Unwrapping a Review of DRACONES: AWAKENING by Sheri-Lynn Marean

I love dragons so DRACONES: AWAKENING by Sheri-Lynn Marean sounded like the ideal paranormal adventure for me to embark upon. As debut novels go, sometimes the writing isn’t up to par but the story is so imaginative that it can be overlooked somewhat.

***ecopy provided by author in exchange for an honest and unscripted review.

Blurb for DRACONES – AWAKENING:

If it lives, it can die...

For a thousand years, the Ilyium druids have hunted the Dracones without mercy.

At seven, in a terrifying moment, Tierney lost her world and fled to Earth, keeping her true nature secret from humans.

But a nightmarish past is not easy to escape.

Now, years later, that truth is abundantly clear every time she looks into the eyes of the man she secretly loves, seeing a torment that draws her to him even as he pushes her away.

Jax battles his desires for Tierney alongside his inner demons, ashamed to speak of a past he cannot forget.

Frustrated by her efforts to connect to Jax, Tierney is unprepared when the Ilyium resurface triggering ancient instincts. Now she and Jax will be tested in ways they never imagined. Will Tierney and Jax overcome the legacy of their past, or will it destroy them?

~*~               ~*~               ~*~                ~*~

There are aliens among us. Dracones, a human-like species who after reaching their Awakening can transform at will into dragons. Tierney is one (although her father is a Fallen Angel), as are her two best friends, Jax and Sami. Together, they all work as investigators helping to locate missing people. Life hasn’t been easy for any of them and they fear every day being tracked and found by their enemies, the Ilyium—the reason they escaped their home planet and came to Earth.

Tierney has been in love with Jax for as long as she can remember. She’s been his rock of support through nightmares born of the past and now, with his Awakening coming up fast, she plans to be there for him again, if he will allow her. She knows she is his soulmate but Jax is rather stubborn about it.

Jax feels he must be everyone’s protector and by keeping himself away from Tierney, physically and emotionally, he is protecting her. Filled with self-hate, doubt about whether he is worthy of a soulmate as wonderful as Tierney, and unable to shake the torture his father heaped upon him as a youth, he pushes her away until he can resist no more—especially when his dragon won’t allow it anymore.

Then with all that's happening, Tierney's father, Zander has gone missing too. 

DRACONES: AWAKENING by Sheri-Lynn Marean is Tierney and Jax’s story – a story about how limitless love can help heal the scars and nightmares of the past. One of the problems that I had with reading this was I kept getting distracted by everyone else’s stories as they were pulled into Tierney and Jax’s. I would like to have seen more concentration on their relationship and the Awakening of Jax’s dragon with Tierney, knowing hers would be coming soon too. There’s fear of the Ilyium, fear of Marcius (Jax and Sami’s father), fear of betrayal by the wolves and other species, and fear of the Awakening. That’s a lot of fear to encounter in one book.

Sheri-Lynn has conjured a mysterious and exotic adventure with the Dracones at the center. We meet many characters besides the immediate family but with so much happening all at once, I felt the relationship between Tierney and Jax got overshadowed. There’s always time to tell the other stories in greater detail in their own books. I do want to know more about the wolves, the other characters, Thaniel, Genna, and Caden, even their enemies. I want Sami to find his dream girl, and the wolves to find Toren but preferably, not all at once.

DRACONES: AWAKENING by Sheri-Lynn Marean is action-packed, mysterious, heart wrenching at times and when treated to the love between Tierney and Jax, passionate. There’s great imagination behind the Dracones, the Ilyium, and the growing cast of characters inhabiting the Dracones series. I’m still interested and very intrigued.

Happy Reading Everyone!

DRACONES: AWAKENING by Sheri-Lynn Marean, a debut indie novel available now in print and ebook formats at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobobooks.