The Savage King: A Dragon Lords Story

Lords of the Var, Book 1

By: Michelle M. Pillow

Narrated by: Michael Ferraiuolo

Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins

Publisher's summary

"To be ruled by a woman is to be ruled by weakness and kingdoms are only as strong as their rulers. A king must stand alone, beholden to none." - King Attor of the Var

Agent Ulyssa Payne is on a mission. It's her job to make sure the Medical Mafia leader doesn't leave the planet of Qurilixen. But, when her target is killed by his own daughter, her mission is over. Now, she's stuck on a barbarian planet for three months until the Agency comes to get her.

Getting kidnapped by King Attor, she's left in the Var harem to await his return. But, when the King dies in battle and doesn't come for her, she's stuck dealing with his son, the new savage King of the Var. This is one complication Ulyssa didn't need.

A royal complication.

The Var Princes were raised by a hard man who put no stock in love - especially love with one woman. Bred to never take a life mate, these men will do everything in their power to live up to the dead King Attor's expectations and never fall in love.

Kirill is a man who must do his duty, only he didn't expect to do it so soon. When his father dies, he knows it's his destiny to be king. What he didn't expect is the troublesome mistress that's now his to deal with.

©2013 The Raven Books LLC (P)2016 The Raven Books LLC

Loved the book... And the cover..

I can’t say I’ve read too many “other” planet books but the ones I’ve read I’ve enjoyed. This one is no different. My only complaint, and I can’t believe I’m going to say this, is that there was too much sex. According to “Jane’s Data” (another reviewer) there were 7 sex scenes and they took up 29 pages. That’s way too much for a 228 page book. When there’s that much sex that’s when I start skimming, and that’s never a good thing. Ms. Pillow is a good writer but she needs to concentrate more on the story and less on the sex. Of the 7 sex scenes I read 2 of them, and by then I’d had enough and zipped right over the rest.

Other than that it was a good book. I especially liked the part where Ulyssa took her first bath ever. She was used to a decontaminator, not an actual a water bath. Her reaction to it after she’d been in it a while was hysterical, and scared Kirill half to death. It was all pretty funny.

I liked the mess Kirill’s mind was in, thanks to his father’s teachings. Wow, I was sure dear-old-dad was dead when the story started. Him never showing Ulyssa any affection in public did get annoying but he did have to un-learn all that his father had crammed into Kirill’s brain his whole life. It was nice watching him slowly come awake, in how to treat the one you love.

I liked his brothers, too, but I liked Falke the best. He was the biggest and the blandest of the lot.

As mentioned before there was LOTS of sex, and he!! and da*n was used a very few times and the F-bomb was let lose 1 time.

As to the narrator: He was terrific. He really, really laughed when the book called for it. He whispered, groaned, sniffed when Ulyssa was crying. He was simply superb when it came to his wide variety of emotions. Every single man had his own voice and the women couldn’t have sounded more feminine if they’d been done by a female narrator.

Loved this story!!

I really loved this story!! This is my first book by Michelle M. Pillow and will not be the last! I couldn't put it down and tried to hear the whole thing in just one day! The minute that I finished it, I turned back around and started it over. DO NOT MISS this amazing series by Michelle M. Pillow! The narration by Michael Ferraiuolo was great!

Pretty darn steamy..characters were likable!

Would you listen to The Savage King: A Dragon Lords Story again? Why?

So, I listened to The Savage King: Lords of the Var, not sure why it says A Dragon Lords Story. It was a fun easy listen. Great while driving to work. I liked all the characters too. No one was an ass.

What other book might you compare The Savage King: A Dragon Lords Story to and why?

it's pretty unique, at least for me. I don't normally read other planet books.

Which scene was your favorite?

All the two main character scenes! They were fun and playful.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Sure, but I didn't.

Best one yet!!

Best book yet! Awesome narrator also!! Can't wait for the next one in this series

The What King?

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

To make this book a 4-5 star listening experience the author must throw out 85% of this story and rewrite it with NO sex scenes. There was no story to this novel at all.

This is the second intergalactic-ish story I've read this month. Much to my surprise. I thought this would be just your average run of the mill fantasy novel with Dragons. Instead, we get something of an intergalactic CIA story where I main character finds her mission aborted/terminated at the very beginning of the story and ends up stranded on the planet for 3 months. She's then kidnapped by the King who dies and ends up with the King's son. We then spend the next 80% of this book listening to them have sex. They don't know each other, they never get to know each other. There may have been one conversation where they tried to learn about one another, I don't remember, because all I remember is one person always becoming distracted and then off with the sex-a-ton again.

Nothing was as it seemed with this story. We start off under the impression that Ulyssa is this badass, independent, and strong agent, but she quickly succumbs to whimpering and near crying the first time she encounters a shifter. All will to fight and defend herself goes out the window. She basically spends the rest of the novel a slave to her own sexual desires. Now Kirill wasn't so bad. He certainty wasn't a savage, so I don't know why the title is Savage King. He also isn't a Dragon Lord. He isn't a Dragon at all. We meet 4 dragon lords later in the story. They were there for about the last 20% of the story, never as dragons and all mated already, so I don't see a story for them coming in the near future. And to make matters worse, Kirill didn't even pick her to begin with. The attraction was there, but he originally chose another women.

Here's the thing, if Pillow would have focused on Ulyssa's mission from start to finish instead of the last 20% of the story, as well as introduce us to how the Human Intelligence Agency was founded, the different nuances of these intergalactic alliances, etc...that would have been better. There's so much to work with when it comes to intergalactic travel. You can probably much do anything within reason and no one can say it's wrong. You can build new worlds, cultures and customs. Ulyssa and Kirill could have worked together and let that sexual chemistry build as they teased and taunted and fought. And, if Pillow introduced that old Lord and his son as antagonist, they should have been Antagonist. They showed up 1 time, simply for the Ulyssa and Kirill could have something to fight about.

I really hated this story. I sat at work all day very annoyed. The only time I was interested in this story was when it looked like Ulyssa was finally going to focus on her mission, but when it turned back into a soap opera, I gave up and stewed in annoyance for the remainder of the story

Michael Ferriuolo didn't do too bad. But I'm pretty sure Kirill's accent changed quite a few times.

1 star.

Would you ever listen to anything by Michelle M. Pillow again?

I want to say no, but I'm a bit of a masochist when it comes to books. I want to read a good intergalactic story.

How could the performance have been better?

Maybe Ferriuolo shouldn't have choose that very distinct accent for Kirill. He and his brothers all sounded different. No two were similar, which is strange considering they grew up in the same castle.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from The Savage King: A Dragon Lords Story?

All of it. Just cut all of it.

Any additional comments?

If you like stereotypical sex scenes that won't even give you a blip, read this. If you like books that confuse sex with courtship and romance, read this. If you like stories with no plots, read this. If you like a story with your story, don't read this.

captivating

Couldn't stop listening!! Ready to move through the series immediately! I loved the way the characters came to life. I'm sure people driving by me were concerned for me. I kept catching myself making faces to match the characters' emotions!!!

Absolutely Fabulous Book

Would you consider the audio edition of The Savage King: A Dragon Lords Story to be better than the print version?

I love listening to the audio edition book. The reader Michael Ferraiuolo's voice is sexy as sin. I love that they need to lean to trust each other in order to find happiness. I enjoy all of Michelle's book but this one by far i my favor it!!!!!

Which character – as performed by Michael Ferraiuolo – was your favorite?

The new King Krill and Agent Ulyssa

No government would send an agent this STUPID!

Any agent of any kind worth their salt would learn something about the country, culture, and civilizations he/she might be going into and try to blend in. Instead, this woman is completely ignorant of the species and their mores, and, instead of pausing in various situations to analyze what might be the best way to handle it, she immediately challenges everyone she encounters, panics, runs, and makes idiotic assumptions about those with whom she is having to deal. The fact the male is attracted to her is completely unbelievable. Making the - uh - heroine - THIS stupid in order to move the plot is just plain sloppy plotting and lazy writing, which is not characteristic of Ms. Pillow's writing in, for example, her MacGregor books.

I am really disappointed in this book, which means I will not buy any more of this series. I can't even finish this one. Because I loved the Warlock: MacGregor books - at least the first 2 - I will sample other series but will be on the lookout for similar egregious choices in character and plot development.

Var-y Good

This was my first sci fi shifter story, and I really enjoyed it. I hadn't read the Dragon Lords series first, but I felt like this book was able to stand alone. It had great world building, and I enjoyed the cultural differences between the characters. I loved the humor at the end over the use of the word property.

I loved the Var prince brothers and look forward to the stories about the rest of the brothers. I liked Ulyssa for the most part, but there were moments when she came off as childish or TSTL. She redeemed herself in most cases, though. I especially liked how her relationship with Falke developed.

The narrator did a great job with all the different male characters, giving each a different tone and accent, making it easy to tell who's speaking. However, I didn't enjoy his rendition of the women's voices. Like so many male narrators, his female voices are a bit whiny, especially over time.

I couldn't push through the whole book

I've never hated a protagonist more than I hated Ulyssa.
I feel like the writer wanted to make Ulyssa into a strong, independent and intelligent woman but failed. Instead, I found her to be extremely rude, weak, emotionally unstable and probably the worst agent in history.
She doesn't posses any exceptional abilities or qualities to make up for her shortcomings and this made it impossible for me to like her.

It's really sad because I enjoyed the story otherwise and I really liked all the rest of the characters. But in the end Ulyssa Paine got to my nerves so badly I just couldn't push through the story anymore.