Title: King Daniel
Series: The Lost and Founds: Book Six
Author: Edmond Manning
Publisher: Self-Published
Length: 225 Pages
Category: Gay Fiction, Romance
At a Glance: If you have not read this series, please do yourself a favor and do so as soon as possible. This is a journey you will not want to miss.
Reviewed By: Sammy
Blurb: After discovering a blog revealing a mighty tribe where “every man was the one true king and every woman was the one true queen…” thirty-five-year-old, unemployed Daniel realizes he’s tired of being a Lost King. He wants more. But more what?
His quest to uncover the secret will drag him beyond his comfortable seclusion, into the cornfields of DeKalb and thunderous, chaotic New York City. After a hotel hookup with a sensual Englishman, the murderous rage Daniel fought to repress is finally unleashed.
In the final story arc in The Lost and Founds series, Daniel faces the ultimate choice: what would you risk to become a Found King? His fate depends on a seedy escort named Fitch, benevolence from the mysterious king named DC, and love from the elusive Vin Vanbly, who may—or may not be—dead.
This is the end.
But is it the end for Daniel?
Review: Oh, dear reader, where to begin? King Daniel by Edmond Manning caps off an incredibly complex, frustrating, gorgeous, smart, powerful series that has kept me captivated from book one. This Lost and Founds series has followed one Vin Vanbly through some of the most unusual places, strangest activities and chaotic adventures one could imagine. Vin’s one mission in life was to find and bring home the lost kings of this world, men who were oftentimes broken down by the life handed to them, and who would have to be brought down even lower before realizing their own innate beauty and kingship.
In this last episode, we are unsure whether or not Vin is alive. Oh, we have an inkling, but the found kings are holding that truth close to their chests as we are introduced to Daniel, who is pursuing his own kingship even though he is quite certain he will never deserve it. Daniel has lived through a horrific life of physical and mental abuse at the hands of a man who should have loved him and been the father who would protect him. Instead, Daniel is now a permanent cripple due to his monster of a parent, and he bears the scars, both externally and internally, of his years spent in hell. The story that unfolds featuring this tormented, broken man is one that will test the limits of your patience. It will keep you slightly unhinged as you watch Daniel slowly unravel. You will begin to doubt your sanity just like Daniel does his own, as paranoia mounts and his anxiety increases. You will breathe deep in those few scattered moments of respite when a found king reaches out to Daniel only to end up drawing the noose around his neck that much tighter.
Finally, you will find out if Vin is indeed still alive, still kinging others, still the same manipulative, smartass, compassionate, loving rat bastard he has always been. And, in the end, you will see if Daniel crosses over—if he can accept being found, if he can endure the love that will be poured out on him, and if he can begin to accept that he was never deserving of the pain and anguish he was served daily as a child and teenager.
Daniel’s story nearly drove me mad. There were times when I swear I was as befuddled and confused as Daniel. This novel will reduce you to a blubbering mess, so much so that I had to stop reading for just a bit because I was overwhelmed by the sheer beauty of this lost king’s story. There is such an intense realness to this series of books. While it is hard to fathom the extent to which Vin must, and does, go to bring back his lost kings, there is never a moment that you don’t believe he is fully invested in reclaiming them.
This is the strength of Edmond Manning’s written word, the magical result of the many threads he weaves together to create amazing stories; stories that resonate with the tears, the love, and the pain this author must surely endure himself while carrying us through the life of those men he creates. I believe it is a given that in every novel you must be a willing participant to enter into the world an author creates. In Edmond Manning’s novels, you must give your heart and mind into his hands and trust he will treat them with respect and compassion. I can assure you he does, each and every time.
If there were enough descriptive words or phrases to describe how incredible this last book is, I would no doubt continue to wax prosaic. However, given my lack of imagination when it comes to sharing how greatly this book, this whole series, impacted me, I will leave this scant review with this last thought or two. What Daniel experiences is as foreign to me as is humanly possible, and yet, through the deft and masterful hand of Edmond Manning, I am able to step into Daniel’s world, share his pain, weep for and with him and then, blessedly, experience the emotions he has when that burden gets lifted. What this author does is remind us that we all carry scars of one sort or another and, if we can take just a moment to tap into that shared experience, we will find the lost king or queen within ourselves and others. For just a second or two, we can understand what it is to walk the path of another person and appreciate how hard their journey is, and see how it sometimes connects to our own. And that? That is beautiful, redemptive, inspiring and majestic.
It goes without saying that I highly recommend King Daniel. If you have not read this series, please do yourself a favor and do so as soon as possible. This is a journey you will not want to miss.
You can buy King Daniel here:
[zilla_button url=”http://authl.it/B077W2FVD4?d” style=”blue” size=”medium” type=”round” target=”_blank”] Amazon [/zilla_button][zilla_button url=”http://bit.ly/2EwyvId” style=”blue” size=”medium” type=”round” target=”_blank”] Barnes & Noble [/zilla_button]
The Novel Approach Reviews 
Leave a Reply