Tara West

This novel is exactly the kind of book I might have read in my twenties but positively avoid now. Screwed up characters whose lives are a mess and who drink too much yet are 'smart' and 'witty' in every line. Cliche. Cliche. Cliche. But.... (ssshhhh - don't tell anyone) .... I quite enjoyed it nonetheless.

The protagonist (and her sister) have each led messed up lives ever since their mother published a scathing book in which she spoke about how awful motherhood was and how she'd have been better aborting them. Now their mother has published a new book, and the sister is traumatised that that she's going to spill the beans in the memoir about her daughter's teenage son not being her husband's child as he thinks. As they desperately try to get their hands on a pre-copy of the book before it is released, acquaintances and issues from the past come to the fore that need mental closure in different ways.

3.5 stars - Would I recommend this? Most certainly not, but it was enjoyable, nonsense escapism for a few hours nonetheless.… (meer)

Series Info/Source: This is the first book in the Dragon Defenders series. I borrowed a copy of this audiobook from my library.

Audiobook Quality (3/5): This book was decently narrated although at points the narrator's thick accent made things a bit difficult to understand. The narration is a bit overly dramatic at times as well.

Story (2/5): This is basically a fantasy book with a reverse harem theme to it. It was okay but nothing special. The story is pretty thin and very simple. Much of the book is dedicated to long sex scenes and to be honest they aren't that well done or creative. There were some points I felt like Lydia is basically a chew toy being passed back and forth between all the men she "loves".

I kept waiting for the story to gain a bit more depth and it really doesn't. This also suffers from the whole trend where the bad guy is killed and then...surprise, surprise, he comes back so there can be another book! Also there were some weird things going on that didn't really make sense....I mean come on cursed feet???...just so that Lydia can constantly be carried and supported by her lovers??? Ugh.

Characters (1/5): The characters here are pretty one dimensional and shallow. Lydia is your typical “I am so super caring and wonderful I can make love to world” kind of heroine. She’s also supposed to be super powerful because she’s part fae, but then in most of the book she needs help to do anything. Her three male defenders are all your typical alpha males. One of the males Titus (sp??) is a bit more distinguished from the rest but the other two were fairly interchangeable. They are constantly trying to overpower Lydia’s decisions and protect her from herself and Lydia thinks it’s cute; mostly their relationship made me want to puke.

Setting (2/5): The setting could be interesting. It is mostly a generic fantasy setting but they end up at the northern border where dragons attack. There is a large twist at the end which hints at the setting being more intriguing in future books.

Writing Style (1/5): Many aspects of this are poorly done. The story is jerky and jumps around, the pacing is just very off. The dialogue between characters is cheesy and stilted sounding. While there was potential for an amazing epic fantasy type story here it ended up being a very simple good vs evil plot with very little complexity to it.

Sex scenes take up a very large portion of this story (maybe 30-40%). The sex scenes are poorly written with very little sensuality to them and very little creativity. Lydia is pretty much passed back and forth between her defenders multiple times in a scene and it gets to the point where it is almost nauseating. The language during the sex scenes alternates between more tender langauge and style that matches the tone of the world, to flat out crude sex talk that sounds like it fell into the book from our modern non-fantasy times.

My Summary (2/5): Overall this book was bad. I bumped it up to two stars because the narration of the audiobook was decent and the idea here could have been well executed if it had been filled out a bit more and just better done. This book needs some serious editing and the author needs to work on both creativity and description...and just developing better storytelling. If you are looking for bad smut with repetitive sex scenes and no story, look no further...this wasn’t for me...at all.… (meer)