DNF @ 85%. I could care less about the characters or their romance.
1st DNF attempt @ 19% then skimmed & skipped until 85% beca1.5-stars ***SPOILERS***
DNF @ 85%. I could care less about the characters or their romance.
1st DNF attempt @ 19% then skimmed & skipped until 85% because:
1. weak & unlikable characters Hero was beta & PC (politically correct). He made many alpha claims but pandered a lot to h. He kept giving h mixed messages, with his "I'm non-commital" but "no others, okay?". He also played games with her. He threatened to go home with another woman he met at the bar, if h didn't choose to go home with him. He also strung h along with his words of desire/affection followed by "right now" and "for now". For example, @59% when they've already been steadily dating, he told her that "Right now, the joy of my life is you." Such a romantic, this guy.
Heroine was mean-spirited and judgmental towards Hero, although she was nice & helpful with friends/family. She never even dated Hero back then in high school. Yet 11 years ago she keyed his car and put laxatives in his football team's donuts just to get back at him for cheating on her best friend(BFF) back then. Her BFF had no part of h's revenge scheme and had to tell h in the current time to let it go since that was 11 years ago. But h still held a lot of bitterness about her past. She secretly liked H even then but he admitted to not being attracted to her then & viewed her as a 3rd-wheel on his dates with her BFF. h also tended to get stuck in a rut. After she was caught cheating and lost her Princeton scholarship, she didn't pursue college at all and partied instead. And was on her way to alcoholism until her sister & her fiance died from the car accident linked to h's drunkenness.
2. HFN romance Such a boring and immature couple. Both were wishy-washy and fought like middle-schoolers. A divorce/break up wouldn't surprise me at all.
3. lacked S chemistry & emotional chemistry No zing. No feels from these 2. They got together due to physical promixity & convenience (i.e., their age, shared single-&-looking status, both lonely & wanted some companionship).
4. un-sexy sex scenes H's sex talk was cheesy. Since he kept reminding h about him being non-commital, his sex talk was insincere and seemed like stuff he probably said to his other lovers to try to turn them on. It was also unsexy that he kept asking h what she wanted and that he wouldn't do anything she didn't like. He was such a PC people-pleaser.
5. too much paleo-diet info as page-fillers
6. dialogue was juvenile and uninteresting Even their texting/sexting was meh. They were both trying to be flirty but it just fell flat.
Sexual History: 29yo h had 2 BFs/lovers before H. Both her ex-BFs were from the last 7 years. Before that, she was depressed and semi-alcoholic from drowning her sorrows from getting her Princeton scholarship taken away from her before she even attended Princeton for cheating on a high-school exam. Her dating life seemed to be lacking at that time too. It wasn't until her sister & her fiance died in a car accident linked to h's drunkenness that she quickly snapped out of her doldrums and began being responsible again. She got a job and took care of her niece and dated. She lived with her last BF & was with him for 3 years but broke up with him after he admitted to almost cheating on her. She'd been celibate for 1 year.
H was a player since high school. I think h's best friend was his 1st serious GF but he cheated on her with another girl from their school. He had another GF in grad school for 1 year but they broke up due to him not being really into her. In between his 2 GFs, he dated many women (including ones he met from dating apps) with clear condition that it was just casual sex. He was celibate for maybe 1 month before smexxing h....more
Finished it after almost-DNFing due to majorly NOT SAFE just from the Prologue (see below). BuUPDATE2 (Jan 12, 2022): 1.5-star (from 1-star yesterday)
Finished it after almost-DNFing due to majorly NOT SAFE just from the Prologue (see below). But continued to see how Zavarelli was going to transform the big negative bang from the 1st couple chapters to something romantic. Not well.
MEH or the BAD: ***SPOILERS*** Well, the big bang @ the start gradually fizzled to a cheesy & kinda pathetic romance @ the end. Their romance felt contrived and just dysfunctional overall. More codependency than love.
H was just like all the other men who used h. Except he married her & gave her some respectability as his wife. But he chose h to use as a pawn for revenge against his cheating fiance (who he actually was in love with) and to show his power to his general-boss. And, of course, for sex since he chose her based on a photo h's BFF gave him to help her find then-missing h. He knew she had a very messed-up childhood (i.e., her mom was mentally-ill & her paranoia made her lock h & her 2 younger siblings in their home, h's mom later killed herself after drowning h's 2 siblings in the bathtub & trying to do the same with h, h was raped by a foster dad, h became a runaway homeless at age 13 when her BFF rescued her from her molesting foster dad). He also obviously knew she was sex-trafficked for 1+ year. But he actually liked that she was so “emotionless” & “despondent, flat” & used to robotically obeying men as a sex-slave. So, the 1st sex scenes & H's POV of him getting turned on by emotionless h was cringe-y. He seemed like another man seeing & treating h as a sex-doll. Another user. The later sex scenes when h was more receptive & even initiating was better but lacking in love. Lacked sexual chemistry & emotional depth. The only emotions there were between H&h were messed-up codependency and lust. Both used sex as an escape & release from their pent-up psychological issues. Not sexy or romantic.
Really sad that h was so needy for love due to her childhood. She acknowledged using sex to connect to a man and hoped it became more. It was sad to see her put her hope (again) on H, after being so hurt by her ex-BF for selling her to the sex-traffickers 1 year ago. Her words & hopes for love from H just seemed pathetic. She succumbed to major bouts of depression every time H would distance himself from her. Especially the many months he confined her to another bedroom when she was preggo for believing that she betrayed him (i.e., sex videos of her during her captivity were sent to H's flashdrive from h's computer). Good thing she was preggo so gave her another reason to live than just H's affections. So, the romance on h's part was out of her neediness & H was just the next man to promise her but ended up using her for his ends. Book ended with him getting proof from his ex-fiance & sabotaging dad that it was them who sent him h's sex videos through h's computer. Only then did he feel bad for imprisoning & avoiding his preggo-wife h for months (probably 6 months) & grieved her death since he was told that she & their unborn son died during a car chase. She easily relented & asked for H right after she gave birth to their baby because she was jealous of her BFF who had her husband lovingly beside her when she delivered their baby and h wanted that too. Even though H had so cruelly betrayed her & treated her like other men in her life. So, HFN.
Also didn't like that h's repeated suicidal & self-mutilation attempts during the 1st month of her living in H's mansion just went away after H&h started smexxing. Yes, he did add pain to their smexxing to give h a more increased orgasm & to help her with her pain-pleasure conditioning. But still not realistic that good sex/orgasms/H marrying her & promising to protect her was enough to stop her suicidal attempts/thoughts & dissociative tendencies. No therapy needed. Plus H's promises to protect her didn't prove true as he himself imprisoned her & left her open several times to being threatened by her ex-BF & open to being captured again.
And, oh yeah, h blamed her BFF for adding to her problems. Her BFF (book1's h) who spent 1 year agonizing over h's being missing & continually went to the police for help & got herself in trouble with the Irish mafia just so she can get info on where h could be & who involved. h refused to call her BFF, when she was already safe. Even though it was her BFF who asked H for help to find h. h had the audacity to lecture her BFF on judging her & whatnot towards the end. Again, blaming her awesome BFF. h was also jealous that her BFF got together with her old boss & that he was so devoted to h. What an ungrateful/self-pitying/blaming/jealous h was as a friend!
The GOOD: Writing was smooth & fast-paced. Unpredictable plot in 1st 60%.
Sexual History: h molested as a young teen by her foster dad. She used sex to connect to man & had a BF for 1 year (who she really liked & who gave her similar feelings like with H) before he sold her to sex-traffickers. Then, multiple faceless men for 1+ years of being a sex-slave. ...............................................................................
UPDATE1 (Jan 11, 2022): 1-star Was going to DNF @ 12%. But I started skipping pages today since I wanted to figure out who the H was since I didn't know why he'd bother rescuing h, who he knew was being sex-trafficked & they didn't know each other before this.
Plus I gave it a night to get my supreme ouch-iness of h's rape out of my system. Feeling a little braver today.
So, I'm not ready to give up on it after all. ;-]
BUT it's definitely NOT SAFE!!!!
I have the Boston Underworld: The Collection: Books 1-3 (6-in-1) so I just kept reading after finishing book2. This book 3's Prologue hit me with h being fooled by her BF-of-1-month to think he's taken her to a nice vacation. Only to be punched to unconsciousness by him & then, waking up all drugged up & being raped by 2 men & then her BF too. And then a whole host of fuzzy drug-induced memories of other men lined up to smex her.
Yuck! Ouch! Rape by multiple men for more than 1 yr of sex slavery before Chapter 1, when H appears & rescues her....more
Final book5 of Systematic Siege series. Could probably skip the 1st 4 books (maybe read book1 for brief romance intro) and just read this book. Not saFinal book5 of Systematic Siege series. Could probably skip the 1st 4 books (maybe read book1 for brief romance intro) and just read this book. Not safe (rape by h by others, cheating of h with H, H&h sex after/during killing). This is a full-length novel & not a bunch of novellas like books 1-4. Reads more like romantic suspense.
3.5-stars
The GOOD: ***SPOILERS*** Tightly-written & straightforward, giving us all the relevant details that were danced around books#1-4. Good emotionality. Lots of angst (i.e., h regretting not asking H re: the sex video 7 years ago, h's regret @ trusting the wrong people, H's years-long & desperate search for h so he can explain re: his false confession & to just to be with her). Also gritty from H&h's vengeful satisfaction at seeing their enemies die & tortured @ their hands. Good detailed sex scenes with H&h FINALLY(!) having sex by 9% of this book. Some might be put off by H&h's smexxing right after their kills. Or, in 1 instance, while H's ex-GF lay dying while watching H&h smex.
Good character development. This book tightens H&h's loose/iffy characterization in books#1-4. Getting details of their past really helped with this. Both H&h went from normal hormonal & not-so-savvy teens to calculating & computer-hacking vigilantes who loved & killed for each other. h transformed from helpless & clueless 18yo to a blood-thirsty vengeful & controlled 25yo lead computer-coder & nanotech inventor. H's grew into the calculating & vengeful 25yo man from bottoming out from his suicide attempts with alcoholism + drug-use due to his desperation to find h & blaming himself for her leaving him & likely hating him from what she thought he did 7 years ago.
Loved H's OTT stalkery obsession with h & the lengths he went to find her, forsaking his mental & physical health and finances. He spent 2 years hacking into various computers to find her whereabouts & waiting for her to contact him while becoming alcoholic & then doing drugs later to fill her absence in his life. He later attempted suicide 2x, after he concluded that she must hate for him what she thought he did to her. Also loved his OTT protective-possessive jealous “mine” claims over her.
MEH or the BAD: Timeline in this book is inconsistent with books 1-4 (i.e., books 1-2 states that H was 19yo when he started drugs & then went to rehab 6 months later after his 1st suicide attempt with his car crash but book5 states that H was 21yo). Thus, somewhat confusing if you keep track of exact time of events. HATED detailed rape scenes with OM & OM2! But both got their painful comeuppance they deserved at the end at the hands of H&h. Didn't like nor did it make sense that H went back to manhoing after his 2nd suicide attempt, when he realized that he wasn't giving up on h.
Sexual History: h was still a virgin when H1st kissed & the oraled her. BUT she was devirginized via rape by H's friend OM 3 years later, after pretending to be her friend. OM blackmailed her for subsequent sex the next 4.5 years to keep her mom (who he'd injuected with a virus) alive. She often fought him & he'd beat her up for it. Her 2nd lover was a co-worker who she had sex only 1x just to see if she can have non-rape sex. h's 3rd lover was from rape by OM2. H became h's 4th lover. H was a manho in high school & cheated on his then-GF who also chated on himmany times. H became celibate for about 2.5 years after the night with h. Then, after his 2nd suicide attempt during his drug/alchol-rehab, he manhoed the next 4 years after he realizing that h likely hated him if she ran from him again when he found her location & stopped looking for her then. Sex became his new addiction....more
Slow burn. H was too clingy & whiny with h as well as very impulsive & emotionally immature. H did grow up more by book2 but not enough. Meh pacing & Slow burn. H was too clingy & whiny with h as well as very impulsive & emotionally immature. H did grow up more by book2 but not enough. Meh pacing & romance. H was about as obsessed with his ex-GF who he forgave multiple times for cheating on him and still wanted to marry her and she her bareback to get her preggo at her request....more
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