Let me start by saying I love Alessa and will continue to read everything she writes. This book, however, wasn’t it for me. Fucking fuck I wanted to love this so badly, and I am so disappointed. I read the chapter one teaser like a month ago? And was hooked. And then we meet Quinn. And there’s a kidnapping attempt. And then Taran decides to punish her for said kidnapping attempt (which is no fault of her own!) by some non-consensual and non-sexy spanking? That scene made me soooo uncomfortable. He talked to her like a child but then his dick twitched (why are the dicks always twitching?) It went downhill from there. Quinn was the epitome of every negative ADHD trait, and that’s me being nice about it. She was no dragon queen in my opinion, because she was so obnoxious and immature. And my opinion of Taranis was truly quite high before diving into this book. I thought, “here we go, book 1 was boring, book 2 was steamy and great, I just know this last book is going to check all the boxes because Taran is smart, sexy, and magically the most powerful!” But nope. We have the typical alpha male who’s refusing to admit he’s found his mate, then proceeds to fuck her repeatedly while calling her his slut. Yes, you read that correctly, every single spicy scene he calls her a slut. And it just ruined it for me. On the one hand, the alpha male vibe was off the charts, and then suddenly here’s Taranis sobbing…again. Did this make for a complex character? No, instead he felt confused and muddled for me.
The highlights were the cameos from past characters. We might even get a story for every single Greatdrake in the future, which would be great. But the plot line has got to diverge from the lost fae kings by leaps and bounds if they’re going to succeed or hold my interest.