This is the best kind of romance novel. Funny, swoony, full of wit and charm, and one with a Queen who understands her own worth and the worth of a man who sees you and loves you as you are. She also gives people who care about her heart attacks every now and again, you know, to keep things lively and spicy!
Never have I ever come across this magical skill in a book before. Verity’s magic is directly related to art. Paintings. Her abilities allow her to restore artwork, not just deftly, but magically, as she channels the master painters who did the original piece. She recreates exactly what the masters did when they painted the first time around. Stunning right? I know!
From the first few test pages, Devonnie had me hooked. All I remember is downloading the first book from Amazon, then I blinked and in a few days, the full 5 book series was done. The fog that engulfed me had lifted and, once again, I was able to read. To fully read and finish books! That was a HUGE relief. How did that happen? Well!
But what else can you expect when a sarcastic survivor is placed in jail as a child until she is secretly stolen away to compete for a queendom in a neighboring land? A competition, btw, that can be and has been, dun dun dun, deadly.
Or maybe you stopped in the grocery, not realising you were hungry, to pick up two things max, and ended up rolling a full cart back out to your car? If either of those situations resonates with you, you completely understand when I say, every time I pick up one of the books from Victoria Raschke’s Voices of the Dead to just read a few pages in-between some task, I end up getting caught up for a minimum of 5 chapters.
I had snark! I had independence! I had romance, but not the icky squishy kind; it was love where the woman could still be her brave, action sheroe self. I thought this was it. This is the goal. This is what I have been waiting to read and have access to read all my life. And honestly, I still love those authors. I comfort read their books, and I am always searching for authors like them. It is all AMAZING work. But. They are not my unicorn treasures.
Because you begin to unconsciously absorb what the ‘important’ people look like. What they sound like. What they think like. Your vision of the ‘right world’ and the ‘right culture’ is shaped by people who seem to not even know or probably care that you exist. Your subconscious begins to be unwittingly shaped into a very colonial controlled space.
I have never before read this kind of twist on the existence of Vampires, Fae, and Magical Humans. It was a refreshing take! The book is one of those that gradually slides new information to you, the reader. It feels as though petal by petal you are diving deeper into a story that is hiding major secrets.
At its core it is an enemies to lovers story with a twist. They start off as enemies, fighting, at each other's throats, but then, one of them loses her memory. The book starts after the main character has lost her memory and she is in desperate need of a safe space to hide and recover. She heads STRAIGHT to her enemy's house, since her subconscious mind knows that is where she will find sanctuary.
Found Family, Grumpy Hot Guy, and a Heroine who finds her POWER! This author knows how to pack emotion and action into words that sink into your soul. I really enjoyed this book, and it will definitely keep me coming back for other books by this author. The story starts with a computer programmer who is very unsure about herself and her place in this world.