Primal Mirror
Psy-Changeling Trinity, Book #8
By Nalini Singh
ISBN# 9780593440735
Author’s Website: nalinisingh.com
Brought to you by OBS reviewer Heidi
Review
Leopard changeling, Remi Denier, was abandoned by his father when he was just a young cub of five. It’s something unheard of in the emotional changeling packs. Luckily, he had a good mother that was always there for him. However, they had a horrible alpha that couldn’t handle having such a powerful young dominant in his pack. He kicked Remi out when he was only seventeen.
Now Remi is older and wiser. He’s fully grown into his dominance. And, he’s the alpha of his own pack. RainFire is a very young and new pack, but Remi is trying to do everything right to grow the pack the right way. He’s had help from leopard alpha, Lucas Hunter, to make sure he stays on track to do all the things he should.
Remi has been trying to find out who owns the property next to theirs so he could try and purchase it. He doesn’t like the idea of some unknown so close to his pack. Especially considering someone has already hurt some of his pack using that property.
One day he finds people there and is able to talk to them. The young spaced-out girl, Auden Scott, appears to be the owner of the property and it sounds like they would be open to selling.
Then months later, a small cabin is erected on the property, and a very pregnant Auden moves in. Remi can’t understand why she’s there all alone so late in her pregnancy. This should be the time when her family rallies around her. He decides that the pack must do what they can to protect her and the cub.
Auden’s mind is fractured. She has moments of lucidity, but also has large spaces of lost time as well. It’s due to an experimental surgery her mother had done on her when she was younger. It was a failure and left her brain damaged.
Now Auden is pregnant and has no memory of how it came to be. Her mother passed away a few months ago, but her aide, Charisma, has been keeping everything going. Charisma and Dr. Verhoeven have been keeping close tabs on her and they seem especially interested in her unborn baby.
Auden is a Ps-Psy, a psychometric that can feel imprints from objects. And the imprints have grown stronger with her pregnancy, making it difficult to even sleep. However, when she was with Charisma checking on that property, she felt peace that she hadn’t felt anywhere else. Worried for the fetus, Charisma and Dr. Verhoeven see no other choice, but to let her stay there for a bit.
Auden’s brain seems to be improving and she’s become lucid for longer during her stay at the cabin. She does occasionally have to go back to the Scott household to check in. As she nears time for the baby to come, she grows increasingly worried about why Charisma and the doctor are so interested in her baby. She fears whatever it is, is very bad. She has no choice but to ask for a certain changeling’s help in protecting her child.
I do struggle with this spin-off series. Maybe it’s too political? I’m not sure. However, this book actually felt like the original series. I really enjoyed reading this novel and didn’t have the problems I’ve had with the majority of the series. I also enjoyed the previous book, Resonance Surge. So maybe, just maybe, it’s coming out of the darkness, for me, and into the light!
I really enjoyed the young alpha, Remi. I honestly would have liked to have learned more about him. We got little snippets about his past. His father abandoning him, getting kicked out of his pack too young, and him trying to run away from all he had bubbling up inside him by driving race cars. However, the book did not delve too deeply into any of that as Auden and the baby were the main focus. I really would have liked to have gotten more of his backstory though.
Regardless, Remi was a sweet and caring soul. I loved seeing him interact with his pack, especially young Jojo. And, he was great with Auden’s ‘cub’ as well.
He also has an alliance with the deadly Arrows thanks to his friendship with Aden, that I would love to know more about.
This book does really show you how twisted Shoshanna and the Scott family can be. How little psy actually care for their children. I guess that goes hand-in-hand with being silent for all those years.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. However, I found how quickly Remi and Auden went from friends to being together to be unbelievable. They didn’t even discuss becoming more, they both just started claiming each other as theirs. It was the one hangup I had with the book. It made me not buy into the couple, honestly. Even though, I knew they’d end up together.
The ending of this book was hopeful for the psy race, although I wouldn’t mind if they’d disappear as I’ve never been a fan of their lack of emotions. I am curious what will happen next on that front though. The current band-aid can only last so long.
I hope this series continues to improve and I start seeing the things that made me love the original series shine through. More changelings please … they are the key to my enjoyment.
