I picked up half of the Harmony Ends series as Amazon freebies and purchased the other half.
I know I technically have all four books in the picture, but as of now, I’ve only actually read Earth Song, Blood Shield, and Wing Strike. Storm Claw is a prequel, and I didn’t pick it up until I was about halfway through the series. But now that I’ve finished, I need a break before I jump into a prequel that won’t have any (or many) of the side characters I’m used to. I need to give it a little time so that it can stand on its own. I’ll come back and add a review for Storm Claw once I read it.
Earth magic suffers at the hands of humans.
Atomic warfare unleashed poisonous Rot forever.
But shifter life can’t stop for Earth magic’s demise.
Lucky loves working for her family’s bear shifter security firm. She can keep her secret abilities hidden in plain sight. The drawback? The higher she climbs, the more she has to work with humans in their Rotting cities.
When a human requests her for an unusual contract in DC, Lucky wants to refuse—until she learns the client probably knows her secrets. There’s only one man who could have betrayed her. Again. Lucky delves into the contract to bury the past… but Earth magic has other plans.
I liked this series a lot. I thought the world was interesting, the shifter magics innovative, the Native American aspect unique, the platonic cross-gender love and friendship refreshing, the diversity satisfying, the characters engaging, and the writing easily readable. I was kept entertained throughout.
I like Lucky a lot. I thought her strong while still feeling like a woman. (As opposed to the ‘strong female’ that reads as if the author wrote a man and then grafted on some boobs.) She grew a lot over the course of the books—forced to face her own prejudices and accept hard changes for herself and her world.
I adored the side characters but felt a little let down by the romance. I liked Rohan as a character and how open the two were with each other, but the spark didn’t ignite for me. I found this aspect of the story pretty lackluster, if I’m honest. I also thought the books could have done with one more mechanical editing pass. The editing isn’t bad, mind you, but I did notice a few mishaps (and they get more frequent as the series progresses).
Lastly, I’m also going to include two points that aren’t really the author’s fault (I didn’t detract stars or anything when I cross-posted) but definitely adversely affected my enjoyment. One, I’m sick to death of cliffhangers. So, I’ve committed to only reading standalone books and completed series for a while.
Amazon has Wing Strike (book 3) listed as book 3 of 3. So, I picked it up, thinking it was the last book in a 3-book series. Imagine my disappointment when I finished it to discover the series is not finished and no fourth book is on the horizon. I’m not complaining that the author isn’t writing fast enough; Wing Strike just came out. But I feel like being listed as book 3 of 3 infers that there are 3 books in the series, not that there are 3 books now with an indeterminant number to come.
Second, I discovered this series because the author posts promo videos on Tiktok a lot. I saw recently that, though this version is fade-to-black, she is publishing a spicy version too. This publishing of several versions of the same story is a huge pet peeve for me. I want to read the story, not a version of the story. I don’t want to forever wonder if I’d have liked the other version more or less*.
*I just had déjà vu as I typed that sentence. A quick search of the blog shows me I wrote almost the exact thing in a review early last year. At least my feelings are consistent.
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