Bria Lexor, $0.99, ISBN 979-8201214609
Fantasy Romance, 2022
Donovan Seaton’s real name is Taron Seaton.
Normally, I would question why he bothered to change his first name if he’s going to keep his surname, but you see, he ran away when he was 12 from his undersea kingdom, of which he is the octopus-y (ahem) heir of, only to later name his boat Octopus Prince.
Does he want to be found, or is he just lacking in general when it comes to the brainpower department?
Anyway, don’t worry about the octopus thing. Just like with all the werewolf and were-dragon heroes, he remains in hot human form so the were stuff feels more like cosmetic edginess that will not intrude on the torrid sexy moments.
When Bria Lexor’s Hero of the Fallen Empire opens, he’s been found.
“Taron, we have been searching for you.” I hear a familiar male voice saying.
At the sound of my old name, I start. With a deep sigh, I turn around.
“Nerio, long time no see… Why have you been searching for me?”
Nerio quickly makes sure that we are alone as he explains everything to me.
“I am sorry to bring bad news to you, but the Empire is in ruins. Your father is missing, so the situation is extremely delicate, and we need a ruler to stabilize everything. I thought it would be best if it were you.”
“What? When did all of this happen?”
“The war with the Siren Reign has been violently going on for a few years, and now it cannot be worse. If someone does not take control of this terrible complication, King Theo will take over, the Empire will fall, and the gods know what will happen next-”
Why do these people converse like a kindergarten teacher talking down to a slow kid? Couldn’t the author inject some sense of urgency into the conversation?
For example, that last part could have been touched up a bit into something like:
“The seahorses! They have breached our defenses! Most of our people are now captured to be impregnated by horny, evil seahorses, doomed to lay eggs forever and give rise to more seahorses to ravage us further!”
Anyway, it just happens that our heroine Monique is nearby during this scintillating conversation.
A loud splash interrupted the speech of Nerio, immediately followed by a scream. I rush towards the prow to see a girl in the water, struggling to stay afloat. Supposedly, she accidentally fell off the mole, and she probably cannot swim. Determined to save the endangered girl, I dive into the frigid water and swim swiftly toward her. She notices me, and I hear her frantically shout.
“Hey! Can you please help me?”
I meet her, grabbing and holding her close to me as I swim back to my boat. We both fall on the deck, and as I take a first look at the young lady, I immediately recognize her. While breathing heavily, we rest here for some moments as Nerio looks at us, cocking his head.
“Is she your girlfriend?” Nerio asks me with curiosity.
“What? No!” the mysterious girl and I reply simultaneously, wide-eyed by his presumption.
“By the way, are you ok?” I ask her with a worried face.
“Yeah, I’m alright… Thank you.” she replies, slowly coming to a sitting position and tiredly putting her head in her hands.
“Then it’s a good thing that I was here tonight, right?” I jokingly ask.
She chuckles. “Yes, I suppose. I do not even know how I got into the water. To explain, I was admiring the sunset, like the hopeless romantic I am, and I must have tripped or something similar to it. Of course, I cannot swim to save my life, so here we are!”
Nerio frowns. “Wait for a second… That means that you must have heard us!” Her smile falters. “I am sorry. What do you mean?”
Now Nerio is looking at me.
“Taron, we cannot simply let her go away. If she speaks to someone about this, bad things will happen. She could be a spy, or worse. Imagine what would happen if a human discovered this. We would certainly become a science project of sorts!”
Seriously, the author couldn’t think of a less laughable reason to have the heroine fall into the played-out “Oh no, I am held by a sexy hot guy, what am I to do?” premise?
Also, yikes, the conversations in this story make all the characters appear as if they were putting on some bad skit on TikTok. It’s hard to take the gravity of their situation seriously when they talk like vapid teens at Hot Topic trying to pick what they want to wear for the coming weekend.
Then there’s the author having a first person point of view in this story, only to include details that the narrator shouldn’t know about.
So, in the end, the plotting is off, the conversations are just painful to read, the author’s technical polish is of “Let’s go back to the drawing board, darling…”-tier, and the whole thing just screams super amateur hour. The only thing that is halfway polished is the gorgeous cover, which I suspect the author has no hand in, and that’s really sad.
