical allowance in years. The man didn’t ask any questions, though. He simply turned and handed the two vessels to a hired runner. The young girl slipped inside the warehouse through an interior door. Ren caught a glimpse of the factory-like rows. Discolored gases churned in the enclosed space. It was still strange to think the city’s entire magical supply came from underground. Ren knew the histories. She’d memorized all the dates for her exams back in undergrad. She could recite the year that her people—the Delveans—first landed on this continent. She knew the name of the woman who’d cast the first recorded spell in their people’s history, and the group of wizards who’d invented the conversion process that refined raw magic into a form that could be dispensed to the masses. Like every other primary school student, she’d memorized the names of the four ships that had sailed up the eastern seaboard to land in what would one day become Kathor.

She’d also read through all the modern theories and conspiracies about magic refineries. One author claimed there was infinite magic underneath their city and that the five wealthiest houses had created a scarcity model to keep the rest of the population underfoot. Another claimed that the city’s supply was nearly depleted, and when it ran out, society would completely collapse. After spending time with the scions and heirs at Balmerick, Ren suspected the former was far more likely to be true.

As the interior door shut with a thump, Ren watched the girl vanish with the two most valuable items she possessed. She wondered how the accountant—who’d barely even looked at her—might react if he knew all the spellwork written into the veins of each of those vessels. All the time she’d spent hammering perfection into her stances and her enunciations.

All he sees is another welfare wizard.

“You can step to the side. She’ll return shortly.”

Ren complied. She felt an itch at the back of her neck. A whisper of an echo of a curse. This was where she always stood as she waited for her items. She knew that the alley over her right shoulder ran straight and narrow, down to the place where her life had changed forever. Every time she stood here, she tried to resist looking. And every time she failed. As Aunt Sloan stepped up to speak with the accountant, Ren looked down that arrow of an alleyway.

It pointed to the distant canal bridge. Unfinished back then, it was the place where her father had turned to wave back at her. Ren’s eyes found the wooden bench where she’d sat down to wait for him. Sometimes she couldn’t believe it was still there. Like a relic that she’d summoned from her own memories. And then she imagined hearing the sound of the earth grinding beneath their feet as it had that day. The way her father had looked back one final time before he fell. Her entire life, changed in less than a breath.

“Your things?”

The girl was back, standing with both vessels held out. Ren liked to imagine she saw a new glow in them, but the truth was they looked exactly the same. She accepted both vessels, and the runner slipped back to her position behind the table. Ren glanced at the line one more time.

Everyone was waiting. She knew they’d refill their vessels and use spells that unwound the knots in their backs. Spells that added strength to get them through another grueling day. Aunt Sloan liked to spice her soups with a little magic. Others entertained grandchildren with clever charms. She almost envied the thought. Using magic to touch up their days. Meanwhile, she would spend the next few weeks trying to create entirely new spells with her meager allotment. Doing her best to impress people who seemed to find nothing so impressive as their own lives.

Ren took a final look, tucked her wand into a waiting belt loop, and started to walk.

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

#Review - Becoming Alpha by Aileen Erin #YA #Paranormal

Series: Alpha Girl # 1
Format: Kindle, 350 pages
Release Date: December 17, 2013
Publisher:  ‎ Ink Monster, LLC
Source: Kindle
Genre: Young Adult / Paranormal

One stupid party. One stupid boy. One stupid kiss. And my life was virtually over.

Tessa McCaide has a unique talent for getting into trouble. Then again, it isn’t easy for a girl with psychic visions to ignore what she sees. Luckily Tessa and her family are leaving California and moving halfway across the country, giving her the perfect opportunity to leave her reputation as “Freaky Tessa” behind.

But Tessa doesn’t realize that kissing the wrong guy in her new Texas town could land her in far more trouble than she ever imagined. Like being forced to attend St. Ailbe’s Academy, a secret boarding school for werewolves.

Even if the wrong guy did accidentally turn her into a shapeshifter and doom her to attending the weirdest high school ever, Tessa can’t help her growing attraction to the mysterious Dastien Laurent.

When vampires attack St. Ailbe’s and her visions pinpoint an enemy in their midst, Tessa realizes that boy drama and her newfound canine tendencies might just be the least of her problems.

Becoming Alpha, by author Aileen Erin, is the first installment in the authors Alpha Girl series. 17-year-old Tessa McCaide has a unique talent for getting into trouble. Tessa has always been the outcast at school because she has a gift but her peers perceive it as making her a freak. When she touches someone, she has visions of things they have done. She can’t turn it off so she wears gloves at all times. Her brother who is also her best friend is about to go off to college so her parents announce that they are moving to Texas. 

Her first few days at her new school seem to go alright until she attends a party and meets Dastien Laurent. She instantly feels a pull to him and sitting next to him she gets her first kiss. But this kiss changes her life. You see, Dastien is a werewolf, and he has chosen Tessa for his mate. He didn’t mean to, but when they kiss, he bites her. And the bite causes her to change into a werewolf as well. But Tessa doesn’t realize that kissing the wrong guy in her new Texas town could land her in far more trouble than she ever imagined. 

Like being forced to attend St. Ailbe’s Academy, a secret boarding school for werewolves. Even if the wrong guy did accidentally turn her into a shapeshifter and doom her to attending the weirdest high school ever, Tessa can’t help her growing attraction to the mysterious Dastien Laurent. When vampires attack St. Ailbe’s and her visions pinpoint an enemy in their midst, Tessa realizes that boy drama and her newfound canine tendencies might just be the least of her problems.

Most everyone at St. Alibe’s are great people but there are a few that has it out for Tessa and will do whatever it takes to take her down or get her thrown out. Imogene, ex-girlfriend/best friend of Dastien, still wants him and tries to let Tessa know by getting her face at every opportunity. Her father seems to have a long game in play which just might find the leadership at St. Alibe's tested in ways they never imagined. Tessa is thrust into a new life with things she never knew existed.

It seems as though werewolves aren’t the only mystical creatures walking our earth. There are also bad guys, very bad guys, vampires, and it is up to werewolves to police the supernatural world. Also, Tessa is different in that part of her family belongs to a Bruja witch coven. Tessa, who may become the strongest Alpha around, may have an alliance with them if she can find a way to control her new abilities.    

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

#Review - Gray Court by Hailey Edwards #Fantasy

Series: Black Hat Bureau, # 7
Format: Kindle, 242 pages
Release Date: March 19, 2023
Publisher: Black Dog Books, LLC
Source: Kindle Unlimited
Genre: Urban Fantasy

After wiping out an entire black witch coven on the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, Rue can no longer afford to have a laissez-faire attitude toward the Maudit Grimoire. Its black magic is infecting her, and it’s leaking into her familiar bond with Colby, poisoning the loinnir with its thirst for violence.

A trip to the fae realm ought to be just the ticket, but any hope for a quick fix dies when a message arrives from High Priestess Naeema. Her daughter has gone missing, and she expects Rue to find her. As much as Rue wants to help Naeema, can she afford to put off disposing of the cunning book yet again?

 

Gray Court, by author Hailey Edwards, is the Seventh installment in the authors Black Hat Bureau series. As the story opens, Rue Hollis is still dealing with the fall out of the previous installment and hiding from her grandfather, the director of the Black Hat Bureau. Then Colby finds a new friend who may or may not be a spy for Stavros who is still stalking Rue. When Asa's Grandmother, High Priestess Naeema arrives with a message that Asa's mother has gone missing, Rue knows things are about to change.

Rue, after killing an entire black coven in Louisiana, and the fact that the Maudit Grimoire seems to have a mind of its own, and now she may have to make a visit to the real of Hael where Stavros awaits her arrival. Rue also needs to face the fact that her own father (Hiram) is now wandering the world trying to find piece with Rue's mother (Vonda) and she knows that whether she likes it or not, she needs to face off against her grandfather for control of the Black Hat Bureau, especially since she has not recruited people telling them they would be safe. 

As usual, Colby is the adorable butterfly fae who loves first player video games, while Clay is the one who keeps everyone from getting way too seriously while Rue and Asa are continuing to explore their relationship. There are things that happen in Hael, as well as with Rue's grandmother chose with Rue's cousin, pretty much gives you a clue as to what is going to happen next. One could hope that the end game is coming soon. This series has dragged on far too long.  

Amazon 

#Review - These Infinite Threads by Tahereh Mafi #YA #Fantasy

Series: This Woven Kingdom # 2
Format: Hardcover, 416 pages
Release Date: February 7, 2023
Publisher: HarperCollins
Source: Library
Genre: Young Adult / Fantasy / Epic

The second book in an epic, romantic fantasy trilogy based on Persian folklore, which #1 New York Times bestselling author Cassandra Clare called “exquisitely crafted,” by bestselling and National Book Award–nominated author Tahereh Mafi.

Alizeh is the heir to the Jinn throne and fulfills a long-foretold prophecy of a Jinn sovereign destined to free her people from the half-lives they’ve been forced to live under the rule of humans.

Kamran is the heir to the human throne, and he’s being pressured to marry before he becomes king. When he falls in love with Alizeh and subsequently learns her true identity, he must question everything he’s been taught about Jinn and their future in his kingdom.

These Infinite Threads picks up at the explosive cliff-hanger ending of the New York Times bestselling novel This Woven Kingdom, and is perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo, Tomi Adeyemi, and Sabaa Tahir.

 

These Infinite Threads, by author Tahereh Mafi, is the second installment in the authors This Woven Kingdom series. This story alternate's between Kamran and Alizeh. It picks up right where This Woven Kingdom left off with a wild cliffhanger ending. The series was inspired in great part by the epic poem Shahnameh, one of the greatest literary masterpieces in Persian history and culture. Alizeh is a Jinn with extraordinary powers that she’s forced to conceal to survive in a world controlled by humans. 

She can fight off any threat that comes her way all on her own—even a team of six men sent to execute her. Though the Jinn no longer have an official leader, she’s the heir to the throne and is destined to lead her people out of hiding and back into power. Kamran has been hardened by war and by loss. Only Alizeh can bring out his softer, more tender side, and he’d do anything to protect her—even risking his life and defying his grandfather, the king.  

With the heat of a kiss, the walls between Alizeh, the long-lost heir to an ancient Jinn kingdom, and Kamran, the crown prince of the Ardunian empire, have crumbled. And so have both of their lives. Kamran’s grandfather, the king of Ardunia, lays dead, the terrible secret of his deal with the devil exposed to the world. Cyrus, the mysterious copper-haired royal, has stolen Alizeh away to Tulan, the neighboring kingdom where he rules. 

Cyrus has made his own deal with the devil (Iblees) one that would require Alizeh to betray her feelings for Kamran if she’s to reclaim the Jinn throne. Kamran, meanwhile, is picking up the pieces of his broken kingdom. Facing betrayal at every turn, all he knows for certain is that he must go to Tulan to avenge his grandfather. He can only hope that Alizeh will be waiting for him there—and that she’s not yet become queen of Tulan.

Meanwhile, Alizeh finds that Tulan is a entirely different world. A world where there are Jinn here eager to find their savior and a mother who really hates her own son because of what he did to take the crown from his father is willing to make a deal with she has no clue may very well be her enemy. While she has no desire to become Queen or marry Cyrus, both Alizeh and Cyrus know that in order to defeat the devil, sacrifices must be made. I am a bit confused in that the relationship between Cyrus and Alizeh seems to be overriding what was supposed to be between Alizeh and Kamran. 

Tahereh has created an incredibly rich and lush world, and the sumptuous details describing Alizeh’s seamstress work, the bustling marketplace, and the glittering castle bring it to vibrant life on the page. This story is a feast for the senses—readers will be able to taste the sweet pomegranates and smell the freshly baked baklava, and will never look at fireflies in the same way ever again. Mafi treats readers to sumptuous world-building. Like an intricate Islamic flower mural, Mafi’s story expands deliberately, each small revelation rising from the one before, delivering deeply satisfying epiphanies at the end of each chapter. 

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble | Kobo