Dog and Dragon
Dave Freer
Baen, Apr 3 2012, $14.00
ISBN: 9781451638110

Seventeen years has passed since Fionn knocked down the South-Eastern tower that contained the void (see Dragon’s Ring). Over that time, paramatter has mixed with real matter.

The Earl of Carfon and Guardian of the Southern Marches Lord Alois demands the young woman identify herself even as he tries to kill her. Her screams lead to other men arriving at the anteroom who tackle Alois. With some of his guards dead outside the room, Prince Regent of Lyonesse Medraut ap Corrin asks the female who she is. She says she is called Meb but her true name is Anghared. Stunned Medraut has doubts until Alois states she used magic to get inside the impenetrable walls of Dun Tagoll. Meb points out her screams saved the prince’s life from Alois.

Medraut wonders if Meb is the prophesized Defender. She is taken to meet the Mage Aberinn, but he and Medraut are frustrated and confused with how she suddenly got inside the castle. At the same time, Fionn the black dragon and Dileas the sheepdog search for Scrap, the name they have given Meb as they head towards Lyonesse.

The second Lyonesse dragon fantasy is an action-packed thriller that grips the audience from the opening scene in which Meb cannot explain her arrival or how a window, which became a wall, reverts back to a window. From that entreating hook, the story line moves out nicely on two fronts as Meb tries to stay alive while Aberinn believes she is the enemy, and on the dangerous trek by Fionn and Dileas. Fans will feel dace Freer soars with this exciting tale.

Harriet Klausner

Deadly Is The Kiss
Rhyannon Byrd
Harlequin HQN, Mar 20 2012, $7.99
ISBN: 9780373776801

Ashe Granger the Formyndare warrior of the Deschanel vampires is resolute when it comes to performing his mission to protect mankind. The only crack in his determination is his destined mate Juliana Sabin who is locked away with her family in an isolated impenetrable prison for crimes of treason. However, Ashe conceals his need to rescue her from his peers and the Council with an out of sight almost out of mind tenet.

His resolve implodes when Juliana arrives in London to beg him to help her. She explains an unknown individual enabled her to escape incarceration though the Wastelands. Furthermore, Juliana insists she and her family are innocent of the sedition charges and that someone wants them dead before they can prove they did not commit acts of treason. Desperately wanting to believe her, Ashe knows he is biased, but rationalizes if she is telling the truth, a dangerous conspiracy is brewing.

The first “post” Primal Instinct fantasy romance (see Rush of Darkness and Rush of Pleasure) is an exciting thriller that focuses on the Deschanel vampire cultures. Though it helps to have read entries from the previous series to better understand the Byrd mythos, this is a fast-paced action-packed tale starring destined mates investigating a deadly truth.

Harriet Klausner

Demon’s Bride
Zoe Archer
Zebra, May 1 2012, $6.99
ISBN: 9781420122282

He was raised in poverty; scorned by those who looked down at him. Leopold Bailey vowed to do anything to become affluent and influential so that he can strike back at those who belittled him when he was a nonentity. He made a pact with the devil that enables him to foresee the future. This advantage led his becoming affluent and influential.

In 1763, to the Ton, even to the impoverish aristocrats, Leo remains a commoner beneath them. He knows the only ticket to the ballrooms is an aristocratic bride. He chooses bookworm Anne Hartfield, daughter of an impoverished baron; she accepts as she knows that with no dowry he is her only marital offer. Both are stunned when they begin to fall in love with each other. However, Lord Whitney, once a Hellraiser, warns Anne that Leo sold his soul into damnation and only she can redeem him.

The second Hellraisers’ paranormal Georgian romance is a terrific paradoxical Faustian thriller starring a bad boy hero who sold himself to the devil and the caring female who prays she can rescue his soul through his heart. Though the premise is similar to Devil’s Kiss, the heroine’s reserve personality is different than her extroverted Romany predecessor so she refreshes the fast-paced storyline from her opening marriage to a stranger to the final confrontation as once again love may not be enough to save his soul.

Harriet Klausner

Dead Light
Mike Pace
River Point Press, Mar 5 2012, $11.00
ISBN: 9780615518428

In 1667 aboard the London Rose, Eli Creed travels with 562 manacled Africans taken from Gambia to be slaves in the New World. The Good Christian prays for these heathen even as he shared sex with the girls as part of a so-called ritual. When Captain Stigg tosses the dead into the ocean, Eli saves the life of a girl Abi still breathing. Her father thanks Eli by giving him a box that the man says contains the devil’s light that he took from a dead shaman. He is warned not to open it or all will die.

Three and a half centuries later in Cumberton, Maryland, a cemetery dating back to colonial times is moved in order for Reverend Jimmy Starr to construct a dormitory on the hallowed grounds. Two teenagers Tony and Jill fall into a hole where he finds a box in the empty grave of Father William Cumber 1645-1713. They accidentally break the box releasing “Lucifer’s Light” caged by Father Cumber centuries ago. Soon hell breaks out in Cumberton as student suicides occur. Sheriff Estin Booker and former Baltimore homicide detective Anna Tucci investigate what increasingly seems insane as the clues point to a two millennia Satanic myth in which humans must prevent the end of days, Lucifer’s way.

Dead Light is an exciting good and evil horror thriller as readers will be caught up in the doomsday countdown. Fast-paced, the only hope for mankind is two cops with personal demons preventing them from fully committing to fighting hell. Mike Pace provides a tense thriller as increasingly the dark appears on the brink of winning the ultimate battle by using the light.

Harriet Klausner

Deliverance
Dakota Banks
Harper Voyager, Mar 27 2012, $7.99
ISBN: 9780062049988

Three centuries ago Maliha Crayne sold her soul to Rabishu the demon who saved her when she was Susannah Layhem being burnt at the stake in 1692. Since then she has become Rabishu’s prime assassin (see Dark Time). However, she recently learned of a path out of the darkness by balancing the scales between hits and lives saved. Thus she goes rogue choosing redemption over murderous torment.

However, her path to redemption proves troublesome when close friends begin to vanish and subsequently body parts arrive in packages delivered to her home. Trusting no one, not even her lover Jake, Maliha is given a horrid choice by an evil immortal psychopath; kill the innocent or receive the body parts of her friends. Regardless of what she decides, Maliha knows she still remains eternally damned.

The third Mortal Path urban fantasy (see Sacrifice) is an exhilarating thriller in which the assassin feels she jumped from the frying pan into the fire. Filled with deft twists, sub-genre fans will wonder how the beleaguered protagonist will handle the Mt. Everest size deterrence to her goal of redemption.

Harriet Klausner

Darkest Knight
Karen Duvall
Luna, Mar 20 2012, $14.95
ISBN: 9780373803446

One month ago, Aydin the warrior, bonded to a gargoyle, sacrificed his humanity to free his beloved Chalice from her master Shui the homicidal gargoyle before the psychopath dined on Chalice tartare. To fight Shui, he had to accept the curse. Now Aydin is a gargoyle and Chalice plans to bring her lover back to human form by facing her nightmares in the Vyantara Fatherhouse on the other side of the Veil.

Chalice has become a knight in The Order of the Hatchet. When something murders her sister knights while they sleep, Chalice investigates alone. At the same time, Aydin visits Chalice in her dreams. Soon she will be caught in a choice of competing loyalties no person should have to make.

The latest Chalice urban fantasy is an entertaining thriller as the heroine, filled with guilt and plenty of heart, struggles to adjust to her changed circumstances and what her beloved mentor did for her. Although newcomers will struggle with comprehending the Duvall realm (it behooves fans to have read A Knight’s Curse in which the mythos is established), the beleaguered protagonist remains a confused adult who is unsure what to do now that her teacher is no longer there for her and her guardian angel Rafe refuses to coddle her. Filled with sorcerers, angels and the fallen, fans will enjoy this complex thriller as the heroine continues to learn good and evil tend to somewhat overlap.

Harriet Klausner

Dire Needs
Stephanie Tyler
Signet, Mar 6 2012, $7.99
ISBN: 9780451236234

Medical resident Dr. Gwen Kadlin knows she is dying from her unexplained seizures. With nothing to lose, Gwen seeks passionate lovemaking before she is unable to have sex. She goes to the unsafe Were biker bar where she plans to hook up with a dangerous hunk.

Rifter leads the six remaining immortal Dire wolves whose mission is assigned by the enigmatic Elders to protect humans. However, they and the Weres are in mortal combat with human Weretrappers, who seek to capture and experiment on them. Rifter is shocked when Gwen enters the bar; as she is out of place here and his inner wolf wants her. They begin to make love when a seizure hammers Gwen, which makes Rifter sense shapeshifting is involved. However when his Gwen becomes the target of the enemy, Rifter vows to keep her safe but also wonders if the threat is because of her connection to him or something else.

Tyler moves from romantic suspense (Night Moves) into paranormal romance with the derivative first Eternal Wolf Clan book. Rifter must sort out a deadly plot involving rogues, witches, black magic, and weretrappers while grappling with his unlikely longing for Gwen.

The first Eternal Wolf Clan romantic urban fantasy is a fast-paced tale from the moment the “strangers in the night exchanging glances wondering in the night what were the chances (they’d) be sharing love” (Frank Sinatra) and never slows down until the final altercation. Although the overarching combat premise to protect humans has been used frequently (see The Walker Papers by C.E. Murphy), sub-genre fans will enjoy this engaging suspense laden thriller.

Harriet Klausner

The Dread
Gail Z. Martin
Orbit, Feb 1 2012, $7.99
ISBN: 9780316093613

Weary of war but knowing hostilities are heating up; tired King Donelan of Isencroft goes to lie down in his bed. However, an assassin rigged a bow contraption underneath, which is activated when the monarch’s weight hit the bed. The ruler is dead and the kingdom is on the verge of civil war. Donelan’s daughter Queen Kiara Sharsequin Drayke leaves her husband and child behind in Margolan to go home as the monarch and prevent the civil war at a time when external crisis threatens the country.

Elsewhere in the Winter Kingdoms, trouble has returned with the bellicose rise of normally isolated Temnotta. At the same time, Kiara’s mate Summoner-King Martris Drayke (see Chronicles of the Necromancer) struggles with sorcery and steel combat coming to his nation at a time Tris fears for the soul of his infant child while he must use forbidden magic to deal the rise of the Dread.

The latest Fallen King’s Cycle political-military fantasy (see The Sworn) starts off with the shocking assassination, but slows down immediately afterward while the numerous subplots are established. Once done, the storyline accelerates into a rousing thriller as war has returned to the Winter Kingdoms. Filled with minute details, fans will believe they traverse the dangerous realms of the Martin mythos.

Harriet Klausner

Darkness Bound
Stella Cameron
Forever, Feb 28 2012, $7.99
ISBN: 9781455500154

After two years as a couple and a few days married, Chris died. Fourteen months later, his grieving widow Leigh Kelly decides she cannot live in their home filed with too many memories. She moves to Chimney Rock on Whidbey Island.

Former Special Ops soldier Niles Latimer and his werehound Team are diligently watching the newcomer to keep her safe from rogues assaulting women. However, he also senses Leigh possesses something unique that could prove her compatible as life mate for a werehound. Nile realizes she knows nothing about her DNA or the existence of werehounds as he and his Team vow to protect her while the evil enemy senses who she is too and pledges to take her.

The first Chimney Rock romantic urban fantasy is a superb dark thriller in which Stella Cameron creates a deep mythos that feels genuine; inside of a fast-paced good and evil battle for Leigh. Loaded with chilling action, a strong lead couple and two camps of werehounds and other ilk, sub-genre readers will enjoy a visit to mysterious Whidbey Island where the paranormal is the normal.

Harriet Klausner

Darkness Undone
Jessa Slade
Signet, Mar 6 2012, $7.99
ISBN 9780451236265

To earn his wings as a League of Talyan Bookkeeper, Sidney Westerbrook leaves London to study why Chicago contains an exorbitant level of otherworldly combat. Though he preferred research from a distance, he knows field work is an inconvenient truth of his mission. However, the Chicago League Chief Liam Niall refuses to allow him to join their night patrol on his first evening in the city; suggesting he adapt to the time change first.

Thus Sidney goes out on the town alone. However, Westerbrook realizes the stupidity of his actions when two feralis attack him. His shoulder injured, he expects to be a mangled corpse only a female talya warrior intercedes as Alyce Carver is not bound by strict League rules as a rogue battling evil ferales solo. They are attracted to one another, but Sid is a London based Bookkeeper and Alyce is a rogue unaffiliated talyan ,and is expected to mate with one of her kind.

The fourth Marked Souls romantic urban fantasy (see Seduced by the Shadows, Forged in Shadows and Vowed in Shadows) is an exciting paranormal with a fascinating unexpected but plausible twist. The story line is fast-paced with the well done gender spin of the heroine saving the helpless male in distress. Although Alyce garners much respect for her dedication and empathy for her loneliness, Sid fails to do likewise as understanding him comes late. Still this is another dynamic thriller in the super Slade mythos.

Harriet Klausner