Romance Reviews Today sent me their review for GUARDIAN, which is scheduled to post on their site in December. Here it is:
“GUARDIAN – Claire Delacroix
Tor
ISBN: 978-0-7653-6
October 2009
Paranormal Romance
New Seattle; 2100
Twenty-three is a shade, a human deemed less than perfect at birth and condemned like others of her ilk to a shadowy life of service to citizens of the Republic. She serves at the Citadel of the Daughters of Light of the Republic. Historically, one of these Daughters is selected by Angels to serve the Republic’s president as the Oracle of the Republic. Twenty-three knows the selection of the Oracle is a sham, that the Daughters plan to present a false prophet. She knows this because she saw the rehearsal for the ceremony, and because Twenty-three knows that she is the true Oracle. She has felt Angelfire, the delight and power felt by Oracles when an Angel is nearby.
When a shade suddenly utters a revelation during the ceremony to select the Oracle, Rafe knows she is the true Oracle no matter what sham the Daughters try to perpetrate. Despite the Daughters’ subterfuge to hide the shade, he is determined to see her take her rightful position as true Oracle. In a risky move, Rafe abducts the shade, renames her Delilah, and becomes the focus of a nation-wide, wanted dead not alive manhunt. However, he has trouble winning her trust because he remembers nothing before the previous October. He knows Delilah suspects he has been mind wiped. Who knows who programmed him for what?
Once readers figure out the horrendous changes in this future society, they quickly become enmeshed in this tense thriller that mixes Christianity with politics and government. Delilah’s horrible life as a shade wins instant empathy, and that she remains a decent and honorable person certainly seems like divine intervention. Rafe is also honorable and dedicated. The truth of his past is guessed long before it is revealed, but this only adds to the story. The hellishly twisted subversion of today’s society presented in this post-apocalypse tale and its strange cast of characters will keep everyone reading GUARDIAN.
Robin Lee
Romance Reviews Today”
And the review is on the RRT site, right HERE.
Deborah Cooke: Author 