Rachael Orman

Flawed by Rachael Orman
Source: Netgalley
My Rating: 4½/5 stars
My Review:

Julia and Garrison have a quite wonderful if unconventional marriage. Julia earns a living as both a school teacher and a domme. Clearly, one job knows nothing about the other  For Garrison’s part, he works as a detective which offers Julia a measure of comfort should she ever have an issue with one of her clients. Thankfully, Julia is quite good at her job so she rarely has a problem keeping her clients in line.

While it might seem like a most unusual arrangement, Julia and Garrison have made not just a success of their marriage but one filled with love, tenderness, caring, and some delightfully naughty sexual encounters. In her professional life, Julia is the dominant partner but in her private life, Garrison takes control. As if things weren’t spicy enough, from time to time, Julia and Garrison invite a third party into their bed and it’s always a man which appeals to Garrison’s bisexual nature. Until Keaton, Julia and Garrison have never considered asking a third party to become a more permanent fixture in their lives, but then, no one else has been quite like Keaton.

Keaton is a seriously badass lawyer with a reputation for being a shark in the courtroom. He often works with Garrison on cases and of late, the two have become quite worried over an unsolved string of murders. In his private life, Keaton is far less dominant which is precisely how he met Julia. Though it takes a bit of time - and at least one seriously uncomfortable moment - for everyone to figure out they all know each other and are completely attracted to one another. While it may seem like Flawed is nothing more than three hot people coming together and having some fantastic sex, recall I mentioned a string of unsolved murders. What I failed to mention is just how close to home those murders are going to get.

As Garrison and Keaton work diligently toward a break in the case, any break, Julia is working toward thinning out her client list in preparation for the upcoming school year. Trouble is, Julia’s clients tend to get attached to her and one becomes particularly attached, Julia is in real trouble. In fact, at just about the same time as Julia is finding out what a terrible situation she is in, Keaton and Garrison are on the way to help her. The situation goes far beyond serious to life threatening which only serves to strengthen the bond between Julia and her men.

The Bottom Line: I sort of expected Flawed to be a well-written down and dirty read about three pretty people coming together. What I got was a well-written down and dirty read that had a dark and twisted side as an added bonus. The darkness only added to the intensity of the read and the naughty bits, between anyone and everyone were quite fine. At the end of the day, Orman put together a read that has a little bit of everything.… (meer)

(dnf at 15%)

I vented a little on twitter about this novel, that should tell you enough. But because I don't want to make you search through my twitter to learn what exactly made me dnf, I'll state it here as well (well, of course I do).

First thing I noticed was the writing. Missing words, typos and on one occasion the two main male characters were mixed up. But I would have struggled through, even if I had to stay very focused on reading and read some sentences more than one. (Seriously, this has to be edited sooo much.)

And then came that one scene when I thought to myself "fuck this".

"The man had gotten up balls to hit on me, which was surprising if he was submissive. However, if he truly was submissive, the fact that he'd gone against his nature for me was that much more attractive." ~kindle pos. 376

Because submissives always wait to be hit on and they can't possible do it themselves. It's not in their nature. Sure.

There were some things, I did enjoy about this novel. The dynamic between the three main characters seems to be very interesting (the little I read about it) and the bdsm scenes were interesting as well. But after that thing I just quoted? They could be the very best I've ever read and I would have dnfed.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you.… (meer)

My first book by this author.

I believe I originally got this book because it was mentioned as being free in that Dark Erotica group I’m in. So, if so, I’ll mention that up front – this is not a Dark Erotica book (at least by my understanding of the terms). Though it is an erotic book. And a book filled with BDSM. There’s bondage, a bondage club, spankings, whippings, domination, submission, a mix of sadism and masochism, some comments about ‘pain slut’, some bit of orgasm control/denial, the use of chains, the use of cuffs, and blindfolds, and a bit of forced exposure (inside a bondage club, while blindfolded and therefore uncertain how many might be there); and finally a bit of romance between two sex addicts. The kind of romance that can occur while one keeps their identity a secret (hence the use of a blindfold).

As the book description starts off (at the moment on GoodReads) “My name is Alix and I am addicted to sex.” This isn’t a pose or anything like that. She’s gone to therapy. She’s a sex addict. Not someone who thinks they might be or could be. The kind who can’t stop herself from masturbating at the drop of need. Though, after the therapy, she’s been able to fight her cravings. Until recently.

Alix works as a concierge at a hotel. While in her position she has a view of the hotel lobby. This is important because her ability to fight her cravings has collapsed under the assault of a hotel visitor, who she eventually learned is named John. John’s crime? Existing. Something about him has caused Alix to lose her control. And by lose control, I don’t mean that she day dreams about him, then in the safety of her own apartment . . . handles things. By ‘lose control, I mean that she masturbates. There. At her desk. While looking at him. That kind of lose control.

Naturally, in a situation like this the thing to do is allow your coworker, the hotel receptionist (hmm, what is that position called again? Gah), to talk you into going to an exclusive club. Alix reluctantly agrees. Whereupon it turns out that this exclusive club is a bondage club. The friend is both fascinated and horrified – some petrified like deer in headlights. Alix is some mixture of that, but mostly aroused. To the point of needing to use the restroom. To play with herself. Then stand in the hallway outside and continue (if I recall correctly, been a while since that part of the book). Not that night but eventually, she meets a man whole will become her Master. That man happened to witness her actions. And had previously seen her at the hotel. That man is none other than . . . Santa Claus. Who is always watching you. Be naughty or nice. Wait, no, it's . . . John.

That guy who I mentioned above *waves vaguely upwards*, John? I’ve forgotten what his specific background is, but he has a distinctive British accent. Which I mention because, after a certain event, hell I’ll just say it. After becoming Alix’s master, he never attempts to talk to Alix while Alix knows him as John (that’s awkwardly phrased, I know, while in the mode of Master, Alix wears a blindfold and the room is kept darkish when she isn’t; when not in the mode of Master . . . John continues his never actually talking with Alix, now with the added risk that if he did, his distinctive accent would immediately give him away). So.

John keeps stopping by the hotel, not because he really likes hotel lobbies, flirty receptionists (desk attendants? Desk managers? Bloody hell, can’t remember what they are called), nor specifically because of Alix. But because he lives there. And, occasionally, uses one of the hotel rooms for work. For he is a sex therapist. The kind who helps couples who are in need of help. With sex. He, no longer, allows himself to be involved directly – at least no more directly than being in the same room.

Alix doesn’t believe she can have a real relationship (romantic or otherwise, i.e. friends) because of her sex addiction. John won’t allow himself to have a relationship because of the nature of whom and what he is. He has had too much experience with those who freak out about his job; and/or turn out to be inadequate submissives (that was mentioned, I forget now how). Yet both are drawn to the other. They complement each other’s needs and desires. The book follows this couple as they move from strangers to vaguely couple like status.

I must have hated this book, right? I mean, I started reading the book on the 20th. No, not 11 days ago. The 20th of November. And completed it on the 31st of December. Six weeks. 42 days. 1008 hours. 60,480 minutes. 11.51% of 2015. If you are familiar with my reading style then you might know why I am belaboring the amount of time taken to read this book. If not, then not. It’s simple. I have on occasion read 3 books on the same day. Though that’s stretching things and likely the first book had been started the night before, and all three are super short, but it’s been done. Books not short stories. Toss in short stories and the numbers go up. It’s a book of only 217 pages. It shouldn’t have taken this long to read, right? Well, no not right. I always take longer with certain books. Nonfiction. Wordy fiction. Erotica that is book length. I read them, at least erotica, in short chunks. Meaning that I didn’t read, or need 1008 hours to read the book. At least not in terms of amount of actual reading time.

Okay, that was a boring paragraph above. I only meant to note that it took me a while to read this but it was my own choice and not a reflection of the book itself. It was a clean well written book without anything that pushed me out, caused me issues, or otherwise ‘deserved’ to look like a ‘problem book’.

I liked the book. I’m not 100% certain I like John, but he was ‘livable’. I liked Alix though she was kind of down on herself. Straight forward BDSM novel. There’s no non-consent or dubious consent moments. Heck, John kept up a steady stream of comments, dropping them here and there, to reassure Alix, and himself, that everything was okay (I’m making that specific aspect seem worse than I mean). Certain boundaries are pushed, but with great care. There are only, really, two negatives.

First negative (One) - after being so concerned with how Alix was reacting to everything, and wanting to make sure she didn’t flee or anything like that, dragging her out into the bondage club, while blindfolded, and wearing only panties without first determining if that might or might not be an issue was vaguely confusing. In that he seemed determined to make sure everything else ‘worked’. To just drag her out there seemed out of character. Granted, I only thought of this specific negative after I started thinking about the book as a BDSM novel. At the time I probably thought of it, but it wasn’t really much of an issue. She didn’t panic, nor find herself in a situation she didn’t know how to get out of or anything like that. So it was all good. And stuff.

Second negative (Two) – this is a much more important negative. I’ve mentioned before that John works as a sex therapist. I mentioned use of hotel rooms. Apparently he also has an office (not important), and also works as an online (anonymous) consultant. At some point, Alix begins to use the service (and will continue to do so throughout the book). I forget now how John knew immediately that it was Alix, but he knew immediately. Despite both using code names as online handles. This initial online consultation isn’t the issue necessarily. He knew of her, had seen her, but had never interacted with her in any way before this initial online interaction. No, it was later, when she continued to use the service. And he continued ‘handling’ her. After they became an item. That’s . . . unethical and super creepy. And that’s not even considering the part where Alix didn’t know who her online doctor was, nor that she actually knew him.

Despite those two negatives, which I noticed in passing but didn’t actually and really get annoyed about, I enjoyed the book. I’m not exactly sure what could be in a second book. Though know that there’s both a prequel and a sequel to this book here. I’ll probably read another book by Rachael Orman but not sure I’ll read the sequel.

In terms of ratings – somewhere along the way I had a system. At some point I broke the system and started thinking of ratings in terms of deducting ½ or full stars for certain things. I’m sure I overrated (and/or underrated) books in the past during my brief run of insanity. Well, I was using a baseline of 5. ‘There’s nothing bad about it, so I’ll give it a five’. I don’t think any book actually crept into the five star slot because of that, but some probably got overrated because I’d fallen into that trap. No, I start with three, as ‘average’ and deduct or add as needed. In theory. Mostly I just wing it. Like now. I liked the book. Roughly 4.5 much. So . . . I deem this book 4.5 stars! Or something.

ETA: oh right, I just thought of something of a negative I forgot to mention. John kept calling Alix his Precious. And capitalized it. It was . . . . giggle-worthy. In that John kept turning into Gollum in my mind.



December 31 2015… (meer)