Sandy M’s review of Forgotten Kisses by Rena Marks
Contemporary Erotic Paranormal Romance eBook released by Ellora’s Cave 26 Mar 08
Just from reading the prologue in this book, I had high hopes for getting a good read that’s right up my alley: vampires, werewolves, hot and sizzling sex, a great story, and a good mystery to go along with it all. I only ended up with one or two of those things by the end of the book. The others either irritated me or bored me, which is usually hard to do, as folks here around The Pond (a.k.a. TGTBTU) will tell you.
First of all, it took nearly half the book to get to the good part of it, the mystery and the reason for reading in the first place, so after a while I was bored with it all. The first half is spent with Anjelia and Julian, the vampire part of the story, finally coming together after she has rebuffed him time and again. There’s only a little bit of Leo, the werewolf part, here and there. I honestly didn’t expect to see much more of him after meeting him once or twice, so it was another surprise to find later that he becomes a major part of the book. I thought I’d been reading about the hero, Julian, all along, but apparently that wasn’t so.
Julian is the master vampire of the city and Leo is the werewolf king, both alphas, powerful, and handsome as sin. They’ve been bitter enemies for eons and they’re now embroiled in a tug-of-war for Anjelia and just a plain old war between their factions due to a serial killer that’s on the loose. But it takes Leo to make Anjelia see that all is not what it seems in her relationship with Julian.
I liked Julian up until this point. Anjelia is a lot more forgiving of his transgressions concerning her than I ever would have been. With Leo waiting in the wings, I would have walked away from Julian and straight into Leo’s arms at the drop of a hat once Julian’s deceit was revealed. She supposedly still loves Julian, though, even after all that, but I never really felt it. It seemed more contrived, needing to be that way for the ending of the book down the road, which is another whole story when I get to it. Eventually Leo is brought into the storyline on a more regular basis, we learn more about him through his “friendship” with Anjelia. He wants more, of course, because, as he tells her, she’s destined to be his queen, but she has the taint of vampire in her blood and his pack is reluctant to accept her.
After getting through way too much of Julian and Anjelia’s budding relationship — it could have been cut way down to get to the good part of the book — finally the meat of the story arrives. Anjelia is kidnapped, held captive for weeks, which causes Leo and Julian to work together, to become bonded, to have the power to find her. This part of the book is actually very well done, it’s interesting, the mystery of it all is kept alive, and it works. Even the impossible odds of Leo and Julian working together works during these scenes. It’s afterwards that it all falls apart for me again.
Anjelia’s feelings for Leo grow, but she keeps telling herself it’s the feelings of friendship, until she just can’t deny it’s love she truly feels. But she still loves Julian. Even after his deceit is revealed for a second time. Okay, maybe you can love two men at the same time, loving them in different ways, which in itself is an interesting concept, but the way it’s done here just didn’t fly for me. The author basically created circumstances where Anjelia is tied to the two men that compels their need for one another, which led me to the feeling of it being contrived. Love should be an all-out, flaming, out-of-control emotion and I never felt it here, not even with Leo, who was my favorite of the book. So to have it divided between two men just didn’t feel right.
Which leads me to the ending of the book. Just didn’t work here for me either. I kept asking myself how is the author going to come up with a way to leave Anjelia free to make her own choice. The answer is she didn’t. At least for me. The idea of these two men agreeing to such an ending and not go ballistic as most heroes do when their heroine is in another man’s domain, well, it just isn’t justified for these men and their feelings. I know some readers will like the way this all ended, but I’m still too disillusioned with Julian that I didn’t want him anywhere around at the end. So it’s only the fact that I liked Leo, I did get at least a pickup in the second half of the book, and I liked most of the secondary characters that the grade isn’t any lower.
Grade: C-
Summary:
Anjelia Romere falls in love with a vampire, yet is pursued relentlessly by his rival, the werewolf king. Her life is turned upside down when she realizes her vampire betrayed her by erasing her memory of being the wolf queen.Now she wonders whether the vampires are the good guys and if the werewolves are really the villains.
Tied for life as a human servant to the master vampire, yet destined to be the wolf king’s mate, Anjelia wonders: Whom shall she choose? For one option is death; the other, insanity.
Read an excerpt.
