Fated Blades by Ilona Andrews, the third book in the Kinsmen Universe series, provided me with a wonderful reading experience. I went into it with high expectations, and it did not disappoint. It had all the elements I expect from this writing duo. Snarky dialogue, awesome characters and a unique and fascinating world.

Fated Blades provided the perfect enemies to lovers romance. Ramona Adler and Matias Baena’s family are sworn enemies, fueled by a feud which spanned generations. So, under normal circumstances, these two would not be caught in each other’s company. However, when their cheating spouses stole research that could bankrupt both their families, they joined forces to avert the threat.

The story which developed because of this unexpected and forbidden alliance kept me on the edge of my seat. Drama, suspense, action, danger, humour, and sizzling chemistry permeated the pages of Fated Blades. Although they shared an intense attraction to each other, they never gave into it until they were both free. The alliance created out of necessity started on rocky ground, but as the story progressed, the two became closer. The connection which developed between them warmed my heart.

Aaron Shedlock’s narration was entertaining. This was my second time listening to his narration. Despite the deepness of his voice, his female voices sounded natural. He had different tones for each character, which made it easy to distinguish between them.

Overall, Fated Blades delivered and provided a fitting end to my 2021 reading journey.

4.5 stars. So good. I love an alpha pair and these two made such a good complimentary team. A lot more decapitations than I was expecting but when you have fancy lightsabers in your arms, it makes sense. 😂

On the alien planet of Rada, most of the powerful families have genetic abilities in some way or another, but the ones born with lethal combat abilities are the fiercest of rivals, and none more so than the Adlers and the Baenas. They are constantly vying to be the most dominant, and now both families are close to discovering the secrets behind their genetic abilities.

Matias Baena, head of his house, is surprised when he is told that Ramona Adler, head of hers, has come to see him unannounced. He's even more shocked when she has undeniable proof that her husband has been having an affair with his wife, and the couple is currently on the run with the business secrets of both the Baenas and the Adlers. Matias and Ramona have no choice but to join forces in tracking down their cheating spouses, to prevent possibly universe-altering technology being leaked and exploited.

It quickly becomes apparent that there are some very deadly groups wanting the business secrets, and Matias and Ramona do not have a lot of time. They need to keep their personal alliance hidden from their families and business rivals, escape the lethal forces trying to kill them, and resist the rapidly growing attraction between them. Not only are they both still married (although that's not going to be lasting long), but their families have been bitter rivals for more generations than anyone alive can remember.

Previous to releasing this novella, author-pair Ilona Andrews hadn't written or published anything in their sci-fi series Kinsmen since 2011. So I think it's fair to say that this story took a lot of their fans by surprise. At the same time, die-hard Ilona Andrews fans, affectionately nicknamed the Book-Devouring Horde on their website (of which I am certainly a member), will buy and probably love anything they publish. The good news for those readers who haven't read any previous Kinsmen stories is that this stands entirely on its own and can act as a jumping-on point to the other stories in the series or just act as a very nice taste of what the authors have to offer.

There is interesting world-building, which even in a story this short, feels perfectly established. There are intricate power struggles. The protagonists are both extremely capable at what they do, top of their field and also start out as antagonists. The chemistry between the leads and the dialogue, both between primary and supporting characters, sparkles. In this story, there is a clear goal, some very impressive action sequences, some hot personal moments, and a wholly satisfying ending. Well, if I was going to quibble, the ending came a bit too soon for my taste and I would have loved to spend more time with Matias and Ramona than a longish novella.

This story is available now and has been since late November. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to review it, but I am hoping to do better with my reviews in the coming year.

Judging a book by its cover: After seeing this cover, and the one for Blood Heir, from the start of the year, I am of the opinion that Louisa Pressler should design and create all of Ilona Andrews' covers. Considering so many of their books are eye-sores, these recent self-published books are a welcome change. I love Pressler's art and even if Ilona Andrews were number one on my pre-order list, I would have bought the book based on this cover.

A ton of fun in a world I hadn't read about yet. This book takes place mid series and I wouldn't have known. The back story is well done and can be read without reading the previous books. Love a great enemies to lovers romance!

I’m a bit behind in getting this review written considering Fated Blades came out before Thanksgiving, but then again, this review is going to be largely gushing because I loved this book so much and don’t have a lot of coherent thoughts to contribute! So I’m not sure how much you would have gained if you’d read this earlier.

Fated Blades is the latest installment in Ilona Andrews’ Kinsman Universe. There’s a bindup of the other novellas, which are super fast reads that I highly recommend, but you don’t need to have read them to dive into Fated Blades. I suggest having them handy if you do read this, though, because you’re going to need them once you’re done!

This scifi romance novella opens with the head of one rival house approaching the other after discovering that her husband ran off with his wife — and the two of them stole all of the research into a new technology that the families were competing to bring to market first. Now, these two leaders must put aside the years of enmity between their families and work together in order to save their finances and reputations while preventing their technology from falling into the wrong hands.

I can’t begin to tell you how obsessed I am with this story. I started reading it one morning before my brother came to visit, and it was torture to put it down even though I was excited to see him. Don’t start this book unless you have time to read it in one sitting, because it’s going to hook you!

I really liked seeing two lonely people trying to protect their families and do what’s right gradually realize that the person they’ve been taught is their mortal enemy is the one most likely to understand what it’s like to be in their position. It was so lovely seeing them realize how much they have in common and how much they like and respect each other and watch them gradually start to open up and share with the other. Plus I’m always a sucker for a good fated mates moment!

Obviously I wish this was longer because I’m so obsessed with Matias and Ramona that I just need more! But actually, this story was the perfect length. We got tons of action and romantic development packed into a novella that just flew by! It had everything I could ask for and more, and I have no qualms about saying this is one of my favorite reads of the year. Honestly, even writing this review (finally!) is making me want to go back and reread it — it’s that good!

I can’t wait for the physical book to come out in the next few months so I can add this to my shelves. While I did get an arc of this to review (and actually read it before it was published, even though the delay in getting a review out might suggest otherwise), I had preordered a copy before I got approved and just kept my preorder. I’ve also since bought the Audible edition since it was on sale for $1.99, so I really should reread it in that format. But yeah, I’m going to own this in all three formats by the time it’s all said and done. If that doesn’t tell you what I really think of this book, I don’t know what will!

If you’re a fan of scifi romance, romances with lots of action and high stakes, and/or Ilona Andrews, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed in Fated Blades. As you might have gathered, I highly recommend checking it out!

Has this book been on your radar? How stunning is this cover?? Are you interested in picking it up now that you’ve made it through all of my gushing? Let me know in the comments!

I received an arc of Fated Blades from the publisher via Netgalley.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the complimentary ARC. All opinions provided are my own.

📖 Q: if you could travel to space, would you? I’ll stay right here, thanks.

In Fated Blades three of my fave romance things collide: fighting leads, solid worldbuilding, & Ilona Andrews’s writing 😆.

I jumped into this series with this book, an approach that worked for me but not necessarily one I would highly recommend.

In this novella, long-standing enemies Ramona Addler and Matias Baena from long-time fighting families learn that their spouses have cheated with each other & stolen data critical to the survival of their families from each of them.

Ramona & Matias embark on a dangerous journey to retrieve their data, each of them with the deadly person they’ve been told not to trust since birth.

The tension between leads is admirably built up & seeing it turn into trust & kinship warmed this romance-lover’s heart.

The fighting scenes are epic in nature, gory, & fast paced. This is a society that operates on threats of violence but neither Ramona nor Matias are crazed with bloodlust which makes it easier for me to root for them.

Despite the fact that they’re married to other people—marriages which are not based on love but rather alliances—they are attracted to each other. That’s not my fave romance set-up & I wish things are slightly different but I’m okay with how things play out here.

This read is fun & whip-fast, a sweet & also provocative treat but definitely not where I’d suggest starting if you’re new to IA 😉.

4 ⭐️. Out now.

[ID: an ebook rests on an open hardback which is on top of a white furry blanket. To the sides & above the books three separate mason jars hold red & orange marigolds.]

4.5 stars

Fun, action-packed, sexy sci-fi romance novella with echoes of Mr & Mrs. Smith. I loved it. Ilona Andrews never disappoints.

After a startling and ruinous betrayal, Ramona Adler and Matias Baena, the heads of two leading and rival families, must work together to save not only their livelihoods but their planet from destructive and malicious mercenaries. As Ramona and Matias work together, they discover they are more similar than they ever imagined.

First, Fated Blades can absolutely read this as a stand-alone. There is some cross-over from Silent Blade and Silver Shark but nothing so much that you will be lost.

This series just keeps getting better and better. You honestly cannot beat House Andrews when it comes to action, pithy dialogue, strong main characters that you would seriously hesitate to pass in a dark alley, and the romance. The visuals from reading about Ramona and Matias' 'synchronization' attempts gave flashes of whirling dervishes and maybe a bit of Mr. and Mrs. Smith. (You know that ballroom/dancing scene- smoking hot!)

I absolutely loved this. You can read (and listen) for free if you have a Kindle Unlimited subscription (like I'm going to. I can't wait to hear Aaron Shedlock narrate). I would absolutely give Fated Blades a whirl. It was really entertaining and fun.

*ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.*

This book was such a thrill ride. Andrews crafts a fast pace, high energy and funny adventure with warring families who must team up to stop the destruction of their companies. It was awesome! The tension between Matias and Ramona is the perfect amount of steam, sweet and dangerous.

I loved this book. Go read the Kinsman series. It is amazing.

As a huge Illona Andrews fan I feel that this is the perfect introductory book!

It has all of the elements that make reading their books so great! The world building, action, and romance create a unique combination that I really can’t compare to any other author(s) that I have read.

I loved the power equality Ramona and Matias brought to the relationship I particular.

I strongly hope that they continue this series!

Fated Blades is the 3rd novella (nice and long novella!) in the Kinsmen series. What a nice surprise to get another installment to this wonderful world. Ilona Andrews always has amazing world building and this book did not disappoint. Mortal enemies to lovers is always a fun trope and when it’s done by these two authors it’s fantastic. Fun sci-fi action and wit Make this book hard to put down.

I hadn't even been aware of this series, so an Ilona Andrews story in a sci-fi setting was a delightful surprise!

The heads of two families (historically blood enemies) team up when they discover their spouses have teamed up with a Big Bad and stolen all their research into some very dangerous and lucrative stuff. So they have to go hunt down the spouses, defeat the big bad, and and recover their research. And, oh yeah, they're the descendants of super soldiers who have some sort of malleable sword/shield energy weapon embedded in their arms.

It took me a few beats to catch up with the setting and background of the families, but then it was basically a non-stop action romp with romantic tension (that they can't act on because they are married and honorable, even if the cheating spouses are dishonorable) and trademark Ilona Andrews banter.

There's so much action! It also has a very high body count, if that's a concern.

Oh, and of course the heads of the families are mystically linked through their arm weapons in a way that is extremely rare, aka "Fated Blades" of the title.

Such fun.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

A fantastic book! Although this is a novella, the writing is so good that it feels like you have read an entire novel. Each book in this series gets better, I frequently re-read all of them. This book is a twist on the enemies-to-lovers trope. The main characters are interesting, both flawed and super-human and the quick peeks we get at side characters give us enough info to make them interesting. Although it's set on another planet, the 'sci-fi' content is not the focus of the story, it's more of an interesting setting for a story that's focused on the main characters. I really enjoyed this book and know that I will re-read it often, highly recommend!

Don’t hesitate to read!

I am an avid reader of fantasy, but I will admit that I am cautious when it comes to science fiction books. I’ve picked up books and have been so lost just pages in with all the sci-fi lingo that I can never get into the story. This was definitely NOT the case with Fated Blades. Ilona Andrews did an excellent job introducing each sci-fi term in a way that didn’t intimidate me or make me feel stupid for not immediately knowing them. This is the third book in their Kinsman series, but the way that it is written lets it stand alone. I hadn’t read the other books (yet, but I definitely will now!) and I don’t feel I’ve missed out on anything reading them out of order since they all are about separate people and each book wraps up it’s own storyline. I won’t waste time summarizing the book, since I’m sure you’ve read the description if you’re reading this review. I will say that you won’t regret this book purchase. Fated blades is funny, sarcastic, quippy, just the right amount of bloody and gory, slightly romantic, and the fight scenes are to die for! Try it, you will love it. Definitely a 5 star book.

Received an ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review

One thing. It's everything a Ilona Andrews books is. Exceptional story telling combined with a creative plot. I have finished every series of by them and i can honestly say this. This is amazing.
Happy ready everyone!

I love this series and this novella is no exception! The world that Ilona Andrews has created is, as ever, fascinating and enthralling. I loved getting to know about the secare and watching Matias and Ramona discover how much they actually like and respect one another despite the animosity between their families. This was a great book that, as per usual, leaves me wanting so many more stories. Definitely recommend!

Great romance with awesome story telling. It’s a shorter book so it did feel like they were trying to cram as much as possible in it but it didn’t ruin the book for me.

This whole series is like category romance but set in space. There’s also lots of banter and blood <— an Ilona Andrews staple.

The previous two stories in the series had arranged marriage and boss-secretary tropes. Fated Blades has the soulmates trope.

I hope they’ll continue writing the series with other tropes like best friends to lovers, one-night stand unexpected pregnancy, etc.

That would be fun.

The Adlers and Baenas are supernaturally powerful families on the planet Rada. Their families have been rivals for years, but Ramona Adler and Matias Baena must work together after their unfaithful spouses steal groundbreaking technology to sell to a deadly enemy.

At first, they don’t trust each other, but since they must work together, they put aside they old family differences. Mutual admiration, respect along with an irresistible attraction starts to form and they find that they work perfectly together. Perfectly deadly to any that get in their way!

I recently read the prior two novellas in the Kinsman series and loved them! Passionate and hot, set in a vivid and unique world! The previous stories are super short, both less than 100 pages, but Fated Blades is longer at 222 pages, but still a quick read. Each features a different couple, standalone story/romance.

Fated Blades would technically be considered an enemy-to-lovers romance, but they were never at each other’s throats. I enjoyed the fun, sensual push and pull between them, but more than that I loved seeing these two open-up, get close and form an intense bond. Ilona Andrews is one of my all-time favorite authors and I’m continually amazed by their ability to suck me into a story whether it be a 50-page novella or a full-length story!

OVERALL
Absolutely liked it. Its shortness makes for a fast pacing but at the same time it doesn’t feel like it skips important information or undermines some of the more emotional moments.
I highly recommend it for those that like fantasy and want to branch out into sci-fi.

CHARACTERS:
The two protagonists of the story are Ramona and Matias.
Matias belongs to one of the most powerful families in Rada, he’s been leading his family business and family clan for a long time and he’s as ruthless and cunning as all the other big sharks swimming in the socioeconomic ocean.
His intensity and loyalty are what made me like him the most, seeing a few hints of humor once he relaxed enough around Ramona was the cherry on top.
Ramona is the female counterpart of Matias, like him, she’s one of the bigger sharks, she reflects everything he is, but at the same time, I felt more emotionally connected to her because while. Arias kept his emotions locked behind a vault door almost all the time, Ramona stayed connected to hers even while wearing an icy mask.
Both of them being Secare (highly trained combatants with the access to biological energy weapons implanted I their forearms) and belonging to rivals families added an interesting layer of secrecy and conflict to their initial relationship, but as they got to know each other and peel back the layers, it becomes clear that they’re made for each other, which made the romance quite enjoyable.
Honorable mentions goes to the smattering of secondary characters, they enriched the environment and story with their quips and personalities.

WORLD-BUILDING AND PLOT:
The plot focuses on revenge and on fighting for the honor of the family.
The protagonists are tasked with the retrieval of a very important packet of data and while they start as enemies, they soon discover that they’re what they crave in their personal lives, it’s pure rivals to lovers goodness.
The world building is very intriguing: it has a lot of fantasy elements like magic and hierarchies but applied in a sci-fi context. I admit that I’m not a huge sci-fi fan because I often feels like I’m being force fed a lot of niche terms that are common used in the genre but to a novice appear as obscure as a foreign language. The beauty of this book is that while there are a few of those niche words sprinkled in, they are either explained or simplified so it’s easy to fully understand the concept and keep the immersion.

WRITING:
Ilona Andrews is a staple when it comes to easy, immersive writing.
Their writing style encompasses all the best qualities that make up for a great read: it’s funny, it’s emotional, it’s exciting, it’s reflecting, it’s intense…each scene has its own mood and the flowing from one scene to the other is seamlessly done.

Ilona Andrews do fight scenes better than love scenes

When I saw the announcement that Ilona Andrews had a book coming out in the Kinsmen Universe, I was rather surprised, as I hadn’t been aware that they were even planning an addition to this old series, much less that the publication date was imminent. I was assuming they were putting the finishing touches on Ruby Fever, the final instalment in Catalina and Alessandro’s story, or finally working on Hugh 2 or Aurelia/Julie 2, or even a new Innkeeper. But I really liked the original two novellas in the Kinsmen Universe, particularly Silent Blade, so of course I jumped on the opportunity to get my hands on Fated Blades.

I really liked it: it’s a quick, fast-paced and compelling read with lots of their trademark well-choreographed fight scenes that play like a movie in your mind (or at least in my mind). The story is difficult to summarize without giving away too much of the plot. It is set on the same world - Planet Rada - as the previous Kinsmen stories and even in the same province, Dahlia, as Silent Blade, but apart from that, there are no connections between the characters, except that they also belong to the class of humans that were at some point technologically enhanced with fighting capabilities, traits that were then subsequently inherited. Those that have those traits are called <i>secare</i>. Both of our protagonists were born with those traits and have honed their abilities since an early age. They belong to two families that have been locked in a kind of cold war because of an enmity, the origins of which have been all but lost in the past. So the members of the two families have avoided open conflict by steering clear of each other, though they share some business interests and naturally they also monitor each other. So when Ramona, the head of the Addler family walks into Matias Baena’s corporate offices unannounced, disrupting his minutely structured day, he is a touch taken aback, to say they least. But a theft affecting both their businesses forces them to work together. This in medias res beginning really set the tone for the rest of the book, which is very action-driven. I also like the rather unconventional fact that both main protagonists are married at the beginning of the book, but not to each other. Together with the resolution of the corporate theft and the recovery of the stolen data, the disentanglement of their personal lives is one of the main drivers of the story, as well as one of the main obstacles before they can be together. Because of course they fall in love, mostly by being impressed by each others fighting prowess and how well they “dance” together.

I love everything Ilona Andrews have ever written, some books more than others, and I understand that not every book can be even “better” than the previous one. But because of the consistently impressive quality of their stories, they have set a rather high bar for themselves and this story does not quite manage to deliver on all accounts. For one that might be due to the fact that this is a standalone novel, and a comparatively short one at that; so the story lacks some of the intricacies and depth that characterize their multi-part series and also secondary characters (with maybe one exception) seem less fleshed out and colorful than readers have become accustomed to.

Additionally, I got a bit riled up about the understanding of politics that seemed to underpin the story: not actively pursuing a career in politics does NOT mean you are not political: if you are the head of a large enterprise you can’t help put being political because you have a stake in things like trade agreements, labor policy, government contracts, etc., that all affect your business. And lobbying your government for or against a law that impacts what kind of research and development you can do, is highly political, in fact, it’s the essence of politics (as you might have guessed, I subscribe to Hanisch’s view (the personal is political) which postulates that our personal experiences are the result of/constrained by societal structures and the context we live in and not the limited view that sees politics as something that is divorced from ordinary people’s lives).

But still, a gripping, imaginative story with an original starting point and solid world building, so 4 1/2 stars.