You know when you first start a series and you have that will I, won’t I enjoy it mentality? I had that when I first started reading the Immortal Curse series. I have been an avid fan from the beginning, enjoying the ride at the same time as the author created these marvellous works of art. Because that’s what they are, works of art. However, in all honesty, Elder Bonds wasn’t one I was truly looking forward to and here’s my reasoning.
I have this weird thing about groups of people talking in books, it confuses me. I’m easily confusable. A group of people talking in a book has me like, what the hell is going on, which story am I reading now, what part does this come in? It confuses and frustrates me and when I get frustrated I find that I tend to stop reading. So in the case of Elder Bonds, I knew firstly, that it was totally different to anything this author has written before and secondly, that most of the characters talk in this one book. That’s a massive task for an author but also a big undertaking as a reader to follow a story.
I’m very pleased to be proved wrong in this instance. Yes, multiple characters speak at once, they’re all involved somewhere, somehow and had it not been for the authors style of writing, I would have perhaps lost my way. But this author has a way of engaging the audience using camaraderie, humility and experience. A lot of love has gone into the making of this story, more so than the others I think because whilst the others are filled to the brim, this story spills over.
A lot of research can be seen, and here’s an example. In a section of the book, there’s a story called the Treaty of 1747. One of the characters uses a swear word starting with F and ending with K (I’m saying it this way for review purposes but hopefully you’ll all understand me)
Now me being me, I’m thinking, ‘Did they use that word back in 1747, was it even around then?’
So I go on the ole Goo of Gle and what do you know, the F word has been attested to as far back as 1475. I mean blow me down with a feather, it seems like a relatively new word but no, it was actually used in the 15th century.
I mean, I don’t know if the author researched this but it seems to me like she has. And if so, how clever to research a single commonly used word.
Okay, so back to the story. I can’t go into too much detail because *spoiler alert* but I can say that B is definitely on top form. His sexual prowess is something to behold. One would hope for something of his caliber in real life but sadly this is why I live in books, they’re nothing like the real world, well mine anyway.
All the characters and the world itself are brought to life. The different personalities of each character shine through, so much so that we can visually categorise them, ie, Alik is the broody one, B is the full of life one etc.
Elder Bonds is filled with love, laughter and enough ‘shenanigans’ to fill you up for years.
I’m really looking forward to the build on several characters who have been hinted at but not fully talked about such as Luc, Stark and Ezekiel. I’ll be honest right now and say that Ezekiel is my favourite character and I’m very excited to hear his story. Yum!
I cannot get enough of this world and I’d highly recommend to any PNR fan looking for a brilliantly unique world to escape to.