Nikyta’s Reviews

Book Review: Black Magic by Megan Derr

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Black Magic
Author: Megan Derr
Series: Black Magic #1
Heroes: Sorin & Koray (and a few others)
Genre: M/M Fantasy
Length: 90,000 words
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Release Date: October 31, 2012
Available at: Less Than Three Press, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: When High Paladin Sorin discovers the brutally dismembered body of his cousin Alfrey, a much loved priest in the royal palace, he is left baffled as to who would do so terrible a thing to so good a man. But to find the answer to that question, he must cooperate with one of the highly despised necromancers, men who practice black magic, sleep in graveyards and feed upon souls…

The necromancer Koray, however, is far from what he expected. He is beautiful, stubborn, and possessed of a tongue sharp enough to cut down even the High Paladin himself. Koray is also possessed of a strength like nothing Sorin has ever encountered, and the power of the Goddess herself.

It does not take them long to realize that solving a murder is the easiest challenge they must face, and in order to save a kingdom they must first unravel centuries of lies and misunderstandings. Continue reading

Categories: 5 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2012 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Book Review: A Cupid’s Wager by Deanna Wadsworth

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: A Cupid’s Wager
Author: Deanna Wadsworth
Heroes: Lio & Ethan
Genre: M/M Paranormal Fantasy
Length: 70 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: February 13, 2014
Available at: Dreamspinner Press, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: The name’s Lio, and I’m a cupid working for the Gay Division of the Inter-Dimensional Association of Cupids. An Aztec god, whose modern name, Ethan, doesn’t make him any less scary, just busted me shooting a closeted human with a gay lust arrow. I might find him sexy with all those tattoos and piercings, if I didn’t have a rule against getting it on with other supernaturals—especially ones working for the Straight Division. Now, to save my butt I’ll have to strike a bargain with this tough god. But what I didn’t see coming was my little wager not only risks my career, but places my broken heart completely in Ethan’s hands.

A part of the “A Valentine Rainbow” set of 14 holiday stories. Continue reading

Categories: 3 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2014 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Early Review: The Oracle’s Hatchling by Mell Eight

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: The Oracle’s Hatchling
Author: Mell Eight
Series: Oracle #2
Heroes: Ling & Rion
Genre: M/M Fantasy
Length: 20,000 words
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Release Date: March 5, 2014
Available at: Less Than Three Press & All Romance eBooks
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads

Blurb: Ling is hated because his birth killed his mother. He hopes that testing will ease his troubles—either his rank will be so low that everyone forgets about him, or it will be so high they’ll be forced to respect him. What he doesn’t expect is to walk out of the testing chamber with an egg emblazoned on his back. Laughed out of the Monastery, Ling hides himself in Altnoia, where he becomes embroiled in a plot to overthrow King Edan and the Oracle who supports him.

The ringleader behind the plot is Prince Damarion, son of the evil despot who forced King Edan to flee in the first place—but his motives are not anything that Ling could have anticipated. Neither could he anticipate a friendship, or what that friendship could become, and the choices it would force him to make.

Continue reading

Categories: 4 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2014 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Book Review: Crow and Firefly by Sam C. Leonhard

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Crow and Firefly
Author: Sam C. Leonhard
Series: Crow and Firefly #1
Heroes: Ari & Roulfe
Genre: M/M Fantasy
Length: 78 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: October 31, 2012
Available at: Dreamspinner Press, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: The laws of man and nature are harsh and decisive: Unwed mothers are not allowed to raise their children, and shapehifters must wed and consummate the marriage to satisfy the magic that would otherwise render them beasts forever upon the morning of their twenty-third birthday.

With the life of his sister and newborn nephew at stake, shapeshifter Ari is trapped in a castle and compelled to accept a situation he’d dreaded: he is forced to marry Lord Dagur, a man he’s never met. A man called “The Cruel.” A man he fears, and not just because he fancies someone else. Continue reading

Categories: 3.5 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2012 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Book Review: The Oracle’s Flame by Mell Eight

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: The Oracle’s Flame
Author: Mell Eight
Series: The Oracle #1
Heroes: Dragon, Shev & Shov
Genre: M/M/M Fantasy
Length: 18,700 words
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Release Date: November 20, 2013
Available at: Less Than Three Press, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: The Kingdom of Altnoia is on the cusp of civil war. The king and heir have been murdered, the throne taken by their uncle, and the kingdom’s only hope lies with Prince Edan who has been missing for the past year. The Oracle appoints her new Dragon of Fire one task: Find Prince Edan and keep him alive.

It should have been a simple task, but Dragon did not anticipate that Prince Edan would hide away on a pirate ship, forcing Dragon not only to endure pirates, but sea-sickness and his fear of water. And nothing, not even the Oracle, could have prepared him for the twins and the complicated feelings they spark. Continue reading

Categories: 3.5 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2013 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Heidi Cullinan Week: Love Lessons

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Love Lessons
Author: Heidi Cullinan
Series: Love Lessons #1
Heroes: Kelly Davidson & Walter Lucas
Genre: M/M Contemporary
Length: 379 pages
Publisher: Samhain Publishing
Release Date: October 1, 2013
Available at: Samhain Publishing, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: Love doesn’t come with a syllabus.

Kelly Davidson has waited what seems like forever to graduate high school and get out of his small-minded, small town. But when he arrives at Hope University, he quickly realizes finding his Prince Charming isn’t so easy. Everyone here is already out. In fact, Kelly could be the only virgin on campus.

Worst of all, he’s landed the charming, handsome, gay campus Casanova as a roommate, whose bed might as well be equipped with a revolving door.

Walter Lucas doesn’t believe in storybook love. Everyone is better off having as much fun as possible with as many people as possible…except his shy, sad little sack of a roommate is seriously screwing up his world view.

As Walter sets out to lure Kelly out of his shell, staying just friends is harder than he anticipated. He discovers love is a crash course in determination. To make the grade, he’ll have to finally show up for class…and overcome his own private fear that love was never meant to last. Continue reading

Categories: 4.5 Star Ratings, Author Week, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2013 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Book Review: The Experiment by Alicia Nordwell

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: The Experiment
Author: Alicia Nordwell
Heroes: Ryker & Seral
Genre: M/M Sci-fi Romance
Length: 270 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: January 27, 2014
Available at: Dreamspinner Press
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: In the distant future, humans wage war against the alien planet Caeorleia, with no tactic off-limits if it will help the humans get their hands on Caeorleia’s resources. Ask Ryker. He thought he volunteered for a simple experiment that would help his government in the war. He didn’t realize sadistic doctors would turn him into the experiment—by injecting him with blood from a captured Caeorleian, Seral Iorflas.

Nor did Ryker realize he’d be sent to sabotage a planet full of the very beings his world is battling, beings who kill humans on sight. But then, thanks to the experiment that irrevocably changed him, he isn’t exactly human any longer—and with each passing day, as his blood bond with Seral strengthens, he’s less and less sure as to whose side he’s on. Continue reading

Categories: 4 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2014 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Book Review: Campfire Confessions by Bru Baker

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Campfire Confessions
Author: Bru Baker
Heroes: Mitchell & Case
Genre: M/M Contemporary
Length: 50 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: February 11, 2014
Available at: Dreamspinner Press
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads

Blurb: Best friends Case and Mitchell are so inseparable everyone assumes they’re dating. Case’s dad even buys them a joint gift—a camping trip. Even though Case hates the woods, he wants Mitchell to have a good time. When they discover the trip is a couples’ retreat, they have to fake a relationship. Case can’t understand why the trust and intimacy exercises the other couples struggle with come so naturally to them. After all, they’re not really boyfriends….

A part of the “A Valentine Rainbow” set of 14 holiday stories. Continue reading

Categories: 4 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2014 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Book Review: Beneath the Surface by Kate Sherwood

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Beneath the Surface
Author: Kate Sherwood
Heroes: Peter Carr & Caleb Sinclair
Genre: M/M Contemporary Romance
Length: 200 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: August 20, 2012
Available at: Dreamspinner Press
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads & Booklikes

Blurb: When Peter Carr’s company sends him to Southwestern Ontario to sweet-talk the town into agreeing to a gravel quarry proposal, he welcomes the challenge. Technically he’s a lawyer, but really he’s a problemsolver. He just never expected the problem to be Caleb Sinclair, the passionate but introverted artisan carpenter who lives next to the proposed quarry site.

“Know your enemy.” That’s Caleb’s philosophy. And trying to turn fertile farmland into a gravel pit earns Peter the title of “enemy.” Caleb loves that land, and if he has to make peace with his homophobic neighbors to make war on Peter, so be it. Except knowing his enemy doesn’t turn out anything like he expected. Peter’s not the fairy-tale monster—he just might be the first step to happy ever after. Continue reading

Categories: 4 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2012 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Book Review: Ice by L.J. LaBarthe

Reviewed by Nikyta

Title: Ice
Author: L.J. LaBarthe
Heroes: Koby & Mircea
Genre: M/M Futuristic Fantasy
Length: 30,000 words
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Release Date: February 5, 2014
Available at: Less Than Three Press, Amazon, All Romance eBooks & Barnes and Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads

Blurb: Koby is a graduate student specializing in the cohabitation of dead and living cells in a single body, a course of study that requires he spend two years working in the labs at the parium mines in Antarctica, where he will assist in experiments conducted on the vampire prisoners kept there.

Expecting little more than a tedious assignment, despite the dangers of the environment and the dangerous vampires sentenced to the mines for life, Koby instead discovers a dome of horrors, where the persons in charge cannot be trusted and the greatest victims are the prisoners—and the most incongruous place to discover a new love. If he cannot solve the problems destroying the dome from the inside, the vampires won’t be the only ones to die. Continue reading

Categories: 3 Star Ratings, Book Review, LGBT, Nikyta's Reviews, Published in 2014 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment