#AudioBookReview – “A Hundred Kisses” by Jean M. Grant and narrated by Rosalind Ashford

Blurb

1296
Two wedding nights. Two dead husbands.
Deirdre MacCoinneach wishes to understand her unusual ability to sense others’ lifeblood energies…and vows to discover if her gift killed the men she married. Her father’s search for a new and unsuspecting suitor for Deirdre becomes complicated when rumors of witchcraft abound.
Under the façade of a trader, Alasdair Montgomerie travels to Uist with pivotal information for a Claimant seeking the Scottish throne. A ruthless baron hunts him and a dark past haunts him, leaving little room for alliances with a Highland laird or his tempting daughter.
Awestruck when she realizes that her unlikely travel companion is the man from her visions, a man whose thickly veiled emotions are buried beneath his burning lifeblood, Deirdre wonders if he, too, will die in her bed if she follows her father’s orders. Amidst magic, superstition, and ghosts of the past, Alasdair and Deirdre find themselves falling together in a web of secrets and the curse of a hundred kisses…

 

Review

Alasdair Montgomerie is on a mission in the Highlands. Several claimants are vying for the Scottish throne, but the English King Edward has sent an evil baron north to kill everyone who’s loyal to one of the claimants. Alasdair has to deliver his sensitive information to a waiting party, but his plans are derailed after he rescues a drowning woman from a lake.

Deirdre MacCoinneach has lost two husbands and a fiancé in a short time span, but her laird father is determined to marry her off again—to Alasdair (who’s going by Aleck Stirick). She has a magical gift in which she can feel heat, energy, and emotions from other people, which she calls Lifeblood. She recognizes Alasdair from her visions and sets off on an adventure with him to find her deceased mother’s people.

Deirdre and Alasdair (Aleck) were strong, stubborn, intelligent characters. I liked them a lot. They kept a lot of secrets from each other, however, which became tiresome after a while.

I enjoyed the side characters of Kate and Christal (spelling?) and would love to see more of them. I wasn’t crazy about Deirdre’s father, Simon, but I hope I’ll like him better in his book, which is the prequel.

The story pacing was quick in the beginning, slowed some in the middle, and picked back up at the end. I normally read ebooks or print books, but I received a copy of this story in audio. It’s 10 hours and 49 minutes long, which I listened to in two days. The narrator, Rosalind Ashford, did a wonderful job speaking with multiple Scottish accents, but it took me a little while to get use to it.

About the reading order…it’s confusing. I believe A Hundred Kisses is book 1, and A Hundred Breaths is book 2 and a full-length prequel. These books are standalones, but I recommend reading or listening to the prequel first. I wish I had done that. I learned a big spoiler in book 1 about the H/h from the prequel.

Anyway, I enjoyed this story, and I’m still going to give the prequel a chance.

4 Stars