Tag Archives: sci-fi romance

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Book Review: Claimed by an Alien Warrior, by Tiffany Roberts

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Tiffany Roberts‘ Claimed by an Alien Warrior has been on my shelf for a while now. I received it in a Renegade Romance book box last year.

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After losing her job, apartment, and boyfriend in one afternoon, Zoey doesn’t think things can get any worse. Then an uninvited passenger—green, four-armed, and sexy as sin—proves her wrong by dragging her into his frantic escape. Helping Rendash is the right thing to do, but it means becoming a fugitive and risking the only things she has left—her life, and her heart.

Weakened by years of captivity and torture, Rendash, an elite aligarii warrior, seizes his only opportunity for freedom. Alone in an alien wasteland, he seeks the aid of a human, one of the very species that imprisoned him. But he finds himself inexplicably drawn to Zoey, and his need to protect her soon wars with his mission to return to his homeworld.

With a shadowy government agency pursuing them, Zoey and Rendash must race across the country before he is recaptured, and she is thrown in a dark cell as a traitor to her kind. But their greatest obstacle may be the most unlikely—their insatiable attraction to one another.

my review

Meh, I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t love it either. It was sweet, but also not particularly deep, fairly formulaic, and therefore predictable. Honestly, that could stand as the review in its entirety. If a sweet, comfortably predictable alien romance is what you are after, this will fill the bill. If you’re looking for a little more depth or development, it’s probably not the book for you.

I liked Zoey well enough, though the “I’ve let myself get treated badly because I’m fat” got old pretty quickly, even if I did appreciate her finding her alien who liked her curves. Rendash is wonderfully straightforward and noble, but he’s also a cardboard cutout of a noble alien warrior. Nothing about him feels new or original, and I didn’t find him very well developed. The thrown-together-by-fate road trip felt overly long, though the book does have a couple of humorous culture clashes and is a quick read.

All in all, it’s not an overall winner for me, but it’s not a waste of my time either.

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Sci Fi Romance Review: Claimed by an Alien Warrior by Tiffany Roberts

 

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Book Review: Freeing Luka, by Victoria Aveline

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I received a copy of both Choosing Theo and Freeing Luka (by Victoria Aveline) in a monthly Renegade Romance box. I had already read the first one. So, you can find the review of Choosing Theo over here.

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Luka has spent his life researching fertility in the hopes of discovering a cure for the Clecanians’ low birth rates. After years of working tirelessly with little progress, he becomes enraged when he uncovers a sinister plot to abduct compatible species from their home planets. But before he can tell anyone what he’s discovered, he’s captured, drugged, and thrown in a cell.

It’s just Alice’s luck that when she finally begins to get her life on track, she’s kidnapped by reptilian creatures and forced into a cell with a fierce incoherent alien for some kind of breeding experiment.

Even though they aren’t able to communicate, Alice and Luka find solace in each other’s company. As the days drag on, it becomes harder to keep her heart locked away, until she can’t help but wonder what a life with Luka might look like outside their dark prison. When an opportunity to free herself, Luka, and the other human prisoners presents itself, Alice takes it.

Once free, can Alice and Luka’s tenuous relationship survive on this planet? Will the evil men that held them prisoner ever see justice? And can they play a part in the rescue of the other women being held captive around this strange new world? Alice knows only one thing for certain—her life will never be the same again.

my review

Honestly, I found this milquetoast and was bored with it. There was so very much that could have been done with the plotline that the author set up, and Aveline chose to do almost nothing. So little that I’m almost irrationally angry about it. Alice is abducted and thrown in with an alien who does not speak her language. We see an encounter or two, and then weeks pass. Then they escape and don’t see each other for a while, then they… go on a few earth-like, unexciting dates, and the end. I mean, it was as dull as dishwater. Yes, Luka is sweet in the way he wants to be loved, and Alice, who has historically been a doormat, finds her spine in space. But this was a disappointment, I’m afraid. Because most of that seems to happen off-page and then we’re told about it. Meh, what a waste of a gorgeous, if inaccurate, cover.

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Bianca’s Book Review: “Freeing Luka” by Victoria Aveline

 

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Book Review: Vigilance, by Etta Pierce

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I received a copy of Vigilance, by Etta Pierce, in a Renegade Romance Book Box. This is book two in the Intersolar Union series. I reviewed book one, Convergence, here.

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Still reeling from the upending of her life, Dr Amelia Ahlberg finds herself the sole physician of the new human colony on Yaspur. Luckily, a medical delegate was assigned to help her settle in after the trauma of the Paramour. When a young girl falls ill because of a common flower, Amelia begs him to take her on his research excursions into the jungle. She needs to learn how to care for her people first hand.

But Ezraji Zarabi is confusing. He’s erratic, distant, and increasingly hot-headed. He refuses, leaving her to fend for herself as the stress threatens to crack the good doctor’s reality. When she starts to hallucinate, she has to wonder…Is it her? Or is it him?

Amelia’s instincts are put to the test. Does she trust the one person that’s always there when she needs him, or does she question why he’s there in the first place?

my review

I like the characters in this book. The series is interesting because the aliens are truly alien, and I very much like that about them. I enjoyed seeing Ezraji’s alien instincts come to the fore. He’s lovely and sweet and trying his best to do the right thing. Amelia, too, is doing her best in a challenging situation, and I appreciate that she is clearly able to learn and grow with new information and experiences.

However, where is the actual romance? There is no romance here. Nor is there any significant spice. So, it’s not erotica where sex (rather than romance) might be the point. This is intended to be a slowish burn romance, but it isn’t. The reader never really gets to see any of it. The closest we come is an accidental chemical attachment that Ezraji tries to hide. We barely even see the two interacting with each other. Yes, Ezraji goes above and beyond to protect her. But she’s unaware of that. Yes, she decides to give a relationship a try, and he’s happy with that, and the reader is led to expect an HEA. But we see none of it. I felt very little attachment to the characters, even if I liked them, and had no investment in the relationship. And what good feelings I was left with at the end of the story were destroyed by the epilogue, which appears to be the hook for the next book in the series.

All in all, I didn’t hate it, and the series seems interesting. But I was only actually so-so on the actual story as told.

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Review: Vigilance by Etta Pierce