Official Review: Serenity song by Denise Burdette

[Nisha Ward]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Serenity song" by Denise Burdette.]

---

2 out of 4 stars

---

Share This Review

---

It’s always kind of a bummer when I find myself unable to recommend a book with great narrative potential. I always want to say, “Hey, read this. The story is pretty interesting.” The thing is, with books like Denise Burdette’s Serenity Song failing in many ways to meet my standards, I can’t do that. While the narrative and world-building tend to be pretty interesting, the book will fail in other areas that can’t very well be overlooked.

The love story of Jas and Serenity, Serenity Song sees the reawakening of magic in a world that desperately needs it. When ancient vampire and protector Jas finds himself liberated of $500,000, he doesn’t expect to come face to face with Serenity, a newly awakened fire witch. After all, magic hasn’t existed in the modern world for centuries. Danger is quick to follow, as Serenity attracts the attention of an evil focused on world domination. Both are now forced to deal with the same question: can they save this new world and come together as one?

I’ll be the first to admit that this isn’t exactly my cup of tea. While I’m not opposed to urban fantasy and paranormal romance, I’m not exactly a fan of those genres either. They’re tricky genres to balance, what with the trope of the alpha male dominating them while still featuring relatable and strong women as protagonists. With this book, I don’t think Burdette quite reaches that balance.

I really didn’t like any of the characters in the book because of this. I found the men to be too domineering while the women refused to compromise. Serenity and her friend Demoana often spent more time arguing with Jas and his friends or risking their lives unnecessarily than they did talking. It resulted in several situations that were made more dramatic, and unnecessarily so, by the lack of communication between the characters. This, more than anything else, took away from my enjoyment of the book, particularly when threads like Serenity's feelings about Jas' past are brought up only to be dropped again.

Moreover, this wasn’t helped by the numerous errors that riddled the book. Aside from a lot of punctuation errors, some words were frequently missing. Furthermore, I often had trouble telling who was talking to whom as dialogue tags did not match the context of what was being said at all. It’s clear that this book needs a lot of editing, so much so that I’d recommend the author hire a professional to do so. While it didn’t detract from the actual story the way the characters did, it still made my reading experience unpleasant.

However, not everything about it was bad. I really did enjoy the story, which is why I’m giving it 2 out of 4 stars. The world-building was excellent, from the concept of vampiric protectors to the composition and nature of the demonic kingdom. In addition to this, the villain’s plan was elaborate enough to have me wondering just when our heroes would slip up and fall into his trap.

Further to this, I really liked how the introduction of Jas’ sire, Amun, complicated things quite a bit. I had wondered how his dilemma concerning his mate would connect to the main story, and I wasn’t disappointed by what Burdette did with Serenity and her sisters, the eponymous circle of the book’s series, The Witches Circle.

It’s a fun book, meant for leisurely reading. While it’s not something I’ll continue, I did enjoy it and I think, as far as erotic fiction goes, paranormal romance lovers won’t go amiss with this one. Just don’t let your kids read this, as there are some hot and steamy scenes inside.

******
Serenity song
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon

[Petruschka1]

I actually like the main plot of this book. The story is a bit unusual, but I am sure, it is entertaining and fun to read. Just the right literature for lovers of the paranormal. Thank you for your review!