Reviews

Auctioned by Cara Dee

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This review is also posted on my blog.

This was a too dark for me and not really my cup of tea until the very end. The content in this novel was too much. I quickly skimmed through the first 15% (don't ask me why I kept reading), but I will say that the last 30% of this book is satisfying and everyone gets what they deserve. And it was really the last bit that saved the book for me and has me open to reading the rest of the books in this series (there's supposed to be a total of five). I somehow keep stumbling upon books with human trafficking topics in romance books for some reason. It's probably the flashy covers and Amazon advertisements to be honest and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

This book is...different. In a way. Yes, the "owner" is the love interest, but this is possibly the first time I've come across a book where the "owner" is actually a hired gun by the "slave's" family to bring him back home. The relationship is all a ruse. So that's a key difference and what puts this book in a murky grey area for me.

Trigger warnings for extremely graphic descriptions of physical abuse, sexual abuse, rape (mentioned), and torture of queer characters.

The book is very graphic, and unnecessarily so, I think. The story is about Gray, a guy who gets kidnapped off the streets and sold into a human trafficking ring that takes place on a ship out at sea. He gets sold at auction to the highest bidder - Darius. Gray has been through a lot at this point and it's been months since he was captured. Gray, understandably, doesn't trust Darius, especially not when Darius and Gray have to maintain appearances in front of the other people on board the ship.

This is where the story becomes a bit of a mindfuck because for a couple chapters you don't know if Darius can be trusted. The story is told entirely from Gray's POV and it's all mind games. Gray isn't in a good headspace after being put through hell and seeing stuff he never should have had to see. This definitely isn't the easiest book to read.

I don't know if you can call this a romance book. I think this book does end in a kind of HFN, but this is going to be a series with Gray and Darius for all the books in the series. However, the themes in this book are disturbing and gruesome and it's not really the right background for a romance, I think. Or at least, not for me. I really didn't care about whether or not Gray and Darius got together in this story, because the most important part was getting Gray off the ship. He had made friends along the way, or as much as one could make friends in that situation, and he wasn't going to leave the ship without saving all the other boys on the ship.

This story is intense and definitely isn't going to be for everyone. I like Gray, but Darius is still kind of a mystery to me. There's a lot about him and his past that we don't know about at this point. As long as the following books in this series aren't as dark or as disturbing as this one, I'll probably keep reading. I want to see Gray get home to his family, but it does seem like it's going to be a long journey for him before he makes it back home if there's four more books left. Hopefully, the rest will be somewhat lighter reads.

marlobo's review

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2.0

2.5 stars

tasnim_2000's review

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adventurous dark funny sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

jmross10's review

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challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

Not really my type of story due to the intense subject matter. However I was curious about overlap with The Game series. It’s good if you don’t mind confronting the harsh realities of the world in your reads. The romance, understandably, is slow and low key. So I wouldn’t depend on that being the thing to get you through.