Scoundrel-Zoe Archer

Scoundrel
Zoe Archer
Zebra, Oct 5 2010, $6.99
ISBN: 9781420106800

Destruction is as human as apple pie; so to protect mankind from self extinction magic is hidden. Still in spite of overwhelming majorities believing magic to be a parlor trick, some Sources contain unexplained power. The Heirs of Albion want to own all the Sources to support their belief that the citizens of Britain are the master race who should dominate the lesser beings of the world. They have found the most powerful object Primal Source of Africa and now are work on learning how to use it. The Blades of the Rose oppose the Heirs.

Linguist London Harcourt is unaware that her late husband, her father Joseph Edgeworth and her brother belong to the Heirs of Albion. Joseph plans to unleash magic so Britain can rule. Thus in 1875 he takes his widowed daughter with him to Athens, Greece as she speaks an ancient dialect that will bring the wrath of the Gods to the earth. Blade Bennett Day meets London who he realizes is ignorant of the threat posed by her father. He also knows the linguist is the key to the Heirs using the Source.

The second Blades of the Rose historical romantic fantasy is a strong adventure tale as the action moves from the Mongolian setting of the Warrior to Greece. A womanizer, Bennett tries every means he knows to persuade the female to his way of thinking, but never met one as intelligent as London is; although some readers will question how smart she is when she failed to realize the nefarious activities of the three main men in her life (before Bennett). Still fans will enjoy the teaming of a refreshing woman who speaks dead languages and the suave operative as they battle her family who employ her as the expendable key to use magic to dominate the world.

Harriet Klausner