My library didn’t have the first 3 books in the series, so I rescinded myself to reading the fourth first. I really don’t like doing that, but lo and behold, what should I discover after I was well into this one? My library had gotten the first books, so I was mad that I’d read this one out of order. And boy, was I lost. This author did not recap anything that had happened in the past, what exactly the Ferals were, their customs, how they had come to be together, or the significance of anything they did. I felt like I was coming into the story completely lost and nothing really made sense. It wouldn’t have hurt if there had been some explanations for those readers who had the misfortune of not reading the novels in order. I had no idea why Olivia and Jag thanked the goddess, like she was their God. I was wondering who this goddess was that they prayed to, and I’m still wondering after having gotten done with the book. That shouldn’t happen. I also didn’t understand the radiance ceremony, the history of it and how exactly the women’s healing powers worked. So I have to go back and start from the beginning and read in order so I’ll know what the heck is going on.The first thing that struck me was the misspelled names. I couldn’t decide whether I liked it or not, it was just too reminiscent of J.R. Ward’s names in her Black Dagger Brotherhood series. I don’t know which one copied the other and I don’t care enough to look. There was Paenthar, Jag, Hawke, Kougar, Lyon, Wulfe, Tighe, Skye and Vhyper. It’s just whatever at this point. Then there was the crazy villain Satanan. There we go. Just take Satan and twist it around. If he came loose the world would be over and they had to stop him at all costs. It was just too doom and gloom, very dramatic and just like a cheap thriller, sci-fi movie. I like a little more seriousness than that, not something so corny and overdone. During the meeting, in front of everyone, Jag said to Olivia that he would “f*** her brains out when we’re not hunting Daemons,” and “I’ll learn best with you sucking my c***,” and “Sorry I won’t be joining you and your FBI mate, Stripes. I’ve been looking forward to that little threesome. Like I’ve said before, I’m happy to let you take her from the front while I take her in the rear.” That was appalling and so disgusting I just really disliked him right there, and didn’t think I would ever come to like him, and I didn’t. He stuck up for a flamingo woman, which literally came out of nowhere, and was just bizarre to me, but it made him “caring” because he wouldn’t let them tease the stupid bird lady. Dumb. I was really thinking that their chemistry was good, because Olivia was having a physical reaction to her and Jag was staring at her and touching her to bring it out. He was so confident she would partner with him and they would sleep together. In the beginning I couldn’t wait to see where the story would go. I liked it so far and couldn’t put it down, and I was so ready to give it 3 stars. And then it all started to fall apart.The first time Jag saw her he came up to her touching her breast, asking her to come upstairs, because sex apparently heals them after battles or something like that. Wow, how disgusting.Olivia stands around while the draden are biting Jag and almost killing him. She finally decides to intervene, outing herself as being draden-kissed. Jag is mad and disgusted, but concocts the plan to play it to his advantage. He coerces her into doing whatever he says, and having sex with him, and he’ll keep her secret in return. She agrees, because she’s into self-preservation and surviving. She doesn’t want to do it, but quickly gets caught up in the pleasures of his body. So it looks like she really wants it. I am so sick of authors having this borderline rape scenario, where it’s not sex with mutual consent, but it’s not exactly force. I just call it borderline rape, because it’s not the sex anyone would like to have, and it’s disgusting, and off-putting and just awful. There’s nothing romantic about force and entrapment. I’m crying foul on this one. Men having sex with women who don’t say no doesn’t mean it’s not rape. He still forced her into it, so my respect for this man was in the negatives. I’d never like him after this disgusting trick for sex, and I never did come to like him. And Olivia, well, I don’t have any respect for women that willingly sell their body. And all she had to say was that her pride is bruised but her body was sated. He’d been demanding and determined to have his way. Demanding and determined? Is that all you have to say, like it’s admirable that he wanted you so bad and he won out in the end? How pathetic. And FYI, just because you were physically satisfied doesn’t make it any better. In rape scenarios the woman’s body responds without her consent, it’s a physical reaction you can’t stop, so just because Jag can please a woman doesn’t mean there’s anything noble happening there.The sexual nature of the Ferals and the Therians was just…disgusting. They had to have sex to heal themselves, they had to have sex to see things that were related to Mages or some such nonsense. And then you’ve got the man calling out to everyone that his female mate “is a go” after he just sexually stimulated her to get her to see a house in the woods. Gross. Then everyone is sleeping with everyone, which is disgusting. Jag had had hundreds of lovers over the years, mostly human, because he discovered a human girl at the age of 14 sleeping with a guy, and then went back to her the next day and had her show him the ropes. Then he got with every human girl that would lift her skirts for him. And he was having sex with a human girl in a barn when his mother walked in on them, and he didn’t stop. He pushes his mom away, and keeps on at it, just wanting to “get off.” And Olivia isn’t much better. She’s slept with every man that’s ever worked with her. And she’s slept with both of her guards, one of which loves her, and that was really awkward because she’s sleeping with Jag and both men know she is. It was a really twisted circle of everyone sleeping with everyone else and then being together with each other. Pretty awkward having the exes around. Olivia can’t see the house in the woods because of some reason I can’t remember now. Oh that’s right, only Ferals can see through glamor or something, so she has to be sexually opened so to speak, because “sexual release opened the Therian mind to magic in ways nothing else could.” So with a disgruntled sigh, she tells him to make it quick. Wow, I’m so sick of her telling him to make it quick. It’s cheap, trashy and gross.Then it’s just dropped like a bomb out of the clear blue sky that Olivia was a rape victim the first time, then a rape seeker as she let it happen over and over and over. This author really has a flare for the disgusting. I don’t like rape victims at all, and I steer clear of them like the plague. I don’t like the victim, emotionally and physically traumatized woman. And I especially don’t like when someone lets themselves be rape one by one as a whole camp of men uses them, because they think they deserve it. That brings up a level of mental instability I don’t even want to deal with. And rape is so awful that I can’t believe an author would have their character willingly seek it out many times. These characters are too screwed up for me to care about or have the tolerance for. And don’t even get me started on Jag, up one second, down the next, lashing out at everyone with crude suggestions and comments, and hurting people purposely because he has to punish himself. There again, don’t have the time or the patience for that.Jag called her a bitch so many times there should have been a running count. It was ridiculous. He calls her that when she stabs him, sucks his energy, hits him, etc. And Olivia was always calling him a bastard, but went along with everything he wanted, because like he says, she’s his slave. She has her hands in his hair and he takes them out, saying you touch me only if I say you can touch me, slave. She’s disappointed that the warmth is gone but lets him position her how he wants her. Then she decides to fight him so she’s kicking his nose and beating his chest, while he calls her a bitch and she calls him a bastard. I was seriously getting sick of hearing that.On page 283 he’s still verbally and emotionally abusing her, saying you draden-kissed, life-stealing bitch. Real nice. There’s 372 pages, and this late in the book they’re still having the same old problem. Now who’s going to believe the quick turn-around she’s going to have to have them do? Not me. You don’t spend almost 300 pages having the man be a class-A a**hole and then suddenly do a 360 in time for the cookie cutter happily ever after. Don’t start things you can’t finish. Olivia should’ve been much angrier with Jag and his treatment of her, but she kept coming back like a moth to a flame, or a glutton for punishment, neither one giving her any credit. I seriously couldn’t feel sorry for her because she put up with it. You can’t blame someone for treating you badly when you keep letting them mistreat you repeatedly. I’m all for a good tussle in the heat of the moment, a little struggle if you will, (thank you Mrs. and Mr. Smith) but as far as her beating him up, and him pushing her down and slinging her around, well, that’s not okay. Their relationship was so unhealthy and so toxic, on both their parts. Really nice that she can beat him up any time she wants. I’m all for a strong woman that can hold her own, but Olivia wasn’t strong, no matter how much the author tried to make her be. She was physically abusive, going off on him with no warning, and when there really was no call to hit him. It was just crazy, she’d just haul off and kick and hit him like a complete psycho. Jag had been dealing with emotional crap since of the beginning of the book, and Olivia called him out on it, instantly recognizing why he lashed out at people. That’s the stem of all of their arguments. Olivia tried to get him to forgive himself and deal with it, and he cussed her out. Then fighting ensued. Like clockwork. After he accidently outs Olivia as a life-sucker, and some of the men are nearby and hear, she’s sent away and he realizes everything he lost. He finally lets himself really think back to that disgusting day when his mom tried to stop his sex, and just like that, realizes that he didn’t kill his mom. I kid you not. The whole novel revolves around his guilt with himself, and in one instant, he just remembers that day that happened hundreds of ago differently. The truth comes at him and he realizes he tried to help his mom, but she insisted they weren’t related to protect him so no one would think he was a witch too. And that accusation he saw in his mom’s eyes as she was tied to the stake and burned? Yeah, it turns out that wasn’t really accusation. She was trying to force him to run. She didn’t blame him at all, she just wanted him to live. She was a good mother and actually loved him. Just like that. Wow, it’s just absolutely astounding the things romance authors will do to patch things up. They literally pull things out of their butts.Another thing that didn't set right with me was that I was realizing while reading that things were going by incredibly fast, but no time was passing. It was crazy. The entire book only spanned about 2 days, and I cannot stand when a whole book takes place over such a short amount of time. That isn't a book, that's a story. Almost 400 pages and the book doesn't even last a week. I need to feel like an actual story has taken place; I need to see growth and progression and a long journey between point A and point B. And then they just realize they both love each other--in 2 days. Wow. Just wow. Who's supposed to believe that this was a love story when they've been together for a couple of measly days? What a lousy attempt at a love story.If you want a relationship where the man has literally called you a bitch too many times to count, then this is the book for you. And it wasn’t like Olivia was perfect either. She literally beat the crap out of him too many times to count too, kicking him in the face, causing his nose to bleed, and kicking him all over his body. There’s nothing special about this book at all, and I think it’s because it’s a rip-off and I can’t really take to anything when I know it’s just the same run-down plot and the same idea being copied. I don’t like when authors jump on the bandwagon and do the same names, personalities, plots and ideas. It’s really pathetic. They’re all Christine Feehan knock-offs and now those knock-offs are copying each other, so the plots are really getting watered down. Lara Adrian’s Midnight series, J.R. Ward’s Black Dagger Brotherhood, and this series, are all the same. Her characters had the crazy names and all the volatile personalities of J.R. Ward’s men, with the concept of Christine Feehan’s Carpathians, added to the ceremony and cloak and dagger dramatics of Lara Adrian’s Midnight warriors. The previous books were difficult for me to start but as I got through the first few chapters they really improved and grabbed me. Unlike the other books, this one captured me from the start. Yay! One of the things I like most about these books are how different they all feel. Each new heroine has a completely different skill set that, while they could be dangerous they can also be extremely helpful for the Ferals. I really like that about these books. Many shapeshifter books often feel similar, while their personal/mental issues may differ the interactions and how the story develops often tend to be pretty much the same. You don't get that with these books. With each, very different, heroine I feel like you get a very different story each time. I can't wait to start the next book as it plans to be very different yet again.
What do You think about Rapture Untamed (2010)?
Thought this was a great series! I need to re-read them so I can read the last book!
—Dani
I am really enjoying the Ferral Warriors fight for survival.
—fondofbooks
