Of Fire and Stars (Of Fire and Stars #1) by Audrey Coulthurst

Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst

My Rating: ★★★★★

Princess Dennaleia, also known as Denna, had been betrothed to the prince of Mynaria since she was a child. The problem? His kingdom are against magic and she possesses multiple Affinities, including fire, water, and wind. Not only that, but she is also slowly falling in love with her future sister-in-law, Amaranthine, also known as Mare. The more their friendship blossoms, the more she is romantically drawn to Mare. Denna doesn't know what to do with herself as the stakes continue to raise when magic users appear to be attacking the kingdom. It's a risk for her to enter the marriage, but duty calls as she's torn with making the alliance work and coupling herself with Mare while trying to protect her people.

I absolutely love this book. It has excellent world building, which made it more fun to imagine the world that Denna and Mare live in. The characters that we get to know are well developed and allow us to see the different sides to them. All of the characters have their personal and professional lives, which are entwined into one in the case of the royal characters throughout the story. It also allows us to see what it's like outside of the kingdom. While we see what it's like outside of the castle through Mare's eyes, she's in disguise, we get to see how it works and who is getting hurt in the crossfire as a war starts to rise.

It's wonderful when characters remain who they are as they fall in love and a romance ensues. Denna and Mare are two very different people, but it was lovely to watch their friendship develop as well as watching it bud into something more. I found myself rooting for them and wishing that they had a easier choice ahead of them since Denna is involved in a politically arranged marriage that's soon to come to fruition. Their friendship and romance felt very natural. Sometimes the two characters involved in a romantic pairing seem forced, and this was not the case. I also enjoyed reading from each of their perspectives and seeing the different characters throughout the story through their eyes as well as how they saw these people differently.

All in all, it's a wonderful read. I will definitely be back for another installment when it arrives. I look forward to seeing where these characters go as well as where the story takes us when it returns. I had a lot of fun reading it and found myself not wanting to tear myself away. It's one of my favorite reads of the year.

Daddy Darkest (Doctors of Darkness #1) by Ellery A. Kane

Daddy Darkest by Ellery A. Kane

My Rating: ★★★

I received a copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Best friends Samantha and Ginny take a trip to San Francisco. It was supposed to be their pre-college trip of a life time, but things go awry shortly after landing: Ginny is abducted from the airport bathroom. Armed with her luggage and Ginny's cell phone, Sam is on the run for her life after realizing that she was the target, not Ginny. Told through rotating narrators, we learn about Sam's mom, Clare, and why her secret past just caught up with Sam.

I love when authors have rotating narrators, so it was exciting to see that the book is written from Ginny's perspective in the present as well as Clare's perspective in the past. The closer we get to the end of the book, the closer the events in both perspectives collide. Clare has no idea about her mom's true past. She just knows her as her strong doting and protective mom who also hates psychology. However, Clare's past reveals that she was once a green psychiatrist working at a prison. She's a survivor of abuse who feels broken and blames herself for what happened to her and for the way men respond to her. What Ginny knows of her mother clashes with the life that Clare shed when she fled and started a new life.

Ginny and Clare are very different characters, so it's interesting to jump back and forth between the two and see what's going on in their minds. Clare's young, getting ready to enter college, and is terrified while running for her life and trying to save her best friend at the same time. She went from living the small town life that she's always known to being thrown into this whole new world where she has to trust a guy she just met, try to save Ginny before she gets killed, and face the fact that her father is far from who she thought he was. Meanwhile, we jump into the past every couple of chapters and read about Clare's life, the long term havoc that her attacker has left her with, and how she fell for the charming murderous man, Cutthroat Cullen. It's also interesting that Cullen is so charming because it echoes reality. We're taught to get away from the people who look like "weirdos" when the suave guys are often the ones who we should be weary of.

It was an interesting mystery to get sucked into because the true mystery is not what it appears to be at the beginning of the book. I thought I had everything figured out when one final mystery, one that has been fueling Levi for years, is the one that pulled the wool over my eyes. It is a difficult read because of the nature of Clare's chapters, which are very dark as well as sad, but Kane put together a story worth reading. I will definitely be back for the second installment in the series.