Helispeta used every wile, even forbidden tactics, to make sure that her Prince went through with their arranged Royal marriage.

What is she to do when she wakes up in the wrong god's bed?

REVIEW

Reviewer: Jean
Rating: 5 Angels


I really like Cherry's writing; it is literate and fast moving, with active imagery, and it challenges the reader. This story is a pre-quel of sorts, taking place seventy years before the action in Cherry's novel Forced Mate. Mating Net is very enlightening about some of the back story of the other book, and it made me want to re-read the novel to see if this new information added to my enjoyment. I will say, though, that although this story stands alone fairly well, the reader would un! derstand some of the surrounding cultural details better if she read Forced Mate as well. The story has a very sexual ambiance, but it is definitely science fiction with romantic elements, rather than the other way around. I definitely enjoyed this installment and look forward to reading more about the world of the Great Djinn.


Rowena Cherry, MATING NET

I recently had the pleasure of reading this short story, and now I can't wait to get my hands on this author's books! It's a short read, but far worth the price of the download. I won't summarize it, cause I really can't do it justice. It was an absolutely compelling Science Fiction Romance read, with a depth and intricacy that transports you to this fascinating world. The characters are vivid and jump right off the page. The ending was fabulous and satisfying, while at the same time, making you crave more of Ms. Cherry's writing. Here's the link, since this is in e-book format only: http://www.newconceptspublishing.com/matingnet.htm

~Kathryne Kennedy

Reviewed by: Jean Cooper, Kathryne Kennedy

EXCERPT

He was on the prowl for a new mate.

No one suspected. It was too soon after his last Empress's death. Everyone who knew anything about the Great Djinn god-Princes of Tigron would expect him to grieve for the rest of his natural life, because everyone assumed that he had had the rut-rage with his young Empress and had fixed his affections on her for ever.

Though he had every right to mate againâ?"and there were two innocent reasons why he should replace Djustine-Saturna as soon as possibleâ?"the chattering fool peoples of all the Communicating Worlds would call his haste indecent in the extreme.

What did he care what aliens and lesser beings thought? His broad shoulders already bore the blame for his father's final atrocity. His friends and his enemies could not possibly think worse of him than they already did.

Consciences were for Commoners. He was the greatest of all the Great Djinn. He was the god-Emperor Djohn-Kronos. By All The Lechers of Antiquity, he had gods-Right to any virgin he wanted, and he hadn't had sex in a gestate.
He flung himself into the pilot's seat, snapped the canopy shut, and chopped his beringed right hand into the cradle.

"I'm Djohn-Kronos. Open the force field."

A hot, blindingly bright cross-hatching of light yawned ahead of him. He accelerated out of the apex at the top of the Palace's West Pyramid and enjoyed the sensation of being slammed back in his seat by Tigron's heavy G-forces.

His racing craft's sinister double shadow scudded over the rough flowering desert terrain below, startling large lizards, stampeding small herds of hardy ruminants. Moving fast and dangerously low, now his shadows skipped the ridge-backed mountain range and swooped over crater-worlds. Some craters were volcanic in origin. Some were ancient asteroid-impact. Some were both: crater-upon-crater.

Each crater was a distinct eco-system varying according to their depth, geology, whether or not they were spring-fed, and the overlaps of shadows thrown by the distant small white sun and by the nearer Primary planetâ?"the Body Imperial. While not quite a second sun, it made the Royal Side of its moon up to six percent hotter than the Commoners' side of Tigron.

Unlike his twin brother who thought that Tigron was doomed to crash into its gas giant, Djohn-Kronos loved his home-world.

There! Below him shimmered the forbidden paradise of which all Djinn Princes dreamed. Created in more fertile times, the school for Djinn princesses had been built on an island which was surrounded by a shallow sea. Light blue, inviting, but dangerous was that sea. Tigron's most precious virgins were guarded by sea monsters.

Since a rut-enraged Prince would not be put off by monsters, the school for princesses was also protected by an overarching biodome ....