In Peace Lies Havoc

All things sinister taste like honey

You ever see a book around and think it would not be your kind but after reading it you question yourself why did you not pick up earlier?

This book is that book for me.

I actually saw the second book and I wanted to skip the first and read the second but in hindsight it would have been a total disaster because this book is the foundation to all that happens.

⚠️ TW: kidnapping, sexual assault, abuse, OW/OM (other woman, other man) drama, drug and alcohol

I loved the idea of this book, it is completely new to me. Which really fed the curiosity because I needed to know why the Brothers (Kingston, Killian, Keaton and Kyrin) were acting that way towards Dove. The suspense was done well in this book.

The first 60% of the book was just filled with question marks- I did consider dropping the book multiple times. I'd read a paragraph, put down the book, feel confused and frustrated yet curious enough to pick it up again and this was the cycle for most of the book. It was worth the confusion because the last 40% of the book made up for it, my eyeballs almost fell out from how much I kept getting shocked.

On a scale of grey to black, I'd say the brothers are borderline grey. They're not too screwed up but they're not normal either, they exhibit behaviour that you'd want to get to the bottom of. The brotherhood between the men was nice to see. I was actually expecting some RH because of the dynamics (and also because I went into the book blind, as in I didn't read the blurb entirely) but the way they protected Dove together and against each other was nice to read about as well. I couldn't connect with King's and Dove's romance though.

One aspect I couldn't appreciate was the music and outfit descriptions. Ms Amo included all the songs Dove danced to and the outfits that she wore but I'm not a music reader so it didn't make a difference to me. I'm also a reader who imagines the characters' outfits differently in my head, I don't necessarily follow the author's descriptions because I imagine the outfits and the characters in a way that makes me understand that particular scene. So personally, this aspect was redundant to me. But I think others might appreciate this.

I do have reasons as to why this book wasn't as good though, which I can't explain without spoiling so proceed with caution:
I was feeling frustrated at Dove's lack of reactions. You'd think a girl that was kidnapped, locked in a cell and sexually assaulted, forced to work in a dark circus where there were multiple sexual interactions in groups with the same guys who wanted to kill her, she should have some emotions right? But she didn't, entirely. She screamed a few times and asked why but other than that she seemed to adjust pretty well. And that just threw me off because I know for sure I wouldn't keep quiet. People who got kidnapped would try to escape but Dove actually could fall asleep in a moving vehicle with the guys?? How??

Secondly, I felt like the ending happened too fast and everything was reconciled too quickly. This has a big deal to do with Dove's lack of emotions because she should not have forgiven King or the whole Brotherhood for putting her into that situation. But of course Dove falls for King's apologies and runs into the sunset with him because King is her soulmate, other half, man she would die together with. I also didn't like how King and Dove's dynamic was just screaming at each other and then having hate sex after. King is probably the least interesting out of the brothers for me because I just can't find any reason to say he even had any character development in this book. Yeah he killed for his love, but that's really all about him.

I will definitely be reading the next book because Killian's in it and I'm most interested about him from the pack. Kinda glad we got Kingston out of the way.