Reviewed by Carissa
TITLE: The Chase
AUTHOR: Nessa Vincent
PUBLISHER: Loose Id
LENGTH: 148 pages
BLURB:
Halym knows better than to trust humans. Even though he’s a dragon at the top of the magical food chain, he just can’t get any respect from humans–particularly not from a magician like Merrick Leigh, who has the audacity to steal Halym’s soul.
Merrick has good reasons for taking the dragon captive, though it leaves him holding the proverbial wolf by the ear. He wants to use Halym’s powerful magical abilities to work an important spell, but Halym has other plans. Something about this magician piques Halym’s curiosity and whets his sexual appetite. Once Halym gives chase, Merrick finds he doesn’t have the will or the wiles to fend off the dragon’s advances. Although the dragon is under Merrick’s control, Merrick realizes he’s not the one in charge…and he likes it that way.
But everything changes when Halym steals back his soul. Now that Halym is free to leave, he isn’t sure he wants to. Yet staying with Merrick means not only learning to trust humans, but becoming one.
REVIEW:
Ok, first thing. This book is not listed as part of a series, but only because I could not find a series name for it. There is a previous book to this…world, I guess I should call it, since they aren’t technically listed as a series…called The Catch. The events of The Catch play a pretty big role in the begging chapter of this book (as well as probably explaining how the hell Merrick got his hands on Haylm). I was perfectly able to read The Chase without having read the first book, but it probably would have been easier to have read The Catch before I read The Chase. Just take that into consideration if you feel like you might enjoy this book.
As to this book…at some point in The Catch (I assume) Merrick, bookstore owner/magician, gains possession of Halym’s soul. As a dragon, Halym’s soul exists outside his body as a jewel and if it is ever taken possession of by another being, Halym is bound to obey his ‘master’s’ orders. He is free to speak and think however he wishes, but if under an order to do something he must then do it. But like most things in the magical world, there are loopholes, and Halym is the master of slipping through those holes. Which is a bit of a problem for Merrick, because Merrick needs information from Halym, and Halym is not looking like he is going to give it to him.
I was not expecting to enjoy this story as much as I did. I mostly just picked it up because I love dragons, and this book has dragons, and I haven’t read about dragons for a while, so…dragons! But nearly from the first page, Halym’s snarky attitude has me hooked. Even when I was floundering in the beginning, trying to figure who was who and why they want what, the banter between Halym and Merrick was enough to keep me interested in reading more.
These were two truly interesting characters, and I really liked them. They are both older than they look, but they sell that age very well. I have a constant gripe against ‘old’ characters that sound/act like teenagers, and this book very neatly sidestepped that problem. Mostly these two have great interactions, and even though they were not always pleasant with each other (stealing someone soul can make them a bit tetchy) there was a level of chemistry that you just couldn’t wait to explode all over them.
I do have a little niggle with some of the sex scenes in this book. Two of them are a fair bit dubiously consented to. One happens under magical order, and the other under trickery. While it was written that both participants enjoyed/wanted the first, and that there was a misunderstanding in the second, I really am not comfortable calling them ‘consensual.’ It didn’t ruin the story for me, but I know there are some people who get triggered by that kind of thing, and thought I should warn you, just in case.
Overall this was a very good book, and I’m hoping to have the chance sometime to go back and read the first book in this world. The characters that showed up here in the second book intrigue me. If you like shape-shifting snarky dragons, and magicians that don’t quite know it all–but can be just as stubborn as any dragon–you will probably really enjoy this. I know I did.
RATING:
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