Knight of a Trillion Stars (Matrix of Destiny #1) in Alpha Heroes & Spitfire Heroines

Jul 11, 2008 MelissaB rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2010-reads, paranormal-romance

Deana was having a really bad day - she was fired from her job, she sat in something funny and her car is parked in by an accident. While she waits for her car, she goes to a nearby pawn shop and buys a random necklace that she thinks is junk. The necklace is actually a Shimalee, a magical necklace that brings Lorgan ta'al Krue across time and universes to her side. The sexy blonde alien with purple eyes shows up in Deana's living room where he proceeds to tell her that he will now protect her. Deana was having a really bad day - she was fired from her job, she sat in something funny and her car is parked in by an accident. While she waits for her car, she goes to a nearby pawn shop and buys a random necklace that she thinks is junk. The necklace is actually a Shimalee, a magical necklace that brings Lorgan ta'al Krue across time and universes to her side. The sexy blonde alien with purple eyes shows up in Deana's living room where he proceeds to tell her that he will now protect her. She thinks he is a sci fi fan sent to her as a joke by her friends but soon realizes he really is an alien.

Lorgan sticks by her side as she goes to a sci fi convention then randomly takes her trough a travel portal to his home universe to continue his quest as a Knight of the Charl to find who or what is messing with the fabric of his home world. Lorgan recognized Deana (or Adeena as her calls her) as his fated wife since she wore the Shimalee. He married her (without her knowledge) then sets out to seduce the very reluctant Deana. Lorgan is very determined to win Deana over, so he puts his considerable focus on loving her senseless. Deana tries to resist but Lorgan is one sexy and dominant man who overwhelms her in bed.

Deana tries to adjust to the alien world she is thrust into but she stubbornly refuses to contemplate staying. Lorgan has no intention of returning her to the strange world she came from because she is the woman he has waited for, so he lets her think she is going home so she has more time to adjust. While they are dealing with Deana's stubborness, they are also trying to fulfill the quest they were sent on by Lorgin's mentor Yaniff along with Lorgin's sexy-as-hell brother Rejar. But will Deana chose a life in a new universe with Lorgin? Or will she continue being too stubborn to realize what a great man Lorgin is and that he really wants her?

Dara Joy is a good story teller. These books were written way before the current paranormal craze and are pretty imaginative. The hero Lorgan ta'al Krue is so sexy and hot plus he is a strong, dependable man with a dominant streak (yum). I am not quite sure what he saw in the cranky Deana who stubbornly refused to see how she felt about him and his depth of caring for her. I liked how he just ignored why she said and showed her how she couldn't live without him (mainly by loving her senseless time and time again). Deana did annoy me often but not enough to ruin the story. I got a kick out of how Lorgin and Rejar used her stubborness and attitude to make jokes at her expense - hey she asked for it.

Rejar is featured considerably in this book so I am excited to read his story, he is one sensuous and sexy Familiar. Traed was introduced in this one but I am annoyed because we never get to see his story because Dara Joy went a little nuts awhile ago and never wrote his story.

So overall, the story was interesting and the hero is very sexy. The heroine is annoying but I could put up with her because Lorgin was great plus he had no trouble taking on her stubborness. The humor in the book is a little too slapstick and dated for me sometimes but there were a couple funny parts. I liked Mine to Take (book 3) better than this one because it has a nice heroine but it was nice to see the background story of the characters in this book. ...more

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Aug 20, 2012 Lisa Kay rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: genre-romance-sci-fi, to-ponder, m-audible-dot-com, authors-d, authors-j, series-m, character-female-j, character-female-d, character-male-l, character-male-k

Rating: ★★★1/2☆ (This is a review of the audiobook.) Nicely narrated by Rebecca Cook, who delivers the tongue-in-cheek dialogue well. I haven't heard her read before, but I've already searched to see what else she has narrated.

As far as story, I have mixed feelings about this one. Some parts were fun and definitely entertaining. Also, the world building was well done, as were the secondary characters. In fact, the secondary characters were so well written, it is hard for me to pick a favorite. H ...more

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Mar 26, 2008 Julie (jjmachshev) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: long-ago-reads

This is one of those books I have reread until I ended up buying another copy!
Lorgin is a Charl Knight trying to track down the source of some time stream troubles and ends up on Deanna's doorstep. She thinks he's just some wacko her friends sent as she is planning to go to a sci/fi convention. Lorgin won't let her out of his sight, so she drags the sexy alien along to the convention. Scenes from Lorgin at the convention are wet-your-pants hilarious and scenes from Lorgin and Deana making love a ...more

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Jun 22, 2009 Julianna rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-2013, sci-fi-romance

Reviewed for THC Reviews
Knight of a Trillion Stars was my second read by Dara Joy and the first in her Matrix of Destiny series. Having read and loved her stand-alone historical romance, Tonight or Never, I was really looking forward to this novel, and for the most part, I'm happy to say it lived up to my expectations. When I finished the book, I was left somewhat undecided as to how to rate it, but eventually settled on four stars. I thoroughly enjoyed most of the story, but there were a few we Reviewed for THC Reviews
Knight of a Trillion Stars was my second read by Dara Joy and the first in her Matrix of Destiny series. Having read and loved her stand-alone historical romance, Tonight or Never, I was really looking forward to this novel, and for the most part, I'm happy to say it lived up to my expectations. When I finished the book, I was left somewhat undecided as to how to rate it, but eventually settled on four stars. I thoroughly enjoyed most of the story, but there were a few weakness, enough that I didn't feel it was quite worthy of keeper status. However, Knight of a Trillion Stars was definitely a solid four stars, perhaps even a tad higher. Overall, a delightful read that was quite steamy for the 1990's when it was first published.

When the story opens, everything is going wrong in Deana's life. She was laid off from her job, sat in something nasty on the train, and then was trapped in a parking lot when two other vehicles were involved in an accident behind her car. While waiting for the accident to be cleared away, she goes into a junk shop to browse and ends up buying an unusual necklace. She finally arrives home to find a gorgeous stranger in her apartment who claims to be from another world and who insists on being her protector. As it happens Deana is a sci-fi geek who is on her way to a convention in San Francisco, which I think made her a lot more accepting of the idea of Lorgin being from another planet. Of course, that doesn't stop her from being frightened and stubborn when he unexpectedly takes her to his world. I could hardly blame her though, given that she was practically “kidnapped” and taken to outer space, but she does start to warm up to the idea gradually. Although Deana slowly beings to accept a relationship with Lorgin and decides to enjoy it while she can, she adamantly refuses to entertain the fact that he views her as his wife and that he intends for her to stay with him in his world. This is where I thought the author could have dug a little deeper with her characterization. I felt like Deana's reasons for not believing Lorgin truly wanted her as his mate were lacking in clarity. It took most of the story for me to figure out that part of it was rooted in self-esteem issues and part of it was that she stubbornly believed that she was not the woman destined for Lorgin (ie. He had made a mistake). This being the case, it took until the final pages of the book for her to finally embrace her destiny, and it came about without any particularly deep introspection on the matter. Deana and Lorgin also had a few too many misunderstandings based on misinterpreting each other's language and culture, which could be funny at times, but once Deana had her translator implant, it seemed to me that she shouldn't have had as much of an issue with the language barrier. Also, I felt like she should have been asking more questions. Oftentimes, she would start questioning Lorgin, but when he gave her a muddled answer, she would simply stop. If I were her, I would have asked as many questions as it took to fully understand what was happening. Overall, though, Deana was a nice heroine who was pretty relatable if a tad obtuse at times.

In the beginning, Lorgin is an arrogant alpha which isn't my favorite type of hero. In much the same way that Deana should have been asking more questions, I felt that Lorgin should have been more understanding of Deana being a “foreigner” in his strange land who wasn't familiar with the customs and culture. He should have taken the time to explain what was going on and gently coax her into accepting certain things and doing what was necessary for her safety. Instead, he basically compels her into many things, including getting the translator implant and making love the first time which made me rather uncomfortable. In particular, he should have explained the Transference ritual, which among other things, bonded her to him for life, instead of performing the ritual without her full understanding of it. However, despite being a little miffed with him about these things, I can't deny that later in the story he lightened up on the uber-alpha act and transformed into a kind, loving, gentle hero who was a seductive and sensuous lover. I adored how the men from his planet are trained from an early age to weave their wives' hair, and when he did this for Deana it was so sweet, a beautiful way of marking her as his.

The secondary characters were wonderful too. Yaniff is a wise old mystic who reminded me of Gandalf or Dumbledore with a side of Yoda thrown in for good measure. He is Lorgin's mentor and a good friend to all of them. I have to admit that I'm already half in love with Lorgin's brother, Rejar, and his childhood friend, Traed. Rejar is a shape-shifter, known in his world as a Familiar. He has an extremely sensuous nature which essentially makes him a man slut, but I loved him anyway for his charming ways. The story ends on a bit of a cliffhanger for him, but he becomes the hero of the next book in the series, Rejar. I'll be interested to see how one woman manages to tame him. Traed intrigued me almost from the moment he was introduced. He harbors a painful past with a father who abused him. He's a classic tortured hero, and I'd love to read his story. I thought perhaps his would be the third book in the series, but alas, I was wrong. Unfortunately, it also looks like I may never know what happens to him. Due to Dara Joy's hotly contested dispute with her former publisher, Traed's book was never written and sadly might not ever be. Even if it was, I'm not sure I would read it, because it appears that Ms. Joy's more recent self-published offerings are lacking in the quality of her earlier traditionally published books.

Besides the slight deficiencies in characterizations, there were two other things that bothered me a bit about Knight of a Trillion Stars. First, was the author's penchant for head-hopping which could be a little distracting but not as bad as I've read in similar novels. The other was the overall plot of Lorgin being on a quest that is typical to many fantasy-type novels. The problem wasn't so much the quest itself, but the fact that the reader isn't exactly made privy to all the reasons for his quest and how all the pieces of the puzzle fit together until very late in the story. We learn that Traed's father, a dark wizard, is causing trouble in some vague unknown location on the edge of their world and that Lorgin will presumably have to do something about it, but I felt like the author took a little too long to state what the ultimate objective was. This being the case, my interest occasionally waned slightly, but I did enjoy all the adventures the characters embarked upon while getting there. Once Lorgin got over his hot-headed alpha phase, the romance was tender and swoon-worthy with lots of steamy, sensuous love scenes. Overall, Knight of a Trillion Stars was a very enjoyable story that has left me eagerly looking forward to continuing the series soon. ...more

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