Customer Reviews

Heart Journey

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Heart Journey by Robin D. Owens
Paranormal Romance- Aug. 3, 2010
4 ½ stars

Fantasy and engaging romance combine in the 9th installment of the heartwarming Heart Books of Celta series. This was an engrossing read and I felt the strong heroine and the sly Fam (animal familiars that talk telepathically to them) really stole the show!

I love the world the author has created on Celta! Where the citizens have special powers according to their family. (It is a world I would love to live in!) And if they are lucky they will find a Heart Mate. The one person destined to complete them. In this story we have to seemingly opposite characters who find love.

Helena D'Elecampane loves living on the road. Being in the populated city drains her and when she must return to deliver her renowned and well-coveted maps she decides she will search for her Heart Mate there, too. Soon Helena discovers her Heart Mate is the handsome and younger actor Raz Perry. Helena quickly sees that Raz is more concerned with appearances and revels in the city life. She realizes that although he is her Heart Mate their opposite views on life may not lead to a happily ever after. So she decides to become a patron of the theatre and meet him. To discover if they could match. Soon both are caught a whirl wind attraction. Helena tries to find a way to compromise but she feels the confines of the city suffocating her. Can their blooming love survive? In addition, Helena must deal with the responsibility of taking care of her House. Since a tragic fire killed all but one young relative. Trying to balance her responsibilities and her yearnings makes for a heavy burden.

This book seemed to center more on the heroine. What I liked best about this story is how self sufficient Helena is and how comfortable with herself she is. Although she loves Raz and wants to be with him she also recognizes that his acting is important to him. And while she is willing to compromises she is still sure of her own individuality. Even though I really wanted her to be happy with Raz I knew she could survive if they couldn't make it work. (Sometimes the story where the woman has to have the man to complete her gets a little tiring even if it is a romance.)

This was a gentle book that slow unfurls making you love the characters. Robin Owen's books remind of Mercedes Lackey novels except they have a lot more romance and therefore a more developed and meaningful relationship between the 2 main characters.

This was a highly enjoyable romance. And a very moving read. These characters felt very real and I wondered if love would be enough to keep them together. How could the 2 solve their difference when both had such different needs?

I take great pleasure in revisiting Robin Owen's series. I always enjoy learning the new Fam that each of the characters have. (They are playful and fun and I would love to have one of my own!) Charming and magical, this is a series that is sure to enchant readers!

Reviewed by Steph from Bookaholics Romance Book Club

Owens does a great job of blending real life issues in her futuristic/fantasies. Del, a cartographer, loves her job, but fate may be conspiring to change all that. She's learned her entire family has died in a fire. All except the youngest, Doolee, a toddler that was rescued and is living with the Blackthorns.

They have grown to love the baby, and the baby them, and they want to adopt the child. But if they do it might spell the end of her family line. Their spells, rituals, and memories forgotten. And the house, which is growing toward sentience, might die.

She's also learned that her heartmate is Raz Cherry. Bad enough he's an actor and in love with cities and fame, but he's also younger then her. How can a man so tied to city and stage fit into her life of wandering the wilds, mapping and exploring Celta for future generations.

Del must make some hard choices. And she soon recognizes, that what is best for those she loves, may be to let them go.

The book has a few timing problems that mildly distract from the story, but these issues are small and far between.

The book is certainly another gem in Owens growing catalog of great reads.

Heart Journey returns us to the magical world of Celta. Cartographer Del decides to take a break from her travels to search out her Heartmate. The brash practical frontier women figures that she'll find him, claim him and resume her gypsy-like lifestyle. Of course it's not going to be that easy, because her Heartmate Raz's calling is as an actor and his career is his focus, and even if Del could tolerate living in Raz's world he doesn't want a heartmate or a family.

So Del is forced to patiently pursue the committment phobic Raz - Del knows Raz is her Heartmate but she's not allowed to tell him - and though Raz is drawn to Del and deep down he senses their connection, he's in denial. Still he's likeable as a leading man and Del goes through changes during the course of the story which up her appeal and I couldn't help but hope that her efforts to find a way to meld their two totally incompatible worlds would pan out.

Heart Journey on the whole was pretty meandering and not one of the strongest stories of the series, but even though all of the conflicts in the story are pretty easily and quickly resolved, there are some pretty powerful moments later on in the story before the pair finally find their HEA and I loved Del's fam-fox, and appearances by old characters - so as long as Owens keeps writing these, I'll keep reading them.

I really enjoy this series, but I've gotten more frustrated with the quality of the writing as I've gotten more accustomed to the world. Consider the following excerpt from this book:

"She had it bad.
She wanted him bad.
And she wanted him to need her bad."

Despite Owens' strong imagination, she could win a competition for bad writing with this!

Except for the terms that she invents, you will not learn a single new word in reading her books. She uses weak words like "nice", "stuff" and "fun", over and over again, sometimes three times per page, which just feels like laziness.

She allows powerfully dramatic moments to pass by with no emphasis at all. When the main female character discovers her "Heartmate" ( a powerful mating bond that greatly surpasses ordinary love attachments), the revelation doesn't even merit an exclamation point from Owens, whereas various telepathic communications between humans and a kitten are full of uppercase words and exclamation points.

Another example of failure to exploit potentially powerful plot points is found in the exchange of "Heartgifts", the custom-made gift which each Heartmate is supposed to spontaneously discover and choose as part of the legally binding process of claiming a Heartmate. It forms a critical part of the bonding process, but in this book, Del, the female protagonist, never is allowed to accept hers until after she and her mate have already committed themselves to each other, at which point we find out that her lover has simply given it to her.

There are plot developments that fail to go anywhere, like the hostility directed at Raz, the male protagonist (who is an actor), by Lily, his frequent leading lady. And the central drama, aside from that of the mismatched Heartmates, involving a string of burglaries and a murder, is resolved so quickly and neatly at the end of the book that its impact, again, is thrown away. The menace, which should create almost equal dramatic tension as the Heartmate dilemma, is almost treated as an afterthought.

The other habit that Owens has that annoys me intensely is that of writing incomplete sentences - lots of them. And for some mysterious reason, she constantly uses commas instead of the word "and" or "em" dashes, creating an awkward flow in her sentences. And sometimes, she's just grammatically incorrect, using "good" instead of "well" e.g. he didn't do it as good as the others.

I guess that this series is so popular that the publisher asks very little of the author, other than that she cranks out one a year, along with her other writing. But it's such a shame that her editor (if she actually has one) asks so little of her in the way of taking her writing to a more polished and satisfying level. I will keep reading these because of my appreciation for her imagination, but I wish that someone could encourage her to refine her writing so that it is as strong stylistically as it is imaginatively.

The Heart series is a favorite of mine because the world is really solid, the characters are interesting, and the fams (telepathic animals that bond with their owners) are hysterical. This particular installment was a bit slower then some others but very enjoyable with strong main characters and neat twists that could be a spring board for more stories. The focus on change, acceptance, and compromise between the main characters made this a deeper story in my opinion. The older woman/younger man angle was well done with no mothering on Del's part but real support for Raz. Good dialogue as well. If you are a newcomer to the series, try to start at the begining, heart mate, and work your way up. THe only reason I gave it 4 stars is because it was a bit slow in some parts. These books are fantastic - great fantasy and science fiction blends with a fresh look at the idea of soul mates.

Robin Owens is amazing and continues to keep me riveted to her stories! I love the way she carries her characters forward, a little intoduction in an earlier book and then you're wrapped up in their adventures when you open the next book!

Hate to be nit-picky but I have a hard time buying books that have stupid covers, and unfortunately, this is one of them. I have never hesitated to buy a Robin Owens title until this one, and it's funny because not only is the cover dorky, but the story (as stated in other reviews) is not one of her better ones. You could, in fact, skip this one and pick up the next one and not miss much. It is just...well...okay. That said, I hope they get back to the original illustrator for the covers. I also look forward to getting the next installment!

Love this series. You need to read the whole series, but you can read this one and understand it without reading the others. Robin Owens is a wonderful author. I love this futuristic series.

This is my least favorite of the Celta series. Swapping the male/female roles just didn't work for me. It seemed halfhearted and the most interesting part was at the very end. I put it down several times and then forced myself to finish it because I enjoyed the earlier books in the series. I'm happy to know the developments at the very end but a book shouldn't be a chore to get through.

Don't let the mismatched cover fool you. This isn't about a half-naked guy living in the wilds of Celta. It's about Del, Celta's premiere cartographer, a tough, independent, career-oriented older woman who's returned from one of her yearlong mapping journeys to discover a family tragedy is about to change her life forever. Adding to her problems, the young man who is her intended HeartMate, Raz, is a polished, urban actor - definitely a city person - while she's more at home in the wilds. Raz is nearing the height of his stage career, and applause can be as addictive as falling in love. Some tough decisions are ahead for these two star-crossed lovers, and maybe death as Del learns predators come in human form in the city as murder and threats against Raz and his family add complexity to the story. Fans of the Celta series will enjoy being immersed once more into a world full of Flair users (magic), telepathic animals, sentient residences, and landscape globes, along with tantalizing info about the original colonists and the three multi-generational spaceships that brought them from Earth. A fascinating world full of romantic characters who readers will enjoy spending time with. It's always good to come home to Celta.