Monday, October 24, 2011

Review: Spell Bound by: Stephanie Julian



Kindle Edition
Published September 27th 2011 by Moonlit Night Publishing
ISBN 098466310X
Source: Author for the purposes of an honest review
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Series: Darkly Enchanted, book #1
Stars: 4
Flames: 4

                Shea is running. She’s running with her little brother from the nightmare that killed her parents. She keeps going because she knows that the people who are after her little brother have all kinds of vile intentions for him. The running is wearing her down and she has begun to realize that she can’t do this on her own any longer. She has to start seeking out the protector that her mother told her about in her final letter to her.

                Gabriel is a grigori (warrior.) He is part of the Etruscan race born to protect the streghe (witch.) Gabriel is very persistent in his search to find and eliminate the family who cursed a specific group of thirteen streghe nearly five hundred years ago. His frustrations are running very high as Dario and the rest of his Malandante minions consistently stay one step ahead of him.

                I love how Gabriel and Shea come together, both after the exact same thing, for completely different reasons. He is attempting to put an end to a curse. She has no clue what curse he is talking about. He believes that if she is truly who she claims to be then she should just know what she is. I liked the way the romantic built up in Spell Bound. Shea and Gabriel throw sparks from the very beginning, but it takes some time for them to see what exactly can become of those sparks. Julian has also woven a complex plot into this tale. I felt like I got more of the Etruscan world with this book than I have with other books set in this world. This curse has affected numerous individuals over the course of the past five hundred years. It was interesting to read about how the curse affected the different secondary characters and not just the main characters.   

                The cast of secondary characters were fantastic. I would love to know more about them all. I’m hoping Julian goes more in depth into their lives in future books. Quinn’s life is so terribly heartbreaking. To know that he is someone’s blood bound mate, for that person to deny him, and for him to know all the reasons he is denied and still he wants to be with her. Matt has to have an interesting past. He is blunt and to the point. His fellow grigori brothers all think him a bit crazy. Leo, even though he is just a child played a fairly large role in Spell Bound. It would be interesting to see where all of his extraordinary abilities take him once he is an adult. I can easily see Leo having an incredible book. I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed!
       
        I know I’ve said this numerous times before but I really love Julian’s magical Etruscan world. Each book in each of her series’ gives readers a taste of this world from a different magical beings perspective. The series’ are loosely tied to each other, readers can definitely read one series without reading the others. If you’ve never read any of her books before this would be an easy place to start. I can guarantee that you’ll soon have read all of her different series’.

***authors note at the end states that Spell Bound take place before Seduced by Magic. Having read both books I can honestly say that one can be read without having read the other***

2 comments:

  1. Have this one in my email box! Can't wait to tear into it :)

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  2. Great review. I don't think I have read anything by Stephanie before - but you've made me want to go searching to add them to my tbr and like I have mentioned before - her covers are hot!

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