A unique idea, strong characters, a fast pace and well written scenes made “Made To Be Broken” a pleasure to read and showed that Kelley Armstrong is just as good at writing about thoroughly human monsters as she is at writing about werewolves, witches and demons.

“Exit Strategy” introduced Nadia Stafford, a disgraced ex-cop who moonlights as a hitman to keep her wilderness lodge business open, tracking down a rogue hitman with the help of her mentor, Jack and Quinn, an FBI agent who occasionally kills the people he can’t convict. I enjoyed the book but it suffered from an “Episode One, Series One” feel.

“Made To Be Broken”, the second book in the series, has the same characters and the same moral ambiguity but much faster pace and a more interesting plot with more surprises in it, but what sold me on the book is that I finally got inside Nadia Stafford’s head.

In most books, Nadia would be the bad guy, and a fairly scary bad guy at that. In this book, Nadia is working to do something good, rescue a teenage employee of the wilderness lodge and her baby who seem to have been kidnapped, but her pursuit of justice is entirely outside the law.

Nadia is not a vigilante. She is more like a professional carpenter volunteering her time to a charity building project except that Nadia’s professional skill is tracking people down and executing them.

The book is character, rather than plot driven. We learn a lot more about the things in Nadia’s past that formed her. We see her able to relate emotionally to other killers but being able to pull the trigger and do her job without a moment’s hesitation. Kelley Armstrong evokes the emotions Nadia experiences, making her human without making her a hero.

There are no sharp edges in the this book. Nadia sometimes behaves in a way that screams pyschopath and yet is capable of great empathy and compassion. The good guys are all breaking the law. The violence of what Nadia does for a living is contrasted with the picture of her relaxing among friends and lovers.

The story resolves itself but Nadia remains a hitman and her relationships with the men in her life remain “unresolved”, setting up the final book in the trilogy, “Wild Justice”. ( )

This is the 2nd book in the Nadia Stafford trilogy. I didn’t enjoy this book quite as much as the first book in this series; I thought the pace was a lot slower and didn’t enjoy the mystery as much. However, it was still a very readable and engaging book.

In this book a young teen mother who has been helping Nadia at the lodge disappears. Everyone in town assumes that she ran away, but Nadia suspects a more sinister plot. It’s up to Nadia to figure out what really happened to this poor teen.

The mystery in this book was a lot more personal. Nadia takes on this case because of personal interest and because of events relating to Amy; her childhood friend who was murdered.

I felt like this plot was a bit too convoluted and drawn out for the mystery presented here, I also felt like the pacing was slow at points. That being said I still really enjoy Nadia, Jack, Evelyn and all the characters we meet in the first book. This series continues to be engaging, and the psychology of the characters is interesting.

Overall this is a great continuation of this series. I really enjoyed it, I plan on reading the final book and finishing up the series. I would recommend to those who enjoy murder mystery/thriller types of books with complex characters. ( )

Liked it overall -- but definitely didn't love it like I loved the first one in the series. I'll still read the third (whenever that's going to be) but I was a bit disappointed with this one. :( Unsatisfying cliffhanger ending. Some good moments, though. ( )

The next in the Nadia Stafford series. Nadia is a female “hit-person”. But she is not all bad! When one of her employees, a young teenage single mother, goes missing Nadia decides she needs to know what happened. This leads her down a road to a hit-man for adoption purposes. It was an interesting concept told in a very interesting and easy read. ( )

I really enjoyed this book. I love Nadia. She is great character. I think Evelyn drives me as crazy as she drives Nadia. Still. It a big fan of Quinn's. I love Jack. I have just one question, why does every book have to a love triangle in it? This book is not a romance in any shape or form and yet we have a love triangle. ( )