Review! Warrior Ascended by Addison Fox

Warrior Ascended
Sons of the Zodiac, book 1
Addison Fox
Signet
March 2, 2010
ISBN-10: 045122938X
ISBN-13: 978-0451229380

Millennia ago, the Goddess of Justice created a race of fierce Warriors, each imbued with a special power of the Zodiac, charged with protecting humanity from the darkest of evils.

Charming, proud, and impulsive, Leo Warrior Brody Talbot is fighting what may be his final battle. Enyo, the Goddess of War, plans to fulfill an ancient prophecy to destroy humanity by harnessing the dark power of the Summoning Stones of Egypt and there's only one person who knows enough about the stones to help Brody diminish their strength.

Since her father’s murder, museum curator Ava Harrison has continued his research of Egypt’s ancient treasures. She’s just landed the exhibit of a century, displaying the Summoning Stones at New York’s Natural History Museum. Used to working alone, Ava is suspicious of the arrogant archeologist who’s been brought in to ensure the stones safekeeping–but his presence ignites an unexpected blaze of attraction.

Never in all his centuries has Brody met a woman who enthralls him like Ava. But, bound to protect her, he struggles to deny his passion as they are drawn into a dark and dangerous final reckoning between good and evil.

Brody Talbot is one of the zodiac warriors. Each warrior was chosen by the goddess of Justice, Themis, thousands of years ago and given their own sign and now they fight together against Enyo, the Goddess of War and have been doing so for as long as they have been warriors. So far, they have managed to somehow balance the evil that Enyo inflicts on the world but there's a prophecy that has just been uncovered that says humanity will be destroyed if something called the Summoning Stones are brought together.

Those same stones reside in five different museums around the world. But before they can be used, you need the instructions, if you will, that Thutmose's high priest wrote down in tablets way back when and said tablets were just excavated recently. In them, it tells the prophecy of the Chosen one who will be the person able to harness the power the stones have to pretty much bring hell on Earth. Good times.

However, there's only one person that can help Brody and the other warriors prevent Enyo from getting her hands on the Summoning Stones and causing hell. Her name is Ava Marie Harrison and she's the museum curator that has one of the Summoning stones but before Brody can get her to help him, he has to prevent Enyo's henchmen from harming her. Brody and Ava have the hots for each from the get-go but Ava has no clue about this supernatural world that exists and they have to learn to trust each other - and fast, because they sort of have the save the world.

Warrior Ascended is the debut novel by Addison Fox, starting off her series the Sons of the Zodiac. I'm still not quite sure how I feel about this book, there are some things that I would overlook if there was good characterization in the story, but the main characters, Brody and Ava, really annoyed me at times. Brody, for one thing, sucked as a hero. He's a Leo so he's supposed to be super protective and yet under his watch, Ava manages to get snatched by the evil guys several times. So then he starts beating himself over it, then Ava strokes his ego and then he's back to normal. After a few times of this happening, I was just over it.

Another thing that I had problems with was the plot, or rather lack thereof. There were random jumps from one scene to another without a bridge between and it just really confused me. One second I'm reading about one thing and the next it's a completely different scene and I'm left trying to unscramble what's going on.

Those were my biggest complaints about the book. Overlooking that, the story has a very interesting premise based on Greek mythology which I really do like reading about and I really liked the other Zodiac warriors, like Zane, the Scorpio one. I will definitely be checking out Fox's next book, I think that while I did have issues with Warrior Ascended, the series sounds really promising and hopefully, I will enjoy the next book more than I did Warrior Ascended.

Lush Rating: 3.