Forged in Shadow by Anna Carven

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Sergeant Arin Varga has a problem on her hands. She’s supposed to be in charge of a squad of peacekeepers. That’s something she would normally handle with ease, except that now her people are stuck in Earth’s orbit on a doomed superfreighter. To make things worse, they’re being held hostage by a group of very threatening, very menacing silver-skinned Kordolians, who are insistent that all they want is safe passage to Earth to kill oversized insects. 
One particular alien, who goes by the name of Rykal, seems be constantly getting inside her personal space. He isn’t just threatening, he’s friendly and threatening, and if Arin isn’t careful, that could become a major problem.

Forged in Shadow

Space bugs!

The following ratings are out of 5:
Romance: 💙❤️💚💜
Steam: 🔥🔥🔥
Story/Plot: 📕📗📘
World building: 🌏🌍🌏🌍
Character development: 😊😘😟🥰
Narration: 🎙🎙🎙🎙
Narration Type: Solo Narration

The heroine: Arin Varga – she is the daughter of a female general and she is a peacekeeper that has been in charge of patrolling a gigantic mining station in a super-freighter for the last few years. She had to report to a committee to explain the situation with the Zargek and the Kordolians. The Zargek are large bug-like aliens that can easily overcome a planet and are a threat to Earth and Humanity. The Kordolians are the only alien species that have the capacity to get rid of the adult Zargek’s. Though the leaders of Earth see the Kordolians as another hostile species of alien, especially since they had recently captured the super-freighter.

The Heroes: Rykal – He took Arin hostage when they first met. She reminded him of an ice blade (ashika). She was sharp, direct and effective. She was able to take control of the humans and guide them with her level-headed intelligence and poise. The super-freighter was how they escaped the doomed mining station Fortuna Tau.

The Story: Kordolians and humans looked a lot alike and when Rykal thought of Arin, he often wondered just how alike they were. Rykal was a killer, but he rarely made promises, though he promised Arin that he would try not to kill any of the humans. He didn’t have a very high opinion of humans other than Arin. There was no way a human could kill a Kordolian, as they had body armor coded in their DNA which could be called up at any moment. Almost nothing the humans had could get through the exo-armor. Though the humans on the freighter did try to overpower the seven Kordolians while Arin was off the Freighter making her appeal to the senate.

Arin didn’t really mind Rykal. She thought he was the most handsome of the Kordolians, and actually preferred being on a doomed freighter with him than on Earth dealing with the politics and her mother. When two agents from alien affairs meet with Arin, they tell her that since the general died, she is the sergeant that has taken on most of the leadership on the freighter, especially since she was the one trying to broker a deal with the Kordolians. They want Arin to continue to work with the Kordolians but to also spy on them. They don’t give her a choice. They plan to use the Kordolians to get rid of the Zargek’s then figure out how to get rid of them.

I liked this book, both main characters had interesting back stories, especially Rykal. He went through something in his transition to be a warrior where they removed all his memories, but he has been having flashbacks. I also liked Arin because she was a strong female character who was more intelligent than most people she had to deal with.

This audiobook was told in dual points of view via solo narration and was narrated by Jillian Macie. I like her voice and she is very good at using different voices and tones for different characters. She is also great at showing emotion through her voice. Though I would much rather this be dual or duet narration, but Jillian does a terrific job.

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