“One person was never just one person. You made the decision to do the right thing and took the first step. Then, gradually, others would follow. But someone had to be brave enough to dare. Somebody had to take that first step.”
Cade
by Mason Sabre (as a side note, it is listed here on Goodreads as number two in the series. On amazon it is listed as first, apparently there is a 50-page prequel that dives into the back story of Phoenix. I did NOT read that story before this one.)
4.0/5.0
So, I am relatively new to the Urban fantasy/ Paranormal genre of books. Over the last year I have read several, a lot of indies and self-published to be honest. To me most I would consider to be Urban fantasy with some romance on the side. This, I think, maybe the first book I have read that I would officially classify as a ‘Paranormal Romance’… So yay me? I guess.
~Story~
The Story is mostly told from a third person narrative, alternating between a few different perspectives. It follows two main plot lines, first is the rescue and protection of a Half-breed from not only humans but the supernatural in this world, known as the ‘Others’. The second is the aforementioned romance (illicit and outlawed of course, because that’s how they always are) between our main character Cade and Gemma. While nothing ground breaking or genre defining, there was really nothing to complain about. There were a couple of inconstancies I thought with some plot details here and there, especially with the romance, but nothing really too distracting. I don’t really remember where they are in the world but I believe it is somewhere in the UK. The Others dynamic I thought was cool to learn about, especially the silver cage punishments, but really, they were all old werewolf/shifters tropes and cliches (Silver equals bad, have to change for the full moon, etc.). To my knowledge we had representation for the Wolfs, the Tigers, and the Foxes. It would be fun to learn more about any other breeds of Others, if indeed there are any.
~Characters~
So to start off we have Cade Macdonald, main protagonist a resident titular character. To be honest I did enjoy his character, he is a little goody goody, regardless of that I still enjoyed his perspective. He has a fierce loyalty to protect people around him which I found. He is joined by other characters to name a few:
•Gemma (Tiger): Love interest and friend.
•Stephen (Tiger): Best friend, brother to Gemma
•Phoenix (Wolf/Half-Breed): Adopted brother of sorts, mentee
•Trever (Wolf): Cades father, Alpha of Clan
•Aaron (Wolf): Cades Brother, Beta of Clan
•Malcom (Tiger): Father of Gemma and Stephen, Alpha over all ‘Others’
•Patterson (Jackass): Jackass
To be honest all characters are well written. There are some depths I would have like to see as well as some character flaws that we all have. The romance really took up much of the development time for Cade so we really could see his character gain depth or grow as much as I would have liked. I feel like there were a couple of good opportunities here and there, they just weren’t taken.
~Writing~
The writing was well done. I honestly am not sure if this is a self-published book (it is on kindle unlimited). There was maybe a mistake or two, but nothing that was distracting what so ever. The character POV shifts were well done, there were a couple of time I got confused in what perspective I was in but it was never that bad. The pace was steady but never really picked up to the point where I like my books to get, but at the same time it was never really that slow either. There was one conflict at the end of the book and that was really it. In the future I hope that we get to see a little more action because I did enjoy it at the end there.
~Final Thoughts~
Cade was a fun ride and I think returning to the world to see what happens is in my near future. I think if people know what they are getting into here, then they will have a good time tearing through the book. Now where did I put my Kindle.
When we start to put our lives before others, when we let someone die so that we don’t suffer, then you can say sorry to me.