Bull Moon Rising by Ruby Dixon
My Rating: ★★★★★
As the daughter of a Holder, Aspeth Honori grew up around her family’s powerful magical artifacts that were excavated from Old Prell. Unfortunately, her family is broke, and her father’s gambling addiction has left them without the artifacts that protected them. Aspeth’s knowledge combined with her fascination with Old Prell leads her to cook up a plan: she’s going to join the Royal Artifactual Guild and steal some artifacts to restore the Honori Hold! Armed with Squeaker the cat, Aspeth and her close (and only) friend, Gwenna, are about to shake things up and join a heavily male field not open to accepting women. One thing leads to another, and Aspeth marries her teacher, Hawk, because it turns out she needs a chaperone to join!
I wasn’t entirely sure what I was getting into when I picked this up since Hawk is a minotaur, but Ruby Dixon is always putting out excellent books, so I decided to check it out anyway. It turned out I didn’t have anything to be scared of, especially since this turned out to be a fantasy adventure vs a fantasy romance! That said, the romance has a large plot. Just don’t jump in expecting a super spicy story. I would say this was 1-2 chili peppers out of 5 if anyone asked what the spice rating was! Just tuck in and prepare yourself for the Conquest Moon, which is when Hawk and all Taurians go into a rut. Spice? It’s going down!
Plus, the story is absolutely hilarious on and off. I had such a good time reading this. There’s an excellent cast of characters, but Gwenna, Lark, and Sleth are my favorites! I also liked that we saw Aspeth learn that you should never meet your heroes. I feel for her! I’m looking forward to continuing to get to know the supporting characters as the series progresses, especially since there’s new leads in each book. I’m not sure how many books this series will turn out to be, but I’ll be along for the ride either way.
