Vulnerable

Vulnerable by Amy Lane
Little Goddess series
ISBN# 0-595-33746-5
Available now
Published by iUniverse
Format: trade pbk., 265 pages
Genres: fiction, urban fantasy, paranormal romance, erotica?

Amy Lane's first book of the Little Goddess trilogy is a self-published gem I happened to trip over on Amazon.com. You can find her among the paranormal romance discussions (I think she lives there). In this case it's especially true what they say about not judging books by their covers. It's such a simple landscape photo, but magic has to hide anywhere it can nowadays. Oh, one more thing before the summary. This book is for mature readers since if it isn't considered erotica it's pretty close.

All Cory Kirkpatrick wants is to leave her small, hick town as soon as possible. She makes her way through community college during the day and works nights at a gas station to pay for it. After Arturo, an elf who happens to work at Denny's, accidentally enthralls her and opens her eyes to the Night People everything changes. Cory starts paying more attention to her odd regulars and ends up falling for a vampire named Adrian. Through Adrian she is quickly pulled into all the magic and the danger that makes the Night World so special. It isn't too long before Green (Adrian's lover and the man that keeps this menagerie of fae and vampires safe) also falls for Cory and will do anything to keep both her and Adrian safe. He's not alone in this fight though once Sezan shows up seeming to not only be after Green's territory, but also the lives of his people.

I like the overall message in this book that love doesn't necessarily come in the same package for everyone, but once you do have it it's worth fighting for. I've seen a lot of comments about the editing, but I have seen worse in books from major publishing houses so unless you're a punctuation nazi I think you'll survive. The guys were a little "girly" about their emotions and discussing them. I'm a girl and even I wouldn't just lay it all out there for someone I met a couple of weeks ago. Sometimes I like reading books that don't follow the traditional one guy, one girl mold and if you feel that way too give this book a try. I'll also be reviewing the rest of this trilogy whenever I get done with them.

Zhye