Anhaga Bisexual Romance, Paranormal
Dreamspinner Press
July 23, 2019
227
Aramin Decourcey—Min to his few friends—might be the best thief in Amberwich, and he might have a secret that helps him survive the cutthroat world of aristocratic families and their powerful magic users, but he does have one weakness: his affection for his adopted nephew, Harry.
When the formidable Sabadine family curses Harry, Min must accept a suicide mission to save his life: retrieve Kazimir Stone, a low-level Sabadine hedgewitch who refuses to come home after completing his apprenticeship… and who is in Anhaga, a seaside village under the control of the terrifying Hidden Lord of the fae. If that wasn’t enough, Kaz is far from the simple hedgewitch he seems.
With the Sabadines on one side and the fae on the other, Min doesn’t have time to deal with a crisis of conscience—or the growing attraction between him and Kaz. He needs to get Kaz back to Amberwich and get Harry’s curse lifted before it kills him. Saving Harry means handing Kaz over to his ruthless family. Saving Kaz means letting Harry die. Min might pride himself on his cleverness, but he can’t see his way out of this one.
The Hidden Lord might see that he never gets the choice.
Review By Sherry Perkins
Member of the Paranormal Romance Review Team
“Of course, he’d always had problems differentiating between the people he’d like to punch and the people he’d like to fuck. They were so often the same people.”—Anhaga
***
That’s a sentiment we’ve all likely experienced, but one Aramin Decourcey experiences more than most. Min, as he’s known to the few family and friends he has, is a man who’d been raised in a brothel. He learned some specialized survival skills there—including thievery. He’s quite good at it, and luckily or unluckily, as fate would have it, his particular skill set is in demand by the riffraff and aristocratic families of Amberwich.
Min’s also a void, a person not particularly influenced by magic. That’s fortunate because his newest foray into thievery is going to involve powerful and defensive magic. But protection from everyday magic is one thing; being shoved into the realm of the fae and the Hidden Lord is another. It’s a job he’d usually turn his nose up to except the life of his “nephew” is at stake. Harry, the nephew, isn’t exactly family but he is a young man quite dear to Min. If that hadn’t been the case, then Min simply wouldn’t have accepted the job.
Harry’s had a death curse placed on him by one of the most influential families in Amberwich—the Sabadines. The Sabadines leverage the curse to secure Min’s services.
The bit of thievery required to free Harry from the deadly magic means Min’s going to need to kidnap one of the Sabadine’s betrothed from a hedgewitch living in the realm of the Hidden Lord of the fae, in a place called Anhaga.
The betrothed Sabadine is a young man named Kazimir, apprenticed to the hedgewich. Not only is Kazimir apprenticed to the witch, Kazimir’s also a Sabadine. Nothing about this feels right to Min. Nothing. But Min has Harry’s life to save, so what suspicions Min might have about this whole stinking mess are going to have to wait.
“Anhaga” is an enchanting story. Lisa Henry’s writing style is inclusive, conversational and witty. It’s snarky too—which I like in mystery/thrillers. Henry also includes words like assholery, and guttersnipe in the narrative…words you’d not necessarily associate with paranormal romance but are nonetheless entirely appropriate and entertaining enough to earn a 4.5-star rating from me.
