Saturday, July 12, 2014

Wind and Shadow (Talbot Trilogy)/ Tori L. Ridgewood


Reviewed by: ?wazithinkin

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Approximate word count: 95-100,000 words

Availability    
Kindle  US: YES  UK: YES  Nook: YES  Smashwords: YES  Paper: YES
Click on a YES above to go to appropriate page in Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Smashwords store

Author:

“Tori L. Ridgewood is a collector and teller of stories; a dedicated wife, mother, and high-school teacher; and is a practicing Wiccan. She enjoys reading, needlecraft, and overthinking movies.”

“She loves to travel, collect and make miniature furniture, and a good cup of tea during a thunderstorm or a blizzard. Under it all, she is always intrigued by history, the supernatural, vampire and shapeshifter mythology, romance, and other dangers.”

Learn more about Ms. Ridgewood at her website.

Description:

“Rayvin Woods, photographer and natural witch. She just wanted to start her life over again after a series of misadventures. She didn't count on rekindling a lost love when she came home to Talbot...or battling a malevolent vampire and his coven for her life.

Grant Michaels, police officer. He thought Rayvin was a murderer. He will do whatever it takes to protect the community he loves from danger...but will he learn to trust his heart, and the word of a witch, before it's too late?”

Appraisal:

Ten years ago Rayvin Wood was ostracized after being falsely accused for a tragic injury of the town’s sports hero, Jason Lucas, which left him a paraplegic. She is now heading back home to reunite with her foster sister and best friend, Andrea Renaud, to try to start life anew. Being pulled over by Grant Michaels, her high school crush and Jason’s best friend, was not an auspicious start. And neither was the huge sinkhole that shows up in the middle of town upon her arrival, which just happens to let loose an evil vampire, who had been entombed there a year ago, three days before Halloween.

It is clear there is a sexual tension in the love/hate relationship between Rayvin and Grant as the animosity flies and neither will admit they are drawn to each other. Grant can’t help but be attracted to Rayvin’s untamed, intelligent, and unapologetic character. Ms. Ridgewood does a good job developing her characters. However she had an annoying tendency to repeat facts about how they felt about each other in the past and the emotions they were going through now over and over again. This tendency led to the over usage of the words had had and the words, after all.

 “The confusion of emotions that had surrounded her when they had had their brief encounter on the highway was nothing now to the storm that rose within.”

“She had had to come back. She wasn’t sure what was more difficult, the fact that she could not avoid an encounter with Lucas forever, or the knowledge that she had had to face him again as a failure.”

“She might be a murderer, after all.”

“The ride had been cold, after all.”

There is a unique story here with lots of twists and turns as the plot unfolds and some captivating characters who are dealing with a lot of unusual situations. This story starts off strong and the sex scenes between Rayvin and Grant are some of the best I have read, they are hot! However, I feel like this book would benefit from a good re-editing. Not only for the issues already mentioned, but for trouble with some continuity issues towards the end of the book with timing and the order of events that get a little wonky.

To say that this book has a cliff-hanger is an understatement. Nothing was resolved to a satisfactory conclusion, only more problems presented themselves at the end. The good news is that book two is out. If you are willing to overlook the issues I had with this book you may find you will enjoy the story.

FYI:

Adult language and strong sexual content. Ms. Ridgewood uses Canadian spelling.

Format/Typo Issues:

I came across several editing issues from simple proofing errors to larger copy editing issues. I find it really hard to handle when a main characters name is misspelled.


Rating: ** Two stars

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