This novella fits several genres - paranormal, romance,
crime. I had read The Nymph's Labyrinth which was set on
a Greek island and wanted to see how the author Danica
Winters would transfer her premise to Montana. The life
of the MONTANA MUSTANGS is a challenging one for the nymph
shapeshifters who once ran free in horse form have been
steadily fighting encroachment by domestic livestock.
Unlike their Greek sisters who profit from tourism, they
find their animal friends are being poisoned or captured
and sold.
A regular lawman who is called to the scene of a grisly
find meets a blonde lady called Aura who reported finding a
severed female hand on a lake shore. Deputy Dane Burke
disapproves of his younger colleague's drooling over the
attractive lady; she deserves respect, and they have a case
to investigate. Aura has driven up from Arizona to meet
her sister and she isn't communicative. Dane thinks there's
something odd about Aura, but it's not illegal to drive
through Montana. Next day however she is reported
trespassing on a mountainous ranch, and Dane decides to
find out more about her. Aura uses her extra-womanly
wiles, and out of the blue Dane finds himself kissing the
lady. He doesn't know that she's a horse shifter nymph
several centuries old, and he doesn't know that a curse
will befall men who love such women.
There's a lot of crime scene investigation as bodies mount
up with startling rapidity; an autopsy report and wolf
attack are part of the action, so it's not entirely cosy
crime. The awful motivation for the abductions and
killings becomes gradually visible while Aura's feelings of
tension mount as she keeps hoping her sister will be found
unharmed. We see Aura working with scared horses and trying
to protect them from ill-treatment. While she heals from
injury fast, I kept waiting to see her shift form... she
doesn't want to do that anymore, which is a bit of a let-
down.
Some of the settings are very well described, frost-tipped
grasses on the mountainsides for instance, but I
preferred The Nymph's Labyrinth which brought the Greek
island and characters completely to life. This instalment
in the Nymphs adult romance series will be favoured
more
by crime readers. Danica Winters has written about swan
shifters in the next book, Winter Swans so after MONTANA
MUSTANGS I'm glad to say we can keep reading.
A nymph: a woman with the ability to seduce at will, shift
to protect, but cursed with the fate to have the man she
falls in love with die a tragic death. As one of these
ill-fated nymphs, Aura Montgarten has spent her lifetime
drifting from one place to another hiding from love. Until
she meets Dane.
When a body washes up on the shore of a rural Montana lake,
police officer Dane Burke is faced with the task of finding
the killer - even if it means he will be forced to put his
life and heart at risk by working with a drifter. As the
truth of Aura’s Mustang-shifting nymph ways are revealed,
Dane learns exactly the amount of danger he and Aura are in,
but can’t force himself to leave a case unsolved when the
truth is just outside his grasp.
When the killer decides he needs to take another victim -
Dane - Aura must choose between their forbidden love and her
immortal life. Can there be life without love or is death
her only choice?
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