Lover Unbound by JR Ward

[jmc_bks]

How did I *not* love J.R. Ward’s lastest book, Lover Unbound, let me count the ways.

Warning -- SPOILERS ABOUND.

1. The “romance“ – which is supposed to be the primary theme, given that this is labeled as a paranormal romance and marketed as such – sucked.

a. Yay, another hero who recognizes his mate while barely conscious. And she loves him because? Yep, hot sex, but that’s not enough for me to believe in their Twu Wuv. Yeah, no, I didn’t believe they “loved” each other.

b. The ending? Sucked big giant donkey balls. I don’t care what kind of ghost Jane comes back as, she’s fucking dead. Killing the heroine doesn’t belong in romance. And there is no HEA if one of the h/h is a frickin’ ghost.

c. The convenient forgetting of Butch and the disposal of the homosexual overtones of their relationship? An excuse, a sop. I felt like Ward was both pacifying the multitudes who caught the homoerotic tones, and reassuring her homophobic readers that the Good Guys could never be Teh Gays.

d. V’s liking for dominance (and submission) must be rooted in his childhood. Because only someone whose mind is truly messed with could possibly be that deviant (her implication IMO). And Jane’s screwed up childhood with control freak parents explain why she jumps right into the life.

2. There was way too much going on. John Matthew’s change. Phury’s complete wig out, followed by his sacrifice. And Cormia? Blech. I’m almost interested enough in JM and possibly Xhex to keep up on the series...but not quite. And Payne? Gee, how very soap opera for it to be revealed at the end that V has a secret twin.

3. The explosion of the BDB world building and theology to date. Wait, the Scribe Virgin isn’t a virgin? And she isn’t the all powerful being that readers have been led to believe? It’s all her about her Father?

4. And the use of “God” as curse/swear rather than some other vampire deity seemed wrong. (That’s something Robin pointed out to me in the last book and now that it has my attention, the use is really jarring.)

5. In case you missed it earlier, the ending totally sucked. While I didn’t miss the POV of the lessers, the inclusion of them in the end for the killing of Jane? Unforeshadowed and cheap.

6. I noticed a lot of typos in my copy. Along with the messy-ing, the sitches, stillies (WTH? -- do the brothers sit around talking about women's shoes a lot that they have a nickname for stilettos?), and the regular disagreement of nouns and verbs in dialogue, the misspelling was just too much. And the use of “obstacle” as a verb? Uh, awkward – I get that Ward was trying to show the formality of the Directrix’s language, but it just came across to me as clunky and poorly written.

ETA: #7. What about V feeding? In earlier books, a big deal was made out of the brothers feeding from their mates, about how sexual it was, etc. No mention here at all about what V's going to have to do about that. No longer relevant? Am I as reader supposed to take it as read that Rhage's solution will also be V's?


Having said all that, Ward is an engrossing storyteller. Even as all these things were irritating me as I read, I wanted to know what was going to happen next.

Weighing that against my general disappointment with LU, it’s not enough. I won’t be buying the next BDB book.

Comments

[jmc-bks.livejournal.com]

I liked Lover Awakened, mostly because I liked Bella. But I haven't been thrilled with the two books since. I'll probably check out the future BDB books from the library...without being in a great rush to read them.