Burned

Burned by KMM

I liked this book much more than I wanted to. I've been a fan of KMM since her Highlander series. Kiss of the Highlander was my first highlander book and remains one of my all time favorites. And the original 5 book Fever series was fantastic. Dark, twisted, at times both hard to read and impossible to put down.

And now here we are, Fever 7. Mac is back. Dani is back-seated. The story is engaging from the start. Drew me right in. I needed to know what happened to all my favorite characters. I needed to know if they were getting any closer to fixing their world. I was excited. And if it wasn't for the assault on feminism that is Mac and Barrons, I would have given this book a much better rating. Mac should be a strong woman, she's certainly a capable woman. But it's growing more obvious to me that she's also an abused woman. And it makes me mad. I read a blog post just today defending romance against the claim that it teaches women that being abused by the alpha male is ok. I don't buy that for one second. But I also can see that Mac and Barrons don't exactly send the best message. This is not a relationship of equals. If you follow KMM, you'll know that this is completely intentional. Mac is not equal to Barrons, and won't be until she suffers some more. A big part of me hopes Mac comes to her senses, drops Barrons (no matter how hot the sex is) and finds herself an honorable MacKeltar to settle down with.

So I guess my advice to readers is this. If you are fans of the Fever series, you'll probably like the story. But if you're like me, you'll also be angry and disappointed.