The Rebel Queen (Outlaw #1) by Lexi Blake-Review & Excerpt Tour
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ABOUT THE BOOK: Release Date April 20, 2021
After returning from the outer planes, Zoey expected a joyous reunion with family and friends. She couldn’t be more wrong. Her kingdom is in the hands of Myrddin, her friends are on the run, and her children are being hunted by the supernatural world. But that isn’t the worst of it. They aren’t just outlaws—they are fully grown adult outlaws.
In the four days that passed while they were gone, twelve years have passed at home. Now Zoey, Danny, and Dev find themselves in the middle of a new war where they are hunted by old foes and former allies…some they could never have imagined would turn against them.
As Myrddin’s plan becomes clear, Zoey realizes she just might hold the key to stopping him for good and reclaiming their kingdom. Doing so means risking it all to steal back an artifact out from under the wizard’s nose. The fate of everyone on the Earth plane hangs in the balance, and one wrong move could cost Zoey everything she loves.
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REVIEW: THE REBEL QUEEN is the first instalment in Lexi Blake’s adult OUTLAWS paranormal/fantasy ménage romance series-a spin off set in the author’s world of the THIEVES. This is Queen of all Vampire / and the wife of the high priest of the Seelie and the Unseelie Zoey Donovan-Quinn, high Fae priest Devinshea Quinn, and king of the vampires Daniel Donovan’s continuing story line. THE REBEL QUEEN should not be read as a stand alone as much of the premise focuses on events that happened throughout the original THIEVES series. Zoey, Daniel and Dev’s story line begins in the THIEVES.
NOTE: THE REBEL QUEEN and the Outlaws/Thieves series contains scenes of MMF/MFM sexual situations.
Told from first person perspective (Zoey Donovan-Quinn) THE REBEL QUEEN follows with the return of Zoey, Daniel and Dev. Twelve years earlier, searching for their husband Devinshea, Zoey and Daniel time-travelled through a magical painting, a portal to another world where only four days had passed. Upon their return the Earth plane, twelve years had gone by, and Zoey, Dev and Daniel’s children were now adults, having made a place and name for themselves amongst the Fae, and the vampires in the Earth realm. Daniel’s mentor turned enemy, Myrrddin Emrys, once known as Merlin, is still on the hunt for his missing grimoire and sword, a grimoire with the secrets to all of the worlds’ magical powers, taking aim at our heroine, who has hidden the cache where it cannot be found.
Upon their return Zoey, Dev and Daniel discover their children have been fighting a war, a war that took the lives of so many people they had once loved. As Zoey and her husbands reconnect with the family and loved ones, our heroine sets into motion a plan to travel back in time, in an effort to correct everything that had gone wrong.
THE REBEL QUEEN is a detailed, complex and multi-levelled story line with numerous supernatural entities. I had not had the opportunity to read the THIEVES series, and in this I was temporarily lost and confused until much of the current story line and time line revealed. I have thought I was coming into a new series but I highly recommend reading the THIEVES for back story and cohesion as many of the events of THE REBEL QUEEN are as of a result of the events in the original series. The premise is fascinating, imaginative, tragic and twisted; the romance is seductive and passionate; the characters are animated and dynamic-the back and forth between members of the family is fun, furious, frenetic and sometimes sad but it is Zoey’s attitude that struck me as selfish and narrow-minded, an attitude that didn’t bode well for her likeability in the early chapters of the story line premise.
Copy supplied for review
Reviewed by Sandy
Rhys was an eleven-year-old with a cocky grin who wouldn’t ever think to order his parents around. Rhys was a good boy who followed the rules. He was every teacher’s pet.
Evan played with dolls, not bows and arrows.
I was going to wake up. I had to. I would wake up and be safely in our bed at Summer’s palace. I would be in between Dev and Daniel, and I would tell them all about this awful dream and they would laugh at me. I would go through the portal again, but this time we would find ourselves back in Danny’s office and everyone would be so relieved to see us. We would take down Myrddin and move on with our lives.
I didn’t have to believe that prophecy. I could control this.
If I could only wake up.
“Evan, to your left,” Rhys yelled as he moved by a connecting hallway. He didn’t even look back. He simply tossed the words over his shoulder as he jogged along.
Evan zipped past her fathers and was firing down the hall before either could protest. She had two arrows off and landing in her targets as Fen leapt to her side. He growled and the third shadowy figure who’d been coming down the hall took off running. But not before Evan got off another shot, and I watched the last attacker go down even as Kelsey hustled me along.
“I think the kiddos know what they’re doing,” Kelsey assured me. “Let’s follow their lead. This is their world. They know it far better than we do.”
It was their world. Not mine. It couldn’t be mine.
We ran, the ground still rumbling under us, and suddenly we found ourselves moving through familiar doors into a dark place. Ether. But not Ether.
“What the fuck did he do to my club?” Dev stopped and stared at the changes the years had wrought.
Ether had been a high-tech nightclub where all of the supernatural world came to play. It had a light-up dance floor and a sleek bar. It had been modern and energetic.
Someone had decided to give the whole place a Hell makeover. It had been redone in shades of red and black.
“I win!” A muscular man walked from behind what used to be the bar. It had been exchanged for what appeared to be some kind of shrine. I didn’t have a chance to really look at it because Lee was right there. He held every bit of my attention.
He was so changed, but when he high-fived his brother and then grinned my way, I could see my little boy.
“I bet Rhys that Papa would be way more upset about Ether than he was about how old we are,” Lee admitted.
“I assure you, Rhys wins that bet,” Devinshea promised. “I’m upset about many things. The atrocity they’ve done to my beautiful club is merely one of them. I don’t want to see the penthouse, do I?”
“According to our spies, you do not,” Rhys replied.
NY Times and USA Today bestselling author Lexi Blake lives in North Texas with her husband, three kids, and the laziest rescue dog in the world. She began writing at a young age, concentrating on plays and journalism. It wasn’t until she started writing romance and urban fantasy that she found the stories of her heart. She likes to find humor in the strangest places and believes in happy endings no matter how odd the couple, threesome, or foursome may seem.
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