Review: Bound by Amy Lane

Bound (Little Goddess Series, book 3)
Amy Lane
iUniverse, Inc
February 19, 2007
ISBN-10: 0595424236

Humans have the option of separation, divorce, and heartbreak—for Corinne Carol-Anne Kirkpatrick, sorceress and queen of the vampires, the choices are limited to love or death. Now that she is back at Green’s hill and assuming her duties as leader, her life is, at best, complicated. Bracken and Nicky are rivalling for her affections, Green is gone taking care of his people, and a new supernatural enemy is threatening the sanctity of all she has come to love. Throw in a family reunion gone bad, a supernatural psychiatrist and a killer physics class, and Cory’s life isn’t just complex, it’s psychotic.

Cory needs to get her act and her identity together, and soon, because the enemy she and her lovers are facing is a nightmare that doesn’t just kill people, it unmakes them. If she doesn’t figure out who she is and what her place is on Green’s hill, it’s not just her life on the line. She knows from hard experience that the only thing worse than facing death is facing the death of someone she loves.

Because loving people is easy—living with them is what takes the real work, and it’s even harder if you’re BOUND.

Cory's back home to Green's Hill. She's still dealing with Adrian's death and now, she's married to Bracken, an elf red-cap and Nicky, who can turn into a bird, due to unfortunate circumstances but she's willing to make it work. There's no other choice, she can't get a divorce like any other human would because it's either make it work or death and that's not even an option. It's not that she doesn't love them. She adores Bracken and she does love Nicky, but not in the way that he wants and needs. And there's of course, Green. Her lover, their leader, and the one she wishes she was bound to the most. However, that can't be possible because as a sidhe leader, Green just can't make that kind of promise to her.

Apart from juggling a pretty unconventional love life, she's also now queen of the vampires, thanks to being marked by Adrian before he died. And now more than ever, they need a leader. But she's still trying to come to term with her new goddess powers and she has to get her act together and quick because people are being literally drained out of their essence, and she has to figure out who it is and stop them because its next target might just be someone close to her.

To make things even more hellish, she's back in school. And if Physics class doesn't make anyone want to pull their hair out, I don't know what does.

Bound is the third installment in the Little Goddess series and wow, it is awesome! One of my biggest requirements in a good book is character development and Mrs. Lane more than delivered. Cory's grown up a lot, she's gone through very hard things and it shows. I absolutely love Bracken, he's my favorite character. When I read the previous book, Wounded, I said I didn't want some kind of three-people marriage between Cory, Bracken and Nicky because I wanted Bracken to just be with Cory but in Bound, we find out more about Nicky and I couldn't help but love him a little. It's not his fault that he's practically trapped in this marriage because he would die otherwise. The story is not in only Cory's point of view, there's multiple ones: Green's, Bracken's, Nicky's, even Arturo's! And while that might sound confusing, it enhances the story.

Something I love about the Little Goddess series is that yes, while there is a plot, like in this case, there's something who can literally unmake a person and Cory has to stop it, Mrs. Lane managed to balance the plot out with Cory's personal life which is a major point in the story. Neither outshines the other and I really like that. This story is emotionally charged, with wonderful characters you can't help but love (especially Bracken!) and a great plot. Needless to say, I'm totally a junkie now and looking forward to the next installment.

[Original review on NOR]