SPELL OF THE HIGHLANDER by Karen Marie Moning

"7th in the Highlander series surpasses expectations."

Spell of The Highlander

Posted: August 18, 2005

The MacKeltar clan is back. This time, Cian MacKeltar, trapped in the Dark Glass, a mirror of unspeakable power, for 11 centuries by a dark sorcerer, may finally have his revenge. A mysterious event shattered the safeguards the dark sorcerer placed around Cian's mirror and it and several other objects were stolen and sold on the black market. Now Cian must use his Druid powers to avoid recapture until Samhain, for if the gold tithe is not paid, the compact is broken and Cian will be free.

Jessi St. James is a graduate student in archeology at the University of Chicago when she receives a phone call from her professor asking her to take charge of a mysterious shipment because he is in the hospital. She is stressed, overworked, taken for granted, and needs to get a life. Jessica has a funny feeling that this may be a life changing event, but she has no idea how much it will change her life until she hears a voice from inside the mirror--Over 6 feet of man steps from the mirror to save her life, and share her bed.

The author treats the reader to an erotic romp through the modern day world as Cian and Jessi try to avoid detection by the dark sorcerer and his minions using Cian's Druid skills and find time to fall into each others arms, without Cian getting sucked back into the mirror. Death follows them wherever they go, until they reach the highlands of Scotland where Cian is confronted with 2 men who claim they too are MacKeltars. Visits from old friends, Drustan and Dageus and their wives, and mysterious interference from the Tuatha De Danaan keep the story fast paced. As Cian and Jessi's relationship unfolds, the reader finds that Jessi is searching for her one true love, and now that she believes she has found him, he may die attempting his revenge and leave her alone in a world that is no longer what she has always assumed. This was a superb story and I can't wait to read the next installment in the Highlander series.

Book Summary

Powerful. Sensual. Seductive. He is all that is shamelessly erotic in a man. In her sexiest Highlander novel yet, New York Times bestselling author Karen Moning stirs up a sizzling brew of ancient mystery and modern passion as she brings together a devilishly handsome Celtic warrior trapped in time... and the woman who's about to pay the ultimate price for freeing him. Age-old secrets haunt them. Deadly danger and irresistible desire shadow their every move. It's a relationship for the ages. And all that separates them is a mere eleven hundred years...

Jessi St. James has got to get a life. Too many hours studying ancient artifacts has given the hardworking archaeology student a bad case of sex on the brain. So she figures she must be dreaming when she spies a gorgeous half-naked man staring out at her from inside the silvery glass of an ancient mirror. But when a split-second decision saves her from a terrifying attempt on her life, Jessi suddenly finds herself confronting six and a half feet of smoldering, insatiable alpha male.

Heir to the arcane magic of his Druid ancestors, eleven centuries ago Cian MacKeltar was trapped inside the Dark Glass, one of four coveted Unseelie Hallows, objects of unspeakable power. When the Dark Glass is stolen, an ancient enemy will stop at nothing to reclaim it, destroying everything in his path, including the one woman who may just hold the key to breaking the ninth-century Highlander's dark spell. For Jessi, the muscle-bound sex god in the mirror is not only tantalizingly real, he's offering his protection, from exactly what, Jessi doesn't know. And all he wants in exchange is the exquisite pleasure of sharing her bed.

Yet even as Cian's insatiable hunger begins to work its dark magic on Jessi, his ancient enemy is about to obtain the final and most dangerous of the Unseelie Hallows, and the ninth-century Highlander must stop him from getting it. Nothing less than the very fabric of the universe and two passionately entwined lives are at stake, as Cian and Jessi fight to claim the kind of love that comes along but once in an ice age...