Taken to Nobu

💬: "The thought has the corners of my mouth twitching in the makings of a carefully repressed smile and just like that, hate slips so easily away. Love weighs so much less. Nothing at all. It is pure buoyancy."

Stephens, Elizabeth. Taken to Nobu: A SciFi Alien Romance (Xiveri Mates Book 2) (p. 294). Kindle Edition.

📖Genres: romance, sci-fi, sci-fi romance, aliens, fantasy romance

📚Page Count: 358

🎧Audiobook Length: 09h 15min

👩🏾‍🏫My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.5 - 4.5/5

----

TW - <spoiler>Body horror, Death, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail</spoiler>

*I read this story because it was recommended by romance author, Katee Roberts*

Taken to Nobu by Elizabeth Stephens is the second book in the Xiveri Mates series. Kiki is on Nobu, a snow consumed planet, where she's stuck with no escape. The leader of the colony that she's on is Va'Raku and he claims that she is his Xiveri mate. She isn't sure what that is but she wants no part in mating with an alien and she definitely doesn't want to participate in "The Hunt", an event where she will be tracked and hunted with little to no options to save herself from the mating event. She knows one thing for sure, she's going to fight anyone who tries to touch her. Va'Raku knows that Kiki hates him but he also knows that she is without a doubt, his Xiveri mate, he's determined to win her over during "The Hunt" so she'll finally be his mate and rule the colony beside him. He's never met a warrior woman like her and while impressed, he suddenly realizes that Kiki is fighting him out of fear and not out of honor. Kiki has been hurt by an alien before and Va'Raku is willing to do anything to make that man pay, will Kiki trust Va'Raku enough to help get her revenge?

(TW - mention of sexual assault, rape, grey sexual consent lines)

I enjoyed this book as much, if not more than the first book in the series. The main character, Kiki, is a character we followed at the beginning of book one briefly, in this book we finally get to read about what happened to her after the events of book one. Kiki is a sexual assault survivor (the events are not shown on page, as they happened before the events of the first book, they are just referred to) and so at the beginning of the book when she gets the news that she'll be participating in "The Hunt" (where alien men chase and pursue woman so they can find their mates and produce children while fostering a relationship.) She goes into defense mode, she doesn't want to be forced to mate an alien against her will so she decides to fight. After defeating a few of these alien men, eventually, Kiki meets Va'Raku and Kiki's body and soul decide that they want Va'Raku (like fated mates, sort of). Kiki then changes her "No, I don't want to be touched" to a "Yes, touch me now Va'Raku".

I really enjoyed the narrators of this audiobook, just like I enjoyed the narrators of the first book in the Xiveri Mates series. Blaire Leblanc returns to voice Kiki and some of the other characters and she does a fantastic job, just like she did with the first book. Marquis De Sade voices Va'Raku and he does a really good job as well. This audiobook was published by Vitruvian Sound and overall, they did a nice job.

All but one of the spicy scenes were nice and enjoyable to read/listen to on audiobook. The first scene where the couple are together intimately for the first time is hard to judge because there is a misunderstanding between the Kiki and Va'Raku because of cultural differences. <spoiler>At first Kiki is determined to not be physically intimate with anyone, even though she is being perused by several alien men in "The Hunt". That changes when she meets Va'Raku. </spoiler> The rest of the spicy scenes were wonderful. I'm giving the spicy scenes three point five chilies 🌶️🌶️🌶️.5 out of five chilies

Overall, I think this story was really enjoyable. I did have issues with the one part in the book that depicted "grey or blurred consent lines", but other than that issue, it was mostly good. I enjoyed most of the characters, in fact, there were only two characters (out of a cast of about 10 main and background characters) that I didn't like. I also enjoyed the growing romance between Kiki and Va'Raku. I'm giving this 4.5 out of 5 stars.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - 4.5/5 Stars

I listened to this audiobook for free on [Libbyapp.com]