Matt Callaghan is pretty sure he’s just an average guy. His tragic past haunts him, and the only comfort he finds is something he’s not willing to explain to anyone else. The jasper stone he found as a child had been with him for over half his life, and he can’t be parted from it.
There’s more to the stone than Matt knows. Thousands of years ago, one man, the last of his people, was cast into the stone, his soul protected when his body could not be saved.
The evil that hunted him is still alive, still waiting for a chance to destroy the jasper stone.
Reader advisory: This book contains scenes of violence and physical assault.
The premise for The Jasper Soul is a set up for a great story and the author delivered with the characters, but the world building was lacking for me. When you’re talking about paranormal worlds and a time traveling plot, the world building has to be tight from the beginning. The Jasper Soul started that way and quickly sucked me in the Matt’s world. Unfortunately, once all the characters were revealed the story lost its focus.
We first meet Matt, an average guy with a tragic past (that we don’t learn about for a while, but we know it’s there) getting by but not living his best life. After a near drowning when he was younger he found a jasper stone that has been his most prized possession throughout his life. He had no real reason to be so attached, but his draw to the stone was undeniable. I liked Matt a lot, he’s a sympathetic every-man with a fun sense of humor that kept him relatable when he could have been a depressing hot mess.
Matt’s connection with the stone becomes stronger when he meets the man whose soul resides there. Andulin’s people were slaughtered by Evil millenia ago and he’s been trapped in the stone every since. Basically there’s a bunch of magical shenanigans that happen and we learn about the gods and goddesses that are at the root of all the trouble that happened way back when. This is where the story lost me a bit. There are soooooo many gods and goddesses and then there are layers of them and holy cats, it was a lot.
The overcomplication of the backstory took away from Matt and Andulin’s time so I had trouble buying into their relationship as much as I wanted to. I could see why Andulin would be in love with Matt, he’d “known” him most of Matt’s life. But Matt doesn’t know Andulin from a magical rock, so the insta love was tough to believe. I would have loved to have more page time with them connecting and a healthy reduction in gods and goddesses that bickered their way through the story.
The Jasper Soul is an overall enjoyable read with likable MC’s and an interesting story arc. While it got in its own way a little too often, I still liked meeting Matt especially and his HEA was hard won and satisfying in the end.
**a copy of this story was provided for an honest review**
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