Play Book Tag discussion

Oh did I enjoy this! It has a mighty fine studly man -- who desperately needs a hunky dog IMHO! Never fear, he fits my PRIME STUD MUFFIN and STUD shelves perfectly.

It is set in an alternate reality Houston where power, business, politics, and wealth are controlled by families known as Houses whose family members evidence strong magic - in fact the strongest magic. It's a world where strength of an family's and an individual's magic is the equivalent of royal blood with a Prime being the most powerful mages, wiht powers capable of mass destruction for example. Burn for Me is the first in the Hidden Legacy series, which seems to be comprised of a couple of trilogies each made up of different story arcs but revolving around the Baylor family.

Nevada Baylor is the PI in her family's investigation agency that has slowly been building a successful reputation, if not accummulating much wealth. However, the firm is owned by MII, one of Houston's biggest investigative agencies which of course is owned and controlled by one of the Houses. The contract binding the 2 agencies includes a clause where Baylor Agency has to take on any investigation MII gives them. Unfortunately the very first time that clause is enforced is on a hopeless case involving a pyrokinetic - controling fire - putting Nevada's life definitely at risk. Nevada is tasked with finding and delivering to his House this out of control Prime with an ability and desire to create an apocalypse using fire, and one who just killed a cop.

Nevada has some magical abilities herself but while useful for investigative work, they are not particularly powerful or of any broader application - or are they?

Also searching for the pyrokinetic Prime for other reasons is Connor "Mad" Rogan, the head of House of Rogan and known at the destroyer of Mexico given his ability to collapse all the buildings in a city using magic. Mad Rogan is a stud, no question, albeit one with little moral compass. Nevada actually frequently refers to him as a dragon, which is pretty apt. Their meet-cute is pretty bad - Rogan kidnaps her in a misguided attempt to force her to disclose information. It takes some time, but eventually they join forces to find the pyrokinetic and along the way not only discover there is a dangerous plot of some kind but that they have a lot of chemistry between them.

The book is full of action, with the magic making sense to the plot and story. I tend to avoid most paranormal thrillers because they seem more paranormal with a thriller element to me than a thriller with paranormal elements. These are thrillers with magic interwoven in an effective way, not a distracting way. At the end, we are left with a few answers but a lot of questions that have me ready to read the next in series. I love Nevada and her unusual quirky family, and "Mad" Rogan is a real bad boy stud, but there is also something more to him that we are just beginning to glimpse. If I have one criticism, it's that magic is depicted here too often as a really bad thing -- and there is purpose to that, but a little balance would not hurt.

Such a lot of fun. I’ve just romped through book 2, and have the third on order from the library. (Haven’t done reviews yet - am so behind …)

PS Theresa, I think you’d really enjoy the Innkeeper series (also by Ilona Andrews) - brilliant and very different world building, not quite so racy as these, but the heroine develops a great sassy attitude to life

KateNZ wrote: "PS Theresa, I think you’d really enjoy the Innkeeper series (also by Ilona Andrews) - brilliant and very different world building, not quite so racy as these, but the heroine develops a great sassy..."

I have eyed that one for sure.

I LOVED the Innkeeper series. I haven't tried this one yet but I'm looking forward to it.

I love all of Ilona Andrews's work - started with Kate Daniels. Admittedly, the first book of that was so-so - a lot of background and world building before the next books of the series could get down to the story and character development. But I kept reading and never looked back.

I think of all their work (this is a husband-wife team), my favorite and most re-readable is the Hidden Legacy series. I love all the quirky characters and can't wait to finish Catalina's story (her power is my favorite of the three) and get to Arabella's. Catalina #3 should come out end of this year, but Arabella is put on hold while they get back to the Hugh series (a spinoff of Kate Daniels). I love their badass grandma who named her favorite tank Romeo!

Also, their blog is a lot of fun and very active. Ilona loves to look up crazy house listings and post them.

I just love the whole family, but Grandma just might be my favorite.

She reminds me of Grandma Masur in the Stephanie Plum books. Except with tanks! And rather more mechanical nous …