Thank you to Storygram Tours and Beck Michaels for the eARC.

HOOKED.

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This book took me on a journey. I realllllly enjoyed it. It’s a captivating beauty and the beast retelling and I loved that it was in the same world of Michaels other series and I noticed a few world building and magic system themes that carried over. I love connections like that.

I was worried the romance would have been off to the races and I was happy to see that it did keep to a slower paced burn. I thought the chemistry between Sunnëva and Jökull was fiery and very well heated. There were a lot of moments I highlighted because I love a swoony death god with words. Spice wise, it went over my line of plot vs. spice. There was an extra scene or two that didn’t fit with the plot and took away from the story for me. Otherwise, I truly was rooting for this relationship and loved all of the development throughout. For a standalone I thought this covered a lot of bases well and wrapped up things too.

There’s a few small plot/writing quirks that I noticed that brought me to a four star. I thought pieces of the ending felt rushed (though I will say I still loved the very end, it’s a HEA don’t worry!!). I’m curious now to make more connections between the two series and seeing how this story intertwines (this do NOT spoil anything for the Guardians of the Maiden series and can be read as a standalone).

Overall audience notes:
- Fantasy Romance
- Language; some strong
- Romance: 4+ open; high explicit
- Violence: moderate
- Trigger/Content Warnings: mentions of past sexual assault trauma (the act is not show but given to understand), loss of life, battle themes, blood/gore depiction