Archangel’s Light

Guild Hunter, Book #14

By Nalini Singh

ISBN# 9780593198155

Author’s Website:  https://nalinisingh.com/

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Heidi

Everyone is still recuperating from all the damage that Lijuan has caused.  China is in shambles with a new archangel at the helm.  Aodhan is standing in as Suyin’s second while she gets her bearings and figures out her new role.  Suyin has enjoyed Aodhan’s help and has asked him to stay on as her second permanently.  But can he leave everything he has ever known?  New York?  Raphael?  Illium?  Raphael is willing to let Aodhan make his own decision, but he isn’t above playing dirty either.  He doesn’t want to lose a trusted member of his Seven and “innocently” sends Illium to China to help Suyin.

The hamlet outside Suyin’s temporary stronghold has been found completely deserted.  No people to be found, but all of their things are exactly as they left them.  As Suyin takes her people to the location of her future stronghold, Aodhan and Illium stay behind to investigate what has happened.

Illium and Aodhan have had a rocky friendship this past year, both still holding on to their own grievances.  But they must work through them to do the job they have been assigned.

And what a gruesome job it is.  They find human skins folded nice and neat in a home in the hamlet.  However, they also discover that someone was held prisoner underground nearby.  And when the child is found, it can be none other than Lijuan’s son.  He looks just like her. This child  has never had the strength to use his wings, he’s a child that doesn’t know how to care for himself, and a child that appears to be suffering from a split personality.  One side of Jinhai is a sweet scared boy, the other a murdering monster.  Can he be saved or is this another nightmare Lijuan has left in her wake?

I have been waiting for Illium’s story for YEARS!!  I really didn’t expect Aodhan to be his love interest though.  I’m not completely sure how I feel about that.  This isn’t your typical M/M romance though so don’t let that scare you off, if it’s not your thing.  But honestly for a book that I was so looking forward to, it was a bit disappointing.

Like most of the later books in this series, this one had quite a slow start and it was hard for me to get invested in.  I had hoped it being about Illium and Aodhan that it wouldn’t be the case, but they spent most of the book fighting, so it was a struggle. 

This book switched back and forth between the present and Illium and Aodhan’s childhood, making the story rather choppy, and it made it that much harder for me to get immersed in. 

Reading about Aodhan’s abduction was heartbreaking though, and made me at least feel like I understood him more. From then on the book was pretty good. 

“We’re all a little broken. No one goes through life with a whole heart.”

Illium and Aodhan finally started working through their issues and the book turned rather sweet and I wish we’d have gotten more of that honestly.  Hopefully we’ll get more of this story when Illium finally ascends though.

“To know a person’s bad habits along with their good ones? To see them at their worst and at their best? To fight and play with them through all the seasons of this life? And to still wake up every morning happy to see their face? This is love.”