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Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Alien Attraction

Read Alien Attraction (Taurean Warriors #0.5)

She doesn’t believe aliens exist… until one needs her help.

Commander Oren Ka’Ress is having a bad day. First he crash lands on a primitive planet and is injured, then he—and his dangerous Xakul prisoner—are captured. Oren needs backup, but with no way to contact his fellow Taureans, he’s stuck.

Dr. Amelia O’Malley doesn’t believe in aliens… until a mysterious patient arrives on her ward. Bigger than any man she’s ever seen, and with inhumanly bright eyes, Amelia finds herself full of questions. But there’s one problem—Amelia can’t understand anything he says.

As the Xakul threat looms, Oren must find a way for Amelia to understand him. With the clock counting down there is more at stake than either of them could dream…

Quite short, leaving little room for character development. I was underwhelmed by the heroine and the monster. No steam, just attraction — clearly it’ll develop in future books.

I DNF’d the first book in the series but figured I’d try this prequel because the reviews were better 🤷‍♀️

Categories
Fantasy Science Fiction

Read Elder Race

Read Elder Race

Lynesse is the lowly Fourth Daughter of the queen, and always getting in the way.

But a demon is terrorizing the land, and now she’s an adult (albeit barely) and although she still gets in the way, she understands that the only way to save her people is to invoke the pact between her family and the Elder sorcerer who has inhabited the local tower for as long as her people have lived here (though none in living memory has approached it).

But Elder Nyr isn’t a sorcerer, and he is forbidden to help, for his knowledge of science tells him the threat cannot possibly be a demon…

There was a lot done well here, even if it tied up a bit neatly at the end and I really wanted to see more consequences for choices.

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Snowed in with the Alien Dragon

Read Snowed in with the Alien Dragon (Snowed In With…, #2)

A Christmas without warmth…
Rachel hates her life in Alaska. She hates the weather, but even more, she hates her job which requires her to stay in the sodden state even for the holidays! Instead of going to visit her family in sunny California, she will be spending the holidays alone in the cold north. But when she encounters an unconscious, golden alien on the way home from work – amidst a massive snowstorm to top it all off – it looks like the holidays might not end up as boring as she’d thought after all!

A dragon paralyzed by cold…
Captain Erro of Traag never thought to go down in a battle. Even less did he think to find his mate on the surface of the planet he crashes on! Trapped in the planet’s frozen wasteland, Erro can hardly function in the cold climate. He’s a dragon, for heaven’s sake! He needs some heat! And yet, despite the icy weather seeping into his bones, every time the strangely beautiful alien female smiles at him, his inner flame burns stronger than ever. She is his mate, there is no question about that.

Now, if only he could understand what the hell she was saying…

This was pretty dumb, but I was looking for something mindless and this fit the bill. The H was not very bright, and their absolute reliance on the translator with only the slightest attempts to communicate was obnoxious. Wouldn’t seek out another book by this author.

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Cyborg Seduction

Read Cyborg Seduction (Interstellar Brides: The Colony #3)

There is nowhere to hide from a Hunter determined to find his mate.

Single mother Lindsey Walters is a blogger and the love of her life is her four-year-old son, Wyatt. When a nearly fatal accident costs Wyatt dearly, Lindsey will do anything to save her son, even take the craziest assignment of her life–sneak aboard a freighter bound for the terrifying alien prison planet known as The Colony and find out the truth about what’s happening to Earth’s brave soldiers.

A Hunter from Everis, Kiel was captured and tortured by the Hive before his banishment to the Colony. When it’s discovered the Hive have a presence on his new home world, Kiel’s existence narrows to the Hunt leaving no room for hope, or love. But when his mark awakens and he shares dreams with an unknown woman, everything changes. When he finds her offered as the prize in the Colony’s brutal fighting pits, he must fight for her with every ounce of strength he possesses, or risk losing her to another.

Yet no matter how quickly Kiel claims her, seduces her and makes her his, Lindsey has secrets, and a bond in her heart that’s even stronger than her desire for him. Lindsey knows she must break Kiel’s heart or risk the life of her child. Her decision to leave will challenge everything Kiel knows about love and loss, family and forever.

The heroine’s refusal to cooperate got pretty frustrating. As a supposed journalist, her attitude about the information she was there to collect was terrible. I liked how the story came together at the end. Cyborg is a bit of a stretch given the H has like one piece of tech in him that doesn’t do anything.

Categories
Culture Science Fiction

Read The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species

Read The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species by Ken Liu

There is no definitive census of all the intelligent species in the universe. Not only are there perennial arguments about what qualifies as intelligence, but each moment and everywhere, civilizations rise and fall, much as the stars are born and die.

Time devours all.

Yet every species has its unique way of passing on its wisdom through the ages, its way of making thoughts visible, tangible, frozen for a moment like a bulwark against the irresistible tide of time.

Everyone makes books.

An interesting layer to this is that Liu is a translator as well as author.

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Rescued by Quiyaan

Read Rescued by Qaiyaan (Galactic Pirate Brides, #1)

He’s a pirate out for revenge … She’s an unexpected part of the loot

An evil corporation ruthlessly destroyed Qaiyaan’s home planet and left his species without females. Now he and his crew prowl the stars in search of vengeance. When they rescue a beautiful human female from her cryogenic slumber, she awakens primal urges in Qaiyaan’s soul he never thought he’d feel again.

Protect.

Mate.

Love.

But claiming Lisa isn’t an option. Humans are too fragile to withstand the mating bond of his species. Yet despite the forbidden attraction, their passion burns brighter with each passing moment, and Qaiyaan begins to suspect that Lisa is not what she seems.

Then he discovers she carries a secret that could change the fate of his people forever – if she can survive the process…

I was entertained enough that I’ll probably read another book in the series, but I don’t think I understood what happened / the mechanics of how the nanobots worked. There seemed to be some contradictions unless I just was misunderstanding, which is very possible?

I disliked the heroine at first but she quickly snapped out of the grift approach, and I would have bailed if she’d continued. ALSO the hero pulled a very questionable stunt that was made out to seem reasonable at the time but later was like “yeah that should have killed her”.

There were some really gross / creepy alien species in this.

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read The Renegade Akseli Cyborg

Read The Renegade Akseli Cyborg (Aldebarian Alliance #5)

Too many years of hunting psychotic vampires night after night have left Rachel with a desperate need for change. So when the opportunity to travel across the galaxy aboard a Lasaran warship to a utopian planet arises, the powerful Immortal Guardian jumps at the chance. Rachel eagerly looks forward to making a fresh start… until an enemy attacks and she ends up alone in an escape pod so far from alliance-occupied space that no one can hear her communications. No one except a renegade cyborg who shouldn’t exist.

After a grueling, hard-fought rebellion, Wonick and his cyborg brethren settled on a distant planet, where they’ve finally carved out a peaceful existence. The Aldebarian Alliance believes every Akseli cyborg died long ago. And battle-weary cyborg leader Wonick is determined to prevent anyone from discovering otherwise, knowing such would spark the fiercest manhunt in the galaxy. Yet when he hears Rachel’s communications, temptation drives him to speak to her, sparking friendship and a longing for a very different future.

Rachel finds Wonick even more appealing when she meets him in person, and the friendship they’ve formed soon deepens into love as the cyborgs—no more immune to her fun-loving, laughter-inducing nature than Wonick—cautiously welcome her into the fold. But the warriors’ unbridled ability to collect intel uncovers a secret the enemy has guarded for decades, one that compels them to embark upon a mission fraught with danger.

If they succeed, they may end the enemy’s attempts to conquer the galaxy once and for all.

If they fail, it could cost Wonick and Rachel This is a fast-paced science-fiction adventure packed with romance, edge-of-your-seat action, laughter-inducing humor, lovable secondary characters, and a HEA ending.

Another fun entry in the series. I appreciate that this series is pretty low drama, and an argument, once explained, is quickly forgiven. The conflict, instead, is mostly external.

A few minor quibbles: having recently reread The Segonian, Rachel has a pretty similar personality to Eliana. Wonick does not act like a leader often enough, deferring too much to his co-leader. And I dislike the name Wonick 😂

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Stone Cold Cyborg

Read Stone Cold Cyborg by Cara Bristol

Dante Stone is an emotionless cyborg who commands a military space fighter. His ship picks up an SOS call from a settlement on the outer edge of Alliance territory, but by the time he can get there, most of the colonists have been massacred. He rescues the traumatized survivors, including archivist Miranda Lowell and her robot dog. His orders are to deliver the colonists to a space station where they can receive the medical and psychological help they need.

However, Miranda awakens Dante’s emotions in ways he never thought possible, and he begins to hope for a different kind of future. But before he can act, the colonists begin mysteriously vanishing from the ship, and he soon realizes Miranda’s robotic dog may hold the clues to saving her, the passengers, and the crew.

I liked what was here — the characters seemed interesting and there was a bit of mystery — and also wish it had been longer. The romance felt underdeveloped for the ending, with them having spent little time together, and I wanted a little more reflection about how or why he’s changed. I think we could have seen a little more action on the heroine’s side. I always appreciate when pets are part of the plot, not just cute. This was enjoyable, and I think expanding it 20% would give a little more breathing room.

Categories
Mystery Science Fiction

Read Drunk on All Your Strange New Words

Read Drunk on All Your Strange New Words

A locked room mystery in a near future world of politics and alien diplomacy.

Lydia works as translator for the Logi cultural attaché to Earth. They work well together, even if the act of translating his thoughts into English makes her somewhat wobbly on her feet. She’s not the agency’s best translator, but what else is she going to do? She has no qualifications, and no discernible talent in any other field.

So when tragedy strikes, and Lydia finds herself at the center of an intergalactic incident, her future employment prospects look dire–that is, if she can keep herself out of jail!

But Lydia soon discovers that help can appear from the most unexpected source…

I was a little unsure about the main character at first and the present tense tripped me up a bit, but once I adjusted I devoured it. The last quarter was full of twists I did not see coming at all. A few loose threads that kind of got dropped, and I’d quibble with the final reveal, but an emotionally satisfying ending.

This cover caught my eye when I was skimming the library’s ebook collection of tor dot com books. Never heard of the author but decided to give it a try since I’ve been wanting to read more mysteries. Glad I did!

Categories
Romance Science Fiction

Read Sight Beyond the Sun

Read Sight Beyond the Sun (Love Beyond #2) by Melody Johnson

Separating truth from lies is impossible in the game of spies… especially the lies you tell yourself.

A prison break.
Adrenaline junkie and explosives specialist Kinsley “Switch” Morales had a chip on her shoulder long before being caught in what she suspects is some sort of intergalactic human-trafficking ring. Aliens not only exist, their reptilian bodies are stronger, their honed reflexes faster, and their shiny scales nearly impenetrable. But nothing will curb Kinsley’s resolve to commandeer their spaceship and return home to Earth—even if that means crawling behind enemy lines and cozying up to their uncompromising captain.

An undercover mission.
When Raveno Hoviir catches Kinsley outside her cell, wreaking havoc in his control room, he sees more than just her strength, resolve, and courage. He sees a golden opportunity to finally root out the traitor under his command and prove his brother’s loyalty before the coming revolution. After so many years undercover, Raveno is finally one mission away from saving his planet from its tyrannical ruler. He’s sacrificed everything to protect his people—his love life, his anonymity, his left leg—but in his efforts to right his father’s wrongs, has he inadvertently become the very monster he plans to overthrow?

An unlikely alliance.
As Kinsley and Raveno each attempt to exploit the other, they find more than just leverage for their separate missions. Inexplicably, they find common ground in their mutual devotion to family and service. Kinsley knows all too well the grief and guilt of making the wrong decision in the field, but will Raveno keep his word to send her home if she flips loyalties? Is Raveno’s softening heart compromising his judgment, or is Kinsley’s intelligence accurate? Separating truth from lies is impossible in the game of spies. Seeing beyond their surface differences and trusting in love again may be the only way to save both their people—and each other.

I put off reading this for a year because it’s so long, but I found the pacing kept the story moving so it never felt like a slog — took me all day to read though! I enjoyed this almost as much as the first book. A long slow burn though 😂 There was a really big time jump that didn’t feel believable they kept their hands off each other for so long. I wish the other humans had gotten a little more development, and it seemed like Riley got forgotten about altogether.

Spoiler below the cut.