A review by taylasfootnotes
The Eraser by Brooke Summers

dark emotional tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

As Mafia romance centred books go, this did not hit the mark for me. Not only was there few moments of actual Mafia activity, most of this story was filled with muddled prose, unnecessary time jumps and characters that felt non-dimensional. 

Yes, there were moments of tenderness between Stephan and Jessica, but those were severely overshadowed by copious amounts of info dumping that served no real purpose to the story. Not to mention that the opening chapters of this book were extremely confusing
with Stephen just happening on a 5 year-old birthday party and being invited in and also punching the birthday boy without reprimand? I knew this was going to be a disjointed, unbelievable journey.
To add further confusion, Jessica is introduced and the reader is hit with “what importance does this character have?”, especially when a lot of emphasis on Stephen and Callie’s friendship is continuously mentioned. 

It should also be noted that this book is violent for no other reason than to be violent. There are horrific scenes of domestic violence with graphic torture of the FMC. These scenes felt disjointed and that they were there for shock value and not to develop the story. It is a universal rule that mafia children and women are not to be touched and if they are, hell is brought upon the person who decided an early death. 

Overall this had all the ingredients to be great but the assembly was left raw. I was left uncaring about the characters. The ending was cliche, as was the romance between Jessica (18) and Stephen (mid-thirties). 
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