The Dirty Book Girls: Giveaway~Broken Dove by Kristen Ashley

5 Stars

“A dove has great beauty, but is easily broken.”

When I opened up my precious kindle and saw the cover for Broken Dove I squealed like a little girl. When I started reading the prologue my eyes started to water. What's in the prologue is nothing that one would cry over so I wasn't getting teary eyed over anything in it it was just because I was finally reading something new by one of my favorite authors of ALL time! If I'm feeling down or not sure what to read next (even though there are a massive amounts of really good books out that I haven't even touched), I can always....ALWAYS count on my sista KA to lift me up or take me out of a book funk. I have lost count on how many times I have reread her books and no matter how many times I do reread a certain book, I fall in love with it even more.

One of my absolute favorite series of KA is by far the Fantasyland Series. Why? Well, I can list about a gah-zillion reasons why but I won't do that because y'all would just get bored and start throwing flaming darts at me and I'm so not down with that. But...ah ha, there is a but, I will list a few. 1.) I love fantasy. Dragons, witches, elves, talking animals, unicorns and so forth. 2.) I love all and everything that has to do with historical/paranormal/medieval romance. 3). I love magic! Spells, potions, hexes, all good & bad. 4.) I love to read about a strong, muscular, domineering, tough as nails man who shows his one & only his soft side. I also love but hate when the man becomes a major asshat towards his lady love and breaks her heart. Why do I love that part? Because damn that asshat, he knows how to apologize and win back her love.
And KA delivers that with each of her books in this series.

*****

With the help of Valentine, a powerful witch, Apollo Ulfr of the House of Ulfr of Lunwyn seeks out to find his late wife's twin from our world to bring back to his world. Upon coming across Ilsa in our world, he rescues her from her evil and abussive husband whose name is....Pol Ulfr...short for Apollo Ulfr.

After being rescued, Ilsa finds herself in a parallel universe and is not sure what to make of things when she finally gets her wits in order. Valentine explains things to her about why she is here and Ilsa feels like it should be a blessing but instead is feeling like it's more of a curse. She must come to terms and understand that Apollo from the Northlands is nothing like her husband Pol.

It doesn't take long for our man Apollo to show his labouche side.

"Be careful what you wish for," he whispered, his eyes locked to mine as I drew in a breath. "You might get it." He put his hand to the doorknob and finished. "And not want it." <----seriously? ugh. I wanted to kick his hanging jewels. At this moment I have dubbed him Assollo.

After being left alone in a house with staff memebers who can only speak Fleuridian (French) so that Apollo (undubbed for a bit) b/c he refuses to let his children travel without him in a time of trouble, Ilsa decides to make the best of her situation. She becomes friends with the guards that Apollo left for her for when she travels to his home. Her journey to meet up with Apollo and his children gets delayed week after week as her guards show her beautiful and bustling cities, shops, bakeries and take her to dine at the finest places.

What happens next at the 20% mark will leave you panting, sweating and wishing for all the things good in this world that you had some Adela Tea. Seriously, Apollo...whoa baby!!!

"My poppy, I drank the tea to keep up with you. I'll stay hard all night."<----lady boner!!!!

At 24% I was laughing so hard that I had trouble breathing. It involves Ilsa's or I should say Madeleine's (Maddie for short) first experience with a talking animal.*Ilsa decided to change her name. New name for a new beginning.*

Ilsa...Maddie is terrified to meet Apollo's children and when you read why it will just break you heart into tiny pieces. But, when Apollo and Maddie comes across a coded message after being attacked, they rush home, hoping and praying that they get there in time to stop what was written on the message. When they get there shit happens. Bad ass shit. So bad ass that you go "Dayyuumm!" And then to top that badassery, this happens....

"You are a lioness."
I closed my eyes tight and said nothing.
He did.
"This pleases me."
I pressed closer and sighed.

Yeah. Apollo and his awesome and loving terms of endearments

Throughout Broken Dove you will come across characters that you have fallen in love with and hate. You will fall in love with and despise new characters. There is danger, always lurking around every corner and heck, even in your woods.You will get more hot sexy time but I can honestly say that nothing beats that 20%. N-o-t-h-i-n-g!!

And never fear, Assollo makes another appearance and breaks our wonderful Maddies heart but as always, as all of KA's hunks do when shit hits the fan and they lose whatever brain cells they have temporarily, he mends it back together.

Epilogue? #KAnailedit #asalways

"Some time ago, a man filled with sorrow handed me a bag filled with hope. Those stones were in that bag," she told me quietly and my eyes dropped back down to the necklace. "He knew, as I knew and now you know, even as he paid for the chance to have it again that love is priceless, love is worth every battle fought, every wound endured. He knew, as you now know, ma colombe, that love is everything."

The only negative thing I have to say is that I was expecting a bigger battle. To me it was a little....lacking but it was still cool. Like way cool.

And this was me when I read the very, very, very end....