I hadn't been paying attention so had no idea this books had come out. This is not your usual Nora Roberts fair. Dystopian is a whole new world for her and I think the main focus is on a child not in any romance. This is darker and maybe even more graphic than anything she's done outside of the In Death series. Also, there's a ton of characters. But still all in her writing style. Still the good vs evil magic with an added element of bigoted non-magic people. Still a diverse cast of character skills. There's an attempt at cultural and racial diversity which is kinda flat. Even so all her usual elements seem bigger here. And it looks like the plot timeline is going to be much longer than her usual as well. But overall this book had me hooked in a way Nora Roberts hasn't been able to do in decades. This was a good book.

This was the first book I ever read from this series. This and the following one in order are still my favorites after all these years.

My 2nd favorite book in the series despite the relationship drama with Richard getting on my nerves. This and the last book were huge game changers for Anita. You can literally see her beliefs changing due to life just happening.

This was good but I should have read it before I saw the movie. No chance of that since this was a gift after I had already seen it. The artwork though... i love it.

Pretty damned thorough.

Decent book. Its basically all about correspondences for each of the four western elements, plus some for spirit. Nothing groundbreaking except its all in one place which is rare and helpful.

Still one of my faves in this series. Its interesting reading it again just before Serpentine comes out. We see the beginning of Edward's relationship with Donna and the kids here. Olaf will forever be one of the most interesting fictional characters I have ever come across.

The beginning of the ardeur and also the start of the cast confusion for me. This is when the amount of characters started doubling in almost every book. None of that is a complaint as I still love, read and reread the books. This was a complex story with a lot of moving parts and a pretty big mystery that I think was handled very well.

I stalled for a bit over the drama with Asher. Since I'm rereading this for the 3rd or 4th time, I am beyond tired of any and all Asher or Richard relationship drama. Anyway, I finally skipped ahead. This book brings a lot of new characters from the supernatural, necromancy and police areas of Anita's life. She truly goes global here. I'm always amazed by the timing the police have. They never call when she is deep in supernatural politics. And the opposite rarely happens either. Suspend belief. Overall, this book has a good balance of the big parts of Anita's life which I like.