This was an odd little experiment, which I undertook because I'm so on the hook for Nalini Singh's Psy-Changeling novels, but then I haven't been down for much else she's written. I'm not sure what the official name for this series is -- Lords of [Something] would be my guess -- but it's four different paranormal romance novels with an overarching plot written by four different writers. I find this sort of thing fascinating -- when novel writers collaborate like television or comic writers.

The last series like this I read was the Crimson City novels. Most of them are by someone called Liz Maverick (which is surely not a pen name at all), but the second is by Marjorie M Liu. who, before she racked up all the awards for Monstress, wrote this fucking brilliantly weird PNR series called Dirk & Steele. I mean, she really moved the markers for what you can pull off in the sometimes boring vampire/werewolf snorefest you can find in the genre. Liu took the kind of premise that made me exclaim, wait, what?? like a hundred times when I was reading the first novel, Crimson City, and in her story, grounds it so completely in believable interpersonal concerns that my brain stopped screaming every 15 minutes about how nothing about the world made any sense. That's some godamn writing right there. 

Singh's outing in the Lords of [Something] maybe wasn't at this level, but I actually made it all the way through to the end of the novel, which is something I cannot say about the other three books in the series. Some of this is just the silliness of the premise, because all of the books are riffs on various fairy tales. There's one based on Goldilocks and the Three Bears, for example, where our fair haired maiden finds a rock hard cock which was just right, and I just couldn't stop my brain from squealing immaturely, and then breaking into laughter.  

Lord of the Abyss is very loosely based on Beauty and the Beast, and it works in the places that Singh tends to excel, and otherwise is kind of a mess. She does an excellent job writing characters out of trauma and abuse. She doesn't go for the magic vagina, the ladybits that can cure all, but constructs believable psychologies warped by neglect, and then slowly, carefully, draws them out. But the world, and the magic, is slapdash, so the parts of the plot that intersect with that are shaky at best. 

So, fun to see a writer I tend to enjoy, at least in one limited context, pull off something in a shared world. Didn't captivate me like Psy-Changeling, but it was a perfectly cromulent way to pass the time. 

ETA: Ok, I actually looked, and the series is called Royal House of Shadows, which seems kind of stuffy and conceited, but what do I know. 

A different tale set in a different universe for Marjorie M Liu. This book has a different feel than the other work by this prolific author.

With the classic horror creatures of Vampires and Werewolves the story almost writes itself. Who is killing the werewolves and vampires? Is it one or the other side that is trying to start a war?  And more importantly how will the humans react?

This story fits into the paranormal romance category cleanly with a hunky vampire and a sexy werewolf. Not as intense as her Dire and Steele novels, this is a good read for a rainy day.

Marjorie M. Liu could write a phone book and I would gobble that stuff up. This is one of those odd series were multiple authors write for it and I don't really have any plans of reading the other books, but this one stands well on its own.

There's a war brewing between vampires, werewolves, and humans. If the war happens humans will have the upper hand. The only way to prevent a massacre is for vampires and werewolves to form an alliance. The problem is, that there are some deep prejudices running between the two races. Despite the mistrust and hatred, the vampire and werewolf clans have decided to start negotiating on a peace treaty. However, several vampire murders threaten to end negotiations when it appears that a werewolf is the one doing the killing. In an attempt to save the peace treaty our heroes, Michael and Keeli, team up to find out who the murderer is.

Keeli is the the granddaughter of the werewolf leader and Michael is the vampires' executioner. This, combined with Michael's past makes him an outcast among his kind. Together they have to solve the mystery, while dealing with hostilities from both the vampire and werewolf clans.

Keeli and Michael's relationship was really interesting to watch progress. I loved that the conflicts of them working together and eventually having a relationship aren't pushed aside. The only thing I didn't like is how quickly they fell in love. It's only a a couple of days before they start declaring their love and that's a pretty huge leap considering how, in their world, that could mean the death of their social standings and possibly their lives.

Other than that this was a really great read. I only wish the ending didn't seem so rushed.