Review: Unbeloved is a winner!
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 07 3, 2014
I love Madeline and her work. I have adored her since the first time I opened up Undeniable on my Kindle Fire and devoured it like a fat kid with a piece of cake. This woman can do no wrong in my book.Unbeloved is a clear departure from all the other books in the Undeniable series. Mostly because it time jumps and we see everyone, older, wiser and still with that spark and shine from when they were younger, naive and believed love conquered all and they would be all right with the world.Unattainable will always be my favorite in this series but I had a few issues with the timeline. Like another reviewer pointed out, the timeline is that of a soap opera. If Ivy is twelve when Hawk is sent away (no spoilers) then she would be around twenty when he finally comes back. That would have put Eva around fifty-six though Dorothy is adamant that Eva is only almost fifty towards the end of the book after Hawk comes back. Now, if I remember the story correctly, Undeniable starts in the early 80s and Eva doesn't give birth to Ivy until she is around 35/36. She and Deuce don't even settle down and make a go at it until he's in his 50s and there is an 18 year age gap between the two of them.This didn't take away from the reading experience but at the same time, I realize Undying will take place far into the future. Not 2018 or 2020 but probably mid 2020s and that is not an issue (I don't mind the younger generation growing and seeing them mature) but to be honest, I feel like I haven't been given enough time with the generation before Ivy and Christopher et al. I would like to see a natural progression that happened with Eva, Deuce, Kami, Ripper, Dorothy and Hawk with the other characters I have grown to love and adore: Cage, Tegen, Ellie, Danny, et al. I want to see them grow from women in their thirties to forties and I feel like we get cheated.I understand: when you have such a colorful cast of characters and NO ONE is a cardboard cutout but feel like real people to you, you want their stories too! I still *want* Cage, Tegen, Ellie and Danny's stories. I want to know how they deal with their generation taking over the club. I want to see Cage struggle with being Prez just as much as his father did. I want to see trials and tribulations between Cage and Tegen while he's president; Danny and Ripper now that he's getting older and she's coming into her own;  Ellie and Dirty now that he has come to terms with his past and found a woman he loves and wants on the back of his bike.These are Madeline's books and *her* characters' journeys that I will happily devour regardless where she takes us. To be honest, this series could go to ten books and I would read them all. She has decided to end it at 6 books but if she did decide to write more, I would purchase them in a heartbeat. One of the most prolific and beautiful MC writers of our generation, I guess it is *me* who doesn't want this legacy, this family saga...this dynasty to end.Five gold stars for Ms. Sheehan!