Review: First Eden Book, Definitely Not The Last
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 18, 2014
I say this a lot, but I believe in full disclosure. I haven't read Cynthia Eden's books before (that I remember anyway) and now that I have...yeesh. I wanna read more!First - while characters from prior books definitely show up (at least I assume the married couples featured in earlier books), they do not overwhelm the story nor is having read their books necessary to make this book make sense. It can stand on its own, though there are connections to earlier (and what I assume will be later as well) books.Jasmine - I hadn't quite figured out the entirety of her secret and connections to the FBI agent and lieutenant in the villain's organization when they were revealed, but I highly suspected part of it. Kudos to the author for putting such a complicated back story together for Jasmine. She was strong yet vulnerable, determined yet not completely hardened by the life she'd found her way into. Despite a very rough childhood, she came through it with a very clear idea of what she could and wanted to do to help with things, including to meet her until-now unmet older brother.Drake - For a while I wasn't quite sure how to categorize Drake. He definitely has some very bad events in his past, things that might color him a not-very-good man, but he's risen past them and definitely when push comes to shove and getting Jasmine, he turns out to be a good man, if not a particularly law-abiding man.I enjoyed the relationship between Jasmine and Drake with all its very wild twists and turns. You never knew what was going to pop out next and threaten to derail the relationship before it fully got off the ground.The villain in this book was fantastic. Twisted and evil with nothing (that I saw) in the way of redeeming features. And yet he wasn't a caricature of a man either. He was fully fleshed out, just very...evil. I like when a villain is a villain with little to no ambiguity to it. Not all the time, of course, but in some books it works and in this one, the villain really worked.I can't wait to read more and am so glad I spent the time to read Mine to Crave. Five stars!Book provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.