Rating: 4.5🌈
Rhys Lawless has gotten to be a must read for me so I picked up this latest book not realizing it’s part of a much larger world of two , now three , connected series, set in the Cursed Hearts universe.
I haven’t read those but found it didn’t handicap me as much as I expected in terms of background. Lawless fills in much here in terms of foundation for the story’s structure so it’s easy to mentally files bits and pieces away as the tale progresses.
And what an entertaining story it is.
Combining various mythologies, particularly Norse, Polish, and adding in twists and mashups to the story narrative makes this fantastic storytelling.
Creating a fantasy landscape of demon gods, witches, and a host of other paranormal beings to use as characters is exciting, imaginative and dangerous while still being a titch familiar for grasping that being’s history. And that works for the reader in every aspect of the storyline.
Especially when the book opens upon a tragedy of immense personal pain and suffering. The loss of one young witch’s entire family by a brutal attack.
Tomasz, a young witch who’s never been able to utilize his powers, is filled with the need to find his family’s killers and get his revenge. But how?
Here comes along a central character who’s a bridge between every book. A ancient witch who lives under a bridge with the answers.
Tomasz needs help and gets it in the form of a demon mate. In this case, it’s Loki, the master trickster! They are sealed together in a master/slave relationship that’s a complicated forced binding.
It’s explored on several levels here by Lawless. The guilty feeling it causes in Tomasz that he’s forcing/must force Loki into the position of having no will, no say , complete servitude. It’s an anathema, especially as their affection grows stronger towards each other.
With Loki, a slave status or that of being forced into a submissive relationship, fills him with rage. He’s a god on a personal mission. It also will turn out that this element will have further philosophical implications, as certain plot points are revealed , that Lawless could but doesn’t fully give narrative voice or space to all the deeper issues it brings up.
Things like if a god has been forced into servitude for all the wrong reasons but it still has ended up being the right thing to do, should it have happened? Does one have the right to take away someone’s freedom for the greater good?
That’s not sufficiently clear or explored here despite being raised several times by more than one person and in more than one way.
However, there’s so many other plot threads to deal with that things like this get overlooked or handled in a way that doesn’t quite have the necessary support for such heavy questions.
The plot lines converge swiftly towards the end, leaving the climax feeling a bit too rushed for all the characters and great plot twists involved. I hope to have more of the children and a certain “not cat “ in future stories. They were fantastic.
Lawless sets us up for the next pair and development in this series. I guess I’ll be spending some of the time looking into those preceding series.
I’m recommending Loki and his Master (Demon Gods Book One) by Rhys Lawless for the levels of detail, the mythology, the characters, and the fast paced, highly entertaining story. Oh and the kinky sexy storyline.
That too. D/s hurt/comfort anyone?
Demon Gods:
✓ Loki and his Master #1
â—¦ Hades and His Witch #2 – TBD release date
Buy Link:
Loki and his Master: A contemporary fantasy romance (Demon Gods Book 1)
Description:
The trickster god is free and he’s under my command.
When I asked the old witch under Camden Lock for help with avenging my family’s murder I didn’t expect her solution would be to invoke a powerful god.
Loki is big, strong and pissed!
Thankfully he’s bound to me so he can’t hurt me.
But the only way he’ll ever help me get my revenge is if I help him find someone really important first.
The problem is the more time I spend with him, the less I’m able to resist him.
But I can’t let my guard down.
He might say all he wants from me is to punch my V-card and end the people that killed my family, but I know he wants something more.
And I’m scared it has the potential to destroy everything.
How can a young, meek little witch like me tame a god like him?
Loki and his Master is the first book in the Demon Gods series, a spin-off series set in the Cursed Hearts universe.
Demon Gods is a contemporary fantasy MM romance/urban fantasy MM romance series where mythical gods are re-incarnated into the 21st century and let loose to destroy, avenge and fall in love with young little witches. Written in British English with US spelling and grammar.
Tags:
mythical gods modernized, witches, demons, master/servant, Ds, age gap, punching his v-card, hurt/comfort, forced co-operation, beauty and the beast vibes, alpha protector, tragic past, big/small pairing, lover in peril, trouble magnet, I don’t know if I can trust you, urban fantasy world, morally gray main characters, Polish folklore, Norse mythology
Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 