Helpful Score: 4
I cannot emphasize this enough: this book is a nightmare. Do not read it. If you do, you will never ever stop regretting the money and time wasted. That you paid for and read this book will haunt you until the end of your days.
*SPOILERS, SPOILERS, SPOILERS*
It tricked me by starting out well, Honor seemed smart, tough, and likable and the initial setup unique and interesting. I couldn't imagine what she was thinking trying to incorporate ISIS into a romance novel (she renamed them A New Era, but they are obviously modeled after ISIS) but I thought maybe Maya Banks had finally resurrected the KGI series which frankly has been boring and forgettable for a while now. Maya Banks tricked me. I will never pay actual currency for any of her books again.
Hancock pursues her, knowing she will suffer a horrific months long torture and gang rape filled death and when he meets her and she seems tough and smart he only then feels sorry for her and explicitly says he wouldn't feel the same way because you know if she had acted like most women in a terrifying situation and trusted him too quickly she wouldn't be as sympathetic to him.
And thus begins HUNDREDS of pages explicitly laying out the unmitigated saint that women need to be to not deserve to be "sacrificed for the greater good". Honor is a caricature. Never thinking of herself, saving his teammates life, unstintingly brave and loving, why she not only tells him it's ok that he is giving her to men who will rape and torture her she OFFERS HIM SOLACE, COMFORT, AND HER VIRGINITY. But she needs to be the cartoon character of a perfect woman because only then will she maybe be worth saving - women are worthless pawns to ISIS - oh I mean Hancock ;)
He knowingly has unprotected sex with her while fully intending to give her (and his kid, but he doesn't care because his penis was hard) to men for months and months of rape and torture because he felt like it was worth the sacrifice. You want to know who else regularly turns a blind eye to the slaughter, torture, degradation of other people because they feel like it serves a good purpose? Terrorists. Terrorists do that. Hancock is a terrorist who didn't even change his mind about saving a woman he professes to love from suffering unbelievably until she spread her legs for him. Then and only then did he decide that she was worth saving.
The book ends with her convincing him (after he screwed up and got her tortured after all even after he got his dick wet and decided maybe she deserved to live after all) that she will always feel safe with him because he's such a "badass". Nothing says badass like blubbering your way through 400 pages about how you love this woman just not enough to protect her from rape and oh how sad you will be once she finally dies :( Oh and with a cringe inducing scene where he's scared of her getting pregnant again even though she had an ucomplicated birth the first time because he just wuvs her SO much. True wuv. The kind where he'll send you off for gang rape and electroshocks but feel so, so sad about it.
*SPOILERS, SPOILERS, SPOILERS*
It tricked me by starting out well, Honor seemed smart, tough, and likable and the initial setup unique and interesting. I couldn't imagine what she was thinking trying to incorporate ISIS into a romance novel (she renamed them A New Era, but they are obviously modeled after ISIS) but I thought maybe Maya Banks had finally resurrected the KGI series which frankly has been boring and forgettable for a while now. Maya Banks tricked me. I will never pay actual currency for any of her books again.
Hancock pursues her, knowing she will suffer a horrific months long torture and gang rape filled death and when he meets her and she seems tough and smart he only then feels sorry for her and explicitly says he wouldn't feel the same way because you know if she had acted like most women in a terrifying situation and trusted him too quickly she wouldn't be as sympathetic to him.
And thus begins HUNDREDS of pages explicitly laying out the unmitigated saint that women need to be to not deserve to be "sacrificed for the greater good". Honor is a caricature. Never thinking of herself, saving his teammates life, unstintingly brave and loving, why she not only tells him it's ok that he is giving her to men who will rape and torture her she OFFERS HIM SOLACE, COMFORT, AND HER VIRGINITY. But she needs to be the cartoon character of a perfect woman because only then will she maybe be worth saving - women are worthless pawns to ISIS - oh I mean Hancock ;)
He knowingly has unprotected sex with her while fully intending to give her (and his kid, but he doesn't care because his penis was hard) to men for months and months of rape and torture because he felt like it was worth the sacrifice. You want to know who else regularly turns a blind eye to the slaughter, torture, degradation of other people because they feel like it serves a good purpose? Terrorists. Terrorists do that. Hancock is a terrorist who didn't even change his mind about saving a woman he professes to love from suffering unbelievably until she spread her legs for him. Then and only then did he decide that she was worth saving.
The book ends with her convincing him (after he screwed up and got her tortured after all even after he got his dick wet and decided maybe she deserved to live after all) that she will always feel safe with him because he's such a "badass". Nothing says badass like blubbering your way through 400 pages about how you love this woman just not enough to protect her from rape and oh how sad you will be once she finally dies :( Oh and with a cringe inducing scene where he's scared of her getting pregnant again even though she had an ucomplicated birth the first time because he just wuvs her SO much. True wuv. The kind where he'll send you off for gang rape and electroshocks but feel so, so sad about it.
Helpful Score: 3
Amanda, I agree with you completely. This was soooooo badly written, it's hard to understand why anyone would even publish it. But you were too generous with your stars; it gets 1/2 star only because if I gave it no stars, someone might think I forgot to rate it. Pure garbage. Far-fetched storyline. Totally unbelievable characterizations. I can't think of one good thing to say about this book - it is horrible.
