Nice story

A nice start to a new series. The characters are engaging and the world is new to a reader. I definitely want more as excited to see what happens.

Omg!! This books is totally amazeballs!! I really think that this will be my #1 book in 2019- and can not wait for the next one! ❤️

DNF

So this is a paranormal reverse harem. If you have read Gift Connections Six Branches is going to ring familiar to you. It's an intriguing idea, the back cover summary really caught my attention, but the writing needs some refinement for this to be a really good read. This is a lengthy review, and that may make it appear as though I didn't enjoy the book, but really did, which is why I took the time to break down where I saw weaknesses and where this book could be revised to make it amazing and how to make the next book in the series blow everyone's socks off, and I hope Allen takes my suggestions, because while I enjoyed the book I'm not obsessed and this has the foundation to be a series I'm obsessed with, it just needs a little work.

The book is rough right from the very start. I'm going to stick to examples from the sample so as no to to ruin anything for anyone, but the problems I'm pointing out carry on throughout the book. Rose, the female main character, is waiting for her 8 am class to start. She is casual in comparison to the overly preened girls who are only enrolled in the genetics class because the professor is hot, a fact Rose was oblivious to because she is a transfer. We are told she is a transfer both by Rose and then awkwardly by the trope perky pretty girl who sits next to Rose, as being a transfer is the only way one couldn't know about the hottie prof, Dr. Evans. Some of the roughness is from a desire to get information out there and just throwing it at the reader rather than weaving it into the story. Instead of awkwardly having a character say you must be a transfer bc you don't know how hot the professor is, Allen could have skillfully weaved that information in saying something like:

"I sat nervously tapping my pen on my notebook, head down, as I feigned intently studying my schedule. From the sounds around me the classroom was filling up. A quick glance at my watch showed it was almost eight am. Odd, the room sounded extra full and boisterous for an eight am class. There was an undercurrent of excitement you just don't usually find in a classroom, let alone an eight am class. At my old school students barely managed to roll out of bed and make it to class in their pajamas; maybe this school was more different than I thought. My eyes slid to the empty seat beside me. I wondered who would take it. When I decided to transfer colleges I forgot I'd be going through first day nerves all over again. I glanced at the seat again. Maybe I'd get lucky and it would stay empty. I was in the first row after all, yes being in the front row was kind of nerdy, but don't call me nerd. OK, so most people wouldn't taken an eight am genetics class because they found it interestingly, but I wasn't most people. Besides, I had other reasons to be here even if I wasn't a science major. 'This seat taken?' I cringed at the exuberant voice. I did not do confident and perky. If I was being honest, I really didn't do most people, preferring to keep to myself, but extroverts and I were particularly like oil and water. Reluctantly, I looked up finding a pair of brilliant green eyes framed by a bright smile and bouncy brown curls staring back at me from across the two person lab table. Ugh, definitely not my type of person. 'Oh, uh...no, go right ahead,' I heard myself saying. Damn, my need to people please. The girl rushed around the table claiming the last free seat in the front of the room. 'Thanks' she critters. I try to return..."

You get the idea. The above conveys all the same information Allen was trying to get across ( with her dialog included) but it doesn't feel like you are just listing off characteristics for the reader, instead you are painting a picture of the classroom, of the character's, and bringing them into the world and the characters your creating. Plus you've created some mystery and foreshadowing. What is this other reason for taking genetics? By the way, Allen can totally do this, she does it really well later in the book with Forrest in the park. I wish all of the scenes were written that way, and it actually made all of the ones that weren't written that way a little worse because you know how good they could have been.

Allen needs to reread through her work or have additional beta readers read for her and catch contradictions or sticking points for her. For example, Rose states why would anyone take a genetics class for fun, then two paragraphs later states she is only taking it for fun, then a few pages later gets huffy that people aren't here to be serious. That doesn't all go together. Or she gets upset with Dr. Evans forcing her to reveal she is an orphan. He didn't force her to reveal that. Yes he was a jerk in his response to why she was taking the class, but he didn't make her tell the class she was orphaned. She did it in a fit of hotheadedness and then goes into a panic attack about it. You have to think through on the little details, does this make sense? If it doesn't you take the reader out of the story and they are thinking "um he didn't force her" or "what kind of college class wastes an entire lecture on student introductions" instead of being immersed in whatever the story on the page is. Rose comments she has four years left at the school, but we find out she is a junior, so she has two years left?

Also, its just weird when you have a character laying eyes on someone for the first time ever and you have them wanting to touch a man for the first time in their life or with an uncontrollable desire to run their hands through another guy's hair just minutes after they were over come with a desire to touch the first guy. Don't force and rush connections. And don't rely of weird physical urges to convey an interest or connection. And yes, it is weird to be overcome by the urge to touch someone you literally had no idea existed moments before.

You need to pay attention to time line. She has one class and then goes back to her dorm for the day not leaving again until the next morning. But when we are following Rose the next morning to the cafeteria she can't take the buzz of students excited from completing their first week of class. We later find out that Rose did indeed only have one class on Monday even though she takes all of her classes on MWF so her TR are free. So is she only carrying three, maybe four credit hours for the semester? Well that could explain why she has four more years left. It's a minor detail, but details matter and good writer tie up all of these loose ends. Back to the skimming over of the passage of time, I understand not wanting to have a lot of filler scenes to get you from A to B but you have to address that time passed as more than just saying time passed, and if something significant happened in scene A have have to acknowledge some attention to it before starting scene B. So, after Rose's after class meeting with Dr. Evans have her comment that she was so shaken she blew off the rest of her classes and hid in her room, not even coming out for meals, or say:

"After the weirdness of my genetics class the rest of my classes passed by in a blur. What was wrong with me? Panic attacks were one thing, but imagining some sort of connection with my professor and then crying? When my last class was finally released I detoured to the empty cafeteria, picking up some food so I could hide out in my room for the rest of the night. The one bright spot in today was the fact I didn't have a nosy roommate to go back to. I spent the rest of the day working on homework before losing myself in a __ reality show. Yeah it was trashy, but it was also like being a fly on a wall to another culture, and hey, not all anthropological work was classy. Plus reality TV was yet another opportunity for me to observe without having to participate. When morning finally rolled around I drug myself out of bed, moving in a zombie state to the cafeteria. I was tired, but that was nothing new. When you only sleep two hours a night on the regular you tend to be tired. This is why coffee was invented. It was also one of the perks of transferring to Woodrow. Tuition may be high, but along with that came great food services along with a ritzy espresso machine operated by bored looking work study students."

Again, with just a slight tweak you get everything Allen was trying to get across, that Rose is a loner, she doesn't sleep much, she enjoys observing people but is uncomfortable with being part of the action, that coffee is her life line, and that the college is a really nice school where you are probably going to find a rich kid or two, but it is a smooth transition from the scene in the classroom and acknowledges the fact that Rose would have been impacted by it.

Spoilers ahead:

As you get further into the story some of the elements feel more like the wisps of ideas than developed plot points. For example, the danger at her place of employment. It's clear Allen wanted to create some tension and drama, to create a reason Rose has to end up with these guys, but just saying you're in danger at this place you have always felt safe that is three hours away from school and no one thinks it is weird that I, a student you just met, randomly showed up at a bar three hours away, like that isn't creepy, and hat you aren't at all creeped out by my tracking your phone to find you or statement that you have no choice you will be with me, now come with me if you want to live, because obviously i'm rescuing you from this unnamed danger from your safe place and friends. I'm sorry, that just doesn't work. Her trust is 100% placed on the mutant connection, there has been zero relationship building between the characters for her to trust him, it goes against her character to leave the small group of people she does trust with this stranger, and there should be some display that she is in danger, even if you want to make it a customer who is showing her a little too much attention through the night that she has to keep shrugging off, and who corners her in the hallway to the bathroom as she is grabbing the mop only for Sebastian to swoop in. The customer doesn't even have to have really done anything at this point, just been there and been close, and with Rose's background that would be enough to trigger her and for her to reasonably escape with Sebastian after checking in with Leeli who would know Rose would be upset after feeling trapped in a hallway with a guy, and be comfortable letting Rose go with Sebastian when she saw how comfortable Rose was with Seb, something abnormal for Rose. And it gets worse with the guys wandering around acting like she was attacked and Rose having an internal monologue wondering if she will ever be safe. The reader hasn't seen any reason for Rose to feel unsafe, so they aren't being brought along for the ride, they are just looking at Rose and her guys like they are ridiculous. Also, without any visibly threat beyond Seb saying there was one it makes non sense for Rose to agree to move in with these guys she has just met, one of whom is her professor. For a school that makes their students get permission to sign out at night and move out of the dorm I feel like living with your professor would be a major no-no.

Also, I get not wanting your characters cussing, but please don't go for cutesy substitutes. This is somewhat a personal preference, I cringed every time she said "chicken-and-rice", "I swear to cheese Nips", "holy cheese muffins" or something similar, but also it just didn't really fit. This is a girl who has been abused, brought up in the foster system, and on her own. There is no mention of any memory of any remember family or happy life, outside of a foster mom she alone lived with for four years. There isn't anything in Rose's background story to suggest she would forgo actual cursing. In that case have her start something and not finish ie son of a... or shh... that hurt. otherwise, for a character like Rose if you should avoid cursing all together if you don't want to use or imply actual curse words. For characters where substitute curses are appropriate, If you are going to do that sort of substitution 1) don't make it overly cheesy, and 2) stick to one or two at most, that is more akin to how people actually curse. (Think about it, people usually have a go to work that they tack modifiers on to meet the situation).

Again, touching on paying attention to details, staying true to your characters, not jumping from A to C, and continuity, Allen makes the same mistake a lot of authors do, writing a character who has suffered some pretty severe abuse, and then conveniently ignoring that abuse. It's not good enough to say oh there is a mutant bond that makes that abuse not matter. It's unsettling when a guy who supposedly fell madly in love with her at first sight is trying to get into her pants less than twenty four hours after meeting her, without ever having had a conversation with her, and just a few hours after she had a nightmare about her sexual assault that was so bad it pulled all of her guys from across the estate into her chambers. She wouldn't be rushing off to get sexy and thinking oh well I know I was just screaming from night terrors of being bound and assaulted but now that I'm with this guy, bring on the bondage! There was nothing touching or endearing about that scene. It also super creepy when she started hooking up next to the incapacitated Seb. I mean you can't get much more inappropriate. And since I brought up continuity again, they create this schedule, which makes no sense because 1)she is still getting to know the guys and she grew up human so a schedule of who owns her what day is a LOT premature, and 2) complete exclusivity to her on a given day is completely illogical and wouldn't work with you know life, but they create this nonsense and then immediately abandon it less than eight hours later because she has to go fabric shopping. Allen also creates this hey you can't draw blood of anyone higher ranking than you or its serious trouble, and then has it happen again as though it's no big thing. And why on earth would Rose have been left alone a second time. I mean when someone eats your flesh off your body the first time you don't follow the plan you have to be really stupid to immediately leave someone to the sharks a second time.

And the epilogue should be cut entirely. Open the second book with that info, but the first book should end with Seb in a state of unknown. Second book open up with Rose smoothing back his hair or washing his face with a wash cloth, having an internal dialog about how his body doesn't need tending to because of whatever magic was used on him, but it makes her feel better to do so. Talk about how they changed him out of his formal wear into something more comfortable. That she had her receiving room turned into a space for him after the first week or second week when none of the people they brought in had the right gift. Have the door to the room open and one of his sister or mom pop in and say oh you are with him. I was going to read but I'll come back later. Have Rose insist they stay and zone out to the sound of her voice as she stares at the sleeping Seb. Here Rose gets lost in thought about how Sebs family, who had never left their own region, moved into the estate to be close to their only son/brother. Mention something about how she had spent a little time with a couple of the people ie his sister would sit and tell stories of mischief they used to get into, his mom would lament about all the trouble raising a boy was and how excited she was to be getting another daughter, talk about how proud they've always been of him. Have Rose, via the internal monologue this is all happening in, mention how much she likes Sebs family but wishes she was getting to know them under happier circumstances. Have her think about all of the different people who have come in over the months to try their gift to no avail. Actually give the reader the scene of one of the guys telling Rose they found someone in a far off village to try. Have the guy be excited and Rose feigning a smile, she wants to believe but so many others have failed. Or have it the other way around, have which ever guy is telling her be cautious and warn her not to get her hopes too up that it kills him how she is crushed every time it doesn't work and remind her even if this woman isnt the one they will find the one. Then actually give the reader the scene with the woman, include the moment everyone can tell the spell has been lifted and Seb takes his first breath in months, Rose sobbing in joy as she puts her ear to his chest, feels his heart rise, his body warm. Have that excitement turn to concern as minutes go by and he still doesn't wake. Then have the doctor step in and mention the coma. The next part of the second book can time hop again if need be or it can pick up five minutes after the doctor leaves, but all of that is information that really belongs in the next book in the series and needs to be written out for the reader.

Overall, I feel like the book was decent, though it did seem a little more to the YA group than I expected from a reverse harem style genre. A lot of high schooler seeming feelings. I know the main character is only 20, but still. Also, I was surprised by the personalities of a couple older guys. I just feel like they should be a bit more mature and ready to handle things than I interpreted it.

I might have given this a 4 star if there weren't so many typos and repeated words. Examples I use are not directly pulled from the book.
Example 1: Then they then they went to the store.
Example 2: I couldn't believe me my eyes.

Pretty interesting start to a new series. I do like the world and plot of this story as well as the characters. The MC's character though was tricky to pinpoint as it seemed to keep changing but that can be just her evolving. The faster pace of the relationships is not my favorite as I do like more build up but the storyline keeps a good flow to keep me interested. I am intrigued to learn more about the world and each characters' backgrounds as well as some mysteries this book brought up. I also hope yo maybe learn about the MC's family background as that was her main goal from the beginning and so I hope that is something we get to see as the series progresses. Overall a book worth checking out.

Odd

There's a naivety to the work that bothers me. Rose as a character is hard to believe because she's so mercurial. Her personality and emotional reaction as so much like a pendulum it's like getting whiplash to read it. Magic bond or not people with a history of sexual abuse that's not been dealt with don't instantly jump from afraid of the opposite sex to moving in with six men. I mean this girl has nightmares so bad that she averages two hours of sleep a night, in the beginning of the story she has severe social anxiety disorder and a complete aversion to any and all touch, then she meets these guys and she's hugging everyone, sitting on laps and going clubbing? It's not character growth, its downright ridiculous. I could accept a slow progression but it's one extreme to the other. None of the characters are fully developed and the world is so vague its unclear if the writer herself knows its rules and laws. I'm a strong believer in the potential of a story and of Allen sat down and fully established her characters and world building and then took the time to add that to her text allowing a more natural progression of emotion this story would definitely have potential. That said, as that's not the case it just falls short. Add to that the abrupt ending that gives little in the way of closure even for a series opener and it's clear to me that this series is not for me.

She gets thrown into a world but handles it quite well. I thought this was well written and can’t wait to learn more about her men.