Joshua James Simpson Guiscard, aka G.G., knows a lot about Immortals—enough to make him wary. Yet from the moment Ildaria walks into his club, he feels desire stronger than anything he’s known. Accepting the fact that they might be life mates is disconcerting. But when her past catches up to them, G.G. faces a choice—confront his demons at last, or lose a passion that’s hot as hell.
Comment: It's been two years since I've read a book by this author. Now, I've finally got into book #31 in the Argeneau series, which I'm still reading because of what it means, not much because of how great the series still is.
In this new adventure, Ildaria Garcia is a vampire who went vigilante on her area and the immortal council decided to relocate her for her own safety. She's looking for to study and is attending night school when her actions to help women being targeted once again calls attention to her and now even Lucian Argeneau himself comes to talk to her. In the meantime, she's staying with Marguerite and she is the one who suggest to Ildaria to have a job, recommending G.G.'s bar. Although he is human, he is aware of immortals since his mother was turned years ago to become a life mate but G.G. isn't too keen on the idea. Now, interacting with Ildaria starts making him think since they do seem to be possible life mates. The problem is that someone from Ildaria's past is still looking for her...
Apart from the fact the series should have ended years ago, when the main characters of the first books got their HEA, I must say the allure is no longer the same, and not only due to the change in the story's vibe. The early books were fun and focused on the silliness of the romance, but from a certain point on, everything became different, with an emphasis on more serious themes. This wasn't bad and I actually liked the change, but at the same time other elements were brought up.
For several books now, the immortals' pasts, which had been vaguely addressed in the early books, or sometimes made to be a comedy or not that important, have gotten a slightly darker tone, and some of the immortals are quite old in age and that means they went through complicated issues while they were human or at the time of their transformation. Ildaria is one of those cases, and as the story evolves, she mentions several factors which are, to be honest, problematic, and it feels as if being now surrounded by well intended people is enough to overcome what was wrong.
There is also a huge focus in all books that finding a life mate seems to be a solution for most the immortals' issues and, for the most part, that is so. However, there have been stories in which this only happens at the expanse of something. Ildaria went though traumatic events while she was a child and teenager and she is still dealing with the emotional aspects all this time after. The plot also includes a specific situation which kind of exacerbates this and, still, it feels as if the author uses these things as if they aren't big deals. I think that, if these subjects/issues are used for plot purposes, then different tactics should be used to address them and to allow the characters to have proper help in dealing with things. Even if they are meant to be immortals.
The most obvious problem in this novel, to me, is related to Ildaria and I won't spoiler it by giving examples, but the hero, G.G., also went through a trauma because in a past book - forgot which one - he was there when his mother was transformed and this affected him to the point he doesn't want to become immortal. Of course, this has always been quite the issue because immortals live longer and don't get old in physical appearance. In the early books it was fun and romantic to have one person choose to change so the love would be eternal and so on. I liked this option, it allowed the romanticism of the situation to be easily solved.
Now, while I still prefer this at the same time it makes the stories feel repetitive, G.G. here had another POV. How could this work if he weren't to change his mind, but the way this was done was incredibly dreadful not only because of how he was "manipulated" in what felt like a silly tactic but also because of how quickly this happened in the story. I understand why and I have read several books now so this isn't a big deal to me in the big scheme of things but makes me think it's an easy way out...
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