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Today Tanya Kaanta kick starts the Aegyir Rises by Amanda Fleet for the book blog tour for #Lovebookstours.

Aegyir Rises by Amanda Fleet

Guardians of The Realm 1: Aegyir Rises

Reagan Bennett has always felt like an outsider. Left at the doors of a hospital at birth, her relationship with her adopted family hasn’t been easy. Especially when one of them almost killed her. Now he’s due to be released from prison and Reagan’s settled world is about to be turned upside-down. But not by him.

Something else – something much older, much darker – is also about to be freed. Something that believes Reagan is an arch enemy, and is obsessed with destroying her.

All of her life, Reagan has dreamed of living in another place – The Realm. Can these dreams really be memories? If so, who is Reagan Bennett?

Reagan needs to figure out who her enemy is, before they slaughter everyone she loves. And to do that, she needs to figure out who she really is.

Review by Tanya Kaanta

There are many good things about Aegyir Rises, especially if you are a fan of strong heroines, magic, and urban fantasy. And if you are or become an ardent fan of Ms. Fleet, rejoice, because this is the first in the Guardians of the Realm Series.

In a nutshell, Reagan Bennett is a survivor. Finally adopted into a family, she unfortunately wades through the dysfunction and breakdown of that family. Yet in so doing, she finds her own strength after her life is turned upside down after an assault. Along with the support of her long-time boyfriend, Finn. whom, I might add, is a bit swoon-worthy, she picks up the pieces of her life and realizes she may not have control over what happens to her, but she does have control over how she responds.

But while Reagan’s life might seem normal, the world around her starts changing. Or rather, she’s aware of phenomena that no one else can see. Entities that are not of this earth. Ability to read a language she’s never seen before. And is she going crazy for hearing voices? Alas, she’s not crazy, nor is it so cut and dry that she’s actually of this world. Or is she? Because not only does she start to notice weird changes in the people around her, there’s an evil entity named Aegyir, trying to wield Reagan and those around her in order to obtain greater power.

The author introduces us to a world and a plot that will take us through the series, yet with this first book we’re left with many cliffhangers. Who really is Reagan? How did she come to be on earth and why all of a sudden does she start noticing paranormal activity around her? Does she have the strengths alluded in the story and the lore? Will she shift between worlds in the next book? Who truly are her allies and enemies? If she is of a different world, how did the amnesia happen?

The story has a lot of potential. The world and magic is interesting. The characters are flawed, yet this is fine as long as we see growth. However, often times I was so flabberghasted by the decisions some of the characters made, I had to put the story down and regroup. Remind myself this is fantasy and decisions made in real life, let along fiction, are not always rational. And why the blinders Reagan and Finn have regarding changes with their friends? For real, there were some pretty dodgy choices made, ones that seemed quite out of line with the characters. But I’m holding out hope these decisions will come full circle as the story progresses, and that our main characters’ growth gains a little more consistency and maturity as the story continues.

Finally, I would have loved to have seen us move to the other realm earlier in the story. Or at least have the reader learn about the lore and history throughout the adventure. For example, about halfway through the story, Reagan finds a text and begins reading about the history of this other world. We learn a bulk of the history and lore from her reading. It could have been more powerful to slowly learn about this information throughout the story as the heroine experiences it firsthand, sees it played out before her, or learns through uncovering mysteries, or having conversations.

But besides these personal wishes, Aegyir Rises does a fine job with drawing the reader into the mystery of Aegyir and how Reagan is going to overcome this new brand of evil. Moreover, with the cliffhanger, I am certain readers will want to know more. As for me, I’m curious.

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