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mandylovesbooks 's review for:
Savage Blooms
by S.T. Gibson
This is a spoiler free review, assuming you have a basic understanding on what this book is about based on the summary or the author’s Instagram. If you want to be completely blind going into this, don’t read ahead.
Two American best friends travel to Scotland to uncover a mystery. They do try and investigate but mostly they just have a lot of sex with the two people they meet in a mysterious old manor house.
Adam’s grandfather told him spooky stories growing up and now he’s looking for answers. Adam spends the book with a constant boner over everything and anything.
Nicola is his best friend, and is probably the only person in this book with any sense of logic or reason. She is suspicious of everything that’s going on but ignores most of the warning signs because she wants to fuck everyone so badly.
Eileen is aloof and very erotic and loves being pinned down and hurt during sex. Even though she’s a sub, she spends most of this book controlling everyone around her.
Finley is a brooding Scottish man who spends a lot of his time being cranky and sexy and making everyone around him very horny.
This book has very heavy kink themes. It’s handled in a very consensual and respectful way, with negotiated safe words and careful communication.
They all want to fuck each other all the time while being very jealous of the other people who want to fuck each other all the time which leads to some pretty toxic situations. But there are also sweet moments of being happy for each other so that’s nice.
Between the riding crops, group sex, role play games, and lots of drinking, there is an actual plot in this book and it’s BRILLIANT. I was so intrigued the whole time I was reading this and couldn’t wait to get to the next little clue that was fed to me along the way. Honestly I’d happily read a book just about this plot without all the smut. However, it was pretty good smut too.
I would have liked more gay sex, as they are all clearly bisexual. Though in the authors defence, I can’t imagine how hard and time consuming it is to write each character with THREE different romances while also trying to progress the plot. Trying to give every character time with each other, and also in various combinations and groups, so that everyone has sex with each other in fairly equal amounts, would be very difficult to balance. I’m hoping in the sequel there will be more gay sex scenes!
Overall, I adored this book. The cliffhanger at the end had me ready to throw it at a wall because I can’t believe the book isn’t even out yet so it will likely be YEARS until I find out what happens next.
TLDR: if you’re into lots of polyamorous sex and kink, with a sprinkling of mystery and supernatural intrigue, this is the book for you.
TRIGGER WARNINGS BELOW CONTAIN MILD SPOILERS:
The CNC scene between Nicola and Finley might be a bit triggering for some people as there are a lot of descriptions of Nicola running away and trying to fight him off, which can feel very real and off putting. But her inner monologue assures you that she’s very into this so keep that in mind if you find it distressing.
I’ll also give a trigger warning for kind of incest. They’re not blood related, but it might still be confronting so tread carefully if incest is a trigger for you.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Incest, Alcohol