Does It Hurt?

I don’t really love it and I didn’t really get it.

Lighthouses and sharks were never viewed the same way again!

A lot of suspense and twists throughout. Same feel as the Adeline books but a bit less intense.

I enjoyed every single bit of this book. There was some heavy topics discussed in the book but overall it was great. I was definitely NOT expecting homeboy in the lighthouse to be so unhinged but wanting to know what his deal was really kept me hooked on the book. Something about him had me thinking he was weird BUT NEVER did I think he had his child captive. The description that the author gave and my very weird imagination had my heart hurting for that poor girl, I did wish that she hadn't died but then again I felt like she needed to be free and that was her way of doing it. I was also quite happy that Sawyer got to keep her name.

Just because I absolutely love the work of H.D. Carlton, I had to read her haunted lighthouse standalone, Does It Hurt?. As is standard of all of Carlton’s works, this story does have a lot of dark elements so please read the triggers before proceeding. That being said, I almost didn’t think this story was dark enough for me. It’s not that it wasn’t dark, it just was a different level of dark than I was expecting. The story follows Sawyer, a runaway who will do anything to keep from being found, and Enzo, the quick-tempered marine lover who she scammed, as they try to survive being shipwrecked on an abandoned island that is hiding more sinister secrets than either of them could have imagined What I loved? 🦈 The PLOT. While to me, it doesn’t compare to Haunting Adeline. It does have similar themes such as Enzo hunting down Sawyer after she betrays him, the use of sex as a punishment/reward system, and the beautiful mystery of the decrepit lighthouse. I undeniably loved the mystery and that I would have never predicted the extent of the true nature of events that had and were going to transpire. As with all other H.D. Carlton novels, nothing is ever what it seems, and she certainly loves a dramatic ending 🦈 The pacing of the story. The amount of suspense present was so intense I felt that I was reading faster than the speed of light especially the last hundred or so pages 🦈 Favorite quote: “’Being loved by me will hurt like hell. It’s everything you deserve.’ Then, he declares passionately, ‘I love you, and you will love me.’” What I wasn’t as much of a fan of: 🦈 The spicy scenes….its not that they weren’t creative, they just didn’t do it for me 🦈 Sawyer at first was very hard to relate to. She is incredibly impulsive with taking up smoking, her sexual partners, and getting a “F*ck You” tattoo from quite literally a random person on the street one day. At the beginning of the story, it seemed that her personality was constantly changing. That being said, she does grow on you especially when you discover what she is running from Star rating: ⭐⭐⭐.5 Spicy rating: 🌶🌶🌶