SHADOWS STRIKE is book six in the Immortal Guardians series by Dianne Duvall. I am an avid reader of Duvall's work. This paranormal romance series contains a lot of excellent kick-butt action. There's an overarching storyline, and each book features a great stand-alone romance as well. SHADOWS STRIKE can be read by itself, as Duvall does a good job in explaining the enthralling paranormal world in which it is set. Reading this series in order will allow a much more nuanced appreciation of the story.

Heather is a human, but she's a gifted one, born with special abilities other humans don't possess. She can read others' minds, a talent that's been secretly useful to her in her job in U.S. law enforcement. Heather has been dreaming about Ethan for the last year, the same thing every night about meeting him in a field where he is battling seven vampires. When she finally meets him, just as she dreamed, she is shocked to find out he is real, he's immortal, and she can't read his mind. Heather is a capable woman, smart, and good in a crisis. I like the empowered women that Duvall writes, and Heather makes a great kick-butt heroine.

Ethan is an Immortal Guardian, protecting humans by hunting and slaying the psychotic vampires who prey upon humans. Ethan and Heather very quickly fall for each other. Their burgeoning romance is complicated by the growing war around them between the predators and protectors of humanity. There is a lot of great action in the story with a driving pace that keeps me turning the pages eagerly. The other immortal guardians and their partners, who I love so much, make up part of the story but do not overwhelm Ethan and Heather's spot on center stage. The story is well balanced, the tension of the growing war continues to build, and SHADOWS STRIKE gives me a great romance while keeping the wonderful paranormal action flowing fast. Duvall has written another winner.

Book Summary

U.S. law enforcement agent Heather Lane can read minds. But not the future. The dream of battle and blood that recurs every night must be a fluke, some obscure terror from her own mind. What its significance might be, she can’t guess: an attack from seven psychotic vampires at once, only separated from nightmare by an eighth very different immortal. A handsome, brave man fighting at her side, a man she misses when she wakes.

Then the dream comes true. Heather is flung into a war between predators and protectors of humanity, the man from her dreams beside her again. Except now that she’s awake, she isn’t sure she can trust Ethan, or the shadow organization he represents. The U.S. military doesn’t trust either of them. But against an onslaught of evil like the one that’s coming, it will take everything they have just to survive...