I want to preface this review by telling you that I’ve heard really good things about this author AND this book, so I was excited to dive into this, but wow.

First, the editing is atrocious—from the constant refusal to use contractions, the childish vocabulary, the over-usage of swearing (it’s just too much, after a point), and (perhaps worst of all) the giant blocks of text that make up the ebook. There’s a difference between a few missed there/their/they’re spellings and an entire book that should never have made it out of the editing step.

I noticed most people seemed to DNF within the first few chapters, and that’s definitely fair. I DNFed, as well, though at 79% because I can get through some awful stuff, including just bad writing, but why did MC1 come from such an awful state of shock after being literally a half-moment from being raped to demanding a no safe word, no holds barred, “just us being us” fuck? Why was MC2 so “concerned” about MC1’s wellbeing two seconds prior, then “you fucking asked for this” immediately after? There’s no judgment for how survivors handle the aftermath of their violence, but MC1 was distraught, had frozen and regressed back to his inner child from the level of fear his younger self held for his abuser, and the author figured the best way forward was a brutal dicking where MC2 tells MC1 he’s going to rip him apart, despite MC1 just breaking down in his arms? Jesus Christ. I didn’t get through it.

I did skip to the epilogue to see if anything got better, and—spoiler—it didn’t.

Anyway, one star, but really, half a star because I only made it so far out of spiteful irritation until it got to be too much. It took me four days to not finish this when I normally finish books within hours.