Reaver by Larisa Ione

Narrated by Helen Wick

I’ve been a fan of Larisa Ione’s writing for the past three years or so. Passion Unleashed, first in her Demonica series, hooked me from the very beginning. I’ve read her books as quickly as I could get my hands on them. Needless to say, I was more than pleased to see Reaver available for review.

Reaver is Book 5 in Ione’s Lords of Deliverance series. It’s crucial to read this series in order. In fact, if you haven’t read this series, please skip this review, as it will contain series spoilers.

Everyone calls him a rebel. He’s broken Heaven’s rules more times than anyone can count. This time, the archangels are pretty sure he’s gone too far. He’s on his way to Hell to steal Satan’s daughter, a fallen angel, who has been working as a spy for Heaven for the past five thousand years.

Harvester gave up her wings to look after Reaver’s children, the four horsemen of the Apocalypse. She manipulated things behind the scenes, in hopes of keeping the horsemen seals from breaking but, when her cover is blown, Harvester is taken to the depths of Hell where she is sentenced to suffer an eternity of torture at the hands of her father and his minions. Satan hates being made a fool of, especially by his own daughter.

Reaver, well aware of the risks Harvester has taken, is determined to save her. He knows it’s far from a foolproof plan, but he owes Harvester far more than he can ever repay. Saving her will be the first step. At least, it will, if they manage to survive.

A number of narrators have performed Ione’s work. This was the first time I’d ever listened to Helen Wick and overall, I enjoyed her narration. However, she exhibited a few quirks I found difficult to deal with.

Her character differentiation is very, very good. Ione often uses dialogue tags, but they weren’t at all necessary. However, I found some of the depictions strange. For example, several characters are given accents, even though Ione doesn’t indicate the character should speak in such a way. An Archangel has an Australian accent, a demon nurse has a very strong East Coast American accent, and one of the four horsemen sounds vaguely European. Perhaps, if previous narrators had given these characters similar voices, it would have been easier to listen to, but, coming out of nowhere made it rather difficult. They didn’t sound like themselves, and I had a hard time getting past the new and very different sound given to characters I’ve been listening to for quite some time.

Wick’s pacing was really, really good. She slowed when Reaver and Harvester were experiencing moments of tenderness. She was also quite capable of speaking with the intensity that was needed to pull the listener into the more action-packed scenes.

I want to listen to more of Wick’s narrations before I form a definite opinion about her ability. It’s hard to be completely fair to someone who appears toward the end of a series, and puts her own spin on already-developed characters. Given her skill with narrative, accents, and emotion, I think I would enjoy her narration of another book. I’m just not sure Reaver was the best fit.

I found it really difficult to like Harvester as a character. Since she’s our heroine, this was a bit of a problem. Throughout the series, Harvester does everything she can to be a world-class bitch. Even though I now know it was all an act, it wasn’t easy for me to view her in a sympathetic light. This didn’t detract from my overall enjoyment of the story though.

It’s obvious Ione doesn’t plan to end the series with Reaver’s story. There are too many loose ends. Revenant is next in the series and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

Shannon

Narration:  B

Book Content:  A-

Steam Factor:  For your burning ears only

Violence:  Graphic

Genre:  Paranormal Romance

Publisher:  Hachette Audio

Reaver was provided to AudioGals for review by Hachette Audio.