Obsidian Prey is number 6 in the Harmony series, set on a human colony planet, 200 years after it was cut off from contact with Earth. The inhabitants have developed psychic powers, fostered by the psychic energy which emanates from the alien ruins around which every human settlement is based. And in the last few books, the author has also introduced some additional powers which do not depend on the mineral called amber, which most people use to focus their psychic energies. Continuing this theme, the hero is a descendant of one of the families who are part of the Arcane Society, and who came to Harmony as colonists, and uses the obsidian of the title as his focusing stone of choice. This book, in fact, makes explicit the connection between this series and the Arcane Society books, which had been eluded to in earlier books, especially the one preceding this.

As the story opens, Lyra is at loggerheads with Cruz Sweetwater, member of the powerful Sweetwater family. His family have been involved in the amber trade for genearations, and he heads up their security branch. Lyra has a grudge against the Sweetwaters, stemming from when her grandfather was supposedly swindled out of his amber mine in a poker game by Cruz's grandfather. Three months ago, she and Cruz were having an affair, but then she found out he was actually trying to find out the location of some alien ruins she had discovered. These ruins contained various artefacts made from the rare amethyst amber, with which Lyra, an amber tuner of great skill, has a particular affinity, and she had attracted Cruz's attention by trying to sell some of the artefacts on the black market. His parent company moved in and took the mine from her, as she refused to accept the compensation offered and instead started a law suit, which she has had to abandon due to lack of funds.

Cruz comes back into Lyra's life when five people become trapped in the ruins by an energy field, which only she, being an amethyst adept, can dispel. He confines in her that the 'accident' was deliberate - someone has stolen an amethyst artefact from the Sweetwater laboratories and murdered a lab tech in the process. He and Lyra join forces, albeit with a lot of friction, to find out who is committing the crimes and seemingly trying to frame Lyra. Meanwhile, Lyra has been dealing with her own issues, as she has been having strange distorted hallucinations and an unknown admirer has been sending her very expensive orchids.

This wouldn't be a Harmony novel without a cute dust bunny or two, and here we have Vincent who, in accordance with his name, turns out to be an artist. Lyra and a friend who runs a gallery have a mini scam going, selling Vincent's paintings without letting on that the reclusive artist is not human, something she justifies on the grounds that the law suit left her broke.

I liked the heroine in this novel because she works hard, with her hands, which is a bit of a change from the usual female protagonist businesswoman working in more refined professions. Lyra routinely goes into the catacombs and the underground jungle environment and explores, looking for amber. She has been raised by her grandfather which may explain part of the toughness of her character. I did find it a bit disconcerting at first to have a hero whose name is one letter away from sounding rather unfortunate, then worked out it was meant to be like Tom Cruz's surname and pronounced that way. As usual, we have a mixture of murder mystery, Harmony weirdness, a couple who have issues, and cute furry animals. A likeable 3-star read. ( )

In the sixth Harmony series book, Lyra Dore finds a remarkable amethyst ruin in the jungle. Instead of doing the legal thing and reporting the discovery to the local authorities, she decides to sell some priceless relics in the shady underground antiquities market. When her first client turns out to be an undercover agent in search of the ruin, she’s devastated because the client is also her boyfriend.
Cruz Sweetwater planned to use Lyra but never expected to fall in love with her. After he and his private security firm takes control of the ruin, she breaks up with him and unsuccessfully sues the company. When they reconnect a few months later, they have to team up to survive a frame-up and a mysterious stalker who’s determined to make Lyra his.
I couldn’t connect with Lyra and Cruz, and I didn’t feel any real romance or chemistry between them. In my opinion, Cruz did nothing wrong when he took the ruin from her except that he lied to get close to her. (Lyra didn’t have the money or the connections to properly research the ruin as needed, and she also wasn’t able to defend the ruin and herself from thieves and murderers who wanted to take it from her.) Cruz was able to do all that and more, and offered to pay her outrageously for the find. Unfortunately, she refused the money and stubbornly insisted throughout the course of the whole book that he “stole” the ruin from her. It really annoyed me. Cruz, however, foolishly thought she would forgive him because of their “connection” but never apologized for hurting her.
Lyra is portrayed as determined and strong-willed, but she cried too much and humiliated herself by shouting and screaming for no good reason. I also didn’t like the fact that everyone in Cruz’s family accused her of breaking Cruz’s heart. She did, but he broke her heart too. No one seemed to care about that.
The best part about this book is that the Sweetwater family from the Arcane Society series is back and that the Society is still thriving in secret on the planet of Harmony. Awesome!
The book could use a light edit to fix missing punctuation marks. I usually breeze over all the “he said” and “she said” taglines, and I really enjoyed the murder-mystery and theft part of the book. This is a good series and I recommend it, but this particular book just didn’t strike home for me.
3 Stars

Disclaimer – I bought this book for my own enjoyment. I am not paid or compensated in any way, shape, or form for this honest review. I will not change or alter this review for any reason unless at my discretion.
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Obsidian Prey
3 Stars

After the CEO of Amber, Inc. betrayed her trust and stole her claim to a cave containing rare amethyst ruins, Lyra Dore swore she would never believe him again. But Cruz Sweetwater needs her help and Lyra, once again, finds herself helpless to resist . . .

Unfortunately, Lyra and Cruz's second chances romance is rather lackluster. To begin with, Cruz's behavior was unacceptable and while he regrets his actions, it is clear that he would do it all again in a heartbeat. Moreover, Lyra is far too accepting of his excuses and goes from hating him to loving him much too quickly. Finally, the fated mates idea is underdeveloped and there really isn't much chemistry between them.

The suspense plot is too convoluted with the connection between the various events - thefts, attacks and hallucinations - remaining vague and amorphous until the very end. The identities of the villains are also obvious from the start and the big reveal scene is anti-climactic.

Overall, not one of the better books in the series. ( )

Love the Harmony series. As always there is suspense, danger, romance and the most wonderful of characters - the Dust Bunnies and their fun. ( )

A quick read. Nothing out of the usual for Krentz's book s in this series. But it's suspenseful, fun and I do like the dust bunnies. The characters are pretty standard and so is the plot. The villain was a little out there to believe it could have orchestrated anything but you have to suspend all disbelief in her books. The plots have no relationship to reality. But I read them nonetheless. ( )