Review: Spectred Isle by KJ Charles

06 August of 2017 by ButtonsMom2003

Reviewer's Rating: 4

4.0Overall score

A different kind of story than my "normal" read.

Spectred Isle By KJ Charles

Genre: Historical, Romance, GLBTQ, MM, Paranormal, Magic

Released: August 3, 2017

Publisher: Self-Published

Series: Green Men, Book 1 </p

Synopsis

Archaeologist Saul Lazenby has been all but unemployable since his disgrace during the War. Now he scrapes a living working for a rich eccentric who believes in magic. Saul knows it’s a lot of nonsense…except that he begins to find himself in increasingly strange and frightening situations. And at every turn he runs into the sardonic, mysterious Randolph Glyde.

Randolph is the last of an ancient line of arcanists, commanding deep secrets and extraordinary powers as he struggles to fulfil his family duties in a war-torn world. He knows there’s something odd going on with the haunted-looking man who keeps turning up in all the wrong places. The only question for Randolph is whether Saul is victim or villain.

Saul hasn’t trusted anyone in a long time. But as the supernatural threat grows, along with the desire between them, he’ll need to believe in evasive, enraging, devastatingly attractive Randolph. Because he may be the only man who can save Saul’s life—or his soul.

Review

Reviewed by ButtonsMom2003

A different kind of story than my “normal” read.

I fell in love with KJ Charles writing when I read her Society of Gentlemen series. I fully intended to then go back and read her earlier works, but we all know that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and I just never got it done. After reading Spectred Isle I do wish that I’d first read her book, The Secret Casebook of Simon Feximal because it is referred to frequently in Spectred Isle.I have to admit that I had a hard time getting into this book. I think it was for a combination of reasons. I was behind in my advanced copy reading schedule and wasn’t able to give this my complete attention when I first started it. The story also began with a fair amount of activity that I found confusing at first. I am so glad that I didn’t abandon this story as I ended up liking it very much.

I haven’t read any paranormal stories quite like this one; where most of the characters are perfectly normal on the surface, but as the story develops you begin to realize that other things are at work. The relationship between the two main characters (MCs) is almost secondary to the main story and yet the book wouldn’t be nearly as good without it.

I don’t really want to reveal any details of the story; the blurb is excellent so please read it. From about 50% on I couldn’t put this book down. To some that might seem a bit far into the story to become completely engrossed but, like I mentioned earlier, I think it really had more to do with where my head was at when I began the book rather than the writing.

While the two MC’s relationship has a HFN (happy for now) there is much to come yet concerning the mysterious things going on. I’m really looking forward to reading the next book.