My rating: 2.5 of 5 stars
This book is a hot mess.
I actually had quite a good time at the beginning. I laughed and smiled a lot…the problem? I don’t think it was meant to be funny.
Several of the phrases that made it hard to take the story seriously:
[these are said by an Atlantean warrior-prince during those “oh crap moments” where the hero is in deep trouble]
-“By Zeus’ bullocks!”
-“By Ares’ foreskin!”
-“By Aphrodite’s sweet mound!”
-“By Jason’s fleece!”
-“By Ares’ shaft!”
-“By Hades’ rotten cock!”
The basic plot is that Elena is an underwater archaeologist whose father was laughed out of the field for his belief in Atlantis. He was later lost at sea. Elena is a bit more pragmatic and doesn’t believe in Atlantis, but she is still carrying on his legacy. In fact she so desperately doesn’t believe in Atlantis that 260 pages in, she still thinks it’s a dream. Right. On a stormy night, trying to take one last look at a history-changing shipwreck, Elena sees a man drowning, and she rescues him.
Prince Orion isn’t drowning, he’s fighting Shades. But he gladly takes Elena’s assistance when she offers. They crash on a small island off Greece, and he falls for her…sort of…he wants her, but he’s never been attracted to humans before, and they’re forbidden to begin with. So he settles for a bit of making out and shows her some treasures of ancient times, then erases her memory and deposits her back on shore…where she has a boyfriend waiting for her.
That was totally unnecessary and pointless. Greg’s part in the plot could have been cut totally and it would have only helped the book. There were so many plotholes in this story, and his plothole was one of the worst. The worst was where Orion and Elena stayed in Eden (the land of the fairies) and therefore they reversed time. Ummm, yeah. Then during the time they were in Eden, the princess Morwena is killed, Rhiannon (heroine from first book in the series, Seaborne, but with a new name Claire=Rhiannon) is poisoned and bespelled and almost loses the baby she’s carrying, her daughter Danu is shown to have fantastical healing powers… and all of this is reversed, but not explained. You kind of have to guess at why Morwena is alive, and then it seems like there was no point to Danu’s powers being shown to her family just to have them reversed.
The character of Elena fell flat. The story felt forced. The writing wasn’t bad, but the plot was convoluted and some parts were never explained well.
I give this one a rating of 2.5 flames and I would try the author again absolutely, as I enjoyed the style of her writing, I just hope her editor on the next book points out those plotholes and for the love love of great Ares’ foreskin, please stop using those cockamamie phrases!
**Thank you to Kensington for the ARC-book releases in October 2011
“By Hades’ rotten cock!”
I may have to steal this one!