The Hunter’s Heart by Astrid Sharpe
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Poppy is a woman who lives a lonely and sometimes frustrating existence in the tower blocks of Summercotes in East London, she lives on her own since her mum dies the year before and spends the rest of her time in the fish and chip shop where she works, Franks Fries, but that all changes when she is kidnapped on her way home as someone grabs her from behind and injects her in the neck with a syringe. Zensah is a Relicai, he is the leader of their tribe and has had to make some hard decisions for them when a giant tsunami ravages the planet they live on, destroys their homes and kills most of their elderly, women and cubs, it is a devastating loss and he is going to meet with another race who have said that they are going to be bringing some female settlers with them next time they are there and whether there is room for them on his planet, he says yes and they agree to meet again.

The next thing Poppy knows is that she is waking up somewhere unknown, fully clothed with a headache worse than a hangover, the fully clothed part is a good thing, but when she opens her eyes and sees the bright light above her and a giant toad next to her, things get a bit surreal. The weird thing is that she can understand the language and when she sees the girl next to her getting some laser treatment in her eyes, she understands that the same thing must have happened to her. As she takes in more of her surroundings, she finds she is bound by some glowing yellow bands, which is why she cannot move, there are also four other women in the same situation, well at least she isn’t alone in her predicament. The next thing she knows is that the alien is reporting to someone else that they are ready to be presented to someone and that they need to be their best behaviour, but who to is just as startling, a group of five panther-men walk through the door and as they talk about being “settlers” the truth dawns on Poppy and the others, they are to be sold as “breeding slaves”. Since this is the last thing that they want, they plan their escape by screaming and using the frog people’s own weapons against them, however, the plan doesn’t go as expected and the next thing they know, they are having to escape again, this time down to the last planet they wanted to be on.

When Zensah boards the shuttle with his four best warriors to go and meet the new settlers on the ship, he is thinking about the decisions he has made since being chosen as the leader and he is doubting his abilities to do the job, especially when he sees his home planet from above. When they dock with the main ship and go and meet the new settlers, he soon finds out that they aren’t settlers at all, that they are not there of their own free will and that they are being sold to him for the crystals on his home planet, this doesn’t sit well at all with Zensah or his Relicai nature and so he refuses the trade, that is until it is mentioned that if they refuse, the females won’t be returned home, they will just be taken elsewhere, he is stunned and doesn’t know what to do. However, when the females make their escape bid, he sees something new in them and makes the split second decision to help them, however, the consequences of this are suddenly more drastic than he believes and when they return to his home planet, he knows that he owes it to this band of females to help them adjust to life on his planet.

He starts this by protecting the one who is with him called Poppy, taking her back to his village and then talking to the other females after that, however, this isn’t as simple a task as it seems when Poppy asks him to teach her survival skills on the way, he agrees and becomes a mentor to her as they travel. Will they be able to reach the tribe’s home territory and cross the wild landscape unscathed, or will their luck run out during their long journey? This is a dystopian adventure with aliens, humans, friendship and hardship throughout as these two people learn about life and working together as they draw you along this new path with them.

Reviewed by @roxsannel

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