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Power and passion as one.
This is something that Tiana
understands she will never know personally. She lives quietly on the
frontier
of her people's lands. She is pitied and outcast, she is also a source
of
embarrassment for her family, until they need something from her.
When Princess Merena
kidnaps and enslaves Prince Rainek of
the neighboring kingdom
of Xicanth in
hopes of
increasing the power of her own line, Tiana's quiet, orderly life is
turned
upside down. She discovers that passion is far more potent than she
ever
believed possible as the mighty dragon, Denith, who shares Raiken's
mind and
soul chooses her to be their mate. Solitude and celibacy ignite into
something
that no man, yet one woman, almost tears asunder.
This reviewer finds the
idea of a dragon and a good-looking
guy sharing the same mind, soul and body to be quite intriguing,
especially
when the dragon can curl a lady's toes as skillfully as Denith can.
However, I
also found myself questioning how much of the man and the dragon a
woman can
take before she can't walk another step and calls for a timeout to soak
away
the aches.
Princess Merena is quite
thoroughly and delightfully
despicable in her attempts to manipulate events to satisfy her
insatiable lust
for power. Her ability to convince Tiana, who knows full well her
capacity for
treachery, that Merena was the one with the upper hand to win the day
was a
little difficult to reconcile, however.
I have
been enjoying the heady delights of erotic fiction for several years
now. I
found it difficult to suspend my disbelief that an essentially human
woman
could be in such need of rest from physical exhaustion, yet somehow be
persuaded to go another bout with her lover or the dragon. I can
appreciate in
a fantasy world, that being a hereditary witch can give one superior
stamina
and resilience, but continually going from one tryst to another when
one is on
the run from pursuers to be pushing the envelope of believability.
From my own experiences
and from those related to me by
other women, it would leave one in utter misery to engage in so many
sexual
encounters in so short a time, no matter how tender and considerate
one's lover
to be. Yet this is not the case of Tiana and Rainek, who are constantly
at the
old bump n' grind. Give a gal a break! There's only so much friction
and heat
one can take before one gets burned...
If white hot,
bone-melting passion is what one's looking
for, then this is a book for the reader's shelf. I found it difficult
to
reconcile disjointed events and manipulations so blatantly obvious,
that this
reviewer is left wondering if the quietly competent and compassionate
Tianna
that begins the story, is the same disbelieving lass who ended it.
Reviewed
by Niniri Theriault for The Road to Romance
August 30,
2004
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