Reviews with content warning for Animal death - Still Beating

Cora and Dean don't really like each other - which is a problem as he's about to marry her sister. But one night things go terribly awry when the two of them are kidnapped by a crazed serial killer and forced into unimaginable situations. If they managed to escape, life will never be the same again, and neither will they.

I mean....just no.

I've heard lots of great things about the book and the story premise definitely intrigued me as I was very interested to see how the author dealt with such dark and horrifying topics in her books but managed to make people root for the central love story at the same time.

This book is fine, I just don't think it's for me - and I think this mostly just came down to how the characters were written and how they all acted towards one another. There were certain descriptions of characters too that were clearly there to make readers dislike them - Earl was described as obese on a number of occasions, and this was suppose to make him appear more disgusting (other than the fact he was a rapist and a killer). I also genuinely felt like he seemed too stupid to get away with what he was doing for so long. His 'catches' didn't seem particularly thought out and I found it hard to believe that someone like him would get away with everything for so long.

Mandy, Cora's sister, is basically in the story to show how Cora 'isn't like other girls' if all the heavy descriptions of Mandy's perfect hair, red life and false lashes and nails were anything to go by. And god forbid she wear high heels to a family gathering in her parents, scandalous. I hate when authors do this - focus on a character's beauty regime to define them. Wear too much make-up and you're a slut but wear none and you make no effort - babes, this is called letting the patriarchy win and let's not do that.

The 'hate' between Dean and Cora was never believable as it's just sooo obvious they want to bone each other, and honestly if I had a friend or a sibling who acted in that way towards my long-term partner (and vice versa), I'd be asking serious questions and would not be comfortable around them at all. And also OF COURSE Dean actually saw Cora first all those years ago in school and wanted her before Mandy.

I would like to know how much research the author did into the trauma of sexual assault victims, and people who have gone through something traumatic and live with PTSD for this book, because I'm honestly not sure if it was a lot. It felt odd to me straight away that both Cora and Dean immediately went back to living alone following their ordeal - and while yes, we see Dean turn to alcohol and Cora to unconscious self-mutilation to manage anxiety - there were just many things that didn't stack up for me and therefore the book didn't feel realistic.

Not to mention how friends and family act - the parents were fine, just a little bit useless and absent to be honest but everything about Mandy's reactions to everything was awful. Let me count the ways - pressuring Dean to start being intimate again after only 6 weeks following the kidnap (and sure, they were only captured for 3 weeks during which her sister was raped on a daily occasion and Dean forced to watch and more but no big deal), and then pretty much not supporting her sister at all and when finding out the two have formed a bond and emotions (which honestly is not surprising), her acting out, talking about betrayal and being selfish is just beyond okay. She never seemed to actually care what had happened to her sister, and the type of assault she had suffered. Mandy obviously had the right to feel hurt but I just don't think someone who truly loves their sister would react in this way after everything.

This book has a lot of sexual content from the disturbing (at the start) to more steamy scenes involving emotions and chemistry (middle, end). However, I think because the scenes are the start were just so gross and hard to read, I could never believe in the sex they chose to have during the rest of the book. I couldn't figure out why the two of them wouldn't have had a mental block when it came to physical intimacy - particularly towards each other - following their ordeal.

I'm happy for anyone who enjoyed this book but not for me.

Content Warnings