Sapphire Flames: Passing the Torch

Sapphire Flames

Hidden Legacy # 4
by Ilona Andrews
Publisher Harper Collins | Avon
On Sale: 08/27/2019

I voluntarily reviewed an advance reader’s copy of this book. No remuneration was exchanged and all opinions presented herein are my own except as noted.

 

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Ilona Andrew comes an enthralling new trilogy set in the Hidden Legacy world, where magic means power, and family bloodlines are the new currency of society…

In a world where magic is the key to power and wealth, Catalina Baylor is a Prime, the highest rank of magic user, and the Head of her House. Catalina has always been afraid to use her unique powers, but when her friend’s mother and sister are murdered, Catalina risks her reputation and safety to unravel the mystery.

But behind the scenes powerful forces are at work, and one of them is Alessandro Sagredo, the Italian Prime who was once Catalina’s teenage crush. Dangerous and unpredictable, Alessandro’s true motives are unclear, but he’s drawn to Catalina like a moth to a flame.

To help her friend, Catalina must test the limits of her extraordinary powers, but doing so may cost her both her House–and her heart. https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062878335/sapphire-flames/

I voluntarily reviewed an advance reader’s copy of this book. No remuneration was exchanged and all opinions presented herein are my own except as noted.

Like the Atlanta-based, Kate Daniel series by the same, married-couple team, The Hidden Legacy series is quite graphically violent not only in the physical ways but also with tear-your-mind-apart attacks.  And yet I keep on reading them. 

In this book, set in a world where magic exists due to the development of a virus, a family  of powerful magically-gifted investigators helps the two surviving children of another magical family track down the killers of the remaining family members.  There’s a lot of political, clan, and other built -world bureaucracy surrounding these families, organized into houses and as hungry for power as billionaires and politicians in our own world. But, in addition to the usual instruments of power, the  characters in this series have magical weapons, like poisoning with a thought, an abilities they have weaponized, like controlling people by making them love you.

The mystery here is layered, complicated and convoluted.  The many layers of crime and intrigue can be confusing and overwhelming.  But the turning over of the family enterprise from the oldest sister to  a younger sister is interesting and allows the writers to develop a character who, in previous books, was a girl, into a strong-willed, smart, woman.  She knows her business and she gets jobs done, but sher’s still human and needs her friends and family.

I am not crazy about the love interest here as, regardless of her true feelings, she keeps saying “no.” I don;t like it when people are victimized by a destiny.

There’s one character referenced several times in the book, Arrosa, who I vaguely recall from an earlier volume as  a one-person finishing school, for whom I cannot find an explanation.  So perhaps, if that bugs you don’t jump into the series here.  I wouldn’t advise that anyway as the world is introduced well in the first couple volumes and is well-expanded here  -start at the beginning.

PUBLISHER: https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062878335/sapphire-flames

AMAZON: https://amazon.com/Sapphire-Flames-Hidden-Legacy-Novel-ebook/dp/B07G141J8W

AUTHOR: https://ilona-andrews.com/