Reviewed by Taylin
TITLE: Color of Blood
SERIES: Saint Lakes #7
AUTHOR: April Kelley
PUBLISHER: Self-Published
LENGTH: 286 Pages
RELEASE DATE: October 12, 2018
BLURB:
For fated mates, going from friends to lovers should be a smooth transition, but Ladon and Magnus have never had things easy.
Ladon has to be alpha. How is he supposed to do that? At twenty years old, Ladon knows he’s too young to be Saint Lakes’ Alpha, but no one listens. Not even his mate, Magnus, and he’s Ladon’s best friend.
Magnus is a vampire in trouble. He’s out of town on a dangerous investigative mission when Ladon shifts into his dragon for the first time. They’ve waited years for this day. It’s means they can complete their bond. But Magnus’s mission goes sideways, and he’s stuck in a lab with a crazy doctor wanting to use him as a pin cushion.
Ladon wonders if bonding with his fated mate just isn’t in the cards. And Magnus can’t think about anything but the pain the lab doctor inflicts.
Can Ladon get to Magnus in time to save his life?
Color of Blood is the adventurous Seventh book in the MM Paranormal Romance Saint Lakes series. If you like dragon shifter alphas too young to lead and a vampire with more patience and love than good luck then you’ll enjoy this romantic tale.
Buy Color of Blood to find out the length a dragon shifter will go to save his mate.
REVIEW:
Missing the Vampire/Shifter battle meant that Magnus wasn’t there for Ladon’s first shift. Instead, he was away on an information-gathering mission regarding a group of people who could prove infinitely more dangerous. In the process, Magnus gets captured.
The Color of Blood is the seventh book in the Saint Lakes series. It is well worth a read and is another integral part of the progression of the overall story arc. When one reads the books back-to-back, many of the tales thus far follow a basic pattern and can fall victim to what I call sequelitus. The Color of Blood varies a little from the tried and tested track, making a welcome change. However, while the air of expectation remains (due to the story pattern), seven books in, I’m longing for something different – an extra spark to give me the wow factor. Nevertheless, I do a little jig when certain characters appear because they always add something special to the drama. I’m a self-confessed Fane fan.
The story is told in the third person from the viewpoints of Magnus and Ladon. Worldbuilding has developed over each book, and this one has the addition of politicians – which can never be a good thing, and scientists – even worse when it comes to the paranormal world.
Ladan is born to be Alpha, and while he has a natural presence, he is acclimatizing to his role, the needs of his dragon, and the yearning for the mate he has waited until his first shift to claim. It’s a steep learning curve. Yet he has a super support system and new characters arriving all the time that add new elements to proceedings.
Magnus has had years to perfect his investigative skills, but he gets caught out and suffers in the aftermath. As the blurb says, Magnus becomes a science pin-cushion. Magnus and Ladan are stuck between the need to claim their mate and the clan’s needs.
The Color of Blood contains some good action alongside new elements that begin a path to the overall arc conclusion. With twelve books in the series – all of which are published, it will be interesting to see how the author keeps the reader’s interest.
RATING: 
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