Nalini Singh - Storm Echo

Silence has fallen. The Psy are free to feel emotion. Free to love. But Silence was never a prison for Ivan Mercant. The biggest threat to his future lies dormant in his brain--a psychic monster that wants only to feed. And now, the brutal leash he's kept on that monster is slipping. He prepared for this day, for the end of Ivan Mercant . . . but that was before he met Lei.
As primal as she is human, this wild changeling brings color into his life, laughter to his soul. Then the dream shatters in a rain of blood, in silent bodies in the snow. Lei is gone. Vanished without a trace . . . until he meets strangely familiar eyes across a busy San Francisco street.
Soleil Bijoux Garcia is a healer who has lost everything. She exists in a world of desolate aloneness . . . till the day she finds herself face-to-face with a lethal stranger. The animal who is her other half knows this man, but her memories are tattered fragments. Sorrow and a need for vengeance are all that drive her. Her mission? To kill the alpha of the DarkRiver leopard pack.
But fate has other plans. Soon, a deadly soldier who believes himself a monster and a broken healer might be all that stand between life and death for the entire Psy race. . . .

Comment: This is the most recent installment in the Psy-Changeling series (or the Trinity spin off, which for me works more like sequels than different aims), although the next one is due to be released soon. However, I've been attempting to get the paperback editions and only start the new books a bit later.

In this book we have the story of Ivan Mercant, another cousin to Canto and Silver, whose stories we've had in previous books. Ivan is an adopted cousin, and he has had a dysfunctional childhood for a Psy, which has affected his brain pathways and influenced him to think of himself as a monster. Still, he is capable of feeling and has never been truly Silent. One day he is in a training and meets a changeling he calls Lei who makes him want to feel normal but one day she simply doesn't show up to their quiet meetings. 

Now, he randomly sees her across the street in San Francisco but she seems to not recognize him but there's no time to ponder this since a Psy attack causes many injured and Lei, who is a Healer, is helping with those hurt. Will Ivan be able to talk to Lei and find out where she has been and why she can't seem to remember him?

This book follows the pattern of so many other books where the main couple is a Psy/changeling pair. Ivan is not as expressive in his emotions but they come across loud and clear if one is used to the series. Lei, in my opinion, wasn't developed as deeply as I would have preferred and it felt as if her personality kept being rather flat but it is true I was happy one more couple found happiness.

What I probably liked the most in this novel was actually the secondary situations, such as the couple's interaction with other characters or of those secondary characters among themselves, and the sort of advance in the plot related to the Scarabs, key pieces among the Psy, who are deeply troubled and being influenced by someone to cause chaos. Actually, if I put aside the main romance content, this was actually a great story and I've found many scenes to entertain me. I also loved seeing beloved characters again, such as Lucas, Tamsyn and her twins, Arwen...

Things aren't fully solved of course, I bet there will more to come in the next books, and perhaps it was simply my personal impression, but it did feel as if things were progressing, that characters like Payal and Canto (anchors of the PsyNet) and even Kaleb had to learn new stuff and correlate with things we already knew, so they could keep informing others of what has to be done to help maintaining the stability of the Net, which is key for Psy people to survive.

This isn't a fully action packed plot, but it felt like that anyway. I liked how the characters seemed to be acting on something, even if it was only Lei learning about what happened to her old pack and why she can't remember those events and why she feels like killing Lucas is her way to obtain revenge. Clearly, the problem is not that simple and we quickly learn as she does, what truly happened. In fact, this ties up some loose threads from another book way back (now, to think which one??) when we learnt about Lucas' actions regarding a terrible alpha and how he helped what remained of that pack...

Anyway, it was addictive to read this book, but the main couple... I liked them individually - as I often like all the characters the author centers the attention on - but as a couple, their relationship is heavily set on that special "bond" when they met and before whatever happened to Lei separated them. I understand the idea, after all they had to connect now more easily, but I was not fully convinced of their feelings and it was not because of Ivan's Psy status nor the "lovers reunited" trope (without the intimacy obviously), but the fact they read as flat as a couple. They're OK but didn't fascinate me as many other couples did before.

Despite this, I liked the path they took to be who they are when the story begins and I liked they were able to be happy and also seeing all the interactions during and after they acknowledge their relationship is beyond special. Still, the romance was not my favorite, no, even though they seem to balance each other and they understand the other's fears and still feel like a balanced couple.

Now, I can't wait for the next book, especially considering who the main characters will be....

Grade: 8/10