Chokehold by Leigh Rivers & Harleigh Beck Review

This review contains minor spoilers - no major plot points are revealed. Please read trigger warnings - reader discretion is advised.

Blaise and Cole - two stepbrothers who cannot seem to stand one another - find themselves in a most peculiar scenario when a game of Chase at a party leads to a scandalous encounter between the two in the woods. This honestly reminded me a little bit of the initiation scenes from the Legacy of Gods series by Rina Kent - I would definitely say that it was much more elevated in this book, especially considering what happens between Blaise and Cole in that initial game of Chase. The authors waste no time introducing readers to our two leading men and make it abundantly clear they do not like each other one bit - or so they think. I was really in the mood for a juicy hate to love book and this certainly did not disappoint when it came to that element.

You can see that Cole and Blaise fall into a natural categorization of "older, more tortured" brother and "younger, more prioritized" brother when it came to how Blaise's father viewed them. Blaise's father simply sees Cole as a nuisance stepchild that he has to tolerate, whereas he somewhat pampers Blaise - at least to the extent where he thinks he is taking care of him - even when we see him as more of a neglectful father. Even when he is "taking care of" Blaise, you can tell he does not give it his all, especially when he uses all of his time blaming Cole for everything under the sun that goes wrong or disrupts their lives.

The dynamic between Blaise and Cole is definitely not for the weak or light of heart - we literally see them beat each other up multiple times and take things to the extreme when they want to get their way with each other. If you are a fan of The Ritual and The Sinner by Shantel Tessier, this book is well up your alley in terms of pushing the limits to the extreme. You have to be in the mindset to walk into books like these knowing that there is going to be some seriously triggering content. If you are prepared for that form of intensity, then you will not be able to put this book down. Just when you think things could not get any more wild, suddenly they are chasing each other around town and swinging bats like nobody's business.

Juicy, juicy, juicy spicy scenes that put a lot of books I have read to shame when it comes to making my eyes bug out of my skull. This may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it certainly kept me locked in and had my jaw on the floor for the vast majority of the book. The fact that it is a taboo romance makes it all the more enticing and while some of the plot points were all over the place, it kept me entertained enough that once I started, I could not stop.

The side characters added enough to the plot to continue to drive the story forward, but for the life of me I could not stand Allie and Mia - they were annoying and only provided more issues for both Cole and Blaise as the story went on. I understand what the authors were trying to do with their characters, but my god, every single time they popped up on the page I wanted to throw the book across the room. I guess their presence served their purpose considering the authors truly were able to make me despise them, along with a select few other characters that seemed to have it out for Blaise and Cole for one-sided reasons.

If you are looking for a raunchy, taboo romance to make your blood pressure rise, Chokehold may be calling your name. I know for certain that it has taken me out of my reading slump and thrown me right back into the dark romance scene.

You can add Chokehold on Goodreads now, and follow the authors to stay up to date on releases and publications.

You can catch up with me and my current reads by friending me on Goodreads and following this blog, my Twitter (X), and my Instagram in order to stay up-to-date with any reviews, blog tours, and more!

Conclave (Devil's Night, #3.5) by Penelope Douglas Review

This review contains spoilers - please read with discretion. You can read my reviews of Corrupt, Hideaway, and Kill Switch on my blog, now!

Like an addiction you cannot kick, I cannot seem to stop reading these books, no matter how many brain cells I continue to lose. I always expect a different outcome and yet I am continuously shown that these books are nowhere near the hype everyone gives them. I truly wish the case was different, because I can definitely see the potential in these characters and their stories, but unfortunately they do not hit the mark.

We see Damon and Winter mostly in Part 1 with Rika and Michael taking more center stage in Part 2 in this novella. Of the three installments that I had read, these two pairings are my least favorite, which only indicates how I was going to feel when reading these updates to their stories. I will never forgive Damon for the way he treated Rika and the extremes he took in terrorizing her in Corrupt and the relationship between him and Winter will never sit right with me. Michael is probably second worst to Damon and the fact that he spent so much of his time tormenting Rika in their book and now I am being tortured with their relationship drama.

Damon wants Winter to have eight hundred children and is dead serious when he asks the doctor how long until Winter can get pregnant again after literally pushing a child out of herself mere moments prior. I hate men. Meanwhile Rika is hiding the fact that she has a very high probability of never being able to conceive from Michael, and therefore putting off their wedding for as long as she can... a match made in heaven, apparently. The boys basically spend the entire novella crying over the fact that Will is not there with them instead of focusing on their own relationships. Might as well be dating Will and dumping their wives/girlfriends at this point.

The smut once again is as underwhelming as ever - which is a shame considering the smut in Credence was diabolically addictive if my memory serves true (Uncle Jake, I miss you...). Thankfully there are only two more installments to go and then I will be free from this prison that this series currently holds me captive in. I really do not like to yuck anyone's yum, but unless Douglas manages to truly do a 180 with the next book, I fear these remain lackluster in my eyes.

You can add Conclave on Goodreads now, and follow the author to stay up to date on releases and publications.

You can catch up with me and my current reads by friending me on Goodreads and following this blog, my Twitter (X), and my Instagram in order to stay up-to-date with any reviews, blog tours, and more!

Dark Rise (Dark Rise, #1) by C.S. Pacat Review

This is a spoiler-free review! You can read my reviews of C.S. Pacat's Captive Prince trilogy -Captive Prince, Prince's Gambit, and Kings Rising on Goodreads, now!

As a lover of the Captive Prince trilogy, I was excited to dive into a new world by Pacat. I do not think I was aware that this series was young adult, as I was very much expecting an adult series considering how intense the Captive Prince series was. This aspect definitely made it a little harder for me to get into, and I do not know if I was in a reading funk or just tired, but this book took me so much longer to finish than I expected it to. The story is certainly intriguing, but I found myself having a hard time getting into the plot and found the majority of the characters in the beginning not as compelling as those in Pacat's other work.

This book put me in one of the longest reading slumps I have experienced in years. I had to switch from reading a physical copy to the audiobook to make myself finish it out - for some reason, I just could not get into this book the way I wanted to. It took me basically half of the book to even start to actually enjoy any of these characters - while the world building definitely showed a lot of promise, the constant change of which characters we were following made me forget where they were and what they were doing in order to remind myself who was speaking. That being said, once I finally could focus on the characters, they were certainly interesting and began to be very captivating.

The story truly picks up about two thirds of the way in and shoots the reader forward in action as we watch so many of the characters experience despair and revelations as we reach the end of this first installment. I found that once the stakes truly felt as there was something to lose, the plot became much more intriguing and had me gagged a few times right near the end. There were a few things that you could predict, but even if they were predictable, they still made for good plot devices to propel the story forward.

I will say I was a little confused on some of the magical aspects of this book, especially when at around the halfway point we were suddenly talking about unicorns. Even though this book deals with magic, I did not expect unicorns and that element somewhat took me out of immersion of the book. Obviously I knew that with magic comes some interesting elements, this one aspect just seemed slightly out of place for the overall tone of the book. That being said, the author does a good job at establishing the "big bad" and diving into magical components while keeping the reader engaged and not overwhelmed.

There are a decent amount of characters in this ensemble, and to be frank, I have not decided if there is one that reigns above the rest for me. I found Will and James the most intriguing towards the end of the book, but Violet definitely takes a leading role throughout the majority of the book, with Will and James seemingly trailing right behind her for second. I do wish this had more of an ensemble feel like what we see in Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo. I may return to this series when a fantasy book calls my name, but for now, I need some time to sit with my thoughts and decide where I truly stand on this series.

You can add Dark Rise on Goodreads now, and follow the author to stay up to date on releases and publications.

You can catch up with me and my current reads by friending me on Goodreads and following this blog, my Twitter (X), and my Instagram in order to stay up-to-date with any reviews, blog tours, and more!