Hardcore Heroines

Evy Rivera gets home to find her jerk ex-boyfriend cleaned out most of her possessions, so she decides to live with her father for a while. She works in a bike shop, and seems like an ordinary, curvy Latina. Except…she has always felt strange in the presence of a thunderstorm and suddenly she realises she has a set of incredible powers. She’s the first ever female Lightning Rider, she can travel through time and wield lightning to use it against her worst enemies.

Ilif is Evy’s mentor, and is a great source of information. However, Ilif disapproves of Evy’s abilities, due to his ‘traditional’ *cough * sexist and chauvinistic *cough* views that women cannot be Lightning Riders. When Evy accidently travels to ancient Spain, she meets Penya, who also holds secrets about her. Suddenly, Evy’s not sure who she can trust. What she does know is that she needs to train her powers for a specific mission, and who better to help than sexy, Roman Constantine? As they train, Evy learns to manipulate her lightning as a weapon and fights her growing attraction with Constantine.

She was an interesting character to read, because she’s not the common ‘badass.’ I read a lot of badass characters—hello, my blog name is Hardcore Heroines—because I find strong, capable females compelling. Therefore, it was appealing to read about a different type of strong and capable, not just the generic, skinny Americans. Evy’s Latina, and strangely enough, you don’t get many Latina heroines. She’s curvy, hurrah, a real woman, because I’m assuming when Grayson says she’s ‘curvy’ she means breasts, hips, etc. She wasn’t just different because she’s Latina and curvy, she was different because despite knowing nothing of her capabilities, she forged ahead and learned to control her powers with a fun, sassy element.

At first I thought Evy was all talk and no walk, she seemed cocky, not badass! However, soon the novel picked up the pace and began introducing interesting new characters and I grew intrigued. Soon there were longer gaps when I stopped reading to do something else. Then, from the moment she landed herself in ancient Spain with Constantine, I was hooked.

Despite the initial cockiness, she soon proves she’s worth reading about. She’s sassy and for someone who goes out of their comfort zone and into a completely different era, she handles it more than well. Evy also had a vulnerability to her that made her more complex; being thrown suddenly into this world, she’s a little lost, but she squares her shoulders to fight for, effectively, the future. Evy was hilarious at times and sometimes reminded me of Bridget Jones with her few quirky antics. Namely involving a horse and a thong.

Constantine is a sexy Roman Warrior, who starts off very mysterious, and Greyson slowly reveals secrets from his past. He’s strong and he trained Evy whilst she discovered the full extent of her powers. They had a fiery relationship with sizzling sexual tension, he helps Evy grow as a person and train’s her to wield her powers, when he’s not even sure how to. I would have liked to read more training with her and Constantine, but I guess the matter was urgent, so they couldn’t dilly dally. Along with the Lightning Rider, I was given the first chapter of Shadow Boxer, the next book in the Lightning Rider series and I'm excited to see where this series leads.

It’s got sexual tension, sassy lines, a sexy Roman and a fresh storyline, I really enjoyed Lightning Rider and the world Greyson has created.