ANGEL BETRAYED (The Fallen #2) by Cynthia Eden + GIVEAWAY

ANGEL BETRAYED (The Fallen #2 ) by Cynthia Eden

Paperback, 352 pages

Published June 26th 2012 by Brava

Genre: paranormal romance novel

Rating: 4 stars

“She’d traded her wings for a life with her Fallen. Heaven, hell…everything in between didn’t matter. Paradise was staring right back at her. (…) Dangerous, dark…yes, please. She didn’t want some kind of white knight. She wanted her lover with the wildness in his eyes and danger at his back.”

Sammael is a Fallen angel: he used to be a Death angel, but when he got tired of standing by as a silent witness of violence with the sole purpose of  claiming the souls of the dying sinners , he decided to take the matter in his own hands and deliver the ultimate punishment to a band of brutal murderers.  For his act of arrogance and lack of repentance, Sam (Sammael’s name on earth) gets expelled from heaven and plunged into the humans' world.

Sam’s insubordination to the higher ranks of the angels hierarchy fuels the wrath of Rogziel, the Punishment angel. Blinded by his anger, Rogziel wants to see  the Fallen angel burning in hell and at this purpose he decides to leverage on Sam’s biggest weakness to ensnare him  in a trap  he won’t be able to escape: a woman. The enchanting and seductive Seline works as a dancer  in one of the night clubs Sam owns in New Orleans.  She is a half-breed succubus, a demon-lover Rogziel has raised since her parents’ death and used for his dark agenda of personal vengeance.  What Rogziel doesn’t  consider is that Seline’s psychic power is much higher than he thought and that his trap will trigger a powerful chemistry between the succubus and the Fallen angel.

Good Heavens, Hell’s bells and “everything in between”! This paranormal romance novel,  installment  #2  of The Fallen series by RITA® finalist and national best-selling author Cynthia Eden, was a remarkable roller-coaster of events and emotions.

I read the first part of the book with a  skeptical eye because of the complexity of the characters and the lack of a clear-cut separation between evil and good, villains and angels. In this first stage of the novel I was not quite sure which character to root for: Sam is an angel, but he kills with a touch and snarls like a devil; Seline is as beautiful as an angel and more innocent than a demon lover is supposed to be, but she’s on a mission to ”kill” a fallen angel with her seductive succubus powers. Rogziel, high rank in the hierarchy of Punishment angels, turns out to be more wicked than the Fallen angels he’s hunting down. And it all happens in New Orleans, one of the most haunted places on earth, a city charged with a dark and wild energy.

I was able to make sense of it all  and understand the dynamics that propel demons and angels between realms only  when the main characters, urged by their deepest and truest emotions, took a clear stand. In Cynthia Eden’s novel, angels can be more lethal than the devil himself and can cause a blood-bath of epic proportions, emotions run deep, kisses can kill,  sensuality is scorching hot. The book literally bleeds with action and sexuality from cover to cover. And still, the emotional connection in our lead couple grows to a level that gives a new meaning to the word lust. You may find Angel Betrayed’s world-building to be an imaginative challenge to your suspension of disbelief with all these angels, demons, vampires, magic spells and hellhounds, but the emotions and the feelings that motivate the actions, the struggles, the antagonism among otherworldly creatures are the same  basic and powerful emotional forces that characterize our kind: pride, arrogance, love, hate, the  rivalry between brothers, the betrayal of a friend, the sense of dislocation experienced when you move into a world you don’t belong to, the indissoluble bond and trust issues between lovers.

What charges this fast-paced, action-packed  paranormal novel with a heavy dose of romance and sensuality is the fact that the bond between the main characters goes well beyond Seline’s succubus power of absorbing the vital energy generated by her lover: that bond is much deeper than  Sam’s addiction to Seline’s sensual lure.

The author introduced also a very interesting cast of secondary characters and I certainly look forward to the next installment in The Fallen series to see how their sub-plots will unfold. 

GIVEAWAY!

The publisher would like to offer a copy of ANGEL OF DARKNESS ( #1 in The Fallen series ) to a lucky commenter.  Stop by the blog, drop a comment about this review or any of Cynthia Eden’s books and you will have the chance to win. The contest is open only to US and Canada residents.

Blurb

" As an angel of death, Keenan’s job is to collect the souls on his list. He’s carried out his duty for two thousand years and never faltered once. Until he meets Nicole St. James. When the moment of death comes, Keenan hesitates, and instead of taking Nicole, Keenan touches the vampire who’s attacking her.

Cast out of heaven for disobedience, Keenan plummets to earth. Six months later, he finally manages to track Nicole to a bar in Mexico. He’s stunned to discover that the woman he remembers has undergone a dramatic change—she’s become a vampire. And when he realizes that she’s the target of all manner of enemies—other vampires, demons, even shifters—he’ll do whatever it takes to protect her, even if all hell breaks loose…"

* The publisher kindly provided a copy of Angel Betrayed in exchange for a honest review.