Blizzard by Mikayla Elliot is another fantastic display of Elliot’s talent and an absolutely awesome roller coaster of evolution. The way she weaves all of these various stories, main character Neva’s as well as all of the support characters and the history of all of the major supernatural species that exist in Auria, is an art form that is often lost in this genre. Maps at the start of the book show the transformation of Auria over centuries. Starkness and beauty, horror and romance all coalesce into a strikingly beautiful and tangible new world while the reader’s view of all of the characters from Book One, Snow, is transformed through the story. As Neva comes to know herself as Kareese, the characters from Snow begin an astonishing metamorphosis. Through visions of the past, the reader is completely reintroduced to characters from the first installment of The Black Ice Trilogy, and Zachariah, Eliza, and Xavier develop whole new emotional attachments to the reader’s heart strings. Zachariah’s is of most interest, but that secret will stay, tucked away from this review, safe in the bindings of Mikayla’s work.

Throughout the book, Neva relinquishes her timid, grief stricken life as a baker and widow to become a strong willed, combat ready female heroine. The tumultuous romantic relationship between Neva and Thedryk is a staunch contrast against the gruesome battle being waged on Reegan’s demonic forces, and it’s deliciously horrifying. The writing in Book Two mirrors the graceful writing in Book One that reminded me so much of Anne Rice – the riveting details, the sensory immersion, the vivid imagery. In Blizzard, the battle scenes played through my head like a scene from The Underworld intermingled with the garb and castles from classics like Dracula or Nosferatu. Although I’m still not completely certain what the titles are building into, why they are associated with snow aside from the series being titled The Black Ice Trilogy, I am absolutely thirsty for more, and this book receives a full five stars. *****