Fangs for the Fantasy

Cara was an investment banker and her main problems in life were a misogynist boss she hated and the fact her love life consisted of dreaming of Kai, her married best friend.

 

Then she received an odd letter from her grandmother. It opens a world of vast wealth, a whole new home – and angels. Angels and Nephilim and gifted humans whose job it is to prevent the long banished fallen angels, the demons, from wreaking havoc on Earth. She has been called to serve as one of these gifted people and is part of a sacred prophecy, the first of the 12, leading up to an epic battle for the very sake of humanity.

 

And she meets Simon – sexy, suave, rich, sophisticated and secretly her Guardian in disguise – and forbidden to her.

 

 

Oh, I am torn over this book. Well, kind of.

 

On the one hand, I am fascinated with the concept and world of this book. The Trinities, the three supernatural agents, each with their own niche (which I’m not sure of) and powers (which I have a rough idea of but not entirely) and role, all focused on a centre stone who is important (in some ill-defined way which may be different for each Trinity, though I’m not sure if every trinity has a centre stone?). The ability to gain insights into this future by examining the stones (something I didn’t entirely understand but got the gist of) is a wonderfully teaser way of driving the story. The constraints of free will (which I think they broke a few times but could use more explaining) makes for a nice little twist in both motivation and limits. Then there’s the unaffiliated Nephilim and the Seeker families that both suggest a wider world, activity and involvement beyond the Trinities (but this isn’t expanded upon leaving much up for grabs)

 

And, of course, there’s a prophecy. I know, I know, clichéd but a good prophecy always adds power and texture to a nice apocalyptic story – and this, with its prophecy of 12 possible chosen ones (chosen for what, why and how I do not know) suggests a nice, long, slow build to an epic finale. On top of that we have a huge, ill-defined history full of ill-defined factions that may or may not be relevant today.

 

The world has so much in it that I want to explore every part of it- because I can feel there is so much here. And all this world building has been presented in a way that makes me interested, which is impressive and speaks volumes for the world since it was presented in a series of info-dumping (albeit, it doesn’t reflect so positively on the writing).

 

The dog’s also special somehow. I kind of gave up expecting answers by then.

 

And the problem? Well, if you look above you can probably guess my problem – everything is vague and unfinished – the characters didn’t ask nearly enough questions to fill in the gaps, and they were questions that should have been asked and would have been asked. For most of the book I actually thought Cara was the Centre Stone of the Trinity (we’re talking the last 20% when I realised I was wrong). Everything is suggested but nothing is defined!

 

 

First, let’s take our protagonist Cara. She is single when she starts the book but unlike so many Paranormal Romances, this breaks the mould by not having her be “Gently Used” or only had unsatisfactory relationships in the past. She had a wonderful relationship with Kai. 7 years ago. She now obsess about this relationship, dreams about him and waits hopefully for the day he will come back to her – he’s her best friend, is married and has a small child, but she’s still living in hope. More than slightly creepy desperation isn’t a good look on anyone