In a galaxy far, far away…
But no, really. In the Ichidian Universe there is The League. The League trains ruthless assassins to carry out their missions throughout the galaxy. No questions asked. One night they’ve gone to far and Commander Nykyrian Quiakides cannot carry out his mission. Instead he defies his orders, takes the woman and child he was ordered to kill and gets them to safety where they can go on with their lives. He removes his tracer and says goodbye to his good friend Sheridan. Nykyrian fades into the night and Nemesis is born.
Nemesis, a few years later is feared by all while Nykyrian is presumed on the run. No one outside a few of his closest comrades at The Sentella know his true identity. The Sentella is dedicated to ridding the universe of all the corrupt men they can get their hands on, within the law, as well as protecting innocents. During one mission, Princess Kiara Zamir is found kidnapped on a ship.
Kiara Zamir lived through a horrifying situtation as a child and has suffered from the experience since. Now as an adult she is determined to fight for her life. When she is rescued by Syn (Sheridan) and Nemesis, she has no idea that she is about to see a lot of them in her life.
A story of risk, both physical and emotional unfolds…
I have to say first that I feel so cheesy trying to write those little synopsis things (do you like my cheesy-quality?). More importantly, I really enjoyed Kenyon’s Born of Night. I’ve read a few of her Dark-Hunter novels and fell in love with them so it seemed appropriate to check out another of her series. I categorized it as a paranormal romance, but I have to say that it’s only because I didn’t really know how to properly categorize it. There is a futuristic and sci-fi element to the story, but I figured paranormal would be the broadest way to go about identifying this story.
The two main characters Nykyrian and Kiara make a great couple. Nykyrian lived a tortured existence. He is a human and Andarion (another alien race) hybrid and as such he was feared by humans and considered weak by Andarions. He was disowned by his family at a young age (or so his memories told him) and was sent to an orphanage where he was treated horribly. After a time, he was adopted into a family and treated even worse, kept only for his potential to serve the league and further his adoptive fathers name and cause. I’ve read some tortured heros in my time, but none like Nykyrian. Kenyon created a character who was attacked in virtually all parts of his life. Kiara on the other hand had survived tragedy and while it still affected her, she didn’t live tragedy everyday of her life. She was raised to be strong by her father and she was given love and the chance to build the career she always wanted. The two of them were very stubborn though and it made for a lot of hair-pulling on my end. Another factor to mention is that Nykyrian had seen the worst of the world – or universe, as the case may be – while Kiara was still very naive in certain respects. The romance aspect was good. While the two had their problems, and what couple doesn’t, they really complemented each other (again with the exception of a hair-pulling level of stubborness at times). Being as its Sherrilyn Kenyon there is a lot of great sexual tension, and of course the release of said tension.
There was some fairly graphic violence throughout the novel, and while I’m generally not affected by mention of gore, if you are keep an eye for those parts. There was also some interesting space fighting and the like, which brings me to my first hang-up with Born of Night. While I love the romance aspect of the story, there were times where I felt like I was watching Star Wars, Episode II (thats Attack of the Clones for those of you who have not seen the movie 150 times like I have). The seedy bar scene and the chase and fighting scenes through space represent the deja vu moments that I had during reading. My next hang-up is a scene with music. At one point Nykyrian teaches Kiara a succession of self defense movements and when he calls up music, she uses Drowning Pool’s Bodies as the song they train to. Seriously? There is no earth, this is another universe. Her use of music from real world Earth just bugs me, not that big in the grand scheme of things, but I just can’t get over it. It’s bothersome.
All in all, I really liked Born of Night. Sure, there were a few things that bothered me, but it wasn’t enough to take away from my overall enjoyment of the novel. There was the romantic aspect, the healing aspect, the discovery of the truth, I loved the lorina’s (Nykyrian’s pets) for that matter, as well as learning all of these rules of the assassination and mercernary trade. Oh, and don’t let me forget the obligatory happily ever after. I have to take a couple of points off for originality, but aside from that, I say Born of Night is certainly worth the time for a good read.
Among Stories 