Your name, girl.
Tell me. Now.”
Fear flashed across her features.
“F-fucktoy,” she whispered tremulously.”
This book was very different from anything I’ve ever read in the past and I struggled with my rating because of it. I’m a big fan of Dark Romance and BDSM and I’ve read plenty of it, but this was a mix of a few things and yet…not.
Knight starts off with Smith’s POV during the FBI raid of a BDSM club. Being a Dominant himself, it’s not something that’s out of his normal routine, but what Smith finds there manages to test even his carefully mastered control and anger. Because among the the faceless bodies in that place, he sees her. A woman that is clearly a sub, but even more clear a victim…but of what, he doesn’t know yet.
The rest of the book gets told in her POV.
She knows herself only as slave. A woman so broken, she’s shattered, all at the hands of a monster that has put her through hell. Slave has suffered atrocities that are so painful, just the mere memory has the power to bring her to her knees. She doesn’t know the woman that she once was, she doesn’t remember her…nor does she want to. She’s no longer that woman. She’s buried that in the recess of her mind never to be accessed again.
I’ll be honest, the first 30% of so was very slow. It was difficult to read, and not because it was bad. Julia Sykes’ writing is captivating, and I enjoyed the way she painted a very vivid and painfully dark experience that Slave suffered. Slave is as broken as they come. Broken down to a mere shell of who she once was, she was as fragile as glass.
Smith knows that no medicine can help Slave in the state that she’s in. As a Dom, he knows the control and rules that she so desperately needs and clings to in order to maintain her fragile grasp on reality. So he takes it upon himself to give her that.
Julia Sykes did a fantastic job painting a very realistic picture of a woman that is beyond damaged. I understood her almost obsession and utter devotion to Smith.
I also enjoyed the progression that she goes through from Slave to a semblance of the woman she once was.
Although I wouldn’t call this a dark book, the things that Slave goes through were horrendous and not easy to digest. You have to prepare yourself since it’s no light read. However, it’s also not an action packed and high paced one. The progression is slow moving and slow building, which ultimately makes the story, yet also makes it difficult to get into right away.
Although slower paced that what I’d normally read, it managed to constantly keep me on my toes not knowing what would happen next. Julia manages to throw in some BAM moments that kept me guessing and on pins and needles almost afraid to see what would come next.
The overuse of endearments like “sweetheart” and “girl” did grate on me at times, but nothing that diminished my enjoyment. The love story is not an orthodox one, that’s for sure. What begins as as a clingy obsession turns into something much more eventually.
I really loved the way that the author build the heroine back up throughout the book. She goes from slave to her true identity in a very realistic way. This was not something that happened overnight and you feel that emotion and pain right along with her.
I can’t say that this is something I ever see myself going back to, but I did enjoy it. And I will definitely be continuing with the series as I’m invested in the story and very curious to see what the next book brings. Particularly with the “Mentor” still not caught.
Mainly told in Slave’s POV, the prologue and epilogue we do also get Smith.
**ARC courtesy of author in exchange for an honest review**
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