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Rachel: Mama always said that when I open my mouth, stupid comes out. I guess that's why instead of telling Grace the real reason I'm at the medical hut, I tell her I want to train to be a healer. It's not so bad, though. It's nice to give something back to the tribe, and also, it means I get to care for injured warrior Vantos. He got hurt defending me - looking after him feels like the very least I should be doing. The only problem? I enjoy taking care of him. I enjoy it a little too much. I can't forget that I'm not his linasha, that he'll never be interested in me. I'll only end up with my heart broken all over again.

Vantos: I dislike everything about being injured, except for one thing. Rachel. The female with the sunset hair is the most beautiful of all her tribe sisters. My headspace knows that she is not my mate, but my heartspace is not convinced. It aches with a desire for her that only grows stronger as she nurses me back to health. When we are chosen to take journey to a nearby tribe, selfishly, I am overjoyed at the chance to spend more time with her. But it is a dangerous thing, losing my heartspace more and more to her, when every day we travel takes us closer to another tribe or raskarran males - one of whom could be her real mate...

209 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 10, 2021

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About the author

Heather Fox

11 books107 followers
Librarian's Note: There are multiple authors on Goodreads with the name Heather Fox. When adding new books for this particular author, please use three spaces: Heather^^^Fox

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5 stars
344 (41%)
4 stars
292 (35%)
3 stars
173 (20%)
2 stars
21 (2%)
1 star
3 (<1%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
Profile Image for SheLove2Read.
3,197 reviews210 followers
July 6, 2024
What I liked about the first two books was missing from this one. There was a rhyme and reason to the connection between H/h and in this, the rules changed. I didn't care for it. Also, I understand Rachel lived a hard life before landing on Raskarran, but she acted like a child. Not at all what I would have wanted for Vantos. 3 reluctant stars I think I'm done with this series if the "rules" keep changing.
Profile Image for Poetry Drive.
508 reviews14 followers
February 29, 2024
I love a grumpy/grumpy trope and this is it. He doesn’t speak much but feels everything quite strongly.
Profile Image for Racheal.
739 reviews12 followers
March 30, 2026
This one made me tear up so many times towards the end. Rachel and Vantos are like magnets that keep drawing towards each other. Despite not meeting in the dreamspace (which indicates that they are fated mates), things heat up between them and get oh so spicy. But then guilt gnaws at them, they back off and ohhh man does all the feels hit you where it hurts! The tension between them pulls at your heartstrings but then so does their ultimate reunion when they meet each other in the dreamspace. This book had the perfect romance and the tension/chemistry was so well done. Overall, I'm really enjoying this series!

TW: There is a secret/unexpected pregnancy with the FMC in this book. So for anyone that is sensitive to that, I don't think it would hurt anything to skip over this one and read the next book.
Profile Image for Arctic_Banshee.
468 reviews3 followers
March 31, 2026
I liked this one. The fmc isn’t a badass. She’s just wanting to live her little life and be useful, you know? But compounding anxiety about certain things is crushing her. She’s super afraid she will get kicked out of the tribe, which, after a lifetime of being told what to do and how to do it, plus being told repeatedly she’d stupid, sends her in a panic for survival.

All happening with her falling hard for the mmc which I think any of us would do if someone took arrows for us, was kind, big, and strong.

It would have been nice if it had been a bit longer.
Profile Image for Dakota.
127 reviews1 follower
October 23, 2024
Rachel and Vantos were adorable. I'm a sucker for characters who believe they are unworthy of or hard to love and end up finding it in each other.

I liked getting to learn a little more about the world and the culture of the Raskarrans in this one. It's also fun that the author leaves room for speculation about how the whole mate situation works. I'm sure all will be answered as the series goes on, but it's enjoyable to think about in the meantime.

Another worthwhile installment!
Profile Image for Sarah.
644 reviews301 followers
August 22, 2023
alien romance/ written well/ ended to fast.

Mannn… this series would be a 5 star if it was longer. I’ve read each book so far up to this one and I have loveddd the story line but just as we’re starting to get to what I feel is the midway point it’s like 75 and rushed to end. Like this one… why is there not more for this couple AFTEr they finally get to be mates? A quick epilogue is not enough. Honestly if this was longer and didn’t feel like the author had to stay within a certain page # or words count and was stretched to really give more to the back end of the story it would be 5 stars and be on Ruby Dixon level with IPB. But that being said I’m going to keep reading these bc it’s been a really good series and I have been sucked into the writting. This is a new to me author but I’ll check out her stuff!!

-alien H
-human h
-fated mates
-big scary warrior H whose so sweet to h
-h whose preg when she arrives on planet
-loves me aliens
-we meet a diff tribe also.
Profile Image for Taramisu.
620 reviews126 followers
January 2, 2023
3.5⭐
This would have been a solid 4⭐ for me vibe wise. But the writing continues to be repetitive with the main characters' self deprecating thoughts on endless repeat. Yes, we get it. Neither of you thinks the other could possibly love you. Yes, we understand that Rachel could find a mate any day now. It just needed to be tightened up a bit. Maybe add a bit more of the overall plot into it.

As far as the emotions these two are going through, dealing with current and past trauma: 🤌
I find I'm enjoying the lower key intimacy scenes too. Yeah, yeah, I read a lot of smut. But there's just something nice about the focus on emotions of the heart as opposed to those of the loins.

Regardless, I keep picking up the next book in the series while I almost always cherry pick through other series.
Profile Image for Aspen.
430 reviews4 followers
July 18, 2026
I... I don't know how I feel about this one. Right off the bat, Vantos opens his mouth and shit spills out. His idea of a mate is disgusting. Really? She just has to be beautiful and know how to clean? What the actual fuck? He literally says "suitability as mates does not just involve how a person looks" but just moments before he was thinking about her being tidy and imagines them cleaning together. And while I can appreciate that he says looks aren't the only factor, the fact that It's not if she is kind, or gentle, or nice, or anything else other than can the bitch clean? Yeah she's beautiful but if she can't clean it doesn't matter basically is what I'm getting from his word vomit.

Other than that, I'm pretty much done with these pregnant women tropes. I don't mind them being pregnant at the end of the book where they are with their mate, etc, but any time before that just dulls or completely overrides all that fated mate stuff and makes it feel like the author is taking a shit on their own story. In this book though, it just doesn't make any sense considering all the bottom tier women had meds woven into their food rations that kept them sterile to the point that they never had a menstrual cycle and she doesn't even know what that is. It's disturbing to say the least because her character ends up coming across as uneducated, white trailer trash (or what is more the stereotype for that). Especially when she calls her mom, Mama, and mostly the way her thoughts are structured. She also comes off as super young, like still in the teens kind of young, though I'm not entirely sure of her age to be honest.

I'm also pretty tired of women who can't control their hormones and come off as desperate and needing a good dicking. Like every little thing the guy does makes the woman wet and horny, even something as just talking. It's really friggen pathetic and if you add that to the above in particular, it just ruins the book for me. I get that Rachel hasn't had the best life for numerous reasons, either being used by that Jeremy guy, or the way her mom would treat her and all that, but it doesn't mean the author has to make her this desperate/needy to boot.

Anyway the reasoning behind her pregnancy is stupid. I get only the bottom tier had the birth control in their food but even if she consumed it only part of the time, her body wouldn't immediately go to fertile from missing a meal here or there. Also, why did her mom keep getting pregnant over and over again if they did this with the food? Or was it only like way later that they decided to make them eat birth control food? It's not very consistent or clear for that matter.

Like usual, it's quite a bit repetitive and it makes the book drag a bit. It's not a long book but there wasn't anything really going on other than Rachel's constant trying to convince herself she's not pregnant and wanting to help out the tribe purely so she won't be kicked out. There's not much else to it, well ok other than Vantos' inner struggles about wanting her as a mate but not feeling he is worthy or thinking she'll mate someone else.

Worst of all I just felt like the author went and just went and forced them together. Like he needed that silent, good looking, female who keeps a clean house and she needed a baby daddy/someone to take care of her because she was abused and now pregnant because she was too dumb to use protection (but I guess that part about protection is a moot point since it seems most of these girls know nothing of reproduction or menstrual cycles, etc so why would they know they need birth control?). Anyway, it's one of the reasons I don't like these pregnancy books because I feel like the guy is getting short changed but because he's her mate he'll just accept another man's baby because she's his mate and he should just be happy to have her. There's a very big difference for me with books where they end up pregnant at the end vs another man's baby, and it just doesn't feel right in a book about fated mates. At least to me because it lessens their connection and what the author is trying to sell.

Also to be clear I don't have a problem with her needing a big protector or someone to feel safe with after what she's been through. Again, it's the pregnancy thing that I have this issue with. Couldn't we just have left it with her being abused and then finding love and happiness instead of being pregnant from a man who used her and didn't love her?

2 1/2 very tired of the pregnant by another man trope ⭐. I'm only being this generous because I liked Vantos.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for JML.
1,435 reviews26 followers
September 14, 2021
4&1\2terrific 🌟s for Vantos and Rachel😍😍

This is book 3 in the Raskarran mates series and it's just as good as the previous two. I really want a dreamspace where I can meet the alien mate of my fantasies😘😘 Vantos was hurt in the last book protecting the Human women especially Rachel. He's a serious stoic warrior whose word is his bond and he'd give his life for his people. Rachel has been drawn to Vantos since their first meeting .She's admires the serious warrior and finds his calm her fierce demeanor safe, comforting and very sexy. She decides to learn about medicine just so she can be near him. As Vantos recovers their attraction grows deeper but the dreaming between Raskarran mates has not developed. When a mission to another village is called for both of them take the chance to be together as long as fate will allow. Love and respect grow and when they least expect it the dreamspace appears. I love watching these two people so similar and get so different fall deeply in love!! Great read totally recommend💖💖🔥🔥💖💖🔥🔥💖💖🔥🔥
2,246 reviews24 followers
December 30, 2022
I enjoyed the dynamic between Rachel and Vantos and I liked a lot of Rachel's backstory - she had an ongoing affair with someone from a slightly higher social stratum back home, and got some advantages from that, while simultaneously having her heart broken; Fox has been doing a good job so far with a diversity of perspective for her heroines that I've really been appreciating - but, alas, this is also somewhat unexpectedly .
October 20, 2026
In this one, you can understand that, yeah, all the girls were living at the bottom of society, but some of them still had hope of making it to the middle tier. Even though they were being used, at least they had food and other things that helped them survive a little longer in the lower levels. If you think about it, they were trading one thing for another. That's how we get to know Rachel's story.

I like that, at some point, you can see her growing as a person and realizing that what she did in the past wasn't just stupid; she was trying to survive. But that was also a consequence of the world she lived in. She eventually fell in love with this planet and everyone on it, including Vantos.

“Because if I can't have Vantos, I don't want anyone. His gentle manner, so different from his warrior's exterior. And it seems a stupid thing to say about someone I can't even talk to, but I am the stupid one, and I do love him. I really do.”

Oh, I'm crying over their pain.
490 reviews5 followers
February 15, 2022
Beautiful Read

Vantos and Rachel 's story is more poignant as both have issues of loss and insecurity. Vantos having lost his mother and twin sisters and Rachel having lost her brother, Daniel. She is also in a predicament which she is too uncertain and initially in denial about. The only thing these too tender souls have in common is their undeniable attraction for each other though again, both are initially reluctant to act on their attraction. Added to the fact that they cannot communicate makes it more difficult. Rachel is his healer and Vantos is her warrior. This is a lovely story which is part of the Raskarran Mates series, beautifully written!! It is helpful to read the stories in order as it really enhances the plot!! I shall move straight on to book 4. Great read and I would recommend if you like sci fi romances this will be up you street ( or planet!! ) 😍😀
Profile Image for Madison ✨.
965 reviews18 followers
April 8, 2024
Another quick read in this series that was fun and entertaining. Rachel clearly had such low self-esteem that it was nice to see her finally feel appreciated and I felt bad for how naive she was growing up suppressed on earth to the point that she had no idea what her period was. This one also was interested b/c it didn’t have the MCs immediately fated mates and so much of the story was them unable to actually communicate (not like other mates who are able to talk in their dreamspace). You could tell how this one was going to end so that didn’t come as a surprise, I just wish there was more time in the HEA as it feels like it got wrapped up really quickly. Gets 3 ½ stars from me because I was entertained and didn’t want to put it down ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
Profile Image for BB.
43 reviews2 followers
November 20, 2021
ok story, loved the characters

Spoilers ahead (kinda cause obvi you already must know if you’re reading a romance novel…)
I liked this story the least because the romance wasn’t as fun. The main characters (who I do love, great job there) spend the entire book feeling guilt, shame and distress over the fact that they are not mates but are in love. It takes the fun out of all the sexy parts when they have these anguished emotions after. The ‘mating’ doesn’t take place until the very very end of the book just FYI. So while you are left with a HEA it isn’t as fun to read. But I liked the continuation of the storyline in the series!
Profile Image for DemetraP.
6,406 reviews
December 15, 2021
This is Vantos' book (big warrior, more silent, very neat in his personal space and clean).

His heroine has a secret.

SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER

She is pregnant with a human baby. Her ex boyfriend on Earth dumped her. So she thinks she'll be a single mom and nobody will want her baby.

When hero finds out (she hides it most of the book), he immediately decides he wants her to be his mate and raise her baby even though they have not shared dreamspace and are not mates.

Of course, the next night they shared dreams and are mated.
Profile Image for Alicja.
313 reviews1 follower
October 8, 2023
I started the series with the first book and although they could all be stand-alones I found that by starting in the beginning it made me want to follow the whole story.

It was a fantasy with alien and high stakes and love but then equally it's about two people growing together and finding out about each other over time. It's not rushed or uninteresting and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who would like to see a good fantasy romance could be.

The only reason I gave it four stars is because I was comparing this book to the others which are in the series and some of those appealed to me more then others, which is understandable as you follow the lives of 12 people towards overcoming boundaries, personal issues and grief.
2,168 reviews4 followers
November 29, 2021
Heartspace

There are many things so enjoyable about this book. Love that Vantos and Rachel have chemistry; liked that even though they each cannot speak the others language they communicate; liked that there is loving not abuse of the heroine under the guise of passion.
Did not like Rachel having such low self esteem and how much this impacted her views on acceptance in the tribe.
Profile Image for Claire.
643 reviews2 followers
April 11, 2024
I read all of these prior to reviewing. Series thoughts: really, really good. Strong individually but makes a really nice, cohesive whole.

Book specific: Good. I admittedly didn't like going into a pairing who hadn't shared a dreamspace because it kept me on edge and also waiting for them to actually talk to each other. But the characters are good, and Fox again deftly handles a character that could be annoying - Rachel's insecurity and hang-ups don't undermine her strength.
947 reviews7 followers
August 8, 2023
Scorthed

I am loving this wonderful series by Heather Fox that features a group of the lowest class of human women who crash on an alien planet. They are saved by the Raskarrans whose women all died years prior by some unknown plague. This is the third couple who are matched in the dream world and become fated mates. On to the next book!
Profile Image for Lila.
117 reviews1 follower
December 29, 2023
some of the best idiots mutual pining thinking their feelings could never be requited ive ever read. smidge bit of angst twards the end that turns heartful. only wish there was a bit more fluff between them to make up for the long journey of time they wasted thinking it would never be, but mabey the rest of the series shows some of that
Profile Image for Kate.
241 reviews4 followers
January 21, 2026
I want more people to say I have sunset hair. Be creative like Vantos plz. This was cute. I liked that Rachel didn’t see herself as strong or smart or brave, but she was first to choose a new profession for herself, first to happily go on another trip through the forests, & to willingly learn an alien language along the way. I, too, would’ve only learned all the dirtier words first 🤣
Profile Image for Carmen.
2,193 reviews11 followers
September 12, 2021
Whew!

Would it be awful to admit that I hoped Rachel was wrong about her condition? I really enjoyed the book and the series and understand why it had to be true but still...! Vantose was such a keeper, I’m glad it ended well for them both.
300 reviews
October 9, 2021
Loving the Raskarran books

Have totally enjoyed the first three books, told from a different perspective to one I've read before. Banks and Rachel's story has been my favourite so far looking forward to book 4 . And reading Sally and Raskrys story
145 reviews
October 16, 2021
Sweet!

World and character building are very good in this book and the previous book. I started with book 2, couldn't put it down. Read books 2 and 3 in one day. All of the people in the good tribes are wonderful, Hope to read more of these soon
3,323 reviews32 followers
January 25, 2022
Vantos and Rachel

The horror of future earth plays a huge role in the angst Rachel's character displays. The simple honour displayed by the Raskarran males in this tribe gives me good feels!
Profile Image for CHARIFA.
122 reviews4 followers
January 1, 2025
This is my favorite one so far 😍 I loved the angst and the not knowing if they will be together or not, the journey to their HEA was very entertaining and fascinating 😍

And Vantos? He's the BEST I loved him 😘
225 reviews
February 10, 2026
I liked the relationship building without the magic dreams muddying the waters, but hated that it was bursting with miscommunication as a result. Also the insecurity, a trope I just hate to begin with. I still liked it overall though I suppose.
Profile Image for T Lee Hunt.
35 reviews15 followers
September 11, 2021
Fabulous

I read the first two so fast and excited to see the 2nd. I love books about fated mates and dreams
Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews