Alicia Wright Brewster

First of all, thanks to Grand Central Publishing for providing me with a review copy through NetGalley.

Winterblaze is the third book in the Darkest London series. It features Poppy and her guy Winston. Poppy is the oldest of three sisters, and the prior two books focused on the love lives of her little sisters Miranda and Daisy.

In the prior two novels of this series, Poppy and Winston made minor appearances, but I wasn't particularly fond of either of them. Poppy seemed a little frigid, making decisions and keeping secrets that affected her sisters, who were the POV characters. Also, Poppy and her husband Winston were basically an old married couple, and Winston was an investigator--not a fighter.

Basically, what I'm saying is that I did not have high hopes for this book. I was not expecting a kick-ass story out of a stiff older sister and her boring husband. Boy, was I wrong!

Having recently recovered from a supernatural attack, Winston's been recuperating in the home of the werewolf Ian Ranulf. Ian and Archer (the mates of Poppy's sisters) have nursed him to health and taught him how to kick some butt. If he wasn't that sexy alpha male before, he sure is now.

And it turns out that Poppy is deeply involved with a society for policing supernatural activity. Unlike Miranda and Daisy, Poppy has spent her whole life kicking butt. Of all the sisters, she is the most bad ass.

When the lies of their past are uncovered at the beginning of Winterblaze, Poppy and Winston's marriage comes apart at the seams. As a result, we do get the sexual tension and angst and indecision that comes with good romance novels. On top of that, we have a history of lies to unravel, many of which are revealed in a series of flashbacks. Usually, flashbacks annoy me when used a lot. In this case, however, since the memory of their past had been altered by supernatural circumstances, I thought it worked well. I was interested in both their past and their present.

I enjoyed Winterblaze much more than I thought I would. For me, it was better than Moonglow and just as good as Firelight.