The Awakening

📝🗝️🌳

ok Nora! On one hand I was happy for the cute friendship between Breen and her gay bestie Marco. I did feel like Marco consisted mostly of like cliches and Drag Race catchphrases held together with glitter glue, but, ok, we had a good time. And I did think her relationship with the drag queens at Sally's was really sweet. Hag representation matters.

I liked the portal fantasy aspect a lot and I am stoked that at the end, Breen told Marco about all of the magic stuff and also that he jumped in the portal too! I am excited to see Marco take on magical Tulum or whatever the fantasy land is called.

Overall based on what I've read I think I prefer Nora's contemporary romance but ehhh I'll prob keep on reading. Gotta chase that cliffhanger!

I'm used to Nora Roberts' romance trilogies, where we see a set of three siblings/friends each settle down. This is not that–though it was still good.

This series has much more magic in it; the important part of the narrative takes place in a fey realm with dragons. I say “important,” but I actually enjoyed the first half of the book, the “finding myself” part, even more. And I love fantasy! It's just that I turn to Nora Roberts specifically to see the “finding myself” part, and I wasn't totally in the mood for a high-stakes realm-changing battle. I feel bad saying that–after all, an author should be able to tell whatever story they like–but, nonetheless, it was the case for me.

Bottom line, this is looking like a series that will follow one character as she embraces her destiny, leads a war, and continues falling in love with a warrior. It's deeply felt and I love the world building, but to be honest, that's not the storyline I'm into these days. Maybe someday I'll come back to it. ;)

3.5 stars

I don't normally read fantasy but I really enjoyed this story and liked all the characters! I want to know what happens so will definitely read the other two! I liked how it was in the real world and in the fantasy world as well.

This is the first book I have read by Nora Roberts. I always equated her with the likes of Danielle Steel (whose books I cannot handle), so I was crazy surprised by how much I enjoyed “The Awakening.” I had a physical copy and listened to the audiobook, too. I am very sensitive to the voices of narrators, and this one was an absolute delight!

I'm excited to read the second book in the trilogy as this initial novel weirdly and wonderfully touched on so many areas of my life.

Light and easy read as usual from Nora Roberts. I'm glad she has stepped out of the formula of three lives for the last couple of series. While those are comforting that one knows what to expect a bit, it's nice to have a bit different. I always struggle about how to rate her books as they aren't blow your socks away s but they are a comfort for me. I usually call them Cotton Candy books. For this series I like the main character of Breen and her coterie from home. Still not sure what I think of Keegan as he is a bit arrogant and not very approachable. Love Marco and can't wait to see what kind of trouble he gets into on the next books,

I'll reserve judgement on this series until I finish but for now I'm underwhelmed. We have a lot of typical Nora Roberts ingredients: Ireland, witchcraft, beautiful woman unaware of her powers, and a purely eeeeevil bad guy. Just because a story has tropes doesn't mean it isn't good, and Roberts is still one of best pure storytellers around. So I kept turning the pages and enjoyed the experience. Not sure I'm a big fan of either the alpha hero Keegan or the cliched gay best friend Mario, but there are still two books remaining to give them more depth and perhaps even some nuance. I don't think this will be as interesting a trilogy as [b:Year One 34311452 Year One (Chronicles of The One, #1) Nora Roberts https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1488360073l/34311452.SY75.jpg 55367060] and its sequels, but you could do a lot worse during a pandemic than read about beautiful Irish fantasy worlds with dragons, elves, and loyal dogs.