I received this book for free from the library in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Source: the library
Haunted Moon
by
Yasmine Galenorn
urban fantasy in Paperback edition that was published by Jove on 2013 and has 321 pages.
Explore it on Goodreads or Amazon
Other books by this author which I have reviewed include Hexed, Witchling, Changeling, Never After, Darkling, Demon Mistress, Dragon Wytch, Bone Magic, Night Huntress, Harvest Hunting, Blood Wyne, Courting Darkness, Shaded Vision, Shadow Rising, Night Myst, Night Veil, Night Seeker, Autumn Whispers, Night Vision, Night’s End, Priestess Dreaming, Panther Prowling, "Flight From Hell", Flight From Death, Souljacker, Legend of the Jade Dragon, Darkness Raging, Fury Rising, Murder Under a Mystic Moon, Ghost of a Chance, Once Upon A Curse, A Harvest of Bones, One Hex of a Wedding, Starlight Hollow, Moon Shimmers
Thirteenth in the Otherworld urban fantasy series revolving around three half-fae/half-human sisters living in Seattle. This particular story is from Camille’s point-of-view.
Just as a warning, there has been a lot of suggestive comment in the previous twelve stories about Camille and her three husbands. This is the first time Galenorn comes right out and discretely writes about the men engaging with her. Yes, discretely, because Galenorn isn’t flat out really cranking out the erotica here, but she does mention anal penetration, etc.
My Take
This is one of Galenorn’s better writings. If you’ve been following my reviews on this series, you know I complain just about every other story…sigh… I do enjoy her series for the characters she’s created and the world she’s built. The characters are individual, warm, and loyal while the world incorporates demons, humans, fae, shifters, and other mythical beings in all their glorious individuality with personalities that run the gamut from A to Z, from amazingly caring to disgustingly awful and all the quirks and worries in between.
With all the action these characters get, you’d think Camille would know she’ll be running any night at all, so I don’t know why she’s complaining on this night.
Part of the ritual which Camille must undergo involves three challenges and Galenorn has been quite creative.
Sigh, I do love how Camille’s men take care of her.
The Story
It’s been a constant battle over the last couple of years with the D’Artigo sisters and their slowly growing group of allies doing their best to hold back the demon Shadow Wing who wants to breach the gates and invade Earth and Otherworld.
In this story, someone is messing around with old graveyards and raising the bones, stealing the ghosts. Even those from Ivana’s garden. In the course of her investigation, it’s Camille’s magic that makes her vulnerable on a dangerous plane. It’s also her magic that may save everyone.
The Characters
There are three D’Artigo sisters: Camille, Delilah, and Mennolly. Half-fae, half-human, they are unique individuals who care very much about each other. They live together in an old Victorian in Seattle with their significant others, friends, and allies.
Camille is the oldest and a Moon Maiden, training to be the High Priestess to the Dark side of the Moon Mother after being ordered to pledge herself to Queen Aeval. Her three supernatural husbands — Trillian Zanzera, (Svartan fae and Camille’s alpha lover), Morio Kuroyama (Youkai-kitsune, Grandmother Coyote’s grandson, who works death magic with Camille, and about to take another step up), and Smoky (a.k.a., Lord Iampaatar, a half-silver/half-white dragon shifter) — have bonded with each other. Rodney is a potty-mouthed bone golem given to Camille by Grandmother Coyote.
Delilah is the middle sister, a two-faced were able to shift into two types of cat, a living Death Maiden, and engaged to Shade, a half-shadow dragon, half-Stradolan.
Mennolly, the youngest, was a jian-tu acrobat-spy before she was caught and turned into a vampire. She and Nerissa Shale, a lone werepuma, who works as a counselor for FH-CSI, got married in Shadow Rising, 12. Mennolly is also Roman‘s official consort — he’s the natural and blood son of Blood Wyne, mother and ruler of the vampires — and since Shadow Rising, she is Roman’s heir, and she is bound to Blood Wyne.
Sephreh ob Tanu is the girls’ father who has seen the error of his ways. Oh, man, I’ve always wanted to say that about a parent…! He’s the liaison between the reinstated OIA headed up by the girls and the Des’Estar, the queen’s guards.
Other allies and friends who live at the house include:
Lady Iris O’Shea, a Finnish house sprite and Priestess of Undutar, is four months pregnant with twins and married to Bruce O’Shea, a leprechaun. Rozurial, a mercenary and incubus, wears a long coat filled with every kind of weapon. Vanzir is a demon acquiring slightly different, and more powerful, powers. Maggie is their baby calico gargoyle. Hanna is a hostage rescued in Hexed: Ice Shards, 9.5, who now helps out at the house.
Detective Chase Johnson heads up the Faerie-Human Crime Scene Investigation (FH-CSI), and he’s lucky to be alive. The girls kept him alive with a special potion, and he’s learned that he is very distantly related to Queen Asteria. The potion, however, changed him and he’s still learning what he can do. Sharah is Queen Asteria’s niece, an elfin medic with FB-CSI, Chase’s girlfriend and pregnant with his child. Yugi is Chase’s second-in-command. Mallen is another elfin medic.
Lindsey Cartridge is the high priestess of an FBH pagan coven of witches and one of her members, Tracy Smyth, has a son, Sean, with a problem. Mystic Charms is a homey magic shop run by Beth, an FBH witch, and her Fae husband, Laslan. Kerri is her FBH daughter. Jake Evans is a wanna-be mage who prefers shortcuts to real work; he’s always messing up the books at Mystic Charms. Bran, the son of Raven Mother and the Black Unicorn, is also part of the ritual; he is a sorcerer, a trickster, and Earthside to help train warriors. Camille will be the liaison between Bran and the Earthside agencies. Lord Faerman has lost his wife, Syringa. Tim Winthrop is their friend and the computer guru for the Supe Community Council; Justin Binds is his partner. Even burned down, Fritz and Abby Liebman‘s house in the Greenbelt Park District is still causing grief.
Vampires Anonymous was founded by Wade and has Roman’s blessing. Sassy’s house and estate are the new VA headquarters — the Seattle Vampire Nexus. The hate group, Earthborn Brethren, have been quiet since Gambit’s death, but now they’re out and picketing.
Queen Asteria is the elfin queen; Trenyth is her assistant. A covert team has been sent into the desert in Otherworld to investigate rumors: Darynal is Trillian’s blood-oath brother and a mercenary; Taath is a sorcerer; and, Quall is an assassin and the son of one of the leaders in Rhellah they need to investigate.
Additional allies in Otherworld include:
Derisa is the High Priestess from the Grove of the Moon Mother. “The Black Unicorn is the father of the Dahns unicorns and he reincarnates every 1,000 years”. In Bone Magic, 7, Camille had to sacrifice him and received his horn and hide. Eriskel is one of the jindasels within the horn who must provide Camille help when she asks. Ivana Krask is the Maiden of Karask, an Elder Fae has lost the ghosts in her garden. Pentangle, the Mother of Magic, and Grandmother Coyote are the Hags of Fate entrusted with keeping the worlds in balance.
Marion Vespa and her husband, Douglas, coyote shifters, are living with Wilbur (he’s the girls’ neighbor and a necromancer who was injured in Harvest Hunting, 8, the same in which their house and café were burnt down) while they rebuild their house; the café is already rebuilt. Martin is a Wilbur’s brother and a zombie.
The Supe Community Council really steps up in this story and includes Jonas, a werebear, an ex-Marine, and an ex-football player, and Frank Willows is a werewolf and a farmer where the girls buy their pork and Mennolly’s blood.
Elaqneve is the Elfin lands in Otherworld (OW), which is a human generic reference for another dimension where many of the elves, gods, and Elemental Lords, etc. all live. Access to OW is through portals. The Sidhe and Fae themselves call it Y’Elestrial.
Talamh Lonrach Oll, the Land of Brilliant Apples, is the realm of the Triple Threat and lies in the foothills of the Cascade Mountain Range. The Court of the Three Queens is that of the three Earthside Fae queens: Titania is the Queen of Light and Morning of the Seelie; Morgaine is a half-Fae Queen of Dusk and Twilight and a very distant cousin to the D’Artigo sisters; and, Aeval is the Queen of Shadow and Night of the Unseelie. The queens are teaching Camille the etiquette and rituals that will take her the next steps into the priestess-hood. Arturo, in love with Morgaine, and Mordred, Morgaine’s nephew who hates the girls, are the attendants the night of the ritual.
Gulakah, the Lord of Ghosts, is the current big bad subordinate — he’s a god! — to Shadow Wing. And the most powerful so far. Spirit demons are fed by magic and Gulakah is pulling in as much as he can. Tregarts are nasty sorcerers.
Telazhar, a necromancer training demons for Shadow Wing, is back and threatening two fronts. Shadow Wing is the current ruler of the Subterranean Realms. He’s also known as the Unraveller. The Aleksais Psychic Network is led by Halcon Davis, and the girls think he’s colluding with Gulakah.
The Cover and Title
You know this is Camille’s story when the cover is a busty woman striding forward in her knee-high black boots and black, bat-eared bustier, and skirt slit-to-there. It’s softened by the halo of lavender sky with a circular tracery of gold dashes and symbols, which in turn encompasses a soft yellow wolf looking over Camille’s shoulder.
It’s not so much a Haunted Moon as it is the moon which is so great a part of Camille’s life.
[…] Original post: Yasmine Galenorn, Haunted Moon […]