Reviewed by Carissa
TITLE: Summoner of Storms
SERIES: Spectr #6
AUTHOR: Jordan L. Hawk
PUBLISHER: self-published
LENGTH: 177 Pages
BLURB:
Federal exorcist John Starkweather’s life is in tatters. His best friend Sean betrayed him. SPECTR, the agency he viewed more as a surrogate family than an employer, wants him dead. His only allies are members of the mysterious organization called the Vigilant, whose motives remain in question.
The only thing keeping John together is the presence of his lovers: Caleb Jansen, a powerful telekinetic, and Gray, the vampire spirit possessing Caleb.
Together, they must not only evade capture, but somehow stop SPECTR from building an army of demon possessed soldiers. If they are to succeed, John must question everything he’s ever believed about SPECTR and spirits. And Caleb and Gray must decide how far they’re willing to go—not just for John’s love, but for his very life.
REVIEW:
Keep your friends close, your lovers closer, and your enemies six-feet under.
Something’s rotten in the halls of SPECTR…and it isn’t the three-year-old tub of forgotten leftovers. No, it turns out that the higher-ups are looking to create something much worse than an army of NHEs–not that a seething mass of semi-controlled NHEs is something to scoff at–and it is down to John, Gray, Caleb, and a band of Vigilants to take them all out.
So…no problem. It isn’t like Caleb and John are now wanted men, or anything. Or that the Vigilant seems to be losing members like blood thru a sieve. Or that John might have to trust a friend turned foe, all in the hopes of saving the men his ex-friend previously shot in the head. And it is not like they have to worry about the fact that the other side seems to have helicopters, tanks, and demons (oh my!) at their increasingly blood drenched fingertips.
See. No problem. Just a walk in a blood-soaked, minefield-infested, demon patrolled, park.
*internal squees of perfect happiness*
Oh let me count the ways in which I love this book:
1) John, Caleb and Gray getting it on–and getting it on hard, and repeatedly. No more dancing around the issues of love and attraction, in this book it is full-on full-steam-ahead go get your man (or men, in this case). There is probably more sex going on in this book than in the others, but I am 100% ok with that, not just because it was hot, but because it served an actual purpose (drakul cum: now with additional superpower giving properties!). And Toppy Gray…*shivers*…yeah, that was good. Very very good.
2) Me a grown-up, you a grown-up, he’s a 5000 year old vampire…so let’s talk this shit out.
“You think I should break up with him, if it turns out I’m living the eternal youth vampire stereotype…But if we’ve learned one thing in the last week, it’s you have to talk shit out. So instead of making John’s decisions for him, I’d ask him how he felt. Because guess what? The three of us are partners in this. I’m not going to act like I know what John needs better than he does. He’s an adult, which means he gets to make his own choices. So if you think I’m going to nobly sacrifice my relationship with him, you’re out of luck. I’m not a big enough asshole.”
Thank you, Sekhmet! You have no idea how much this idea of ‘nobly sacrificing your relationship’ pisses me off in vampire books. Because, almost inevitably, it always happens without ever consulting the other partner(s) in the relationship. I have no problem (mostly) with realizing that the loss of someone you love, way before you will probably ever join them in death, can hurt like a bitch and may not be worth it. What I have a problem with is one person deciding that for the other. And nothing is guaranteed. Caleb could get nuked, and who knows if that is something they can come back from…but that isn’t stopping John from loving (and staying with) with Gray and Caleb. So I more than appreciated that Caleb did not fall into such a(n annoying) cliché.
3) John’s identity crises. I think I really connected with John in this book, more so than I did in the previous five. This is probably because John is being forced to look at the world–and more importantly, SPECTR–without the rose-tinted glasses of a boy who was saved, raised, and protected by a group of people he thought of as family. SPECTR is not what John thought it to be. It has taken something he believed with his whole soul and twisted it into some type of perversion that almost breaks him. And yet…and yet can’t seem to ditch his beliefs, even if the organization he followed threw them by the wayside. Because those beliefs are who he is. What he knows is right. And if he has to bring SPECTR down in order to protect the people he swore to protect…then he is going to do it, and goddess save anyone who gets in his way.
4) Comeuppance meet Forsyth. Forsyth, comeuppance. I knew there was no way this was going to end without wrapping up Forsythe in a nice little bow and feeding him to something with really pointy teeth. But the battle that rages, and the changes in Gray/Caleb were beyond awesome. I love me a big-baddie fight, and this one delivered it with double side orders of smackdown and phenomenal cosmic power. And that I wasn’t exactly sure how it was going to go down in the end, what the cost of all that power was going to be…made it all the more delicious. Death and mayhem should not fill me with the warm and fuzzies, but then again, I have never been known to be normal (or stable).
Honestly, I could go on for another two pages, raving about every specific thing I loved about this book. But what I think it comes down to, in the end, is just a well written story that refuses to take the easy way out, or let the characters become so clichéd that they become meaningless. And it does it all while making the story enjoyable and so filled with tension that turning the page is an agony and a relief. Every page has the potential to break you, to kill someone or something you love. To bring ruin to a world. And yet, each page brings such love, such dedication, such goddamn hope that you can’t help but think “yes. Yes, this is what I wanted. What I waited for.”
I am always sad to see the end of a series. Especially when it has been one that I have loved since almost the first word. I so enjoy this world and these characters. But when it came down to the end, when it came time to say goodbye…I was oddly ok with it. I’ll miss them. I’ll think fondly of them (and their bedroom antics). But this ending makes it possible for you to let go. At least for a while. At least until you decide to visit again. Because the thought of never seeing Gray, Caleb, and John again, is a rather sad one. But then, goodbyes usually are.
So if this is goodbye, and if we must say farewell, then I shall try to do it with a smile…and save the tears for when we get to say hello.
“Hey. Don’t cry.” Caleb offered a crooked, weak grin. His gaze went past John, and he nodded at the sky. “Look. Storm’s ending.”
RATING: 
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