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Last Friday, July 9th, was the release date for Tempting Auzed! This is the 4th book in Victoria Aveline's Clecanian series. It's one of my favorite alien romance series and I've been hyped to read it since her newsletter announced the release date and cover last month. I was also able to apply this to the Summer of Swoon board 2 prompt books nobody talks about. With alien romance getting a surge lately (thanks to tiktok and the sudden rush on Ruby Dixon's Ice Planet Barbarians), I wish that more people would talk about Victoria Aveline and her unique take on alien romance.
Auzed we met in the first couple books. He's one of the brothers from the heroes in both books. He's also the head guard at the Pearl Temple, the secure area where human women that aren't mated are staying. After Saving Verakko, they've been on the hunt for Alex since getting split from Lily. He finds her, but she has crossed into Sauven territory and killed a creature that was after her, but also considered sacred to the Sauven. They end up getting captured by Sauven rangers and Alex lies and says that her and Auzed are to be mated. There's political power plays between the reagents of Sauven and Queen of Tremanta. There is a lot at stake if their rouse is found out, particularly for Auzed and having broken three laws (crossing the border without approval, killing the creature and lying to the reagents). Things of course escalate between them as they are forced to stay in Sauven for a week. The reagents want to give Sauven residents the chance to scent Alex to see if a true mate is found.
I loved this addition to the series. I loved the enemies to lovers mixed with fake dating. I'm usually not the biggest fan of enemies to lovers, but there was a lot that both characters were going through. I did like how even though Auzed was frustrated with the situation, his main focus was getting them through the week and taking care of Alex the best he could. Focusing on being a guard, he never expected to have a chance to find a wife, let a lone a mate. Alex sometimes was a little too headstrong for me and I do wish that they had the conversation about what exactly was at stake for both of them earlier. The split up at the end also felt a little bit much, but I did love the hints we got about a couple romances moving forward.
One thing I loved was Alex pushing for Auzed to not follow the Clecanian custom of wives not showing any care or feelings towards their husbands, especially in public. She wanted to hold his hand and do the little touches and felt it was important. She tried acting Clecanian, but I'm happy that it didn't take too long for her to be like, "Hey! I'm human. We don't do it like that." When they got in their argument I loved the point he made to Alex that there's a reason that couples don't act like that. Now he has to move on (he thought she was going back to Earth at this point) knowing what it felt like to have someone be affectionate with him and will never know it again.
If you are into alien romance or interested in starting alien romance I feel like this series is a good one to start out with. It has the normal tropes but the world is so fleshed out and really transportitive. I also like how the fated mates aspect is dealt with in this series. The mate mark takes a while to show, but I would like to see one book in the series where they get mated before really knowing each other and going from there. I'm really excited for what Victoria has planned and can't wait for the next book. Also, can we just take a minute to appreciate the covers? They are so gorgeous. I saw a couple months ago that you could get paperback copies and I had to get them. The covers are even more gorgeous in person and I even love the backs to them, especially Saving Verakko. I can't wait to get this one in paperback as well!
Have you read Tempting Auzed?
Bookishly Yours,
Stasi🍎
STATISTICS: Tempting Auzed, Victoria Aveline, 5-stars, 0 days, eBook, ?? pages, published in 2021
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