Inspire, Cora Carmack

Pages: 284

Publisher: self-published

Release Date: 14^th December 2014

Edition: Kindle e-book, purchased

Other Titles by this Author: Losing It, Faking It, Keeping Her, Finding It, All Lined Up, All Broke Down

Kalliope lives with one purpose.

To inspire.

As an immortal muse, she doesn’t have any other choice. It’s part of how she was made. Musicians, artists, actors – they use her to advance their art, and she uses them to survive. She moves from one artist to the next, never staying long enough to get attached. But all she wants is a different life – a normal one. She’s spend thousands of years living lie after lie, and now she’s ready for something real.

Sweet, sexy, and steady, Wilder Bell feels more real than anything else in her long existence. And most importantly...he’s not an artist. He doesn’t want her for her ability. But she can’t turn off the way she influences people, not even to save a man she might love. Because in small doses, she can help make something beautiful, but her ability has just as much capacity to destroy as it does to create. The longer she stays, the more obsessed Wilder will become. It’s happened before, and it never turns out well for the mortal.

Her presence may inspire genius.

But it breeds madness, too.

I’m a definite fan of Cora Carmack’s contemporary romances. They’re sexy, fun and easy reading and Inspire, a paranormal reworking of Greek mythology, is no different.

I was dubious as to how much mythology would actually be included in Inpsire, but I was pleasantly surprised. Kalli, one of the eight muses, is pretty much alone on Earth. Her and sisters split from each other centuries ago, the gods are no longer present and coming across those with deity blood happens once in a blue moon. But as the story progressed and Kalli’s life and priorities changed, other elements of her heritage started popping up, culminating in a shocking cliffhanger that definitely means full-on immersion in Greek mythology in book two!

Though mythology has a strong hold on the story, most of Kalli and her feelings are completely human. I liked the balance between a fantasy story in a contemporary setting – it worked surprisingly well. It helped to maintain a lot of the things that I enjoy about Carmack’s books as well as slowly introducing the idea of paranormal NA which I’m not so fond of. And yet I found the romance between Wilder (such a stupid name, btw...) and Kalli to be one of the weakest of her novels so far. The crazy, lustful attraction, yes, and Inspire was really quite mature so that definitely came across, but love? I’m not convinced.  It was so sudden and not really grounded in a whole lot. Luckily I liked them separately as characters so I was able to root for them nonetheless.

Inspire is an enjoyable first instalment in the Muses trilogy, and though I didn’t like it as much as I do her contemporary novels, I’ll definitely be checking out the sequel, Inflict.

Sophie