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poisonivy70's review
3.0
-Follow up to first book is pretty polar opposite. I definitely enjoyed the first book in this series, and Ms. Ashenden is an author whose work I like to pick up when I can, since she really has a way with her prose. She takes things down a darker path with this book which intrigued me. It’s a bit of a mixed bag, so here goes.
-Nero is an a-hole of biblical proportions at first. His complete and utter disregard for anyone’s feelings other than himself is tough to take. Like, I considered just putting this aside and saying screw it. I powered through but holy guacamole I wanted to throat punch him. This wouldn’t qualify as a safe read, and Nero crosses lines QUICKLY, like within their first scene together. He has no concept of inappropriate, and a barely there sense of right or wrong. It just made me uncomfortable. Deeper into the story is when we get to see his damaged heart and it helped. If it weren’t for the fact that he’s matched by Phoebe’s own dysfunctions, I’d probably have DNF’d it.
-Phoebe’s got her own issues. Her initial appearance as the proper, starchy British heroine gives way to this to be dominated and that’s when Nero’s jackassery was tolerable. Phoebe’s inner dialogues really helped to understand her sexual needs having been suppressed and subverted does make this erotic romance function to an extent. She spent too much time justifying a Nero’s a-hole behavior when she really didn’t know him and her calm self-possession was frustrating in the beginning. It’s when she started to push back and I got on board with this romance.
-The first third of this story was rough. As you can tell, my rating was affected greatly by that first part of the story. Her fiance, his lack of empathy, some questionable moments that I didn’t need a full description of, etc. It was a steep mountain of obstacles that this romance had to overcome to work, and honestly it felt like a slip ‘n slide for most of it. I can get down with a dysfunctional romance, but there wasn’t alot of fun in that dysfunction, and it wasn’t until late in the game that their relationship imbalance evened out and made the ride worth it.
The Bottom Line 3 stars
I struggled but I ended up liking it, because there are some intriguing themes of non-consent, domination and need to submit sexually. It’s just surrounded by alot of jackassery by Nero. I’m usually all about Jackie Ashenden’s writing, but this won’t be going on my faves list. However, if you’re into erotic romances with a jerk of a hero who eventually shows his heart, you may enjoy this more than I did.
**ARC provided by publisher via netgalley for review**
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