Book Reviews

Book Blurb

The samurai’s only true master is his heart….

For seven years while training for his life as a samurai, Toho Morimasa has been away from Aoki, the beautiful actor who helped him to heal from the trauma of his parents’ brutal murders. Now, nightmares that Aoki is in trouble plague Toho’s sleep, and he makes the journey back from Edo to Kai, no longer wanting to be away from Aoki’s side. Once there, Toho meets the very real source of his nightmares and vows to honor and protect Aoki. When his beloved Aoki is brutally assaulted, will Aoki survive long enough to understand that the love Toho has for him is the love he too has been craving his whole life but doesn’t feel he deserves?

First edition published by Dreamspinner Press, February 2017.

Book Review

This third story in the ‘Sword and Silk’ series by Sedonia Guillone, set in eighteenth-century Japan, brings together some of the threads from the first two volumes, and adds yet another emotional adventure with lots of romance and a love that initially seems impossible. Daisuke, a ronin samurai, and his lover, Genji, from book one are back, but it is Genji’s actor friend, Aoki, whose turn it is to find love. Hirata and Sho also feature, and it is their adopted son, Toho, who grows up and discovers he is in love with Aoki. Of course, with Toho having moved away for his samurai training and Aoki refusing to admit his feelings for a man he has known since he was a boy of ten, their relationship is not an easy one.

Toho has been training hard to become a samurai. He hates being separated from Aoki, one of the men who helped him heal after his parents were killed. And the minute he is done training and has a premonition abut Aoki being in trouble, he leaves his adoptive fathers to check on Aoki. Everything seems to be okay at first, and Toho thinks his nightmare may have been just that, but the peace doesn’t last very long before Toho has his hands full protecting Aoki and trying to convince him that they belong together.

Aoki has never forgotten Toho, but he doesn’t dare admit to himself how attractive the young man is. Aoki has a samurai lover anyway, except the man is not as decent as Aoki always believed. After a brutal assault, Aoki begins to reconsider and focus on what is critical – with lots of encouragement from Toho. It isn’t easy for Aoki to admit his feelings – but denying them is even harder.
 
If you like tension-filled stories full of personal drama, noble characters, and disgusting villains, if you enjoy reading about a time when samurai were the defenders of honor, and if you're looking for a read full of passion and a love that is irrepressible, then you will probably like this novella as much as I do. It’s a great third story in this trilogy, and I loved seeing all the previous characters again!

 

 

 

 

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Additional Information

Format	ebook
Length	Novella, 141 pages
Heat Level
Publication Date	13-February-2020
Price	$2.99 ebook
Buy Link	https://www.amazon.com/Blossom-Samurai-Sword-Silk-Book-ebook/dp/B084SXB96W