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Arising #1
Sons of Devils
British scholar Frank Carew is in Wallachia to study the magic generator on nobleman Radu Vacarescu’s land. There, his party is attacked by bandits and his friends are killed. Pursued by a vampiric figure, he flees to Radu’s castle for help.
Unfortunately, this is precisely where the vampires came from. If allowed, they would feed unchecked and spread their undeath across the whole Earth, but Radu maintains a shaky control over them and keeps them penned in his tiny corner of the country.
As Frank recovers from his assault, Radu finds himself falling for the young man. But loving Frank and not wanting to lose him leaves Radu vulnerable to his demons’ demands. Can he bear to let them feed on the man he loves? Or must he give in to their blackmail and set them free to feast on his entire country?
Unfortunately, this is precisely where the vampires came from. If allowed, they would feed unchecked and spread their undeath across the whole Earth, but Radu maintains a shaky control over them and keeps them penned in his tiny corner of the country.
As Frank recovers from his assault, Radu finds himself falling for the young man. But loving Frank and not wanting to lose him leaves Radu vulnerable to his demons’ demands. Can he bear to let them feed on the man he loves? Or must he give in to their blackmail and set them free to feast on his entire country?
232 pages, ebook
Published March 13, 2017
2 people are currently reading
68 people want to read
About the author
Alex Beecroft
43 books300 followersSpaceships and galaxy spanning empires, conversations with angels, viking villages, haunted mansions and forbidden love in the Age of Sail... I love a good strong plot in an exotic setting, with characters you can admire, and a happy ending.
If you make a venn diagram of genres, including historical, fantasy, gay romance and mystery, I occupy the space in the middle where they overlap.
~
BTW, if you're thinking my reviews on here are a bit mean, most of the books I really enjoy will get a 4 star. I am saving 5 stars for books I find genuinely life changing. 4 is still "this was really really good, you should read it." 5 is "OMG, my mind is blown and my life will never be the same again."
If you make a venn diagram of genres, including historical, fantasy, gay romance and mystery, I occupy the space in the middle where they overlap.
~
BTW, if you're thinking my reviews on here are a bit mean, most of the books I really enjoy will get a 4 star. I am saving 5 stars for books I find genuinely life changing. 4 is still "this was really really good, you should read it." 5 is "OMG, my mind is blown and my life will never be the same again."
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
February 24, 2017
If you think you know vampires, then you need to check this book out and learn a whole other side of them. Based on the logic that vampires aren't meant to be the good guys, this story shows how truly horrible they are. You don't need to worry about this being another Twilight romance, that's for certain.
It's a two-part series that explores the monsters known as vampires (strigoi) and the monsters known as mankind. It's a difficult journey as the main characters struggle to fight the demons of their hearts but also the literal demons that can ravage a countryside.
This isn't a romance, although it has a strong romance plot, and it has a diverse cast of characters as we cross from Romania to Istanbul. It's a powerful read that will have you immediately picking up the next in the series. However, I will say that this is more heavy-hitting literature style writing than the fast-paced fiction some readers might be used to. But definitely worth it for the world we see painted through the narrators' eyes.
It's a two-part series that explores the monsters known as vampires (strigoi) and the monsters known as mankind. It's a difficult journey as the main characters struggle to fight the demons of their hearts but also the literal demons that can ravage a countryside.
This isn't a romance, although it has a strong romance plot, and it has a diverse cast of characters as we cross from Romania to Istanbul. It's a powerful read that will have you immediately picking up the next in the series. However, I will say that this is more heavy-hitting literature style writing than the fast-paced fiction some readers might be used to. But definitely worth it for the world we see painted through the narrators' eyes.
June 3, 2017
Four stars: reviewed for the Paranormal Romance Guild
Sons of Devils (Arising book 1)
Alex Beecroft
Anglerfish Press
Paranormal romance
M/M
2017
232 pages
I have always expected Alex Beecroft to give me beautiful, literate writing, and to take me places that the usual romance writers don’t go. She doesn’t disappoint in Sons of Devils. The only reason I knocked off a star from my review is because this book and its sequel, Angels of Istanbul, should rightly be one volume. Beecroft has tackled a complicated group of intertwined narratives (with uncanny logic based on careful research), and the structure of the first book brings in a major narrative very late, leaving an ending that, for me, is the worst possible kind of cliffhanger. This feels like a large book chopped in half, not the first part of a series. I read Sons of Devils without knowing about the sequel and it left me confused and, frankly, irritated.
Of course, I purchased the sequel immediately and will read it and review it here immediately. My guess is that Beecroft will earn back her fifth star.
Sons of Devils is a double-layered paranormal story. We have a group of young English scholars, led by Frank Carew, venturing into Wallachia in 1742. They are searching for something called a vril accumulator, a magical power source reactivated by the rising of the lost city of Atlantis in 1730. The Rising has given people all over the world, including Carew, magic powers they don’t quite understand. Carew was studying magic at Oxford when he was forced to flee England, disgraced and fearing for his life.
The second layer of paranormality comes from the scholars’ locale: they are in Wallachia, which any vampire buff will know immediately as the home of Vlad Tepes, the historical Count Dracula. When disaster strikes, Frank finds himself alone and amnesiac from a beating. He is rescued and taken to the castle of the local boyar, Radu Vacarescu. There, as he is nursed back to health, he realizes that he’s jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. Radu is as much a prisoner in his own castle as he is its master.
Just as Stoker’s Dracula was an epic novel that covered two continents, so should Sons of Devils have been. Beecroft is an artist, and she weaves the story about Frank and Radu skillfully and slowly. This is no bodice-ripper; it is a slow awakening as Frank gradually remembers who he is, and begins to understand Radu’s place in the dark drama in which he is entrapped. Beecroft throws in another vivid character, a Roma girl named Mirela Badi, whom Frank rescues from certain death, and who has acquired magical powers of her own since the Rising of Atlantis. But Mirela does not seem to achieve full importance in this first book. Her ultimate role is unclear, if tantalizing.
A full two-thirds of the way into the book, an entirely new narrative appears. It is titled “Book Two” by Beecroft, but it is a story that is laid out for us richly without any sort of resolution. This is the point where I knew I was reading a truncated epic and that I was going to be annoyed at the end. (But I also knew there had to be a second book out there.) Here we find another young scholar of magic, Zayd Ibn Rahman, who is the hereditary caretaker of the grand mausoleum of an Ottoman saint in Istanbul. Having witnessed a disastrous cultural misunderstanding between a British warship and the Sultan’s private barge, Zayd finds himself dragged into the Topkapi palace and into the presence of the sultan himself. This second storyline unleashes a whole, gruesome series of events that leave Zayd fearing for his life and faced with an impossible task as his only salvation.
The Epilogue for the book is a brilliantly spun horror story right out of one of Clive Barker’s bloodiest novels. It brings the British and the Ottoman Turks into conflict, and suggests a possible avenue for the connection of Frank’s story with Zayd’s. But then it is over, and it left me churning emotionally, even as I was impressed with Alex Beecroft’s brilliant writing.
There is precious little romance in this book—only the potential for romance. It is the kind of book that will frustrate readers of M/M fiction—but not readers who are looking for superior romantic fiction with gay characters. I can’t wait to start Angels of Istanbul, but would have been willing to pay extra not to have this story so bluntly cut in two.
Sons of Devils (Arising book 1)
Alex Beecroft
Anglerfish Press
Paranormal romance
M/M
2017
232 pages
I have always expected Alex Beecroft to give me beautiful, literate writing, and to take me places that the usual romance writers don’t go. She doesn’t disappoint in Sons of Devils. The only reason I knocked off a star from my review is because this book and its sequel, Angels of Istanbul, should rightly be one volume. Beecroft has tackled a complicated group of intertwined narratives (with uncanny logic based on careful research), and the structure of the first book brings in a major narrative very late, leaving an ending that, for me, is the worst possible kind of cliffhanger. This feels like a large book chopped in half, not the first part of a series. I read Sons of Devils without knowing about the sequel and it left me confused and, frankly, irritated.
Of course, I purchased the sequel immediately and will read it and review it here immediately. My guess is that Beecroft will earn back her fifth star.
Sons of Devils is a double-layered paranormal story. We have a group of young English scholars, led by Frank Carew, venturing into Wallachia in 1742. They are searching for something called a vril accumulator, a magical power source reactivated by the rising of the lost city of Atlantis in 1730. The Rising has given people all over the world, including Carew, magic powers they don’t quite understand. Carew was studying magic at Oxford when he was forced to flee England, disgraced and fearing for his life.
The second layer of paranormality comes from the scholars’ locale: they are in Wallachia, which any vampire buff will know immediately as the home of Vlad Tepes, the historical Count Dracula. When disaster strikes, Frank finds himself alone and amnesiac from a beating. He is rescued and taken to the castle of the local boyar, Radu Vacarescu. There, as he is nursed back to health, he realizes that he’s jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. Radu is as much a prisoner in his own castle as he is its master.
Just as Stoker’s Dracula was an epic novel that covered two continents, so should Sons of Devils have been. Beecroft is an artist, and she weaves the story about Frank and Radu skillfully and slowly. This is no bodice-ripper; it is a slow awakening as Frank gradually remembers who he is, and begins to understand Radu’s place in the dark drama in which he is entrapped. Beecroft throws in another vivid character, a Roma girl named Mirela Badi, whom Frank rescues from certain death, and who has acquired magical powers of her own since the Rising of Atlantis. But Mirela does not seem to achieve full importance in this first book. Her ultimate role is unclear, if tantalizing.
A full two-thirds of the way into the book, an entirely new narrative appears. It is titled “Book Two” by Beecroft, but it is a story that is laid out for us richly without any sort of resolution. This is the point where I knew I was reading a truncated epic and that I was going to be annoyed at the end. (But I also knew there had to be a second book out there.) Here we find another young scholar of magic, Zayd Ibn Rahman, who is the hereditary caretaker of the grand mausoleum of an Ottoman saint in Istanbul. Having witnessed a disastrous cultural misunderstanding between a British warship and the Sultan’s private barge, Zayd finds himself dragged into the Topkapi palace and into the presence of the sultan himself. This second storyline unleashes a whole, gruesome series of events that leave Zayd fearing for his life and faced with an impossible task as his only salvation.
The Epilogue for the book is a brilliantly spun horror story right out of one of Clive Barker’s bloodiest novels. It brings the British and the Ottoman Turks into conflict, and suggests a possible avenue for the connection of Frank’s story with Zayd’s. But then it is over, and it left me churning emotionally, even as I was impressed with Alex Beecroft’s brilliant writing.
There is precious little romance in this book—only the potential for romance. It is the kind of book that will frustrate readers of M/M fiction—but not readers who are looking for superior romantic fiction with gay characters. I can’t wait to start Angels of Istanbul, but would have been willing to pay extra not to have this story so bluntly cut in two.
November 2, 2018
Just scrolled through some reviews and noticed a few comments on use of foreign language. Here, to be fair, it's just a few foreign titles (one of them is misspelled, too) and names/words. Not many, but enough for readers to get pulled out of the story when they have to stop to google things.
A nice glossary in the beginning would be really nice to have. So, why wasn't any offered?
Otherwise a very nice read.
A nice glossary in the beginning would be really nice to have. So, why wasn't any offered?
Otherwise a very nice read.
March 27, 2017
A Joyfully Jay review.
2 stars
I really was excited to start a good paranormal that looked very intriguing from the descriptive blurb. Sons of Devils by Alex Beecroft was not only something that sounded interesting, this would also be the first time I had read anything by this author, so for me this was a double bonus. When, after just a few pages, I began to worry that I had somehow missed a forward explaining some of the language in the story that was completely foreign to me, I should have let that tip me off as to what I had gotten myself into—and it was not going to be an easy paranormal read with a bit of historical fiction thrown in for good measure.
There were times when this story absolutely lost me–enough times that I almost stopped reading and asked to be released from reviewing. It wasn’t that the story was slow—it was, at times, but that was not the real issue. It wasn’t just that the characters were shallow due to the author having to unpack an entire fictional world complete with multiple races of people who interacted briefly and then disappeared, leaving me wondering why they were introduced into the story at all. It wasn’t that the main character, Frank, was rather lackluster and his love interest, Radu, was questionable to say the least. No, when it came right down to it, the story was so incredibly disjointed and ended with introducing an entire new cast of characters in an entirely different locale that left me more than confused as to exactly why the author chose to create a sequel before really establishing the original two men as a couple, so I could feel invested in hoping they would survive whatever was to come next.
Read Sammy’s review in its entirety here.
2 stars
I really was excited to start a good paranormal that looked very intriguing from the descriptive blurb. Sons of Devils by Alex Beecroft was not only something that sounded interesting, this would also be the first time I had read anything by this author, so for me this was a double bonus. When, after just a few pages, I began to worry that I had somehow missed a forward explaining some of the language in the story that was completely foreign to me, I should have let that tip me off as to what I had gotten myself into—and it was not going to be an easy paranormal read with a bit of historical fiction thrown in for good measure.
There were times when this story absolutely lost me–enough times that I almost stopped reading and asked to be released from reviewing. It wasn’t that the story was slow—it was, at times, but that was not the real issue. It wasn’t just that the characters were shallow due to the author having to unpack an entire fictional world complete with multiple races of people who interacted briefly and then disappeared, leaving me wondering why they were introduced into the story at all. It wasn’t that the main character, Frank, was rather lackluster and his love interest, Radu, was questionable to say the least. No, when it came right down to it, the story was so incredibly disjointed and ended with introducing an entire new cast of characters in an entirely different locale that left me more than confused as to exactly why the author chose to create a sequel before really establishing the original two men as a couple, so I could feel invested in hoping they would survive whatever was to come next.
Read Sammy’s review in its entirety here.
August 8, 2017
Review can be read at It's About The Book
This is a vampire story like no other. What it truly encompasses is an epic undertaking of an alternate history, fantasy, paranormal combination. Beecroft’s brilliant talent for world building is on point; it is rich, powerful, and impressive. Each scene and location, and every emotion experienced by the characters, are elements I felt completely enmeshed in. The story has a definite creepy factor, and a fair bit of violence, so it’s not a book for the faint of heart. Any reader looking for a front and center romance should note that this is not that story, although there is a wonderful, slow building romance between MCs Frank and Radu.
Frank Carew along with a contingent of fellow adventurers has traveled to Wallachia in search of a magic generator. What they find is death, destruction, mysteries and horrors. After Frank has a confusing and unsettling rescue from some Roma locals, he soon encounters the very entrancing Radu Vacarescu and finds himself ensconced in the man’s family stronghold, where not all is at it seems. Or is it? Frank finds himself with a confused memory and an even more confusing situation at hand.
I found the world building – a combination of genuine history, captivating fictional characters, and magic/paranormal aspects – to be quite compelling. From the opening scenes I was caught up in Frank’s perils, not only the direct ones happening to him at present, but the ones he had run from in England. Seems his socially important father was none too happy with Frank’s sexuality. Radu also had family problems. Boy, did he ever, being that his family happened to be strigoi (vampires) and Radu was pretty much saddled with the near impossible job of keeping them under some kind of control. The story changes POV several times, first it bounces between Frank and a more-than-meets- the eye Roma girl named Mirela, and later we are introduced to Zayd, who begins a whole separate section of the overall tale. I didn’t mind the changing POVs, they were very clear and necessary to the plot of the story. However, about three quarters through is when the Frank/Radu/Mirela storyline sort of came to a screeching halt, and the Zayd storyline picked up. Knowing the overall story was continuing in a book two, this didn’t bother me too much, but it still seemed an odd way to break things up; there was no clear link or transition point. I’m assuming this was a publisher decision. As a reader, I would have been perfectly happy to keep sailing smoothly through a 500 page book with writing this wonderful and descriptive at my hands.
Frank and Radu end up reluctantly agreeing to accompany Radu’s family on a journey to Bucharest, where apparently more answers about the magic, and perhaps how Radu could be freed from his familial burdens, were to be found. I definitely wanted to know what happened next, including whether Frank would ever see his father again, or make it back to England. The story definitely makes a strong association along the lines of humans being just as capable of performing monstrous acts as “monsters” are, and perhaps some monsters are rather humane.
This is a vampire story like no other. What it truly encompasses is an epic undertaking of an alternate history, fantasy, paranormal combination. Beecroft’s brilliant talent for world building is on point; it is rich, powerful, and impressive. Each scene and location, and every emotion experienced by the characters, are elements I felt completely enmeshed in. The story has a definite creepy factor, and a fair bit of violence, so it’s not a book for the faint of heart. Any reader looking for a front and center romance should note that this is not that story, although there is a wonderful, slow building romance between MCs Frank and Radu.
Frank Carew along with a contingent of fellow adventurers has traveled to Wallachia in search of a magic generator. What they find is death, destruction, mysteries and horrors. After Frank has a confusing and unsettling rescue from some Roma locals, he soon encounters the very entrancing Radu Vacarescu and finds himself ensconced in the man’s family stronghold, where not all is at it seems. Or is it? Frank finds himself with a confused memory and an even more confusing situation at hand.
I found the world building – a combination of genuine history, captivating fictional characters, and magic/paranormal aspects – to be quite compelling. From the opening scenes I was caught up in Frank’s perils, not only the direct ones happening to him at present, but the ones he had run from in England. Seems his socially important father was none too happy with Frank’s sexuality. Radu also had family problems. Boy, did he ever, being that his family happened to be strigoi (vampires) and Radu was pretty much saddled with the near impossible job of keeping them under some kind of control. The story changes POV several times, first it bounces between Frank and a more-than-meets- the eye Roma girl named Mirela, and later we are introduced to Zayd, who begins a whole separate section of the overall tale. I didn’t mind the changing POVs, they were very clear and necessary to the plot of the story. However, about three quarters through is when the Frank/Radu/Mirela storyline sort of came to a screeching halt, and the Zayd storyline picked up. Knowing the overall story was continuing in a book two, this didn’t bother me too much, but it still seemed an odd way to break things up; there was no clear link or transition point. I’m assuming this was a publisher decision. As a reader, I would have been perfectly happy to keep sailing smoothly through a 500 page book with writing this wonderful and descriptive at my hands.
Frank and Radu end up reluctantly agreeing to accompany Radu’s family on a journey to Bucharest, where apparently more answers about the magic, and perhaps how Radu could be freed from his familial burdens, were to be found. I definitely wanted to know what happened next, including whether Frank would ever see his father again, or make it back to England. The story definitely makes a strong association along the lines of humans being just as capable of performing monstrous acts as “monsters” are, and perhaps some monsters are rather humane.
March 12, 2017
Sons of Devils, Arising1, Alex Beecroft
Review from Jeannie Zelos book reviews
Genre: Romance, LGBTQIA
I've enjoyed a couple of Alex' contemporary romances, and I'm a sucker for a vampire story so this caught my eye.
Its a good story, well written, brings in fresh ideas on the Vampire genre, but somehow it just didn't work for me, didn't really hold my interest.
I wanted to like it, there's a second book to come, and it sounded just the kind of read I enjoy...but I didn't.
I didn't dislike it, I did read right through but I'm not interested enough to continue with book two.
What's irritating is I just can't quite explain why it didn't work for me, what I didn't like. I just don't really know, other than I felt detached from the story and the people. Maybe that's it, because usually in books I love I feel I'm there with characters, caught up in events as they happen, living the story as they go through it. Can't see anything else other than that.
It'll be perfect for other readers of course, thankfully there's a variety of stories to go with the myriad of different novels readers want.
Stars: 2.5/3 a good story but simply not the type I enjoy
ARC supplied for review purposes by Netgalley and Publishers
Review from Jeannie Zelos book reviews
Genre: Romance, LGBTQIA
I've enjoyed a couple of Alex' contemporary romances, and I'm a sucker for a vampire story so this caught my eye.
Its a good story, well written, brings in fresh ideas on the Vampire genre, but somehow it just didn't work for me, didn't really hold my interest.
I wanted to like it, there's a second book to come, and it sounded just the kind of read I enjoy...but I didn't.
I didn't dislike it, I did read right through but I'm not interested enough to continue with book two.
What's irritating is I just can't quite explain why it didn't work for me, what I didn't like. I just don't really know, other than I felt detached from the story and the people. Maybe that's it, because usually in books I love I feel I'm there with characters, caught up in events as they happen, living the story as they go through it. Can't see anything else other than that.
It'll be perfect for other readers of course, thankfully there's a variety of stories to go with the myriad of different novels readers want.
Stars: 2.5/3 a good story but simply not the type I enjoy
ARC supplied for review purposes by Netgalley and Publishers
May 14, 2017
From Magnolia Reviews: Four Petals
The way Beecroft took a snapshot of history and inserted magic into the political and social aspects of the time was amazingly written. I did struggle with the often abrupt changes in narrator, but overall I really enjoyed this book and definitely recommend it.
Read the full review on Maggie's website: http://magnoliareviews.weebly.com/rev...
The way Beecroft took a snapshot of history and inserted magic into the political and social aspects of the time was amazingly written. I did struggle with the often abrupt changes in narrator, but overall I really enjoyed this book and definitely recommend it.
Read the full review on Maggie's website: http://magnoliareviews.weebly.com/rev...
September 14, 2017
Wonderful writing but the story was a little slow.
March 3, 2018
This book started out quite well for me by addressing the current political climate and making a dedication to Tolkien. As Ms. Beecroft quotes: "Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . . If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!" I love that.
It was funny to read this just when I did, right around the same time I read another writer's take on Frankenstein, because while this is definitely not a rewriting of Dracula I'd still bet any money that the Alex Beecroft knows the latter book well. The atmosphere, especially throughout the beginning as protagonist Frank makes his way through the wilderness, is extremely reminiscent of Jonathan Harker's travels to Romania.
I never knew that the reason to bury a vampire – or, I presume, anyone who might return as a ghost – at a crossroads is "so that even if they do walk again, they won't know which way to take". Brilliant.
I found it rather intriguing that neither of the two men at the center of this book, neither Frank nor Radu, is a conventionally heroic and amiable hero. Frank is not a brave man; Radu isn't a particularly nice man – and they make for a seemingly deeply mismatched couple – but I liked their characterization. The author has proven herself over and over to have a beautiful gift for that.
Something I also liked was that though this is a book by an LGBT publisher, and features a pair of men who seem well on the way to becoming lovers, their orientation is not the primary focus of the book. For one thing, their plotline also features a very strong female character: a heroine in an m/m novel, when it seems like a lot of m/m novels I've read seem to have all but exclusively male casts of characters. "She was Mirela Badi, and in a contest between herself and the world, the world had better watch out." I like it. Also, there is a whole separate second story line in which, so far, no one's sexuality seems to be relevant at all (except for that one eunuch). I'm not sure what exactly I was expecting, but what I found is a really solid, fun fantasy.
At first I was a bit put out when the book switched over without warning to that second plot, a whole new set of characters in a totally different setting. But it did not take long at all for me to become surprisingly fond of Zayd, and his mother and his aunt, and fascinated by their world and predicaments. Because it also did not take long at all for Zayd to land in one mahoosive predicament. The worst-case-scenario of that difficulty is horrifying – and I think I'm looking forward to the second book more to see how he makes out than to see what happens to Frank and Radu (and Mirela). (A favorite line: "Only after Zayd had seen the destructive glory of the idea did he remember that his own powers amounted to nothing more than the ability to write neatly in small spaces." Poor boy.)
I admire Alex Beecroft's skill at storytelling – that's why I keep coming back. She has a gift for doling out enough information to maintain interest, never showing her hand too early. The mysteries of characters' pasts – and of their settings – emerge in a natural manner, the revelations to both reader and other characters coming just as and when they should. The world in which this story – these stories – take place is coming beautifully into focus, vivid in its colors, exotic, and different in ways that … well, I was going to use the word "fascinated" again. Put it this way instead: It's a great time, and I can't wait for more. And, happily, I don't have to.
The usual disclaimer: I received this book via Netgalley for review.
It was funny to read this just when I did, right around the same time I read another writer's take on Frankenstein, because while this is definitely not a rewriting of Dracula I'd still bet any money that the Alex Beecroft knows the latter book well. The atmosphere, especially throughout the beginning as protagonist Frank makes his way through the wilderness, is extremely reminiscent of Jonathan Harker's travels to Romania.
I never knew that the reason to bury a vampire – or, I presume, anyone who might return as a ghost – at a crossroads is "so that even if they do walk again, they won't know which way to take". Brilliant.
I found it rather intriguing that neither of the two men at the center of this book, neither Frank nor Radu, is a conventionally heroic and amiable hero. Frank is not a brave man; Radu isn't a particularly nice man – and they make for a seemingly deeply mismatched couple – but I liked their characterization. The author has proven herself over and over to have a beautiful gift for that.
Something I also liked was that though this is a book by an LGBT publisher, and features a pair of men who seem well on the way to becoming lovers, their orientation is not the primary focus of the book. For one thing, their plotline also features a very strong female character: a heroine in an m/m novel, when it seems like a lot of m/m novels I've read seem to have all but exclusively male casts of characters. "She was Mirela Badi, and in a contest between herself and the world, the world had better watch out." I like it. Also, there is a whole separate second story line in which, so far, no one's sexuality seems to be relevant at all (except for that one eunuch). I'm not sure what exactly I was expecting, but what I found is a really solid, fun fantasy.
At first I was a bit put out when the book switched over without warning to that second plot, a whole new set of characters in a totally different setting. But it did not take long at all for me to become surprisingly fond of Zayd, and his mother and his aunt, and fascinated by their world and predicaments. Because it also did not take long at all for Zayd to land in one mahoosive predicament. The worst-case-scenario of that difficulty is horrifying – and I think I'm looking forward to the second book more to see how he makes out than to see what happens to Frank and Radu (and Mirela). (A favorite line: "Only after Zayd had seen the destructive glory of the idea did he remember that his own powers amounted to nothing more than the ability to write neatly in small spaces." Poor boy.)
I admire Alex Beecroft's skill at storytelling – that's why I keep coming back. She has a gift for doling out enough information to maintain interest, never showing her hand too early. The mysteries of characters' pasts – and of their settings – emerge in a natural manner, the revelations to both reader and other characters coming just as and when they should. The world in which this story – these stories – take place is coming beautifully into focus, vivid in its colors, exotic, and different in ways that … well, I was going to use the word "fascinated" again. Put it this way instead: It's a great time, and I can't wait for more. And, happily, I don't have to.
The usual disclaimer: I received this book via Netgalley for review.
October 11, 2017
Okay, so this is difficult to rate. This book is only half the story. Nothing is resolved by the end of it. You have to buy the second book, there is no other option.
I can say nothing about the story without giving things away, except to say it is excellently written. The sort of perfect lyrical prose that I wish I had the ability to write.
Some points to note:
This is not a traditional m/m romance.
There are 4 pov's in this book. Only one is part of the romantic couple. The other povs are from side characters (except they may not be side characters because THE STORY ISN'T FINISHED YET). You may be able to tell I am slightly angry about this fact. Seriously, whose idea was it to split this into two books.
Edit: My review and rating is for the story as a whole and can be found here. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I can say nothing about the story without giving things away, except to say it is excellently written. The sort of perfect lyrical prose that I wish I had the ability to write.
Some points to note:
This is not a traditional m/m romance.
There are 4 pov's in this book. Only one is part of the romantic couple. The other povs are from side characters (except they may not be side characters because THE STORY ISN'T FINISHED YET). You may be able to tell I am slightly angry about this fact. Seriously, whose idea was it to split this into two books.
Edit: My review and rating is for the story as a whole and can be found here. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
February 20, 2019
Now I want to know more, I'm intrigued
April 4, 2017
2.5 stars. Well-written but quite confusing. I expected to learn how Zayd and Frank would meet or somehow interact before it simply ended. I guess that's in the next book. I want a full story in one book though.
This was more of a first few chapters than a whole book.
This was more of a first few chapters than a whole book.
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