I still remember the first time I rode a horse which is synonymous as saying I still remember the time I almost died. That hellbeast ran riot across a large desert area surrounding a partially active volcano and laughed at my feeble attempts to summon help or stop his rampage.
What this earned for me was a year or two of riding lessons because where I grew up, riding lessons were the thing to do for proper young ladies. As there is nothing proper about me, you can be sure that I never progressed much past being able to keep my seat and to pick a good horse that would stop when I politely asked it to. A surprising amount of horse riding comes down to just picking the right horse. Some horses are always bad because they hate you and secretly long to tear into your entrails despite masquerading as a herbivore. Other horses are flighty and will have their good or bad moments. So for the most part, you pick a good horse and stick with it.
Authors tend to be like a horse. You find a good one and stick with it and they usually won’t fail you. This analogy is especially true for the Paranormal Romance genre where books tend to be serialized. I’ve tried to ride a series that was flighty with books wavering between good and bad like a toddler on too much sugar. It’s a frustrating experience.
If I had to pick my favourite horse though, Larrisa Ione would be it. I don’t know how she would feel to being referred to as a horse, but there it is. I’ve generally found her work to be consistently readable.
Immortal Rider is the story of a Horseman of the Apocalypse and a human man falling in love and dealing with her lying and evil brothers and the fact that she had him dragged into hell for kissing her. Completely normal stuff that I’m sure we can all relate to.
I have some issues with female representation in her novels and particularly this one. However, over all, I do enjoy her storytelling and her characters.
Her novels also tend to have the appropriate amount of cheesy goodness in them without overdoing it or crossing into the realm of dumbassery. Something that’s surprisingly easy to do in this genre.
I think, if I’d read the first novel, I would have enjoyed this more as opposed to playing catch up and trying to familiarize myself with a world that seems to take it for granted that you already know most of the characters.
Ione’s novels are, at least in my opinion, better than the usual fare and they have a great deal of imagination and interesting world building in them. So if you’ve lost your seat in this genre and are looking for a good horse, maybe give Ione a chance.
