Customer Reviews

Haunting Beauty (A Mists of Ireland Novel)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

It starts with a vision of her own death and a compelling stranger that Danni `knows' she will meet again. Danni has been denying the gift that forced her from foster home to foster home after being abandoned by her mother as a child. Now Shaun, the man from her vision, appears in the `flesh' on her doorstep offering Danni her fondest wish - Shaun tells her of a father and extended family in Ireland who want her. But even as Danni is drawn to Shaun, Shaun is keeping secrets - more secrets than he even knows. It will take a bit of Irish magic, love, a leap of faith and a trip to the past for Danni and Shaun to avert a past tragedy and for them to even have a ghost of a chance at a future together.

I really really liked Haunting Beauty though it took me a while to understand what was really going on. I wasn't initially sure whether it was a ghost story or a time travel romance even though the Danni figures this out fairly quickly. Because key elements of the story are told in visions or dreams, Haunting Beauty has a non-linear flow that actually works to reinforce the haunting feel and to build the tension as Danni struggles to find a way to change the events of the night which had such tragic consequences for Danni and Shaun and for both of their families.

I liked the magical feel that the visions and the Celtic lore brought to the story, but it was really Danni and especially Shaun who won my heart. Both the leads are quite likeable and have an appealing vulnerability. Both have been alone for so long and have experienced such emotional hurt that makes it hard to trust again, but despite that, the connection between Shaun and Danni is so powerful that they can't help putting themselves in the position of being hurt again - even when it looks like there is no possibility for a future together.

If there is a weakness to the story it is that there alot different kinds of mystical things going on (visions, dream sequences, time travel) and there are a few threads left dangling even after the story resolves itself - how does the White Lady fit in? But it turns out that the tale is not complete and the story of Danni's twin is yet to be told. Though I can't imagine where author Quinn will take us next, when the story continues with Danni's also magical brother Rory, I am looking forward to his tale in Haunting Warrior.

Mysticism combined with romance wrapped up in a beautiful mist of Irish folklore and time travel. Wonderfully evocative writing. Characters that jump off the page. A plot that kept me guessing. A chemistry that smoldered. I was transported along with Danni and Sean to another time and place. My sole disappointment in this book was when the journey had to come to an end. I'm just glad to know that "Haunting Beauty" is only the first in a series of books about this family, their adventures through time and the evil Book of Fennore.

Abandoned at a young age, Danni has always felt different. Afraid to open herself up and explore the oddness of who she is. Danni never knew what happened to her family. She grew up in foster home after foster home. And then one night a strange, yet somehow familiar man, appears on her doorstep, and from that moment on, everything changes. This man, Sean Ballagh, claims to know where her father is, who she is, where she's from. He has answers she's lived her entire life wondering about.

Now's her chance to discover her past, as visions unfold, and an amazing journey sweeps both Danni and Sean back in time to twenty years in the past, just a few days before the terrible events unfold that will change their life to the one they just left. It's not often second chances are given. Does Danni have the power within herself to alter the tragic events?

The imagery and tone created a mysterious and vivid story. The twisted, tangled, and devastating events from the past catapult this book on a journey to uncover the secrets that will allow Danni and Sean to find the peace and answers they need to heal and find the love of of a family Danni has always yearned to have. The twists and turns this dark tale takes you on was at times confusing, and some things were left unanswered or rather unanswerable, but I chalk that up to storytelling and the beauty of fiction. Let your mind wonder and explore the possibilities.

Complex and fascinating to say the least!

Danni grew up as a foster child believing her parents abandoned her at birth or soon afterward. She worked hard to make something of herself and has become an expert at antiques. The young woman has no interest in her own past though occasionally late at night she curiously wonders who they were.

Sean Ballogh enters her life seemingly out of thin air. He insists her family has been searching for her for two decades and he wants to bring her home to her Irish roots on Ballyfionuir Island. Furthermore his arrival has stimulated her second sight skill. Unable to resist the lure of kin, Danni travels to Ballyfionuir where she meets loving family, alive and dead. As she and Sean fall in love, Danni realizes, for them to have a future, she must change her family's past and fight an evil beyond her imagination or watch her beloved die.

This is a whimsical charming modern day Celtic romantic fantasy starring a courageous heroine and a haunted hero. Danni makes the tale when she and Sean reach her birth island as she is in awe as she meets her family, live and dead members. Fans will enjoy her family reunion, but in order to have a future, she must somehow rewrite the past. Erin Quinn provides a haunting thriller.

Harriet Klausner

STORY BRIEF:
Ballyfionuir, Ireland (on the Isle of Fenmore) has many people who inherit psychic and magical abilities from their ancestors. Fia had five-year-old twins Danni and Rory. A murder occurred in a cave, and the locals believe Fia and her children were also killed, but they weren't. Fia survived and took Danni to America. She left Danni in an orphanage in Arizona. Danni was raised by foster parents. It is now 20 years later. A man named Sean appears at Danni's home. He tells her she has a father in Ireland who wants to see her. He asks her to return to Ireland with him for a visit. Danni begins having psychic visions and dreams.

REVIEWER'S OPINION:
The story is a mystery with several questions. Instead of someone investigating and talking to people to solve the mysteries, Danni has a series of visions which answer some questions and cause her to take some actions. Each vision is a partial answer and is vague. When she asks questions of others, their answers are usually "I don't know," even though they also have psychic abilities. This method of having visions with partial answers until the very end didn't work for me. It didn't allow me to enjoy a character's personality, thinking and choices. It was too passive - waiting for more visions for more answers. The plot, the characters, the motivations, and the evil were all interesting. However, I would have preferred the story be told chronologically - not done retroactively using vague and incomplete visions drawing it out.

I liked the ending. I liked how magic was used to solve some problems at the end. Those were neat ideas.

DATA:
Story length: 341 pages. Swearing language: strong (including religious swear words). Sexual language: mild. Number of sex scenes: 4. Total number of sex scene pages: 11. Setting: current day and 20 years prior in Arizona and Ireland. Copyright: 2009. Genre: fantasy time travel romance.

Danni Jones has long lived with the knowledge that her mother abandoned her at daycare when she was five years old. She's grown up in foster homes and now works for one of her foster mothers in an antique shop. When she has a vivid dream about a violent event she's flustered, especially when a gorgeous man shows up on her doorstep that very day.



Sean Ballagh knows that Danni holds the key to the violent episode that ended with death, and the disappearance of Danni, her mother and her brother. The trick will be convincing her to come home to Ireland and help to set things right.



When Danni figures out that Sean is not exactly who she thinks he is, she decides to send him away and stay where she's at. But occult forces have other ideas, and the two soon find themselves twenty years in the past, wondering exactly what is happening.



Can they change the past and find happiness? Or will they both end up on the losing side of the battle?



When I read the blurb for Haunting Beauty I was truly intrigued. I love stories of the occult, and this one did not disappoint. It is hauntingly dark and had twists and turns that kept me on my toes. I fell in love with Sean, who was very passionate about his duty and his growing love for Danni. I enjoyed watching Danni uncover her past and come to terms with what happened then, with her family and herself. The two of them together were passionate and so obviously destined to be together that it tore at my heartstrings. I am now impatiently waiting for Haunting Warrior, the second book in the series to see what happens next.



If you enjoy dark, emotional stories that will keep you wondering about what is happening and what will happen next then Haunting Beauty is the tale for you. It is a complex novel that pulled at my emotions, and left me sighing with pleasure at the end.


Amelia
Reviewed for Joyfully Reviewed

Danni is terrified of her visions. But when Sean suddenly appears in her life, she is not only forced to face her gifts, but a past that threatens her new-found love.

Although this is a fabulous love story, there is a depth to this book that can only be appreciated once the full plot is revealed. Quinn's prose is as haunting as the plot itself, which often mirrors the circles of a celtic love knot.

Sensual, oftentimes scary, with a dream-like quality that pulls the reader in from start to finish, Haunting Beauty is metaphorically ingenious to the discerning reader.

Do not miss the opportunity to add this unique novel to your keeper shelf!

A fascinating blend of two kinds of magic: the magic of life and discovery, and the magical world of myth and legend. The normal and the paranormal. Erin Quinn has done it again as the reader becomes silent witness to both worlds.

Danni, an abandoned soul in the real world, is the catalyst that binds the story together. With no memory prior to the age of 5, she has been bumped from one foster family to another most of her life. Now as an adult is suddenly whisked away to Ireland on a voyage of self-discovery and history with little knowledge of how or why. Danni is special and is about to learn far more than she would like.

Erin Quinn has the ability to draw her audience with her through the normal and the paranormal fluidly. Her characters range from innocent to deranged, from old to young, and then there are the lovers, sensual and strong, yet fragile at the same time. Her ability to slip through time and space in her writing captured me and catapulted me into a place I'd never been. Dual characters put a different spin on the story of Danni's past and that of the young man in the normal world, who. suddenly appeared to bring her to this place. I don't want to write too much about the storyline itself. Be assured it is provocative and seductive, a very satisfying read. It also appears to be the beginning of an exciting series. I really enjoyed reading this book.

Erin Quinn has a fabulous style of writing - those readers who enjoy Nora Roberts (esp. any of her Irish or paranormal/mystical series) will thoroughly enjoy this book!

My first run, I spun through the book quickly because I had to know what happened next...then a re-read again, slowly savored each delicious word that the author gave us. Heaven knows I probably fell a little in love with Sean too :)

Readers will be intrigued by this fascinating story and their imaginations captured by the love of Danni and Sean.

2 thumbs up for this brilliant romance!

I know a romance is supposed to have a happy ending, but the relationship between these two people ended up being creepy. Family is family. Saying they aren't blood related does not change that they are, in the end, family. The author is a great story teller and I have bought the second book, but the idea that step siblings "get together" in the end is deeply disturbing to me and I cannot believe no one else seems to have been bothered by that. After it became evident how the relationship would unfold, I could no longer look at it as a love story. It was just creepy. Anyone else out there part of a blended family? It is taboo and spoiled the whole story for me after seeing this unfold. Luckily it was the last chapter, otherwise I never would have finished it.

I am looking forward to more books, because Erin Quinn tells a wonderful story. The visuals she creates are fantastic at times and really pull you in. I am hoping this was just a matter of having so much going on that she didn't think this relationship through. Adding a line about them not being blood related does not change the fact that they are step-brother and sister.