Book Reviews

Book Blurb

When Gabe Windslow and his friends stormed Archbishop O’Fallon's dungeon, the last thing they expected to find was a malnourished young man who’d been beaten so badly he lay at death’s door. Unable to abandon someone in need, Gabe rescues the poor man and continues to care for him during the days that follow.

Branded a Sin Eater at birth by his deformities, Sammy Newton expected to die after the latest cleansing ritual he took part in. Instead he awakens to a world where nonhumans and magic are good and Sin Eaters aren’t needed.

Confused by a steadily growing sense of betrayal, Sammy struggles to decide whether he should help his rescuers fight the dark forces hunting Gabe and his friends or return to his life of slavery and abuse in order to save his soul from damnation and hell.

Book Review

The continuing saga of humankind’s struggle to survive roughly two hundred years after a plague has killed most people, carries on in this third volume of the fantastic ‘Elements of Love’ series. This is a post-apocalyptic world where paranormal beings live behind a veil created to protect them from being hunted to extinction. Earth is ruled by a variation of the church as we know it, with an even stronger hierarchy, a pope interested in the supernatural, and evil forces out to keep humans in power – even though scripture clearly shows the other races to be far older, wiser, and capable of magic. This captivating alternate reality also has the church in charge of repopulating the planet, but with the twisted ideas of the villain of the previous books, Archbishop O’Flaggan, in charge, the situation is not about to get better. The team of gargoyles and humans working together to protect the Elementals is back for a suspenseful, imaginative sequel that had me spellbound as I followed their adventures and discovered new revelations.

Gabe is a rare gryphon shifter who, rejected by his biological parents because his coloring is wrong, has found a family in a group of gargoyles and Elementals who are drawn together by unknown forces. With the help of Evan and Adel from book one, and Jude and Nico from book two, as well as several other secondary characters, they have stormed the evil archbishop’s residence and freed the paranormals imprisoned and tortured there. One of them in particular, a young man named Sammy who is near death’s door, draws Gabe like no one ever has. Gabe will do anything to save him. He soon suspects they may be fated mates, but gryphon mating rituals are complicated and Gabe doesn’t want to stress out the physically and emotionally damaged man. Gabe also can’t bear getting his hopes up only to be disappointed yet again. Whether or not they are mates though, Gabe will do anything he can to help Sammy recover from years of abuse.  

Sammy has been told he is a Sin Eater, and good for nothing other than taking the punishment for others’ sins so they can be absolved. The idea may sound preposterous, but it is all Sammy has ever known and he has no idea how to function in a world where he is not regularly beaten and tortured by Archbishop O’Flaggan, who used him as his personal “whipping boy” for many years. As Sammy’s body heals, he tries to deal with the new ideas, but it is hard to let go of everything he has believed for so long. Like any victim of brainwashing, he is tempted to go along with whatever his rescuers say, but secretly he expects them to send him back to the archbishop sooner rather than later. Gabe is his most frequent carer, and Sammy likes him a lot. As for more? He has no idea how to deal with his feelings.

When the motley team sets out to free more of their friends, there are more revelations, intense situations, and everyone is pushed to the limits of their endurance more than once. The fight against the archbishop and his perverted ideas takes everything they have and then some. When Sammy discovers his destiny I cheered him on, and I was very impressed with the gryphon mating ritual. Best of all? Well, almost best - the epilogue reveals what became of O’Flaggan and, while I am not normally a bloodthirsty person, my only comment is “Good riddance!”

If you like creative combinations of paranormal elements, mythology and legends, and a post-apocalyptic setting, if two men who are attracted to each other but have a lot of issues to deal with before they can figure out what’s what are your thing, and if you’re looking for a read full of action, suspense, mystical beings with unusual powers, and an imaginative world full of surprises, then you will probably like this novel. Do read the previous two books first – you’ll need the background to understand what’s going on.

 

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. This book has been provided by Dreamspinner Press for the purpose of a review.

Additional Information

Format	ebook and print
Length	Novel, 200 pages/73142 words
Heat Level
Publication Date	30-November-2015
Price	$6.99 ebook, $14.99 paperback, $14.99 bundle
Buy Link	https://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/books/gabes-song-by-sui-lynn-4406-b