Fantasy Lover
by Sherrilyn Kenyon
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Book Reviews of Fantasy Lover
Book Review: The #1 BEST EVER! So HOT my fingertips are scorched!
Summary: 5 Stars
Oh Julian, wherefore art thou MY Julian of Macedon??? WOW! A-hem. Whether a fan of romance or not, this is a book EVERY WOMAN MUST OWN, whew! I stayed up all night long, and I shamelessly admit to some major lip licking, messy drools...Awww come on Grace, share!For anyone who has even the slightest "Love Slave" type secret fantasy, this is a must-own-it book, no library copies will do because you will NOT be able to give it back, that means you can forget borrowing a friend's copy! Uh-uh, no way! From page one to the very last typed word, I was ADDICTED! This book has a bit of everything--Magick, God/desses, Ancient history, love story, tragedy, tear jerker, side-achingly funny, action & sword fights, totally NON-stereotypical characterizations, all wrapped up in a most delicious package. Yummmy.
Forget credibility, but that's ok--even if you are like me and don't go for romance because you can't suspend your sense of reality THAT much--because you WON'T even NOTICE it's gone, a pretty neat trick if I do say so! Almost from the start of the story, with Selena bemoaning very publicly about Grace's non-existent sex life, followed by Grace's tomato-ripe protests, the reader falls in love with these characters, and becomes Grace somehow. One definitely loses all sense of time and space outside of this story and almost tumbles onto cloud 9, voyeurs or flies on the wall.
Grace is not your typical super-model type, and has been made fun of for her looks, so she is insecure--I think we all can relate to that! She's been used badly by one man and has become sexually anorexic herself while, ironically, working as sex therapy doctor! Witchy Selena, who couldn't be any more different from her best friend Grace, decides to give Grace the birthday surprise of a lifetime, and whew boy, did she!
I won't give away anymore of this story, just do yourself a favor and BUY THIS BOOK, then guard it from all your female friends (and maybe a few males too? haha). You won't regret THIS purchase, if anything you may regret that you didn't get it sooner.
Book Review: Fabulous, Silly, and Wonderful
Summary: 5 Stars
This was great, and compares well with Lord of the Storm, by Justine Davis. Like Wulf, in Lord of the Storm, Julian, of Macedon, comes to the protagonist to serve as a pleasure slave. Julian has been enslaved in a book for a couple millennium. Like Wulf, Julian has a noble air, and a tragic history. As in the Lord of the Storm, the protagonist takes steps to connect with the human being inside the slave-identity. Another book that is just like this is Spell of the Highlander, by Karen Marie Moning, in which Cian is trapped inside a cursed mirror for 1,100 years, to be freed by Jessi, who works to free him from the spell, and with whom she has a sexual awakening.
For me this story did not end as well as it started. Julian comes to life as fabulous a human specimen as one of those carved statues from antiquity. He is gentlemanly, brooding, and a very creative lover! Then the story diverges into some silliness. I wanted to suggest to the protagonist that she take the man to the basketball game, or other male-testosterone events, to interest him in staying in our century. Instead she reads Peter Pan to him - twice! I wanted more out of her meeting with his mother - or nothing at all. The meeting was the silliest part of the book. I was hoping for more fireworks, with Grace getting seriously in trouble with Mom. Also, the book went on too long about Julian's tragic past.
Nonetheless, it is a wonderful exploration of a sexual awakening for (sex therapist) Grace Alexander, with a 'safe' lover, who is there solely for her. In that vein, it can be compared with Silver Angel, by Johanna Lindsey, and maybe Mine To Take, by Dara Joy: women who find a comfortable lover who initiates them in the art and joy of lovemaking. My favorite scene is the first morning when she wakes up with Julian. And I'll always have Julian somewhere in the back of my mind whenever I enter the shower, now. ;-) Fantasy Lover is a great fantasy, very enjoyable, with the cadre of greek gods to go with, told with humor. Well done.
Book Review: Funny, sexy, and emotionally true
Summary: 4 Stars
As all romance novels tell us, true love doesn't just fall from a tree. It must be earned. No matter how Mr. Right comes into a woman's life, no matter how she feels when their gazes meet, love must be earned.
Grace Alexander is a psychologist, ironically a sex psychologist with no love life. On her birthday after a few glasses of wine, she is goaded into speaking an incantation that brings a personal love slave to life. Lifted from the pages of an arcane book, Julian of Macedon will be hers for a month to fulfill her every carnal desire.
Kenyon makes great use of Greek mythology in Fantasy Lover, which is refreshing considering how overused the whole Celtic mythos is. Julian is the son of Aphrodite and a mortal Spartan warrior. From his mother he gets irresistible attractiveness: women flock to him like bees to honey. From his father he got a harsh upbringing and military training from the age of seven. The Greek gods play a significant role in the action, with all the pettiness, attitude, and backbiting that they showed in the Iliad. Being trapped in the book and condemned to eternity as a love slave is Julian's punishment for offending a minor god.
Once the wine wears off, Grace realizes that she doesn't want to have sex with a stranger, no matter how hot he is and no matter what messages her body is sending. Julian has never had this experience in his centuries of servitude.
I love that Grace, a psychologist, has lots of issues. Books never get that right. She is mourning her parents, years after their death, keeping their room as a shrine. She is scarred by a bad first sexual experience that left her unable to open up mentally or physically to men. Julian has his issues too, and they forge a tentative bond that becomes real love.
Fantasy Lover is fun, emotionally true, and pretty sexually charged. Don't read it on an airplane if you are a sensitive sort - your seatmate will wonder why you are blushing and squirming.
Book Review: Entertaining, and more to it than I'd expected
Summary: 4 Stars
Grace is given a present of an ancient Greek book by a friend; the book contains a picture of a *very* handsome man - a Greek god in appearance. Her friend insists that if Grace performs a very strange ritual, the Greek god, who is apparently a love-slave, will come to life and be Grace's personal love-slave for a month. Drunk and disbelieving, Grace performs the ritual... and Julian appears in front of her. As large as life, and very, very naked. And ready for action, in whatever way Grace wants him!Grace, however, isn't a believer in casual sex; her only previous experience was with a man who hurt her very much and then made fun of her publicly afterwards. She's not, therefore, about to jump into bed with a perfect stranger, no matter how attractive he is or how sexily he talks to her. Julian, on the other hand, is compelled to want her as a result of the curse which put him inside the book, and he also recognises that she needs someone to teach her to enjoy sex. And he's determined to do just that!
I thought at this point that the book was going to be a pure romp. But in fact it ended up being very much deeper. Julian is a tortured soul; he had a loveless life before being cursed, and ever since he's been treated abusively by the women who summoned him, in some cases chained to their beds, never allowed anywhere except their bedrooms, and frequently having to plead for food as a reward for sex. To them, he was a body, not a man.
Grace is determined to treat him better than that; he is determined to help her overcome her distrust of men. But even if both manage to achieve their objectives, there is still the hard fact that at the next full moon Julian will disappear back into the book, to be trapped there until the next time someone summons him. Can they treat this as a short-lived relationship? Or is there a way to break the curse?
The book's poignant as well as funny, and I thoroughly enjoyed it - enough to keep an eye out for the second in the series.
Book Review: Julian & Grace
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the first novel introducing fans from around the world to Sherrilyn Kenyon's world of Dark Hunters, Dream Hunters, Were Hunters and angry, vengeful gods who meddle in the lives of mortals...still.
An RWA Top Ten pick among other prestigious awards, Fantasy Lover begins with a beautiful concept. There is a man, trapped in a book, who, when summoned forth appropriately, must act as a sex slave for a full cycle of the moon. What woman wouldn't want that, just once in her life?
The problem is, when Grace, mocking the curse, calls Julian of Macedon free from the scroll she never imagined 1) it was real and 2) how touched she would be by the trails he'd endured for centuries.
I, as per the norm, began reading Sherrilyn Kenyon's works out of order. That is actually to her credit, that each novel can stand along, not needing the understanding from a previous book to carry its weight. However, it helps. I started the series with Night Embrace. For those of you who are fans, that is Sunshine and Talon's story. As a dutiful reader who has fallen in love with the entire concept and series, I have read everything past that point. This month I determined I should go back to the beginning and learn where it all started.
Jokes on me. No one knows exactly how it all started. At least, Sherrilyn Kenyon has not yet reveled it yet...but we're all hanging tight until she does.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Ms. Kenyon is why we read romance regardless of genre. We become attached to the characters. We cry for them, and laugh, and hold out breath while they blunder. When hope seems to fail, we shed tears for these people we have come to know and love. Fantasy Lover is no different. Julian and Grace stole my heart from page one. Do yourself a favor, if you have not yet read it, go buy it. Fall in love again! 5 Angel Recommended Read