A review by amateur_bookworm
Leave Me Behind by K.M. Moronova

dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No

3.0

Leave Me Behind by K. M. Moronova is a dark romance and is the Probably Smut book box pick for March 2025. It’s centered around members of a dark/underground military. Trigger warnings abound for this one and I suggest you definitely review them before heading into this. 

Ok. Let’s talk about the setting and premise of this book. It’s about the dark forces military. What is that, you ask? It’s an underground subsection of the military that’s secret from the regular military, composed of individuals who committed heinous crimes and are put here instead of in prison, and they’re assigned to do the dirty work ops for which the government won’t publicly acknowledge responsibility. 

My copy came with a bookmark that said “Getting personally victimized by this book right now” and that’s a very accurate statement. I wanted to like this book. I tried really, really hard to like this book. But it just is not for me. I liked it less and less as it went on. Bully romance is not my jam and this is the second one I’ve read in a short period of time, so maybe that’s part of it. 

So, although, this is not MY cup of tea, I’m sure it is someone’s (a lot of someones, based on the Goodreads and StoryGraph overall ratings). So, let’s break down what I did like. I found the story to be engaging and read through it pretty quickly. The idea of the dark forces military is a good one. And I really wanted to sort out what really happened in Patagonia, which is the opening scene, so I was intrigued in that storyline. I also like that the author gave a warning upfront that some of the weapons and scenarios are highly unrealistic. That made me think of it as more of a fantasy book than a military romance and that helped a lot. There are definitely several twists in here that I did NOT see coming so I like that. 

Now, on to what I didn’t like. The characters aren’t likable. That makes it tough for me to enjoy it. There is some smut but it’s so brutal that it’s not anything I enjoy reading. And I know it’s supposed to be a dark romance, but I didn’t find any romance in here. But mostly, the plot took some turns that I just cannot get on board with. Also, there are several grammatical errors and some words whose meaning didn’t fit the sentence, making me think they are typos. 
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