Available: 9/6/2011
Type: Paranormal Romance – Novella
Publisher: Entangled Publishing
My Copy: Sent as part of tour
After paying two millennia’s penance to Osiris, world-weary Phoenix Ice has had enough. Saving souls without any hope for her own redemption isn’t how she imagined spending eternity. Fed up, she decides her next death will be her last. But when she sacrifices her own life for a sexy Texan in a catastrophic plane crash, she has no idea the consequences will be so great…or that she’ll end up back in his life for her next assignment.
Now that Turner Alcott has survived the worst, finding a wife and mother for his son matters more than ever before. When the mysterious Ice comes into his life, Turner knows she’s the one—but love is the last thing Ice wants. If he wants to win her heart, Turner must teach Ice how to forgive herself, and prove that love is the ultimate sacrifice.
As my first Rachel Firasek experience, I would say this was a stunningly good winner! I absolutely adored this novella and will be singing its praises for a long time. As a novella I like to be brought up to speed on back story quickly, given characters I can grow to love in short time spans and a storyline that is engaging as well as gives closure. This novella certainly delivered. I also highly enjoyed the paranormal aspect involving the Phoenix, which has always fascinated me. Mythology as a whole is one of my favorite reads, combined with incredibly sweet love scenes, I was hooked.
The novella centers around Ice, a Phoenix, cursed to die over and over again while saving someone else, someone who has been marked to live. Forced to do this as atonement for a past sin, something she talks to no one about, at the hands of her ex-husband, Osiris. Her last mark, Turner, survived a plane crash as he was supposed to but now Ice is back in his life again. He doesn’t remember much of the fiery crash but he knows his sons new teacher, Ms Nix, is extremely familiar. He knows how he feels when he’s around her and how much he wants her to fill the void left in his life after Brody’s mom took off. The only problem is, she wants nothing to do with him. Breaking down her resolve becomes a pursuit he can’t ignore.
Ice is harboring major guilt from the death of her family centuries before. She even turned her husband into a God in an attempt to bring him back.Now she is cursed and she longs to be finally set free. To learn whatever lesson she is supposed to and live again.Getting involved with Turner is not in her plans since eventually she will have to leave again, once Osiris finally reveals her new mark.
I enjoyed the interaction between Ice and the rest of the Phoenixs. I thought Rachel effectively set up more novellas for the future in each of them. Ice and Turner were great together with their age old cat and mouse type relationship. I chuckled when Ice resisted him time and time again knowing eventually she would have to crack. Turner chinked at her personal shield continuously along with his son Brody. Brody was just to damn cute. The innocence of his age made me long for Ice to open up her heart to this boy. He was incredibly heart by his mother leaving and the fact that Turner saw that and was trying his best to do right by the boy, made me love them both.
Mythology is a great back drop for romance. Since most people know the basics already it’s such a great place to build upon. You can take stories people already know and add twists and turns wherever you like. I’m the kind of person that when I read about mythology wondered about who they were, what did they do in between these stories the school pounded into my brain. What were they like as individuals. With each new mythology based romance I read, my thirst gets more and more pronounced. I just love them. The Last Rising gave me the Phoenix, which is one of my favorite stories. I was totally enthralled and I can’t wait till I get some more!
I will say there were times as much as I understood Ice’s withdrawal, I wanted to smack her. She kept trying to separate feelings and sex. I thought for someone to who had lived for as long as she had, would know better. I mean, theoretically she had to have seen it played out hundreds of times. Perhaps not with herself, but still, she was constantly around others. I couldn’t understand how she might have missed that. At least Turner was tenacious. He certainly needed to be.
I give The Last Rising by Rachel Firasek 4 stars
Great story. Rachel’s an awesome writer.
And yeah, I wanted to smack ICE sometimes, too, LOL, but that’s a sign of a good story when I’m so in tune with the character and his/her dumb decisions. LOL!!
Oh I loved this story !!
and yes i agree with Lynn as far as Ice goes, but hey look where it got her ** waggles eyebrows ** .. Such a great story , one i would certainly read again !!! Rachel is such a sweety and her writing is fantastic !! <3
kat !!!
Ah, just had to pipe in. You guys are gonna make me cry. Lynn, thank you so much for everything you do! And Kat… Kat… (Just so you know, I didn’t put her up to this) thank you so much!!! Your support means everything to me. Luv ya, gals!
Oh, and last but certainly not least, Nikki, thanks for reading my story! I’m so glad to see that you liked it. When I saw your comments about Brodie on GR, I busted out laughing. That was my fave line from him.
I loved that line! So attuned to what a child might say. Love the book and am impatiently waiting for #2 lol,
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