Review ~ Hostage to Pleasure by Nalini Singh

TITLE: Hostage to Pleasure 

AUTHOR: Nalini Singh
COPYRIGHT: 2008
TYPE: paranormal romance
PAGES: 330
SERIES:  yes

1. Slave to Sensation

2. Visions of Heat

3. Caressed by Ice

4. Mine to Possess

5. Hostage to Pleasure 

6. Branded by Fire
7. Blaze of Memory
8. Bonds of Justice
9. Play of Passion
10. Kiss of Snow
11. Tangle of Need
12. Heart of Obsidian
13. Shield of Winter 
14. Shards of Hope (released 2015)

REASON FOR READ:

I loved the first 4 wanted to continue with series.

SUMMARY (from Goodreads):

Separated from her son and forced to create a neural implant that will mean the effective enslavement of her psychically gifted race, Ashaya Aleine is the perfect Psy--cool, calm, emotionless...at least on the surface. Inside, she's fighting a desperate battle to save her son and escape the vicious cold of the PsyNet. Yet when escape comes, it leads not to safety, but to the lethal danger of a sniper's embrace.

DarkRiver sniper Dorian Christensen lost his sister to a Psy killer. Though he lacks the changeling ability to shift into animal form, his leopard lives within. And that leopard's rage at the brutal loss is a clawing darkness that hungers for vengeance. Falling for a Psy has never been on Dorian's agenda. But charged with protecting Ashaya and her son, he discovers that passion has a way of changing the rules... 

THOUGHTS/OPINION:

This review has been hard to write for me due to a lot of reasons. First I love this series hands down one of my favorite series and I have bought every book out in paperback because of it even though up to this book I had only read the first four. Second it is hard to write this book because until this book Dorian was one of my favorite characters that I'd hope would get his mate and now that he has his own story it wasn't what I expected. Hence why this is a hard review to write. On one hand I enjoyed the book on the surface level and once again I did find myself skimming a lot of it. There were some things I really enjoyed (they are listed below) and some things I didn't (again listed below). The story for some reason including the romance just fell flat for me in this book. I thought it was because of the huge read-a-thon push I did a couple weeks back (sometimes I can burn myself out by watching or reading to much of a good thing), but I don't think that was it. I think the whole I hate PSY everything b/c of killing of my sister was too much over the top I have to screw you conflict just went on to long. Or maybe it was Dorian's whole attitude. I'm not quite sure what it is or isn't about this book. By the time I bought into the whole romance and mating thing it was the end and I was pretty much done with the book and skimming to see where we would end up. Now that being said I did enjoy it and I didn't feel as if I pushed through to keep it from being a DNF by any means it just didn't hit the spot like the first 4 did. I will continue to read on from here to just see what Ms. Singh does with her last single alpha leopard cause I am curious what she is going to do with Mercy (she hints that her story is next and I think it involves a wolf) but this book just wasn't a Slave to Sensation kind of OMG you have to read this book to me feeling. So moving on to the next.

THINGS I LIKED

1. The twin twist was interesting although at times it felt over the top it was interesting. 

2. I liked the bond with the son for a psy it was a nice twist

3. I love how multicultural Ms. Singh makes her characters they are not all white with blonde hair and blue eyes and they do not all find white females or males with blonde hair and blues eyes attractive there is a mix and I like that.

4. I like that the main character Dorian has a defect (he can't' shift like everyone else) which is like having a disability and yet he is viewed as strong as everyone else.

THINGS I DIDN'T LIKE

1. I am still struggling with inter-workings of the Psy counsel in the background yes it is just a page long and yes it pertains to the story yet I find 9 out of 10 times I skip those pages the most

2. I didn't like the whole recapping what the darknet was and the psy net we get it. I understand you have to do it in order to update a rare reader who reads a 5th book b/c they didn't know it was 5 out of 3, but still (that being said she did it in a way that didn't feel like she was updating a reader who didn't know)

3. This may or may not be a spoiler to some so don't read if you don't want to be spoiled but: 

I don't like that Amara was saved not going to lie kind of wished she wasn't (may make me a bad person but so be it)

Favorite part or line from story:

 Seriously so if you haven't read don't read this part skip to final grade 

I warned you...

I absolutely loved the end when Dorian finally shifts for the first time and it was so wonderful I found myself crying along with everyone and how everyone was so happy about the whole situation OMG I couldn't help it. BEST ENDING EVER.

Alright spoiler over

FINAL GRADE: 3 out of 5 stars

Would you recommend this story? yes while it wasn't my favorite out of the series it still was a key part of the series and needs to be read in order. 

Is this a part of a reading challenge?

Out Do Yourself Challenge

Finishing the Series

While not part of the official TBR challenge this has been sitting on my shelf since 2008 so it is an TBR book