From award-winning author, Ilona Andrews, an all-new novel set in the New York Times #1 bestselling Kate Daniels World and featuring Julie Lennart-Olsen, Kate and Curran's ward.
Atlanta was always a dangerous city. Now, as waves of magic and technology compete for supremacy, it’s a place caught in a slow apocalypse, where monsters spawn among the crumbling skyscrapers and supernatural factions struggle for power and survival.
Eight years ago, Julie Lennart left Atlanta to find out who she was. Now she’s back with a new face, a new magic, and a new name—Aurelia Ryder—drawn by the urgent need to protect the family she left behind. An ancient power is stalking her adopted mother, Kate Daniels, an enemy unlike any other, and a string of horrifying murders is its opening gambit.
If Aurelia’s true identity is discovered, those closest to her will die. So her plan is simple: get in, solve the murders, prevent the prophecy from being fulfilled, and get out without being recognized. She expected danger, but she never anticipated that the only man she'd ever loved could threaten everything.
One small misstep could lead to disaster. But for Aurelia, facing disaster is easy; it’s relationships that are hard.
About Ilona Andrews
“Ilona Andrews” is the pseudonym for a husband-and-wife writing team. Ilona is a native-born Russian and Gordon is a former communications sergeant in the U.S. Army. Contrary to popular belief, Gordon was never an intelligence officer with a license to kill, and Ilona was never the mysterious Russian spy who seduced him. They met in college, in English Composition 101, where Ilona got a better grade. (Gordon is still sore about that.)
Gordon and Ilona currently reside in Texas with their two children and many dogs and cats.
They have co-authored several bestselling series, including the #1 NYT bestselling urban fantasy of Kate Daniels, rustic fantasy of the Edge, paranormal romance of Hidden Legacy, and Innkeeper Chronicles, which they post as a free weekly serial. For a complete list of their books, fun extras, and Innkeeper installments, please visit their website at Ilona-andrews.com.
Dina DeMille may run the nicest Bed and Breakfast in Red Deer, Texas, but she caters to a very particular kind of guest… the kind that no one on Earth is supposed to know about. Guests like a former intergalactic tyrant with an impressive bounty on her head, the Lord Marshal of a powerful vampire clan, and a displaced-and-superhot werewolf; so don’t stand too close, or you may be collateral damage.
But what passes for Dina’s normal life is about to be thrown into chaos. First, she must rescue her long-distant older sister, Maud, who’s been exiled with her family to a planet that functions as the most lawless penal colony since Botany Bay. Then she agrees to help a guest whose last chance at saving his civilization could bring death and disaster to all Dina holds dear. Now Gertrude Hunt is under siege by a clan of assassins. To keep her guests safe and to find her missing parents, Dina will risk everything, even if she has to pay the ultimate price. Though Sean may have something to say about that!!
“Yes, the princess you were expecting put on her armor and left to kill the dragon. So sorry.”
Dina Demille is at it again and doing anything and everything it takes to save the guests staying at her inn, Gertrude Hunt, a Bed and Breakfast in Red Deer, Texas. Her guests are anything but ordinary individuals though, coming from a multitude of different universes that Earth’s inhabitants don’t even exist and Dina intends to keep it that way. Each story centers around this continued issue of saving her guests, but in One Fell Sweep, we get back to the major plot: Dina’s missing parents. The Hiru was an ancient alien race that flourished until the Draziri declared a holy war on them; few still remained in existence. When a Hiru visits Gertrude Hunt requesting Dina’s assistance with something in exchange for information on her parent’s whereabouts, she wants to say yes for her parent’s sake but knows that saying yes would also bring the Draziri down on all their heads. Naturally, she says yes.
I’ve been a book rut for many months and this was one of the first books to give me a glimmer of hope that maybe this rut isn’t going to last a lifetime. I can always count on Ilona Andrews for that but I’m almost running out of her books so I’m getting a bit nervous. One Fell Sweep was an absolute delight though, between the fascinating world-building, the epic battle scenes, the full-cast of characters that are so well written not a single one ever manages to feel like a secondary character, the subtle inclusion of humor despite the serious storyline:
“Will you take this seriously? The future of an entire species is at stake.” “Yes, we’re going to save them with a fart gun.”
Oh and the romance. This romance will make even the hardest of hearts swoon.
“You taught me the meaning ofloneliness, because when I don’t see you, I feel alone.”
I read this in its finished form (it was also available as a weekly serial released free to read on their website) but I was glad I was able to immerse myself from start to finish. We got to meet Maud, Dina’s sister (who is just as bad ass as her sister) and her daughter Helen who is more badass than both of them combined. Maud married a vampire so Helen is naturally a bit wild around the edges. And has fangs. And is only five-years-old. There’s one particular scene where she sees the Maine Coon that Dina had adopted for the first time that cracked me up to no end:
“He has fangs,” Helen said. “That’s a kitty,” Maud said. “Be careful. They have sharp claws.” “What’s his name?” “He doesn’t have one,” I told her. I hadn’t gotten around to it. “I tell you what, you can name him.” Helen’s eyes got almost as big as the cat’s. “I can?” “Yes.” “I’m going to name him Olasard, after he who hunts the evildoers and rips out their souls.”
I think I need a cat named Olasard too. 😂 I still think there’s something about Olasard, he who hunts evildoers and rip out their souls, that we don’t know yet. And what’s going to happen with Maud and Helen? And where are their parents? So many questions! Next book, please.
Dina DeMille doesn’t run your typical Bed and Breakfast. Her inn defies laws of physics, her fluffy dog is secretly a monster, and the only paying guest is a former Galactic tyrant with a price on her head. But the inn needs guests to thrive, and guests have been scarce, so when an Arbitrator shows up at Dina's door and asks her to host a peace summit between three warring species, she jumps on the chance.
Unfortunately, for Dina, keeping the peace between Space Vampires, the Hope-Crushing Horde, and the devious Merchants of Baha-char is much easier said than done. On top of keeping her guests from murdering each other, she must find a chef, remodel the inn... and risk everything, even her life, to save the man she might fall in love with. But then it's all in the day's work for an Innkeeper...
“What are you planning?” I asked, as we turned toward the grand ballroom. “Just a small demonstration for the public good,” he said. “I am so sorry.” “You’re apologizing in advance.” “Yes.” “Never a good sign.”
Dina DeMille runs a Victorian Bed and Breakfast in a small Texas town but it’s certainly far from normal. She only caters to otherworldly visitors but they are few and far between these days and her only visitor is Caldenia who is actually a permanent resident since she has a price on her head and can’t leave the grounds. When Dina is approached with a dangerous but tempting offer to host a peace summit between three warring groups, she knows that if all goes well this could end up helping the Inn more than anything. But on the other hand, if things go wrong, it could be disastrous and she could lose the Inn for good. Dina takes the chance and hopes for the best.
In Sweep in Peace we get to witness the truly magical capabilities of the Inn and Dina herself and we’re introduced to a large number of new characters but most importantly is my favorite: Orro, the chef she hires to feed the massive group of people now occupying her Inn. She also gets a new cat that remains a bit of a mystery but I look forward to finding out more about him in (hopefully!) the next installment. I read Clean Sweep early last year and felt it was a fun, cozy sort of paranormal mystery. It was a bit forgettable, nothing extraordinary, and I decided that picking up the next installment wasn’t worthwhile.
I’ve been crazy in the mood for Urban Fantasy lately and Sweep in Peace was literally the only one immediately available for check-out at my library so I decided what the hell. IT WAS SO GOOD. It was funny and exciting and I completely fell in love with these characters like I somehow managed to avoid doing in the first. Now I’m on hold for the third installment and the wait is interminable. That’ll teach me.
“This is blasphemy!”Odalon declared in the same way Gerard Butler had once roared “This is Sparta.” Sadly, Odalon had nobody to kick into a bottomless hole for emphasis, so he settled for looking extremely put out.
#1 New York Times bestselling author Karen Marie Moning returns with the epic conclusion to her pulse-pounding Fever series, where a world thrown into chaos grows more treacherous at every turn. As Mac, Barrons, Ryodan, and Jada struggle to restore control, enemies become allies, right and wrong cease to exist, and the lines between life and death, lust and love, disappear completely.
Black holes loom menacingly over Dublin, threatening to destroy the Earth. Yet the greatest danger is the one MacKayla Lane has unleashed from within: the Sinsar Dubh—a sentient book of unthinkable evil—has possessed her body and will stop at nothing in its insatiable quest for power.
The fate of Man and Fae rests on destroying the book and recovering the long-lost Song of Making, the sole magic that can repair the fragile fabric of the Earth. But to achieve these aims, sidhe-seers, the Nine, Seelie, and Unseelie must form unlikely alliances and make heart-wrenching choices. For Barrons and Jada, this means finding the Seelie Queen who alone can wield the mysterious song, negotiating with a lethal Unseelie prince hell-bent on ruling the Fae courts, and figuring out how to destroy the Sinsar Dubh while keeping Mac alive.
This time, there’s no gain without sacrifice, no pursuit without risk, no victory without irrevocable loss. In the battle for Mac’s soul, every decision exacts a tremendous price.
*Beware! Spoilers from the first 8 installments… but that’s to be expected, right?*
Feversong opens to the tragedy that Feverborn left us with: the evil book inside her, the Sinsar Dubh, has finally found a way to take complete control over Mac. Finally possessing a sentient form, the book wastes no time in wreaking havoc on Dublin and its remaining inhabitants. How to possibly destroy the book without also destroying Mac in the process is something no one knows how to do, but stopping the book before it gains, even more, power is crucial to saving the last of the human race. The black holes that were left behind by the Hoar Frost King continue to hover mere feet above the Earth and until the Song of Making is discovered, there may soon not be an Earth to save. Time is quickly running out.
I’m not going to go into plot details because if you love the series, you’re going to read it anyways, but I will say this: There’s a lot riding on a final installment, especially for such a well-loved series that has gone on for as long as it has. There are an immense amount of loose-ends to tie up, deciding how to wrap up the stories of beloved characters (whether they get their happily ever after or not), and trying to find an ending that isn’t predictable but that doesn’t also come out of left field. Series endings have a low probability of impressing me which makes me truly wonder why I embark on as many series as I do. While there were still some questions that went unanswered (not enough to make me grumpy) and a few plot lines that were wrapped up a bit too neatly (nothing’s perfect though), I was overall impressed with how entertaining this final installment was. Have I changed my mind that all installments after Shadowfever were necessary? Nope, but they still gave me more time in a fantasy world that I will always love.
Feversong marks the (second) end of the Fever series, but I’m not entirely convinced that it couldn’t emerge once again from the ashes like a phoenix. It’s been done once before so I won’t say it isn’t possible. There were a few extra pieces of the puzzle that could most definitely go on to form a new book (books?), but I was happy with the ending in Shadowfever and I’m shockingly happy with the ending in FeversongView Spoiler »except OMG WHAT IS THIS WET SHIT FALLING FROM MY EYEBALLS. « Hide Spoiler so let’s not push our luck, k Moning?
I hope she creates a new wonderfully magical world for me to fall in love and obsess over soon.
Circe Quinn goes to sleep at home and wakes up in a corral filled with women wearing sacrificial virgin attire - and she is one of them. She soon finds out that she’s not having a wild dream, she’s living a frightening nightmare where she’s been transported to a barren land populated by a primitive people and in short order, she’s installed very unwillingly on her white throne of horns as their Queen.
Dax Lahn is the king of Suh Tunak, The Horde of the nation of Korwahk and with one look at Circe, he knows she will be his bride and together they will start The Golden Dynasty of legend.
Circe and Lahn are separated by language, culture and the small fact she’s from a parallel universe and has no idea how she got there or how to get home. But facing challenge after challenge, Circe finds her footing as Queen of the brutal Korwahk Horde and wife to its King, then she makes friends then she finds herself falling in love with this primitive land, its people and especially their savage leader.
A word to the wise about these books: they’re… kinda like crack. Imagine there’s an alternate but magical reality where there’s a different version of you and that it’s possible to swap spots with your other version and live in that very different and magical world. In Wildest Dreams, the first installment of this series, Finnie Wilde made the choice to switch places. In Golden Dynasty, Circe Quinn had no knowledge of this alternate world and woke up in it terrified where she’s about to be set free by a primitive type people and hunted, captured, and raped by men who wish to find wives. It’s an ordeal that she didn’t think she would live through, but Circe survived and discovered that she had been caught by the King himself and was now Queen of these people.
Now, wait a minute!! I know what you’re thinking!!
But for you Game of Thrones fans out there… how many of you ended up loving Khal Drogo and Daenerys together??
*cries* Why did he have to die?!
Because Golden Dynasty is a straight up epic Game of Thrones continuation story, taking you on a path that GRRM could never have dreamed up. It takes Khal Drogo and Daenerys’ story to a whole new and amazing level. How could she possibly fall in love with her rapist, you ask? Excellent question; I asked it myself. All I have to say is, Kristen Ashley works wonders in the development of Circe and Lahn’s relationship, generating one of the most intense and passionate romances I’ve read. She also delves deep into the culture of these people without turning it into some excuse for the heinous acts done. Suffice it to say, this entire series has been magical and I can see why Ashley is so beloved in the romance genre.
Blood Heir by Ilona Andrews 
One Fell Sweep by 
Sweep in Peace by 
Feversong by 
The Golden Dynasty by 