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A review by amandaventure
Black and Blue by Gena Showalter
5.0
FINALLY! This is the Gena Showalter that I fell in love with. I never got around to reading this when it originally came out since it a lot of Gena’s books were feeling phoned in around that time period. She was going through some pretty heavy stuff and it showed. But I couldn’t just abandon this wonderful author. I still stuck by her and kept reading her books. I’m really glad I finally got back into this series and finally read Black and Blue.
This pretty much had all the things I want a book to have.
Action? Check.
Likeable characters? Check.
Funny? Check.
Steamy? Check.
Sci-fi? Check.
Our leads are Evie Black and Corbin Blue. (Get it… their names are the title? It’s a PUN! Ha!) I really enjoyed that both of them had an emotional depth to them as well as a backbone. Neither were one to wallow in self-pity and neither one needed rescuing. No damsels in distress here. Only kick ass heroes coming to save their friend and the day. Their banter was pretty great and always had a dash of humor to keep things a bit light hearted considering they were up against some really dark stuff.
As for the nitty gritty technical aspects of how the novel was written, I don’t really have a lot of complaints. The pacing was on pointe. It never felt dull and the action didn’t droop even in the slower parts. There was always something there to drive the story forward. That being said, I felt the ending was actually a bit rushed. It just all of a sudden wrapped everything up. I think it could have maybe handled an extra chapter or two just to have it feel a bit more complete as its own story. It gave me the sense that I would need to read John’s book to finally wrap everything up. I mean, I definitely still want to read John’s book anyway but it would have been great if this had wrapped up a few more loose ends. Also, considering John’s book doesn’t even have a release date nor have I really ever heard anything about it so it makes me nervous that I may never get the answers I’m looking for. It just didn’t feel over with Tyson Star. It just feels a little cliff hanger-y without an actual cliff hanger.
Overall, I really enjoyed Black and Blue. It was action packed and kept me wanting to read further just to know what was going to happen next. It had a real palpable sense of suspense. The characters were smart, funny, capable, and just generally likeable which helped to sell the story quite a bit. The steam factor was super high here. O wow! Definitely some good smut for your reading pleasure here. This was a fun read and I’m actually kind of bummed that there isn’t already another book on deck with this series and I’ll have to wait for more. Sigh… So is life for a book nerd.
This pretty much had all the things I want a book to have.
Action? Check.
Likeable characters? Check.
Funny? Check.
Steamy? Check.
Sci-fi? Check.
Our leads are Evie Black and Corbin Blue. (Get it… their names are the title? It’s a PUN! Ha!) I really enjoyed that both of them had an emotional depth to them as well as a backbone. Neither were one to wallow in self-pity and neither one needed rescuing. No damsels in distress here. Only kick ass heroes coming to save their friend and the day. Their banter was pretty great and always had a dash of humor to keep things a bit light hearted considering they were up against some really dark stuff.
As for the nitty gritty technical aspects of how the novel was written, I don’t really have a lot of complaints. The pacing was on pointe. It never felt dull and the action didn’t droop even in the slower parts. There was always something there to drive the story forward. That being said, I felt the ending was actually a bit rushed. It just all of a sudden wrapped everything up. I think it could have maybe handled an extra chapter or two just to have it feel a bit more complete as its own story. It gave me the sense that I would need to read John’s book to finally wrap everything up. I mean, I definitely still want to read John’s book anyway but it would have been great if this had wrapped up a few more loose ends. Also, considering John’s book doesn’t even have a release date nor have I really ever heard anything about it so it makes me nervous that I may never get the answers I’m looking for. It just didn’t feel over with Tyson Star. It just feels a little cliff hanger-y without an actual cliff hanger.
Overall, I really enjoyed Black and Blue. It was action packed and kept me wanting to read further just to know what was going to happen next. It had a real palpable sense of suspense. The characters were smart, funny, capable, and just generally likeable which helped to sell the story quite a bit. The steam factor was super high here. O wow! Definitely some good smut for your reading pleasure here. This was a fun read and I’m actually kind of bummed that there isn’t already another book on deck with this series and I’ll have to wait for more. Sigh… So is life for a book nerd.