COMPLETE ME

TITLE: COMPLETE ME

AUTHOR: J. KENNER

Pages: 320

Date: 13/08/2013

Grade: 3.5

Details: no. 3 Stark Trilogy

            Received from Random House

            Through NetGalley

Own / Kindle

The blurb:

This sexy, emotionally charged romance continues the story of Damien Stark, the powerful multimillionaire who’s never had to take “no” for an answer, and Nikki Fairchild, the Southern belle who only says “yes” on her own terms.

Our desire runs deep. But our secrets cut close. Beautiful, strong, and commanding, Damien Stark fills a void in me that no other man can touch. His fierce cravings push me beyond the brink of bliss—and unleash a wild passion that utterly consumes us both.

Yet beneath his need for dominance, he carries the wounds of a painful past. Haunted by a legacy of dark secrets and broken trust, he seeks release in our shared ecstasy, the  heat between us burning stronger each day.

Our attraction is undeniable, our obsession inevitable. Yet not even Damien can run from his ghosts, or shield us from the dangers yet to come.

My thoughts:

You are what I need, Damien. You’re all that I need.”

Damien and Nikki are in Germany where the powerful man has to face murder charges. When an unexpected development stops the trial almost before it starts it should mean the end to their problems, but life is rarely that simple and this isn’t one of those rare occasions. Damien is determined to keep his past the secret it has been for so long, but it appears that suddenly that decision is no longer in his hands. Somebody out there can make those sordid secrets public at any time. The fact that nobody knows who that somebody is only makes the problem bigger.

And there is more. Gossip about Damien and Nikki is regularly leaked to the tabloids and Nikki has acquired a stalker who is getting more threatening with each encounter. Facing so many threats together should bring Damien and Nikki even closer than they already were but Damien’s instinct to protect Nikki keeps on getting in the way:

“I believe with all my heart that Damien loves me. What I fear is that love isn’t enough. Not when he’s determined to push me away in some misguided attempt to protect me.”

Damien may tell Nikki that:

“At the end of the day, it’s just you and me. We make our own reality, Nikki. And no one can take it from us.”

But that doesn’t stop Nikki from worrying that they are living in a bubble; a bubble that could all too easily be burst by the very real threats the rest of the world still possess.

Despite the threat of disclosure hanging over Damian and the stalker issue Nikki is facing, there doesn’t appear to be a whole lot to this story except for the sex Damien and Nikki seem to engage in as a reaction to everything that happens to them. Sex when they’re happy and sex when they’re sad, sex when they’re celebrating and sex when they’re commiserating, sex when they feel carefree and sex when they’re under threat; sex seems to be the only way they have of dealing with the world and everything it throws at them.

“Between Damien and me, sex is as necessary as conversation. It is our method of discovery. Our sharing of trust. And our ultimate surrender.”

Do not get me wrong, I love a good erotic novel and can easily get caught up in descriptive and imaginative sex-scenes. And some of the scenes in this book really hit the mark. It is just that there were too many of them in this book. After so many scenes I reached saturation point and found myself skimming over the sexy bits to get to the little bit of background story that had to be hiding somewhere.

As much as I loved passages like the following:

“You’re what gives me strength. If I am what centers you, Nikki, then you are what anchors me. Every time I touch you, every time I bury myself deep inside you – Nikki don’t you see? You are the talisman of my life, and if I lose my grip on you, then I have lost myself.”

...it wasn’t quite enough to make this book a truly satisfying read. It seems to me that the characters could have grown more. The Damien and Nikki we end this trilogy with are not so very different from the personalities we met in the first book. In the last paragraph of my review of “Claim Me” I said that I would read this third and final book not so much because I was worried about whether or not there would be a happily ever after but because I wanted to know if these two characters would be able to resolve all their issues. I really am sorry that I have to end this review with the observation that while I was right about the relationship I was also right about those issues. This happily ever after has come to a couple that appears to be unable to truly come to terms with their pasts. If Damien and Nikki were real people I would be very worried about their future together.

CLAIM ME

TITLE: CLAIM ME

AUTHOR: J. KENNER

Pages: 376

Date: 30/05/2013

Grade: 4-

Details: no. 2 Stark Trilogy

              Received from Random House

              Through NetGalley

Own / Kindle

The blurb:

“For Damien, our obsession is a game. For me, it is fiercely, blindingly, real.

Damien Stark’s need is palpable—his need for pleasure, his need for control, his need for me. Beautiful and brilliant yet tortured at his core, he is in every way my match.

I have agreed to be his alone, and now I want him to be fully mine. I want us to possess each other beyond the sweetest edge of our ecstasy, into the deepest desires of our souls. To let the fire that burns between us consume us both.

But there are dark places within Damien that not even our wildest passion can touch. I yearn to know his secrets, yearn for him to surrender to me as I have surrendered to him. But our troubled pasts will either bind us close . . . or shatter us completely.”

I have to say I’m conflicted about this book. It is very well written, the story is captivating and the characters are intriguing; so far so good. And yet I can’t help feeling there is a lot wrong with this book as well. 

First of all there is the amount of sex; there is a lot of it. The characters in this book resort to sex for every occasion; when they’re celebrating something, when they’re upset, when they’re angry or just when they haven’t touched each other for what appears to be a few hours the clothes come off and the fun and games begin.

“I am going to claim you Nikki. With my hand, with my lips, with my cock.”

In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more words dedicated to sexy scenes in this book than to overall story-line. On the other hand, and much to the author’s credit, this didn’t read like the sort of book in which the story-line is only there to facilitate the sex-scenes. Those scenes seemed to fit both the story and the characters in it very well.

My second issue with this book (and its prequel, “Release Me”) is that it reminds me too much of the books by E.L. James and Sylvia Day. I couldn’t escape the feeling that I had read this book before (which I hadn’t) and that I knew exactly what would be happening next. On the other hand though, every time I feared the story was getting predictable the author surprised me and took a turn I hadn’t quite seen coming. That was a very pleasant surprise, especially since this meant that there wasn’t any of the forced drama that I encounter in a lot of romance and erotic book these days and which never fails to exasperate me.

But, I had the most problems with the two main characters in this story and their relationship. I realise this is, of course, a work of fiction but I can’t help looking at the story and the characters through realistic eyes. And if these two were a real-life couple and I knew them I would tell them to stay well away from each other. I’m all for two people falling for each other completely and without reservations, but that is not exactly what is happening in this story. This seems to be a sort of co-dependency and it scares me as much as it fascinates me.

“But I have come to need Damien as potently as the air I breathe, and I sometimes fear that while our desire is mutual, my need is one-sided.”

There were as many scenes in this book that made me melt as there were scenes that made me uncomfortable and at times even a bit angry. I mean did they really expect their secrets to remain known only to them?

Having said all of that though, I also have to admit that I couldn’t stop reading this story. Despite the fact that this story seemed all too familiar, despite my issues with the characters and even though the book might have benefitted from more story and less sex it did manage to captivate me. The only reason I ended up worrying about Nikki and Damien is because the author managed to make them realistic enough for me to care.

Another thing I really appreciate is that the author didn’t opt for a huge cliff-hanger to end this book with. Yes, there is definitely a huge issue that needs to be resolved, as well as several smaller ones but the book ended in what felt like a natural place rather than one designed to keep the reader on edge.

Which leads to one final question; will I be reading the third and final book in this trilogy? And the answer will have to be yes. Despite the fact that there can’t be any doubt about how this story is going to end, I want to experience that resolution with these characters. It is not so much about needing to know how they will get to their happy ever after but more about whether or not they will be able to resolve all their issues before they get there. So I guess it won’t be long before I read “Complete Me”.