I liked Heir of Raetia by this author very much, so when I saw that she released this FREE story, of course I wanted to read and review it. Have I mentioned that it is free? I mean ebook's edition is free, you have to pay for paperback. I was a little worried that since this is her earlier work (three- four years earlier? I am not exactly sure when Heir of Raetia was released, 2009 or 2010), the writing would not be as strong and enjoyable. Personally I still enjoyed it very much, I thought she managed to give the characters depth and dimension and portrayed the historical settings very vividly. I know next to nothing about Irish war for independence, so I cannot be a judge of how realistically settings are portrayed, but here is what I know - to me the writer managed to reflect what is the essense of every war, of every civil war of the sorts. Everybody thinks that their side is right, a lot of good people have their own reasons for participating in these conflicts and it always ends with a lot of innocent blood spilled and on both sides. I thought that this was close to perfect development of "from enemies to lovers" trope, I liked how not William nor Adam had any time to spend angsting about why they are attracted to each other. I mean, William spends some time (truly not too much) angsting but thats because he is attracted to the man he perceives as potential enemy initially, not because he is attracted to a man. And Adam is not a POV character, but when he speaks I also have not noticed that he has much angst to share about the fact that he is attracted to a man. In fact, while it mostly made a perfect sense for me - both men involved in a war in their respective positions and it seems that what is happening around them and how they are dealing with it is what they spent their time thinking about and love just happens because it happened and they take it, but while William seemed to always be bisexual, I was under impression that Adam was attracted to women all his life and while it is not said, I thought that it was possible that William was his first male lover. I dont know, wasnt he just a touch confused by that? Again, I am not complaining much, as I said, it makes sense to me that at times of war, men are ready to die at any given day (and Adam certainly is ready to die at any given day) and will take any joy and happiness that comes their way without much hesitation. I thought chemistry between them was raw and genuine, I loved how complex William was and how eventually he found his real loyalties and the older I get the more I agree that loyalty to the person you love is the most important one loyalty in the world. "Everything was complicated; Adam was simple" - so very true
