{"id":78312,"date":"2025-03-22T12:00:26","date_gmt":"2025-03-22T16:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/?p=78312"},"modified":"2025-03-22T11:20:36","modified_gmt":"2025-03-22T15:20:36","slug":"review-first-light-shadowlands-1-by-elizabeth-hunter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/?p=78312","title":{"rendered":"Review: First Light (Shadowlands, #1) by Elizabeth Hunter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Buy:\u00a0 Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/h4>\n
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Review<\/b><\/h4>\n

3.5 stars<\/b><\/p>\n

The first book in the Shadowlands<\/i> series, this is a light fantasy novel with a great heroine, a broody hero, a murder mystery, and a complex romance. It\u2019s the beginning of what could be an epic story, and I really enjoyed it!<\/p>\n

Carys\u2019s boyfriend, Lachlan, has disappeared without a trace, and she\u2019s desperate to find him. She travels to Scotland to track down his brother, Duncan, in her search for answers and discovers a whole world that she thought existed only in fairy tales. Duncan takes her through a portal to another world, populated by the \u2018twins\u2019 of human on earth, and where magic exists along with all manner of fantasy creatures. Lachlan is actually Duncan\u2019s twin from the Shadowlands, and it turns out that that wasn\u2019t the only secret he was keeping from Carys.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t want to give away spoilers, because you just want to dive in and experience this one, but wow, what a wildly complicated dynamic Carys finds herself in! It\u2019s so clever, and I couldn\u2019t wait to see what would happen next as the story unfolded. Complicating matters, Carys discovers that she has a bit of magic of her own when she finds herself bonded to a dragon that was previously bonded to her own twin, who was murdered a few years previously. Humans aren\u2019t supposed to bond with magical creatures, and Carys quickly finds herself swept up into this new world, desperate to uncover what happened to her twin, and wrestling her complicated feelings for Lachlan, who lied to her, and Duncan, who may be broody, but who supports and protects her without question, and who definitely had my heart fluttering.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou never liked me from the beginning. If you ever give me a chance, Carys Morgan, it\u2019ll be because I earned it.\u201d<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Elizabeth Hunter is so great at world building, and she\u2019s done a fantastic job creating this world. It\u2019s rich and magical and the way it\u2019s set up creates some fantastic complexities for Carys. And there\u2019s a fabulous bunch of characters that she encounters along the way \u2013 special shout out to her dragon, Cadell, who is able to shift into a human form and who is awesome in every way.<\/p>\n

I really enjoyed this book. It didn\u2019t suck me in quite as much as I was hoping, but I\u2019m definitely invested, and with more mysteries to be uncovered and the romance only really hinted at, I can\u2019t wait to see how the story progresses from here.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou walk through this world thinking you leave no footsteps, Carys Morgan. But your path here could change everything.\u201d He pulled back and stared into her eyes. \u201c<\/i>Everything.\u201d<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

3.5 stars.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Shadowlands<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"\" \u00a0\"\" \u00a0\"\"<\/h4>\n

First Light (#1)<\/strong>
\nReview<\/a>
\nBuy:\u00a0 Amazon<\/a><\/p>\n

The Shadow Path (#2)<\/strong>
\nReview<\/a>
\nBuy:\u00a0 Amazon<\/a><\/p>\n

Broken Veil (#3)<\/strong>
\nReview<\/a>
\nBuy:\u00a0 Amazon<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Buy:\u00a0 Amazon Review 3.5 stars The first book in the Shadowlands series, this is a light fantasy novel with a great heroine, a broody hero, a murder mystery, and a complex romance. It\u2019s the beginning […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","yasr_overall_rating":3.5,"yasr_post_is_review":"","yasr_auto_insert_disabled":"","yasr_review_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,522,95,29],"tags":[459,48,1610],"class_list":["post-78312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drama","category-fantasy","category-mystery","category-steamy","tag-elizabeth-hunter","tag-review","tag-shadowlands"],"yasr_visitor_votes":{"stars_attributes":{"read_only":false,"span_bottom":false},"number_of_votes":0,"sum_votes":0},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/First-Light.jpg?fit=200%2C300&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7gaNL-kn6","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=78312"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78312\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/76527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=78312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=78312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escapistbookblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=78312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}