Title: Icebound
Series: Mortals & Myths
Author: Corinna Rogers
Genre: Urban Fantasy, M/M Romance
Sensuality Rating: Erotic
Source: review copy provided via NetGalley
Published: September 25, 2014 by HarperImpulse
It’s been ten years since Shane Conell sold his soul to the Ice King in order to save the life of the man he loves. Correction, loved.
After ten years, it’s growing difficult to remember love, and hate, and laughter – until a chance appears to get back the only thing his frozen heart still wants…
Drake Young is doing fine. Really. He’s got a good job, nice benefits, and the soulless husk of his old lover only comes by to torment him every so often. However, it only takes the appearance of a creature from the Etherworld wreaking havoc on the decidedly nonmagical city streets to drag him out of retirement, forcing him to team up with the one person he can’t bear even to look at!
Now, Drake and Shane must race against the clock to keep their city from being destroyed, even if it means working together. And no matter how difficult it is to catch the creature, it’s a hell of a lot more difficult to resist the urges that ten years haven’t managed to kill.
Reviewed by: Crissy
Why I Read This Book: As I’m still the new kid on the block around here, you may not know this about me, but fantasy is a favorite genre of mine. I devour it with an obsession, so when I came across this book all it took were words like: Ice King, frozen heart, soulless, and Etherworld, and I was in. Plus, I’m a sucker for second chance love stories and this is nothing if not that.
In A Nutshell: A fast paced urban fantasy with hot and fast sex scenes and lots of delicious dirty talk. Too bad we miss most of the relationship building.
The Setup: Nine years ago, Shane Connell sold his soul to the Ice King to save the life of the only man he’s ever loved—Drake. Drake has spent the past nine years watching the shell of the man he loved become the one thing they hated and being able to do nothing about it. When a Soul-thief steals Drake’s friend’s soul, he is determined to get it back and at the same time, the only way for Shane to get his back is to kill the very creature Drake is trying to keep alive.
What I Liked: Talk dirty to me. Look. I’m a girl who likes to read smutty, steamy sex and sometimes that includes dirty talk. And lord knows I love me some dirty talk. I did not see the roughness and slutty/whore talk coming from a mile away, but I will admit that it totally worked for me. These guys have a chemistry—soul or no—from the first time they’re on page together. They are very possessive of one another, even though they don’t always show it—especially to each other. And it can be crazy frustrating.
What I Also Liked: The flashbacks. Okay, I’ll be honest. I know some of you out there are dead set against flashbacks, but I don’t mind them in the least. In fact, if I can learn from them, I enjoy the heck out of them. In this case, where the relationship building is so lacking, it was nice to see where the feelings between Drake and Shane came from. The flashbacks in this story at least gave me some background on the guys.
I also enjoyed the mix of fantasy and reality. It was fun and exciting—a little bit of dream mixed in with the here and now. The monsters, the magical powers, myths—it was all very interesting. But then again that’s what UF is, yes?
What I Didn’t Like: I’m not going to lie. Just about the only things that worked for me were the sex and aesthetics of the world. This story was written in the dreaded third person present tense POV. Any present tense POV is not my cuppa, but I will give allowance that this author worked it well. There are times that I barely noticed, but then others where I was completely thrown out of the story because of the tense and meanings. It was beyond frustrating.
Also as much as I liked this story, everything about it was super rushed. I didn’t feel like I could catch my breath much less find a foothold within the story to build on. This story is barebones. The world is good but skimmed over. The author tells us about different monsters and magical creatures but only in passing. We don’t really learn what they mean to this world or what they add. Worst of all is how Shane and Drake jump from a nonexistent relationship into this crazy sexual relationship while working together that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. The author gives no reason as to why Shane—who shouldn’t feel anything after having his soul removed—still loves Drake. I just didn’t like how it all played out so quickly and without depth.
In My Opinion: This is a decent book that could have been better. I was hoping for better. There are a lot of questions left unanswered so I’m hoping to have some resolution with book two. If I can make it through.
Memorable Moment:
Crissy’s Rating:
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