Review: Earth’s Requiem by Ann Gimpel

16 November of 2015 by

Google
Reviewer's Rating: 5
5.0Overall score

An epic blend of fantasy, myth and romance

Earth’s Requiem by Ann Gimpel
Earth’s Requiem By Ann Gimpel

Paranormal Romantic Dystopian Fantasy and Suspense

Released February 27, 2015

Self-Published

Series: Earth Reclaimed, Book 1

Reviewed by Jean

Resilient, kickass, and determined, Aislinn’s walled herself off from anything that might make her feel again. Until a wolf picks her for a bond mate and a Celtic god rises out of legend to claim her for his own.

 

Aislinn Lenear lost her anthropologist father high in the Bolivian Andes. Her mother, crazy with grief that muted her magic, was marched into a radioactive vortex by dark creatures and killed. Three years later, stripped of every illusion that ever comforted her, twenty-two year old Aislinn is one resilient, kickass woman with a take no prisoners attitude. In a world turned upside down, where virtually nothing familiar is left, she’s conscripted to fight the dark gods responsible for her father’s death. Battling evil on her own terms, Aislinn walls herself off from anything that might make her feel again in this compelling dystopian urban fantasy.

 

Fionn MacCumhaill, Celtic god of wisdom, protection, and divination has been laying low since the dark gods stormed Earth. He and his fellow Celts decided to wait them out. After all, three years is nothing compared to their long lives. On a clear winter day, Aislinn walks into his life and suddenly all bets are off. Awed by her courage, he stakes his claim to her and to an Earth he’s willing to fight for.

 

Aislinn’s not so easily convinced. Fionn’s one gorgeous man, but she has a world to save. Emotional entanglements will only get in her way. Letting a wolf into her life was hard. Letting love in may well prove impossible.

 

An epic blend of fantasy, myth, and romance

 

I’ve come to expect great things from Ann Gimpel in a very short time. This author has a way of blending fantasy, myth, paranormal, action, adventure, and romance in a way I really love. Earth’s Requiem is a great example of just what you can expect from her. With a world gone nuts at the invasion of dark gods, Ann gives us a kickass heroine and struggle for survival of the human species that everyone is sure to enjoy.Aislinn was a twenty-year-old college student off in the jungles of Bolivia with her folks when the world as she knew it came to a screeching halt. Her anthropologist father was brutally murdered by a dark god and her mother pretty much lost it. Life became all about surviving in the world turned upside down. The old ones have risen and anyone without a promise of magic or the sense to join their ranks quickly found themselves walked into a radioactive vortex. Watching her beautiful but desolate mother marched into the vortex was the final straw. If there is one thing the experience has taught her, it’s to not get close to others. Just how many times can a person have their heart ripped out and survive it? With no real choice in the matter, Aislinn has become a law unto herself. She’s learned to hone her mage and seeker magics and she fights one day after the other in a war not of her choosing. The heat gets turned up a notch when she finds herself the target of the dark gods themselves. With their sickening, slimy way of ensorcelling a person with unwanted passion it’s a struggle to keep one step ahead of them. Not to mention fighting off their dark minions. Life takes another turn on the dime when the wolf Rune claims her as bondmate. Aislinn has operated the last three years with the understanding that she was a mage with a smattering of skill in the seeker magic. Now she is finding out she has yet another magic to add to her repertoire… hunter.

Rune is a talking wolf. Having lost the bondmate that rescued and raised him from a pup to the malevolence of the dark gods, he’s on a quest to find another bondmate when he happens upon Aislinn. When I first read the blurb for this book I assumed Rune was going to be a love interest for Aislinn and was perhaps a shifter. Nope, not even. What is it about the word mate and it has us assuming there is a love interest, and sex involved? In this instance, the term refers to the bond that forms between a hunter and his animal. It’s a magical bond that allows the two to communicate and blend their powers. Pretty heady stuff when you can all the sudden hear, see and smell like a predator. One little issue… the animal is subservient to the hunter and must follow direct commands, something Rune has grown to regret with the loss of his prior bondmate. Let’s just say it hasn’t been an easy pill to swallow for this wolf and he’s not so willing to be placed in the same position yet again. Love and affection grow quickly between Aislinn and Rune, if not a grudging acceptance that the bond means that neither will be walking into battle alone once again.

When Aislinn is handed the mission of finding Taltos, the realm of the old ones in four days time things go a little off kilter for her. When she and Rune run across Fionn and his raven, Bella, it presents the perfect opportunity to learn more about her new hunter abilities. What she didn’t expect was to find herself falling for the big hunter. Nor did she expect to find out that Fionn is not only a hunter but actually the Celtic God of Wisdom among other things. When the two join forces to find out just what is really going on in their world gone mad things really heat up both between the sheets and in the world around them. Fionn finds himself falling helplessly for the human long before he discovers fate was right all along.

I really enjoyed this start to the Earth Reclaimed series. Earth’s Requiem is left on a bit of a cliffhanger after a nasty twist. I can’t wait to pick up Earth’s Blood. Another ride on the back of dragon sounds mighty fine to me… oh did I forget to mention there was a dragon? Needless to say, I’ve really bought into the characters and world Ann Gimpel has created and can’t wait to find out what happens next.

 

♥♥♥♥♥

O Factor: Spicy

Goodreads

 

Earth Reclaimed Series:

Earth’s Requiem, Book 1

Earth’s Blood, Book 2

Earth’s Hope, Book 3

Earth’s Requiem, Book 1

 

Earth’s Blood, Book 2

 

Earth’s Hope, Book 3

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    • Thank you, Ann. Earth’s Requiem was a true pleasure to read and I can’t wait to read the next one. You totally rock!

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