Revived

Hmmm ... where to start? Well first things first you definitely need to read part 1 of The Dungeon Black Duology before reading this book because in reality this is really just one long (necessarily so) book split in two parts. Though Scott & Tad figure somewhat prominently here you could be a stranger to the Upending Tad series, but seriously why would you deny yourself such pleasure?

Okay that's enough of my stalling. I want to give a concise and helpful review for other readers but may just find myself doing Happy dance & fist bumps but I'll give it a go.

Revived starts exactly where Unearthed ended. Max is still trying to convince himself that his life will continue as it was, that Sean will just be his perfectly matched sub and nothing more. What Max hasn't counted on is who Sean is: strong, brave, resilient, curious, open minded and more importantly honest with himself, what his feelings are and willing to act on them. Man do these attributes come in handy when dealing with Max who can be, in his own words, a douche rocket. But is also worth fighting for and who and what Sean wants.

Due to his past Kevin's suicide Max has erected not just a wall but more like a whole fortress to shield himself from any future pain, because his problem isn't that he can't love but rather that when he loves he loves BIG as in ALL IN and loss is just something he can't deal with and so he lives but isn't alive.

Be prepared for Max being all sorts of a*hole in his efforts to keep Sean out and many times I wanted to grab a ball peen hammer and bash his brains in because Sean is just so perfect for him and wanting to be with him and even when he knows this is true he fights and resists with all he's got which sometime can be cruel as hell. He is the guy who will bring a gun to a knife fight.Like Sean you must have patience and persistence with Max because he is one stubborn S.O.B. and it takes every ounce of Sean's efforts with invaluable assists from Scott and even Tad and, the surprise player, Kai to get through to him.I won't lie, the book is long but not gratuitously so. Max's journey to finally letting himself be open and vulnerable i.e. to love and be loved in return is a long and hard one because he was so bound tight in his armor. There are some quite extended sex scenes mostly of the BDSM variety because duh! the story is about Max. He is a Dom. Period. In many books the sex scenes are just super sexy times or sometimes filler you can skim over if you want to. However Kora's guys and in this Duology particularly the sex is where the communication, be it verbal or otherwise, happens. Where true intimacy comes into play and not just because people are naked physically but because these are the moments when they are vulnerable and their souls are naked too. Open to be touched in their intimate core. Exposed. Good things come of this.Ultimately Sean is the hero of this story. The person who without any guarantees keeps putting his heart on a platter as an offering of love and if that isn't a hero I don't know what is. But I will say that Scott (my twin *wink) is the one to give Max the final push and that is so fitting because they are brothers in the purest sense, bound by love and shared experiences, even finding their happy roughly at the same time.

It was good to see Max finally forgive and set free his past because holding on to that misplaced anger had kept him isolated in a prison of his own making.

This book, and I mean Parts 1 & 2, will take you on a emotional but ultimately satisfying roller coaster of a ride. Because the hard won things are the ones we cherish the most and in their own way Max and Sean clawed their way to a HEA.

Thanks to Kora for delivering flawlessly on the promise of these two characters and keeping true to an original vision of this group of friends.

Extra points I did a happy dance every time I got a glimpse of Scott & Tad and how happy they are. The appearances of Jay, Marcie and Ned are icing on the cake and then we have the tasty bait of what will play out between Breck & Kai! Can't wait for that. Even Chad, his bat and his buddy we're a welcome sight and so I have one complaint: the guys that jumped Tad didn't get their ass beat. Maybe Kora can do us a solid and remedy that in the Breck & Kai story and also will Jonah & Ledger's story be a solo thing, a short or woven into the Breck & Kai story????