Like everyone who loves Feehan I thoroughly enjoyed the early books. The characters stand out vividly in my mind and I could recognize each one of them reading those books. The books after Destiny I'll never open again. Once was more than enough for such forgettable and boring reads. But Oh, Gregori, Julian, Darius, Jacques, Lucian, and Gabriel? Now those were the days.

Okay, I'm really surprised chauvinistic attitudes (even for Carpathian males, they were way too chauvinistic - except for Riordan). Nicolas isn't really like that. He kind of starts off that way for about two minutes, but he catches on pretty quickly that his attitude just won't work with a partner in his life. He quickly evolves into a really nice, supportive (and hot!) lifemate for Lara, and you can see the evolution occuring in his mind. He's very aware of himself, his attitude, what Lara needs, and how he needs to adapt himself to meet her needs, etc... I thought that was very refreshing.

Secondly, what I really really loved about this book is that so many characters are in it. Mikhail and Raven (and her pregnancy), Gregori and Savannah (and her pregnancy), Francesca, Virkirnoff and Natalya, Lucien and Jaxon, Jacques and Shea and their baaunt/mother/father made my head hurt. Even though these are flaws in the book, they're minor problems in comparison to all the many things I loved about the book.

I think if you're a Carpathian fan, you'll enjoy this book a lot. I felt that it was a turn in a better direction for Feehan, and I'm looking forward to the next book. This book reminded me a lot of the Christmas book, and I really like that one. I like seeing a lot of characters interacting with each other, and finding out what previous couples are up to. In this book, you find out that several couples have moved back to the mountains to be closer to their people, and I really liked that.