Hawkyn is the fifth book in Larissa Ione’s Demonica Underworld series, which is a spin-off or sub-series of her greater Demonica world that follows characters who live in the Underworld, and it’s the sixteenth book in the larger combined series. Hawkyn is a Memitim, an earthbound guardian angel, who protects Primori, people who will somehow become influential to human events. Draygar, his latest Primori happens to be a serial killer. Hawkyn has tried to ignore the fact that sometimes Primoris happen to be terrible people, but the knowledge that Draygar stalks, tortures, and kills women still haunts him. When he goes to check up on Draygar and finds him about to abduct yet another victim, Hawkyn has had enough. Although he’s not supposed to intervene, he does anyway, but Aurora, the woman in question, gives him a blast of energy that knocks him out cold. Now Hawkyn wonders if he hadn’t gotten involved if that blast might have been meant for Draygar instead, which would have allowed Aurora to get away. Not able to stand idly by if his screw-up might mean death for an innocent woman, Hawkyn sets out to rescue her. He successfully gets her away from Draygar, but he soon discovers that the killer has a mysterious ability of his own that allows him to track the little Wytch and his obsessive nature won’t allow him to stop until he’s found her. It will take all of Hawkyn’s Memitim skills to keep Aurora safe without killing his own charge in the process, but he may end up breaking just about every Memitim rule to do it, which will mean that he’ll never be able to Ascend and realize his dream of joining the Memitim council to make a difference for his earthbound siblings.

Like all Memitim, Hawkyn’s father is Azagoth and his mother is a Heavenly angel. Just like his brethren who came both before and after him, he was abandoned to be raised by humans, because it was thought to be the best way to bond them with those they would later serve as guardian angels. Also like most other Memitim, his upbringing was anything but ideal with him hunting for scraps as a child just to survive. But then his mentor came and showed him the ways of the Memitim. As such, he must follow a number of rules and regulations, including celibacy and not asking questions about his charges. Most Primori are decent people, but occasionally Memitim are called upon to guard evil people if they will somehow change history for the greater good. Most of the time, Hawkyn just goes along with it and tries to ignore the injustice, because he desperately wants to Ascend and become a member of the Memitim council so that he can help change the rules. But now his latest Primori, Draygar, happens to be a psychotic serial killer who likes to abduct and torture women before killing them. When Hawkyn checks on him one night, he finds Draygar about to kidnap a beautiful woman, and in a split second, he makes a fateful decision to get involved even though it’s against the rules. By the time he realizes that his interference might cause the death of an innocent woman, she’s already been taken. He sets about freeing Aurora and then protecting her when they realize that Draygar can still track her and isn’t backing down. Before he knows it, he’s fallen for the beautiful Wytch and is breaking every rule in the book to keep her safe. I like that Hawkyn has a conscience and can’t bear to see innocent people hurt even if the powers that be say it’s for the greater good. I also admired him for wanting to find a way to affect changes to the unfair Memitim rules and for caring for Aurora enough to be willing to do whatever it took to protect her even if it meant that it came at a great personal cost.

Aurora is a Wytch whose powers come from a sex demon who is the common ancestor to all Wytches. Despite having magic and living longer than most humans, she’s been raised in the human world, where she now lives as an unassuming masseuse. Her job allows her to siphon negative energy out of her clients that both recharges her powers and makes her clients feel so good that she’s the most in-demand masseuse in Portland. She’s approached in the grocery store parking lot one night by a guy who she senses is up to no good. Then a second guy seemingly appears out of nowhere. She uses all her energy to blast Hawkyn, thinking he’s an accomplice, but that leaves her with no energy left to take out her real abductor. She spends the next few days being tortured by Draygar until Hawkyn shows up to rescue her. At first, she’s wary of him, especially when he admits that he’s actually Draygar’s guardian angel. But as she spends more time with him, Aurora grows to trust him and starts to fall for the handsome angel who breaks all the rules and goes out of his way to keep her safe. Aurora has a lot of different sides. She’s a sweet and caring person who can’t bear to see Hawkyn hurt for protecting her, but she also has a tough side, bravely standing up to Draygar until Hawkyn gets there. Also because of her succubus ancestor, she has a very passionate side that she generously offers up to alleviate Hawkyn’s pain. But no matter what side she’s showing, I really liked her.

Like all the novellas in the Demonica Underworld series, things happen rather quickly in Hawkyn. The characterizations perhaps aren’t as deep as they are in the longer novels, but I still got to know Hawkyn and Aurora well enough to like them and feel they complemented each other well. Their relationship is basically an insta-love one, which often doesn’t work for me, but here I felt that all-important emotional connection between them that made it more palatable. The plot isn’t as involved either, but it was still enjoyable and kept me reading to see what would happen next. There were a couple of interesting plot twists as well that I didn’t see coming. There’s also a subplot involving Hawkyn’s father, Azagoth (Azagoth), who’s in a sour mood after asking a lot of questions about his offspring and what their lives were like growing up. As a result, he starts to push Lilliana away, which was rather hard to see, but I feel confident that things will be set to rights between them in a future book. We get to see a handful of other common characters as well, including Hawkyn’s full sisters, Idess (Ecstasy Unveiled) and Suzanne (Her Guardian Angel), and his fallen angel friend, Cipher (Cipher). There was also the poor lion shifter, Lexi, who keeps popping up in these books, only to lose one of her nine lives. I hope maybe we’ll get to see her find some happiness before the series ends. All this being the case, the only real weakness I found is that Draygar’s part in everything seemed a little murky and I wish it had been explained a bit better. Otherwise, I very much enjoyed Hawkyn and look forward to exploring this sub-series more. ( )

Larissa Ione Never Disappoints

As always, I was blissfully bewitched with this story and it's characters.
Hawkyn is in BIG trouble after interfering with his Primori, a serial killer, trying to abduct a woman. Hawkyn's duty as a Memitim angel is to protect his Primori no matter what kind of monster he is because Primori play some kind of important role in history. Now, Hawkyn isn't sure if he's changed the future timeline so he has to try to fix it before he's punished and loses any of his future aspirations of serving on the Memitim Council. ( )

Another longish Novella this one is 125 pages, this is Hawkyn and Aurora's story.
Hawkyn is a Memitim the child of Azagoth and an angelic mother and his Primori/charge on earth is an evil serial killer.
A primori is an important being needed for future events to run there needed course and Memitim are there guardians.
Hawk breaks all the rules when he rescues Aurora from her fate at the hands of this killer.
He is hell-bent on protecting Aurora no matter the rules involved even squaring up to his father.
He also wants changes made for all Memitim as they are treated abysmally by the above powers.
Aurora is mostly human but she is also half wytch a natural wielder of magic but she lives like a human not embracing her heritage.
There was also a side-story going on here with Azagoth and a crisis with his new emerging emotions.
The poor guy is having difficulties processing his new feelings and it is having a knock-on effect with all his relationships including his beloved mate.
This was again a good read that I enjoyed that took some unexpecting turns.
The story arc is really starting to hot up and get interesting.
This really is such a great series and I have enjoyed every story yet.



Reviewed By Beckie Bookworm
https://www.facebook.com/beckiebookworm/
www.beckiebookworm.com ( )

Another longish Novella this one is 125 pages, this is Hawkyn and Aurora's story.
Hawkyn is a Memitim the child of Azagoth and an angelic mother and his Primori/charge on earth is an evil serial killer.
A primori is an important being needed for future events to run there needed course and Memitim are there guardians.
Hawk breaks all the rules when he rescues Aurora from her fate at the hands of this killer.
He is hell-bent on protecting Aurora no matter the rules involved even squaring up to his father.
He also wants changes made for all Memitim as they are treated abysmally by the above powers.
Aurora is mostly human but she is also half wytch a natural wielder of magic but she lives like a human not embracing her heritage.
There was also a side-story going on here with Azagoth and a crisis with his new emerging emotions.
The poor guy is having difficulties processing his new feelings and it is having a knock-on effect with all his relationships including his beloved mate.
This was again a good read that I enjoyed that took some unexpecting turns.
The story arc is really starting to hot up and get interesting.
This really is such a great series and I have enjoyed every story yet.



Reviewed By Beckie Bookworm
https://www.facebook.com/beckiebookworm/
www.beckiebookworm.com ( )

Hawkyn is an earthbound guardian angel called Memitim. Aurora is a half-wytch, whom Hawkyn saves from a serial killer. He's in big trouble for interfering with the serial killer he was assigned to protect. Side story, Azagoth talking to his children, being moody and trying to make more demands on Heaven in regards to his children. I liked Hawkyn, he had goals and dreams to make things better for the Memitim, but still chose to protect Aurora. While somethings were predictable, it was still an entertaining read.
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