READ: Flora Reviews… Bring The Heat (Dragon Kin 9) by G.A. Aiken. PDF, EPUB online free reviews.

Flora Reviews…

Bring The Heat (Dragon Kin #9) by G.A. Aiken

Read: 2nd – 10th September 2017

Format: Kindle

My Goodreads Rating: 4 Stars

So, before we get into what I thought about this book, I want you to know that I was lucky enough to be given a digital version of this book for free from the publisher (Kensington Books) after making a request via Netgally.com in exchange for an honest review. The publication date was 29thAugust 2017.

Thanks for the advance copy.

…So what’s this book about?

Bring The Heat is book 9 in G.A. Aiken’s popular Dragon Kin series; it is a paranormal romance story – although I think it would sit happily on the fantasy and/or epic shelf too – based in a fantasy world of dragon shape-shifters, magic wielders and humans.

Bring The Heat can be read as a standalone story; yes, this tale features many characters from previous books and references to past adventures and although I’ve only read a couple of books from this series, Ms Aiken makes sure her new readers aren’t lost; pertinent information is weaved beautiful into this story without slowing the pace. However, as with most long standing series, you may miss the nuances of experiencing past relationships, plot lines and characters when jumping in cold or reading books out of order. When talking about her series’ reading order, Ms Aiken does say on her website :

I, personally, prefer the order in which the books were written because I tease or hint about the romances of the older dragons during the full-length novels. Then in the anthos, some of the humor payoff comes out of having read those novels first.

Now, as my regular followers will know, I never post spoilers or reveal any plot twists in my reviews, so here’s the book’s official blurb:

HE SAYS . . .
I, Aidan the Divine, am . . . well, divine. My name was given to me by the Dragon Queen herself! I’m a delight! Cheerful. Charming. And a mighty warrior who is extremely handsome, with a very large and well-hidden hoard of gold. I am also royal-born, despite the fact that most in my family are horrendous beings who don’t deserve to live. And yet, Branwen the Awful—a low-born, no less—either tells me to shut up or, worse, ignores me completely.

SHE SAYS . . .
I’ll admit, I ignore Aidan the Divine because it annoys him. A lot. But we have so much to do right now, I can’t worry about why he keeps staring at me, or why he always sits so close, or why he keeps looking at me like he’s thinking about kissing me. We have our nations to save and no time for such bloody foolishness . . . no matter how good Aidan looks or how long his spiked tail is. Because if we’re going to win this war before it destroys everything we love, we’ll have to face our enemies together, side by side and without distractions. But if we make it out alive, who knows what the future will hold . . .

…So, what did I like about it?

This is only the third book that I’ve read by Ms Aiken but I find her writing style very easy to read and although I haven’t read enough of her Dragon Kin Series to know the multitude of “families” or remember the many ally/enemy relationships that feature in this book, I was quickly submerged into the Dragon Kin world as any snippets of backstory was effortlessly weaved into these pages.

The pace of this story is fast but without being disorienting and I enjoyed that there are different adventures happening in this book alongside the one that our main characters are on, but all are moving on the background story arc with the Zealots threat.

So often in the paranormal romance stories that I read, the authors forget that we (the reader) want to be gripped by the whole experience; an engaging narrative that’s more than just X meets Y and they fall in love – bam – the end. Thankfully, this isn’t the case in this book, I loved the fact that the background story and the quest that our main characters were on felt more significant than the romance that grew between Brannie and Aiden.

I enjoy a story more if the lead female character is intelligent, resilient and has a good sense of humour; Branwen The Awful (Brannie) was all of these and more, you’d definitely want her on your side. Aiden was a good male lead to balance this strong female and both showed us their multifaceted personalities as the tale progressed. In fact, I liked the way that all of the characters in this story were written, none of them were flat 2-dimensional creations, they all felt very real for me, I loved the way that Brannie’s reluctant group grew and evolved along their journey, all of which meant that I engaged with their story.

Oh, and like most Brits I do love a bit of well written banter and this story has plenty of it! I found myself COL (Chuckling Out Loud) throughout this book while wondering how many of our characters/heroes would still be with us by the end due to the continual pushing of each others’ buttons.

…So, ummm, was there anything I disliked about it?

Not disliked, no.

This book only missed out on a 5 star review from me because of the confusing amount of family relationships. There are a lot of aunties, uncles, cousins, etc which as a new-ish reader to this series, I found daunting and at times confusing. Perhaps Ms Aiken could create a Family Tree that could be printed at the beginning of the book. However, I got so caught up with the story that I soon stopped worrying about my lack of background knowledge and just enjoyed the ride.

…So, basically what I’m saying is…

I really like this book; I found it very entertaining, well written and a real page turner. It’s a first-rate paranormal romance story, passionate, funny and thrilling with an attention-grabbing background adventure to boot and when the fighting starts it gets bloody, especially for the enemies of these mighty dragon kin!

The Dragon Kin series is already a firm favourite with many and I understand why; I’ve added the earlier books in this series to my Amazon wish list!

So, has my review of BRING THE HEAT (DRAGON KIN #9) encouraged you to find out more? Just click on any of the links below to check out the book yourself, find out more about the author or to see the books I’ve read, take a look at my profile on Goodreads.