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I’d like to officially welcome Sophia Rose to That’s What I’m Talking About. Many of you know Sophia from social media or one of the many other blogs to which she contributes. Sophia will be reviewing books on the blog twice per month. Please give her a big hello!
Alien With Benefits
Author: Cara Bristol
Reviewer: Sophia
Rating: A
What I’m Talking About:
The opportunity of a lifetime turns into an alien adventure of epic proportions when a human woman wins a space cruise, gets captured by alien slavers, and saved by another alien prisoner with danger hot in their wake. Cara Bristol’s new alien romance series has one incredible opener.
I’m becoming less amazed as each new exciting series comes out, how Cara Bristol can establish a fascinating futuristic alien world while at the same time bringing on the action and exciting romance. In this case, her world involves humans who have resettled after earth was destroyed by nukes know they are not alone out in the galaxy, but have yet to meet any aliens because their focus has been relocation and survival-mode for so long. On the other side of the coin, the aliens are more advanced and they all look down on the humans as a sub-par race who destroyed their own viable planet and even have sanctions against interacting with the humans.
Now, an enticing chance to take a cruise out beyond their little corner of the galaxy gets a pack of naïve, innocent humans right into the thick of alien trouble. Holly, the heroine, is forced to get up to speed even while just trying to survive. The narrative is shared with the hero, Aeon, an alien prince who is having one last hurrah before he has to wed by taking a low-key tour and ends up getting captured where he meets his first human.
I loved seeing how their differences were sketched out, but they learned to connect while trying to keep alive and from being recaptured. This book had Holly and Aeon’s ill-fated romance (since he’s being offered up as the peace offering to his race’s enemy to stop a war), but was also opening up a plot full of intrigue and a broader cast of characters who will get their future stories. I was left well satisfied, but also eager for what comes next.
So, this was a fabulous series starter and I can recommend it to those who love their alien inter-racial romances with plenty of action and spice.
My Rating: A Loved It
Sophia
About the Book:
A space cruise with her bestie seems like the vacation of a lifetime until Holly Winters gets abducted by aliens and finds herself on a slave ship. When the ship’s AI goes haywire and accidentally releases the prisoners from their cells, she makes a break for it—only to be kidnapped again by a huge horned and furry alien. Aeon claims to be a prince, but he acts like a royal jerk and refuses to let Holly go. But she’s determined to locate her friend and somehow get home to New Terra.
Prince Aeon of Araset is enjoying his last breath of freedom from royal duties when he’s accidentally ensnared by slavers trafficking in alien species, including the protected, but despised humans. At the first opportunity he escapes in a tiny evac pod and lands on the nearest inhabited planet. In an impulsive act of sympathy, he takes a human female with him to save her from a fate worse than death. Now he’s stuck with the talkative, conspicuous nuisance. For her own safety, he can’t release her.
At odds at first, Holly and Aeon quickly discover that on a hostile, dangerous planet being friends and working together offers more benefits than fighting. But when friendship turns passionate, emotions remain guarded because both know they are loving on borrowed time. Upon their rescue, Holly must return to New Terra. A human would never be accepted on Araset, and Aeon must bond with a royal of his species to inherit the throne.
Can two lovers from different worlds defeat the forces against them and find happiness together?
Release Date: May 15, 2023
Publisher: Cara Bristol
Series: Forbidden Bonds #1
Genre: Sci-Fi Romance
Format(s): paperback (292 pages), e-book
Book Source: Author
Purchase Info:
Amazon (affiliate link)