His To Find

Fated Mates of the Apocalypse #1

by Lydia Loomis

Lily
It’s been almost two years since the collapse. Two years since aliens invaded, bombs were dropped, and earth was thrust into an apocalypse. Those of us trying to survive have bound together at the barracks, slowly trying to stay safe and rebuild. When three of our people went missing I was sent out as a rescue party. The last thing I expected to find was an alien, the last thing I thought I’d do is kiss one. Now we are working together to find my missing people. Can I focus on the mission and not the hot alien…I honestly don’t know.

Rork
I was taken by the Vonti as a child. Trained as a soldier and sent on many missions. All I have ever wanted is to find my way home. When we were abandoned on a failed mission and left on an armpit of a planet I lost all hope. But when a little human kisses me I find that hope returned. Now I must help her rescue her people from a Vonti camp, and figure out what I am to do about my growing attachment to her.

Genres: Science Fiction Romance, Science Fiction

175 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 6, 2022

About the author

Lydia Loomis writes monster romance. She enjoys looking at the weird, fantastical, and otherworldly, and finding where the beauty and love are. When Lydia is not writing she is most likely indulging in one of her other nerdy hobbies. She lives with her partner and two pugs in Providence RI.
You can find out more as well as sign up for her newsletter at lydiasnerdverse.com

Reviews

[OneDayI'll · Rating 2 out of 5]

I couldn't finish

I made it to 38% before throwing in the towel. The editing is ridiculously poor. Confused homonyms, apostrophes for plurals, inverted tenses, random commas and run on sentences, ... The list is extensive. But, worse than all that is her attitude. She starts off ok. A little too into her own head and constantly monologuing but reasonable for a young adult in a world devastated by aliens. But when she's supposed to be scavenging items for the community while also looking for clues as to what happened to the previous scavengers who didn't make it back it went downhill fast. She meets an alien, pushes for physical contact (close encounters of the third base kind) and then worries he might want more. Then she talks him back to his tent and asks for more while still worrying about not wanting a relationship. Barely a thought for the missing people. No real plot or plan to rescue them from the other camp. Just a running inner monologue about his anatomy and that ridiculous worry about relationships. She didn't ask about his culture. She didn't explain her expectations. She's just assuming he functions like a human man emotionally. This isn't a romance, it's strictly erotica. Badly edited, narcissistically monologued, emotionally stunted erotica. Which, nothing against it, just don't stick it in the romance genre. Label it correctly.

Btw, as grumpy as I am over her lack of communication, he isn't any better. He knows that the other camp is trying to hitch a ride off the planet. And they're offering slaves as collateral. That's need to know info that someone should be relaying back to the camp.

The one positive thing I can say is:
While you have to hunt down the trigger warnings on a website, at least they're posted. It should be in the blurb, but at least they are somewhere. No go look for them and discover the sure doesn't work. Or there are none at all. The honesty brought about the extra star. Because while the blurb seems to be a lighthearted love story in a dystopian invasion aftermath, it's decidedly not.

[Ashley B · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a quick, fun, raunchy read! The leap from "hey look an alien," to "the alien is doing stuff to me and I'm OK with it," came swiftly. Both Lily and Rork spend the book as their own worst enemy and in search of a new normal, while the world at large is also searching for a new normal. Some may view the internalized thought process and impulsiveness of the characters as selfish or unrealistic, but the story is being told through their eyes. I liked that their individual needs, complaints, and frustrations were focused on within the back drop of the post apocalypse. I find that much more relatable. Excited to learn more about the world, and explore it through other characters points of view. (Looks like each book in the series is a new couple.)

[Frances · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is very good this couple are so cute and with them learning that they are perfect and deserve love. I definitely enjoyed this take on the alien invasion and could definitely see our government doing this.

[Gleeful Goblin Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gleeful Goblin Review: Oh boy, this book had me locked in from early on with being based in Seattle which is my old hometown, the toxic parent relationship navigation which was all too familiar and the feeling of being disconnected or out of step emotionally with the people around you because that foundational parent relationship being so dysfunctional you feel like an alien most times. Which in Lily's case has a bit of irony to it all things considered. But in all seriousness, I gravitated towards Lily for many reasons one of which is how ruthlessly honest with herself she is while also having a sardonic sense of humor that I connect with: "I roll my eyes and let out a deep groan. I would do almost anything for Hank. The gruff, ex-vet, EMT, who saved my life and got me and my mom out of the city and the worst of the bombing. Mom and I traveled with him and his daughter Rylee for months, just the four of us before we found the barracks. Hank and I bonded over a sense of responsibility. I think I gained his respect during that time, which has meant more to me than I care to examine closely. Now he keeps trying to wrangle me into council business. After our government dropped every bomb it ever owned on its own people, then fü€ked right off, we've had to figure things out on our own. We are lucky in our little bunker, we have a group that stepped up to be our council and take a leadership role. Like Hank, they are mostly ex-civil servants. Cops, firemen, nurses, coastguards, and even teachers. Hank thinks I should be more involved since I tend to take a lot of the bigger jobs when they ask but I don't agree. I am a prep school kid, I have a law degree, and was trying to live up to my parent's high society standard before the collapse. People like me being in charge is the reason we are in this situation, people like Hank are why we are surviving it. I am self-aware enough to realize I don't hold a candle to our council...
also the meetings are super annoying." Lily is a survivor and doing her best every day after the end of the world already happened, with all the trauma that entails. It also helps that there's some world building that happens in the beginning chapters that grounded her story and made the post apocalypse setting feel authentic.

Our MMC Rorck also happens to have some trauma in his past that still haunts him: "I groan as the sound of Kaz's voice booms from outside my tent. "It's already midday, you've missed the dawn meal, if you keep sleeping you will miss the mid-day meal as well." "I'm awake, I'm awake," I grumble back at him as I remove myself from my furs. "I'm up," I repeat again, this time more to myself. My dreams have been unsettling lately. Often replaying moments from my abductíon and time with the Vonti. I rub my hands across my face with a deep sigh. Grabbing my jumpsuit off the ground I try and pull myself together for the day. I have been sleeping more lately. I haven't had the energy to keep going after the Vonti ships stranded us on this shítty, moist, armpit, of a planet. I stumble out of my tent with my jumpsuit only around my hips. I let the top half hang down, even though I keep hitting it with my tail. I make my way to the edge of our camp. There we have a makeshift altar we erècted for the men lost in battle and during our failed attempt to evacuate. "Though your lives were short you are our ancestors now. As you live among the stars may you continue to guide our way." I offer my simple prayer even if it feels hollow. They deserve better but it is all I can muster this morning."

Similar again to Lily, Rorck had a rough go of things starting from a very young age because he was taken by the Vonti and has already missed out on a lot of rite of passage style actions and is now faced with a future devoid of them as well since he's stranded on Earth. Both our main characters are surrounded by their own people and yet they feel utterly alone. Small wonder that when they meet that there is such a strong current of craving connection with someone you know in your gut can understand you like nobody else does. These two have electric chemistry from the very start and wowsers are there some fireworks because of it. I had an absolute blast with this book and I'm looking forward to more in the series! 5/5 Stars

[Christine Hrbcek · Rating 4 out of 5]

If the cover caught your eye, you should read!

I was truly engulfed with this novella a great short star-mated story. I want more from Rork and Lily!
This Book had me laughing and crying, such a great read..
2 years after the Alien’s (Vonti) attacked and stole their resources they moved on for the most part.
Second page in and one the American thing to say “if we can’t have this planet, no one can.” The politics within the new America is how I think it would be, open however closed at the same time.
Following Lily and Hank (her co-worker) on a rescue mission for their scavengers, that haven’t returned. This is taking place outside of Seatle they brake up so that at least one will be able to save them. Lily has a mother from hell which I feel like everyone knows someone like her. Another great quote “It’s not like we are going to have some mother-daughter apocalyptic bonding”. When Rork is introduced, he has a tad more trauma and he has what is left of his platoon which is Fen and Kaz. They were also abducted and forced to work. They are now just trying to survive and find their way home, and hopefully are accepted by their own. Lily is trying to hunt. However, after being hunted herself Rork felt like he had to protect her. That is where their story truly begins. The twists within their story will have you wanting to keep reading, the passion is fierce. A specific scene she tries to hide away and gets caught “I wasn’t picturing you”.. Hearing a warning call, they both take off to check on their teams. Once she discovers that he speaks English the banter is great.
Lily is a truly normalized intelligent women, which I love. That fact is that she isn’t the “top model” and she is goofy and rambles is amazing that is how a lot of women are not perfect. How she is also anti-social is spectacular. When she does start opening up it is like you are opening up. Parts had me tearing up!
Rork is a well written character, not just actually being the PERFECT man for all women. He is trying to be the “Model Masaken Man” he can be, respectable. Truly an Alien I wouldn’t mind having with in the aftermath of the apocalypse.

Of course, there were a few times where words were misused or spelled incorrectly. Didn’t deter me from continuously reading alien romance.
I will be continuing the series.

[Mattie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Slightly interesting but lacks heat & seriously needs editing

I decided to keep reading the book despite the error in the first sentence, but I am not sure it was worth it, TBH. The alien-apocalypse trope is cool, and some of the scenes (like the jailbreak) earned this the two star rating. It is a cute buildup to a relationship over a few days, but there's no ratcheting of tension. How can there be tension with cardboard characters? The sex is very vanilla, just basic descriptions of acts with only one scene (tree trunk) being slightly pulse-pounding. I did like that there were lots of supporting characters with even a few detail to fill them in little. The FMC, Lily, didn't seem very likable, although I identified with her mommy and abandonment issues. The MMC's name was misspelled a handful of times :( but he's definitely hot.

Unfortunately, there were TSTL moments that I couldn't forgive. For such a short book, I reported a ton of content errors. All the grammar mistakes drove me crazy (your / you're; quaffed vs coifed; when to use a question mark, etc., etc. ). If you're a writer, I say spell-checking, and understanding basic grammar should be right up there in importance with a good idea. Convoluted sentences can not clearly communicate ideas, and that's why you need grammar.

The series might be promising, but with so much better stuff out there, IDK if I'll get to the next one in this series.

[Alejandra Guerrero · Rating 3 out of 5]

She was one of the most selfish people I've read about. She's looking for some missing people, yet she doesn't even know who the hell she's looking for. Not names, not even their faces. She is more preoccupied with the fact that she doesn't want relationships than with the missing people she's supposed to be looking for. She calls herself an overachiever, but it all felt like she was doing stuff just to get recognized by people she doesn't give a fuck about, since she doesn't even know the name of the people in the community. Why Hank thought she would be a good leader is beyond me.
Neither MC even thought to actually communicate with the other until someone else told them to. The stupid internal "conflict" could have been solved with a five minute conversation in the beginning, instead of waiting till the end of the last chapter to have said conversation. They never talk about expectations before having sex, and then complain that they didn't know what the other's expectations were.
I read the second book in the series first, and there's almost no world building there, so I figured it'd be in the first book, right? Wrong. The work building was as minimal as in the second book. Good thing is, they can be read as standalones, since there's not much information to be missed.

[Estelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like the story line. But, the author doesn't use the correct words sometimes. One of the words misused: presents instead of presence. There were incomplete sentences. The author should use a program that not only looks for spelling errors but grammar and sentence usage/conciseness. So, if you find it to hard to read a book that has a decent story line if there are grammar, sentence usage/conciseness issues along with sentences that are incomplete, you will most likely not finish reading the book.

[Wicked Fox ✨️ · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars.
His to Find is a decent quick read. Worldbuilding is one of the stronger parts of this book. I found the FMC slightly irritating, but she managed to make up for it by the end.

This is my own opinion, but I believe some of the dialogues needs more work on them as they sound unnatural/inconsistent in some parts.

In conclusion, pick this book up if you want fancy peens that vibrates.

[Kay Mack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hot Alien Meeting

It was interesting to read of characters with natural human faults. And the big blue guys (and gal) were more victims than predator. True love manages to leap over every barrier. And it gets very steamy!

[Carla · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this story. I need to stop judging a book by the cover art.

[Scooby2]

DNF

[Coco.V]

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[Jessica Hill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty good

The story was good, but the switching between past and present tense was annoying and distracting. I would read it again if it was re-edited.

[Andi Downs · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this after His To Find with that story's bonus. This time it is Lauren's story and Kaz. Each has a past that keeps them to themselves, for the most part.

Kel feels the need to protect her and does so from afar, initially. He knows Lauren is his mate but is unsure how she will respond, or even if she will accept him. You learn about their pasts and for Lauren, it is very traumatic. Kel is there and both build their bond and thrive. The nasties are still around, as you will read and one from Laurens past. There was plenty of humour as well and loved their coming together. Now I need more!! 😊

[masinahikan_iskwew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lily
Earth is in a post apocalyptic state, aliens attacked earth. The government bombed earth, if humans can’t have earth no one can.
Now humans are scavenging to survive. Lily is part of a small encampment. She works hard and does more work than most. When some humans go missing she volunteers to go.
While out she runs into an alien.

Rork
He is a part of an alien species that was abducted by the continued and used to create warriors. Then forced to fight their battles. Earth was their next stop.

[Andi Downs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you for allowing me to read and review. One down, one more to go. A lovely read and great characters. Loved Rork and Lily, learning of their lives, since their world had gone belly up. Both deserving of a happier life and thankfully together. I had to wonder if his sister might not make a connection with Hank??? There was angst, fear, humour and a HEA. Looking forward to the next book.

Oh... just read the bonus... had a good chuckle and can't wait to read Lauren's story!!!