"entertaining adult fantasy"

Both the Seelie and the Unseelie courts of faerie are dying but Princess Meredith "Merry" Gentry might have the power to bring them back to their former glory. Her aunt, Queen Andes has made a contest with Merry and her son Cel. The first who is pregnant or gets someone pregnant is the next ruler. Right now Cel is being punished for trying to have Merry killed while Merry's new powers slowly bring back life to the unseelie court.

Merry and her guards are in the gardens where once a world complete with sun, moon and weather existed. Also with her are the captain of the queen's guard Mistral and Abeloc. Through sex, they make the land come alive again but the Silth (fairy mound) isn't finished in reviving the Unseelie world. Merry finds herself in the Kingdom of the Straugh; ugly creatures who hunt their victims until they collapse from fatigue. Their kingdom is dead too but when she has sex with its king, it comes alive. In gratitude the monarch hunts Merry, her guards and the rest of Faerie.

There is a lot of erotic sex in MISTRAL'S KISS but it is sex that brings life back to the kingdoms in the Silth. Merry is not accepted at the Seelie court because she is part Sidhe and part human but she also finds it too much to deal with the court intrigues and killings of the unsealie court. Through her magical gifts she makes the Unseelie court a prettier, brighter place much to the court's chagrin. Laurell K. Hamilton has written a powerful and entertaining adult fantasy that is so hot readers will feel the heat.

Harriet Klausner

Reviewed by Harriet Klausner
Posted December 5, 2006

Summary

I am Princess Meredith, heir to a throne of faerie. My day job, once upon a time, was as a private detective in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, princess has now become a full-time occupation.

My aunt, Queen Andais, will have it no other way. And so I am virtually a prisoner in faerie—trapped here with some of the realm's most beautiful men to serve as my bodyguards . . . and my lovers. For I am compelled to conceive a child: an heir to succeed me on the throne. Yet after months of amazing sex with my consorts, there is still no baby. And no baby means no throne. The only certainty is death at the hands of my cousin Cel, or his followers, if I fail to conceive.

Now Mistral, Queen Andais's new captain of the guard, has come to my bed—defying her and risking her terrible wrath in doing so. But even she will hesitate to punish him in jealous rage, because our joining has reawakened old magic, mystical power so ancient that no one stands against it and survives. Not even my strongest and most favored: my Darkness and my Killing Frost. Not even Mistral himself, my Storm Lord. But because Mistral has helped to bring this magic forth, he may live another day.

If I can reclaim control of the fey power that once was, there may be hope for me and my reign in faerie. I might yet quell the dark schemes and subterfuges surrounding me. Though shadows of obsession and conspiracy gather, I may survive.