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Book Review and New Release: The Awakening: Liam (The Awakening #2)

Title: The Awakening: Liam
Author: Abby Niles
Series: The Awakening
Genre: Paranormal romance
Published: 2013
Pages: 209
Format read: ebook
Rating: B+

The Awakening series takes place in a world where shifters exist in secret and are “bonded” to their true love for life…which is awesome if their mate is interested, but can lead to insanity of she is not. This is the second book in the series; I haven’t read the first yet (The Awakening: Aidan), so I didn’t get of the details of exactly how this world works. Enough of it was explained throughout the course of the novel, though, that I really didn’t feel as if I missed out.

I do, however, feel as if I should read the first book. Just to balance out my understanding of the world it takes place in, you understand. 😉

Shifter Liam Doyle was left by Ava Michaels, his human mate, in book one of the series for reasons unknown.  Her rejection has resulted in a devastating condition that leaves him angry, bitter, helpless–and privy to all the emotions that Ava is experiencing as she experiences them.  As his book opens, Liam believes he feels Ava die.

Ava’s not dead, though; she’s become shifter bait. Soon both she and Liam are under the control of a madman, and a horrible game of revenge and torture begins. Will either of them make it out alive?

I literally read this book in one sitting–from the very first page I needed to know how Liam and Ava could escape their captor and somehow manage to be together again. Their time in captivity reminded me of reading The Silence of the Lambs, and made for a taut and adrenalin-charged plotline.

Liam is–wow. A fantastic hero. Though his pride sometimes gets in the way of giving others much-needed clarity (I’m not going to let her know how truly wretched I’ll be without her, is an often-repressed sentiment), his sheer overall awesomeness made it really tough to understand why Ava could willingly make his life so hellish. I think I’m glad that I read this book before Aidan’s, because I’m not sure I’d have been able to really warm up to Ava without knowing exactly why it is that she has left Liam. We find out her reasons  in this book about a third of the way in–and once the explanation is made, she’s a much more sympathetic character all around.

Once the villain and his motivations are revealed, the book finishes up swiftly…maybe a tad too quickly, but the HEA is still satisfying overall. My first peek into this shifter universe definitely left me wanting more–could cop shifter Brit’s book be next, possibly?

Hmm. A shifter in uniform. I hope so!

In a nutshell: An enthralling paranormal romance in a unique world setting. A strong B+ for an author I’ll definitely be reading again.

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review

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