A review by redbeanm0chi
Ice Planet Barbarians by Ruby Dixon

3.0

I truly anticipated this book to be trash and I’m… pleasantly surprised. It’s a little diet version avatar-ish with the big blue aliens with tails, but the book genuinely had some interesting world elements that I hope the author explores more in later books.

I was not a fan of the rape-y vibes from the love interest alien species even though the explanation is that their culture is different.
(I mean the first time the main couple met, Vektal went down on her while she was unconscious and it made me a tiny tiny bit uncomfortable).
Luckily Vektal improves pretty soon after. One of the side characters is also raped by another alien species of screen early in the book, so generally expect some uncomfortable and downright disgusting situations around the abducting of the girls.

The characters were okay (Liz owns my heart) and the world building actually had some interesting stuff with for example the khui and the metlaks. Plot wise I wish we’d gotten more from the whole alien abduction thing cause they seemed like a big threat and then they were gone. The ending in general felt so rushed, I didn’t actually realise that the book had ended.

It gets a spice rating of 3.5. There are loads of explicit sex scenes in the book, but they are all very vanilla and fluffy. They also get a bit repetitive after a while, which often is the consequence of having so many of them hanging on a pretty eventless plot. The sex does end in a pregnancy and it’s mentioned pretty early, so keep that in mind if you want to read the book.

Also, I appreciate a doting and loving partner, but it started to feel a bit like “resonance partners have to do whatever their partner says and they cannot refuse each other ever”, and I was not a great fan of that. I’m worried characters will disappear into their relationships.

Lastly, I basically fell in love with the author after reading the authors note, so I hope she enjoys writing as many more of the books as she wants.

Not sure if I’ll be reading the sequel, but I don’t regret reading the first book at all!
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