Sandy M’s review of Crux (Southern Arcana, Book 1) by Moira Rogers
Contemporary Paranormal Romance published by Samhain 3 Mar 09

I found Moira Rogers late last year when I read and reviewed her Cry Sanctuary.  I love shapeshifters and Ms. Rogers catches the right feel of them, along with a great storyline and love scenes. This book is no different — great characters from the start, action that flies right along, and this time around we get wizards and cougar shifters.  Who could ask for anything more?

Mackenzie has been on the run for a month, running from a crazed monster who’s telling her things she knows just can’t be true. All she does know for sure is the man will probably see her dead if she stays in one place too long. When she hits New Orleans and meets people who are willing to help her, as much as she’d love to stay and maybe start over, she refuses to have their deaths on her conscience. But before she can do anything about it, the latest attack takes place and thank God for Jackson.

She’d been attracted to him anyway, but when she sees him in action, his magic flying all over the place, her fears are somewhat allayed, though her amazement and confusion at what she sees abound, and she wants to spend some time with the handsome wizard. When she finally reveals her story, the whole truth comes out and she’s stunned to learn the crazy things she heard are actually true. She’s a cougar shifter who has no memory of her early life, let alone the fact she’s a shapeshifter. She’s being pursued in an effort to repopulate her species, but the madman behind it all wants it done his maniacal way.

When she and Jackson team up with the local wolves and wizards, they can only hope their mission to rid the world of a very powerful master is successful. I enjoyed all of those characters. Nick is the local bartender, to the chargin of her Alpha wolf father; her sister is a Seer, one of the all powerful of her kind. Alec is Jackson’s business partner in their private investigation firm and he’s also a wolf shifter.  Mahalia is Jackson’s protege, she taught him all he knows of magic and then some.  Steven is another cougar, the nephew of the man they’re after, and he’s more than willing to help put a stop to his machinations.  All of these characters work together beautifully, suffer losses, but still love one another no matter what.

The only little nitpick I have is I would have liked to have seen more shifting, though the cat fight near the end almost made up for that.  Either way, this is another good book by Ms. Rogers.  It doesn’t quite measure up to Cry Sanctuary for me, but it comes close. And it makes me want to keep reading her stories.

Grade: B+

Summary:
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Jackson Holt makes a decent living as a private investigator in New Orleans, home of one of the largest underground supernatural populations in the United States. He and his partners have never met a case they couldn’t crack…until a local bar owner asks him to do a little digging on her newest hire.
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New Orleans is the fourth destination in as many months for Mackenzie Brooks, a woman on the run from a deranged stalker. After all, any man who shows up on her doorstep claiming to be her destined lover has more than a few screws loose. But crazy doesn’t explain why he always finds her no matter how far she runs.
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When her well-meaning boss puts a PI on her case, Mackenzie comes face to face with the incredible truth: magic is real, and whatever spell has kept her hidden and separate from the paranormal world is rapidly deteriorating.
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With time running out, she has no choice but to trust Jackson as he struggles to uncover the truth of her past-and her destiny.
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Warning: This book contains devious schemes, epic battles, forbidden love between a shapeshifter and a spellcaster, nosy secondary characters, furniture-endangering sex and a woman fighting to choose her own destiny.
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Read an excerpt.