Review: Not romance!
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 06 19, 2012
I guess I have to be the negative vote (usually I hate the downers!) but when I saw the price went up to 7.99 I had to warn people that this might not be the type of book that is described in the other reviews. I LOVE romance books -I read at least 5 or 6 a week. I like happy endings, especially if the H/h have to work through difficulties to get there. Other reviewers called this a "beautiful romance" but as I was reading it, I kept saying to myself "Where's the romance?" There was no love story until the very end!OK so in this society rulers of the planet are the bad guys. They showed up one day, took over (because they are so superior in intelligence) and kidnapped most of the natives and turned them into slaves. The ones that remained free were taxed so high that they have nothing left. Of course the palace has GEMS in the toilet (not kidding). This princess had been kidnapped and gang-raped for 6 years and has just now been rescued (bummer, right?) Her father is a really really bad guy and forces her to be chained to a male slave to get her over her fear of men and somehow improve her attitude as a ruler. okay....?So the H becomes her slave after he is kidnapped, beaten and stripped naked. Princess spends a few days terrified of him and the rest of the book humiliating him and treating him like crap. At the palace he is naked, hands bound behind his back, has to kneel at her feet and eat "pig slop" without his hands while everyone laughs at him. (sounds like a really fun book, huh?) His restraints are so painful it feels like his arms have been torn from the sockets ... then she chains him to the bedpost by the neck so he has to sleep on his knees. For me, this might have been ok for a little while to set the stage as to how far we have to go to get to the HEA, but we are past halfway in the book and there is not a spark of love from her.So, now we are close to 70% of the book and we have a cruel h who is continuously having flashbacks to being raped, chained up, humiliated but has absolutely no empathy for another person who is bound, naked, humiliated and at her mercy. (UGH!) All this time, H patiently tolerates her abuse because he has this gift of being able to see past lives and he knows that they are meant to be together.I thought it was going to get better when they left the palace but even after he helps rescue her from her tyrant father and hides her in his village (where she pretends to be his slave) she continues to insult him - call him "Slave" and remind him that she owns him and maybe when this is over she will sell him to a "pleasure house." She continuously insults his home, his neighbors, and the meager food he eats (refuses to eat the food, demanding to be served meat.) OK nasty witch, they already told you THERE IS NO MEAT. They have no food or money because YOUR FAMILY took it away from them. A couple of times I thought she was starting to understand, like when she said something about how many children the natives have because they reproduce like rabbits (or something like that) and he said they HAVE to have a lot of children .... HINT HINT LADY - They have to have lots of kids because YOUR family takes them and exports them as slaves - Get IT??? Nope, right over her little pricess head,I admit I read ahead a few times because I got SO TIRED of her awfulness and him just putting up with it. It takes her to the very end of the book to come off her pedestal and start treating him like a human being ... and THEN (I guess this is where the romance comes in) THEN she realizes she loves him and she should change the way the rulers treat the natives. hmmm...Summary ... The book had potential. I like the idea. I like the writing style. I guess what ruined it for me was that it took SO LONG to start being happy. I couldn't like the princess, even at the end. I know she was raised to believe herself superior to others. I realized she was traumatized by 6 years of torture, but I thought that would teach her some empathy. (NOT!) I liked the hero. It was depressing to read about his abuse and humuliation over and over. Maybe you will like it but it was too much of a downer for me.