Rating: 3 stars
Buy Links: Amazon | All Romance
Length: Novella
Amber Kell is an author who consistently delivers interesting and likeable characters who capture the heart and imagination. Her story lines, while fairly straightforward and arguably simple, are still sweet and funny. All in all this is an amusing author who pumps out pleasurable stories. The Guitarist in the Fae Queen’s Court is no exception to the ideas above, but unfortunately also has a few flaws that prevent it from being an outstanding read.
JB is a struggling country music singer with an ailing mother, a tendency toward doubting himself, and an amazing boyfriend, Raine. Other than Raine’s possessive nature and aggressive bedroom tendencies, we find out very little about the man until well into the novel. We do know that they are in love and that JB could, if he desired, never work again for Raine would prefer he stayed home and has the means to provide for both of them.
When the story opens, JB’s former place of employment has just recently closed down and he is attending an audition for his next job, or so he thinks. In actuality, he has been inadvertently pulled into the world of the fae and his life is about to turn upside down. Secrets will be revealed about his partner/husband Raine that he had no clue about and he will be saying goodbye the world he knows if he wants to keep hold of his man.
This story was meant to be a fantasy, a normal human swept up into the land of faeries—a place where his husband was much more than just one of the fae. So I tended to give lots of leeway, excuse what in any other novella might be called huge leaps into unbelievable territory.
However, there were tidbits dropped here and there that were never addressed. Why was JB afraid of the dark?? If the place or “mound” had such an influence on the faeries how could Raine live above it so easily? Given the many allusions to Raine’s anger and ruthlessness, how is it that he could fall in love with a weak human at all? Add to that the idea of being thrust into the middle of their story with no idea of their back story –but to which there were numerous references, and it adds up to an uneven, and less than satisfying read.
The Guitarist in the Fae Queen’s Court was simply, in the end, too uneven and chocked full of unanswered questions for it to be an outstanding novella. However, this author as I stated above has a real knack for pumping out fun and easy to read romances and should never be overlooked in the paranormal m/m genre.
