Wednesday, August 13, 2014

BOOK BLAST - First to Burn (Immortal Vikings #1) by Anna Richland


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A Soldier with Secrets.

Immortal Viking Wulf Wardsen once battled alongside Beowulf, and now serves in Afghanistan. He's trusted the mortal men on his elite special operations team to protect his secret, until an explosion lands Wulf in a place more dangerous to him than a battlefield: a medevac helicopter.

A Doctor with Questions.

Army captain Theresa Chiesa follows the rules and expects the same from others, even special forces hotshots like Sergeant Wardsen. She's determined to discover the secret behind his supernaturally fast healing, and she won't allow his sexy smile to distract her.

An Enemy with Nothing to Lose.

Even as Theresa's investigation threatens to expose him, Wulf dreams of love and a normal life with her. But the lost Viking relic needed to reverse his immortality is being hunted by another—an ancient enemy who won't hesitate to hurt Theresa to strike back at Wulf.






Anna Richland lives with her quietly funny Canadian husband and two less quiet children in a century-old house in Seattle. Like the heroine of FIRST TO BURN, she joined the army to pay tuition, a decision that led to an adventurous career on four continents (if standing on the bridge in Panama that divides North and South America counts as two).

She donates a portion of her book proceeds to the Fisher House Foundation, which provides housing for families of wounded soldiers in the US and Great Britain, and Doctors Without Borders, which delivers emergency medical care in more than sixty crisis zones world-wide.


To find out about her October novella, HIS ROAD HOME, and the next Immortal Vikings romance, THE SECOND LIE, visit her website at annarichland.com and sign up for her newsletter.



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REVIEW:
Impressive well written debut novel with characters who, for the most part, are easy to relate to. As a military veteran who has done her share of deployments, I think the author did an incredible job with the first few chapters that showcase and explain about the way of life military members experience when downrange or in theater (which can be craptastic at best); especially the scenes that describe the chow hall (I've been out of the military since 2008, but can still remember the smells and pictures those damn trays being heated by sterno lol). 

The beginning seemed to drag on a bit long, but I liked the interaction between the characters when Theresa was asked to visit the village and check on one of the village elders young wife and her pregnancy. Theresa did her best to main the officer/enlisted relationship between herself and Wulf, but fraternization (whether it's sharing drinks, or hitting the sheets) between officers and enlisted does seem to happen quite a bit in the military. Again, impressive with how much well the author showcased how cohesive Wulf's unit is and how they came together to keep his secret, cause those Green Berets are extremely tight-lipped. (Sidenote, if you meet someone who brags about being a Green Beret and what all they did while a GB, chances are they weren't really a GB).

The story really began to pick up speed once Theresa and Wulf were in Italy, and was pretty much action-packed from that point on. I liked how Wulf's story wasn't shoved in our faces from the beginning, but rather told slowly. Although from reading the book blurb the reader already knows going in that he's immortal, but it was cool to see how the story developed for Theresa. It was interesting to learn Wulf's story, to this day I remember reading Beowulf in my senior English class, and it's one of the few stories I remember from high school. I hope we get to read Ivar's story next, this is a series I would recommend.
RATING



1 comment:

  1. Thanks for the review, Nicole! Ivar's story is going to be the last one, but I promise to get other parts of Beowulf in each Immortal Viking book. The Second Lie, coming in January, is about an immortal Viking thief - if you remember the one who stole the cup from the dragon's hoard and woke up the dragon that killed Beowulf? (with a twist, of course).

    Did you see that signups for the Tour of my Thanksgiving/Veterans Day novella, His Road Home (October 13), are out already too? I know you were an early supporter!

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