CURSED BY ICE by Jacqueline Frank is book two in the
Immortal
Brothers series. I've been a longtime fan of Frank's
stories, but Frank's writing has been hit or miss for me
with her more recent books. I was thrilled with Cursed by
Fire, book 1 in this series, and hoped that the old Frank
was back. Alas, Cursed by Ice left me feeling tepid.
CURSED BY ICE features a second brother, Garreth, who is
brought back from his eternal punishment through the
offices
of his brother Dethan in book one. An epic ancient
soldier,
Gareth, along with his brothers, was damned for snatching
the gift of immortality against the will of the gods.
Each
brother was sentenced to their own unique and never-ending
torment. Gareth's punishment was to be continually frozen
and thawed in an agonizing cycle. Gareth was partially
released from his torment by the gods in order to take his
brother Dethan's place in leading an army to conquer
peoples, in order to force them back to the worship of the
old gods, thereby increasing the gods' power which has
been
waning due to their lack of believers. Gareth still has
to
endure being frozen nightly, and he disappears when the
sun
goes down every night to undergo his personal agony at the
will of the gods. I like Gareth, and he is much more
approachable than Dethan ever was.
While assaulting the enemy city of Kith along with Dethan,
Garreth meets Sarielle, a wrenna who can control a dragon
that she is bound to. Sarielle is beautiful and
curvaceous,
with lustrous lavender Kithian skin and fiery red hair.
Kith's evil ruler is forcing Sarielle to defend the city
by
holding her two younger sisters hostage. Sarielle is kept
as a slave, and has a supernatural soulbond to a young
wyvern, Koro, that was she formed when she was just a
youngster. She seems almost too good to be true, and I
found myself frustrated by how two dimensional she feels
at
times.
Garreth takes over the title of bennesah, or ruler of
Kith,
in the name of his goddess Weysa, and must rebuild the
conquered city with temples to honor her. Much of the
book
deals with the aftermath of the conquered city. There is
magic and political intrigue and war in this story, but it
never quite gels smoothly to me. Garreth proposes making
Sarielle the new ruler of Kith, which seems pretty
far-fetched. Even though slavery is now outlawed in the
conquered city, the concept that a prior slave would be
set
up as the new ruler doesn't seem very probable or prudent.
Brother Dethan plays a large part in book two, and is a
jerk
again in this story. This jerkiness is disappointing to
me,
even though I understand Dethan's reasons. I will
definitely read book three when it releases, but I hope
the next
Frank story will be more similar to the first in the
series
instead of CURSED BY ICE.
From New York Times bestselling author Jacquelyn Frank comes the smoothly sensual second book in an exciting new series featuring four immortal warrior brothers who must stake their hearts against their fate. As punishment for plotting with his brothers to steal immortality, Garreth is suffering a freezing torment until the end of time. Again and again, his fierce fighter’s physique is frozen into a chiseled ice sculpture, his heart hardening like a diamond in his chest—only to thaw and resume the chilling torture. Until, like his older brother Dethan, he is offered a reprieve from a goddess—in exchange for his allegiance in a celestial civil war. Garreth lives to fight and fights to live. But while laying siege to an embattled city, he finds another reason to go on—a beautiful warrior woman named Sarielle, who commands a mythic beast through a mysterious and powerful bond. Terrified of her strength, the city rulers have kept her captive, and now she refuses to submit to a new master. As Garreth seeks to unleash her passion and melt the icy resistance of her heart, will he become her ultimate salvation—or lead them both to greater destruction?
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