Leopard Lord

by Alanna Morland

Summary from GoodReads

Romantic fantasy at its best--from an exciting new voice in the genre! The successor to the barony of Leopard's Gard has made a wicked deal with the dark god, and now he must choose between the lives of his countrymen--and the woman he loves.

Thoughts on the Book

This book is a re-read for me.  It's been sitting on my bookshelf begging for me to pick it up again.  It's one of my favorite books, and Varian was featured in one of my Top Ten Tuesdays not that long ago.

My Review

This book is about Varian, who is a baron, a were-leopard (snow leopard to be exact), and bound to the dark god.  He makes a deal with the god to give him his wife - as a virgin - so he can free his people from the god's cruelty.

I think Varian is the reason why I love this book so much.  He's such a great person.  His father is completely awful, but Varian inherited his mother's kindness.  He really cares about his people and does all he can to make them better.  He despises slavery and keeps his word to his best friend, his body slave Corven, about freeing him within an hour of becoming baron.  Varian does the best he can for his people to make the barony prosperous, to fairly judge crimes, to make his people as safe as possible.  After an incident caused by the dark lord which killed his friend's new husband Varian snaps and makes the deal to give his future wife to the dark lord to free his people.  But true to form, Varian begins to care too deeply for his wife, Cathlin, and struggles to come to terms with sacrificing her for the good of his people.  The book ends when Varian finally comes to terms with everything he's done and decides to make the ultimate sacrifice to save his people and Cathlin both.

The one part of the book that didn't sit quite right with me was the missing girls from the village.  When they came back into the story the seemed totally unaffected by what had happened to them.  Which was completely traumatizing, there should have been PTSD like whoa.  Either the women of Leopard Gard are made of some serious stuff, or what happened to them is pretty common in the barony.  Which we were led to believe Varian has zero tolerance for...Although I suppose they all grew up with Varian's father as baron, so it was pretty standard for him.  Sorry about the vague I'm trying to not give spoilers and their fate was pretty shocking.

I give this a 9/10.  It really stands up to rereading years later.