DOUBLE ENCHANTMENT, the second book in the Relics of Merlin books by Kathryn Kennedy, is set roughly forty years before its predecessor, ENCHANTING THE LADY. This book actually serves to explain some of the societal differences between 'real' Victorian England and Kennedy's 'magical' Victorian England that weren't explained, in so many words, in the first book. The fact that titles passed to either gender as long as the heir had the magical ability to back it up, for instance, was mentioned in ENCHANTING, but never formally stated.

Lady Jasmina Karlyle, the heroine, is vastly different from Felicity of the first book as well. They are both sweet, clever and innocent, but where Felicity was content to be passive (until the end of the book), Jasmina did everything she could to forge her own path through her problems. Mostly with mixed results, but she tried at least.

Sir Sterling Thorn, the hero, spends much of the book in utter bewilderment. I honestly felt bad for him. He meets the woman of his dreams, spends an achingly beautiful night with her, marries her and then wakes up to find her gone. If that wasn't bad enough, it turns out the woman he was in love with wasn't real at all, technically, and the person who made her was as different as night is from day. The odd glimpses of Jaz he sees in Jasmina only serves to confuse him even more. Here is a girl who goes from a cold as stone Ice Princess one second, to a fiery, passionate courtesan the next, only to go back to the Ice Princess moments later!

The world feels real, as if I'm not reading a fantasy, but in fact a historical accounting of that time. Little details of life that many people feel would be so much easier if they had magic to perform the task are shown to be just as tedious and time-consuming. You can spell a broom to do your sweeping for you, but the energy required to do such a feat, however, might prove to be more tiring then the manual labor itself! Then also, magic seems to be such an ingrained facet of life that unicorns escorting a golden coach is as commonplace to these people as seeing a dog in a park for us.

I felt while reading the book, however, that it didn't grasp my attention quite as much as the first book. It didn't feel like a 'second' book to a connected series (though they can be read alone quite easily), but more like the first book. As mentioned previously, details that were talked about in the first book are actually explained in this book and I felt as if Jasmina and Sterling weren't as strong a couple as Felicity and Terence from ENCHANTING had been. Part of that could have been due to the fact that Terence was a were-lion, while Sterling is a were-stallion.

One mystery I remain puzzled about is Prince Albert. His age is never given (and I can't be certain that the author is following the 'real' Albert's age either), but he is a grown man in DOUBLE ENCHANTMENT (set in 1848) and in ENCHANTING THE LADY (set in 1882). I remember Felicity thinking that if Prince Albert knew her parents, that he must have been a child, but she wasn't above eighteen herself and her parents died young. It might be I am looking too deeply into this, however.

The series is turning out to be a delightful surprise to me and I look forward to the next book! ( )

Another great entry in the Merlin's Relic series. The male lead is Sir Sterling Thorn whose other shape is a gorgeous stallion. His female protagonist is Lady Jasmina Karlyle. She has a problem, she's cast a spell that has created a twin who is going around London doing all kinds of scandalous things.

Thorn has fallen in love with both halves of Lady Jasmina.

After much magic and adventure, they finally admit their attraction and make a life together.

The magic and magical creatures are great, the mysteries are unraveled, and true love prevails. ( )

I thought this was very interesting book. I enjoyed the plot and thought it was pretty unique compared to a lot of other magic-based books I've read. The gnomes cracked me up! It is the first one I've read by this author, and I believe I will read more. ( )

The heroine has always been the dutiful and dependable daughter. She's run her parents household since a young age and above all else she considers their happiness. But she knows they are flawed. In particular there's the issue of her mother stealing. When it comes to her to sneak the stolen jewelry back into the houses of it's rightful owner, an routine spell to make a doppelganger so she wouldn't be missed goes wrong and throws her neatly controlled world into chaos. The necklace her mother stolen was a relic of merlin and with it's power the heroine as actually creature a living breathing duplicate of herself. The hero is in London to search for his missing sister. It's at a ball where he becomes drawn to the beautiful lively woman who sparks in him a possessive need to make her his. In his lust, he marries the girl but the next morning she is gone. When summoned to the prince regent to track down a relic for the crown, he's astonished to see his wife present. But she doesn't remember him and is nothing at all like the woman he loves. The heroine is horrified to have a shifter taking liberties with her person and even more horrified to know that he twin has been whoring herself all over town. Despite her kneejerk reaction to shun the hansom baronet, the heroine can't help but feel instantly drawn to him. But he is everything forbidden to her. He his a shifter, he is pour and if she's seen with him her family would be horrified. But she needs him to find the relic so she can be rid of her errant twin. Slowly the heroine begins understand the proud man and though she fights her feelings ardently, she finds herself falling in love with him. She also finds herself losing more and more of her ladylike demeanor and succumbing to her passions. She begins to think for herself, live for herself. But she's terrified of the doubt that the man she's falling for has already fallen for this twin. Little does she know that the hero very soon realized that what he felt for his 'wife' was lust pure and simple and that the deeper feelings he possesses for his prim and proper companion is real and true in every sense of the word. The heroine was a great character and I adored her slow development into her own person-free of societies expectations and her parents control. It was her twin who sparked the change and it was the hero and his total disregard for the opinion of others that brought her out of her shell. The prejudice society has for shifters makes you cringe and the horrible step brother and his selfishness makes you really feel for the hero. But he bares it all stoically and doesn't pay much attention to anyone but the heroine and I guess that's why she feels driven to defend him despite her own slight prejudices. I really liked this book and it was a joy to read. What a lovely magical world this author has created. ( )

This is book two, but it works perfectly as a stand alone and you can just jump straight in. There is a little prologue at first explaining why and what magic is.

And on to the book. Jasmine is a proper young lady, until a spell backfires on her. Which leads her to meet a shapeshifter, and those are just so beneath her social standing. Too bad Sterling is a total hottie and sparks fly. The book is about Jasmine trying to find a missing magical relic, and the twin she created with magic. Her very naughty twin. Sterling is sent to help her, and he wants her. But he does seem to have a few issues to deal with.

Oh and there is a gnome! At first I did not like him, but he was fun in the end. And annoying! Poor Jasmine. Also loved her aunt Nettie. So glad about a thing that happened *giggles*

A magical story set in an alternate England


And now on to the spoiler....

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Sterling meets the illusion twin first and has sex with her! Wtf? And lusts after her. Then he gets disappointed when he meets the real deal. But oh she is after a while nice too. All while All I can think of is that he had sex with her TWIN! Fail!( ( )