Reviews tagging 'Pregnancy'

Hooked by Emily McIntire

105 reviews

theequeendee's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I love this book. I love how Wendy and James balance each other with James helping Wendy become her own person and Wendy helping James be more in tune with his humanity. I would look up triggers before reading this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Sexual content, Violence, and Death of parent

Moderate: Death of parent and Abandonment

Minor: Pregnancy

mpass61's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.0

Boooooo tomato tomato tomato I'm throwing tomatoes 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Fire/Fire injury, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment

beckyyreadss's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This book was gifted to me by my brother for my birthday and this book has been on my TBR for so long that I decided to just jump right in. I liked the idea of this book, and this was a strong book for the start of a series.  

This book has two points of view. The first is James and he has always had one agenda: destroy his enemy, Peter Michaels. When Peter’s twenty-year-old daughter Wendy shows up in James’s bar, he sees his way in. Seduce the girl and use her for his revenge. It's the perfect plan, until things in James’s organization begin to crumble. Suddenly, he must find the traitor in his midst, and his plan for revenge gets murkier as James starts to see Wendy as more than just a pawn in his game. The second point of view is Wendy, and she has been cloistered away most of her life by her cold, wealthy father, but a spontaneous night out with friends turns into an intense and addictive love affair with the dark and brooding James. As much as she knows James is dangerous, Wendy can’t seem to shake her desire from him. But as their relationship grows more heated and she learns more about the world he moves in, she finds herself unsure if she’s falling for the man known as James or the monster known as Hook. 

I usually struggle with retelling, but I managed to get into this one quite quickly. Should I have enjoyed it as much as I did? Probably not, but it was very addictive. James just reminds me of very single villain that you hate to love – Klaus, Damon, all the typical bad boys who are soft for the good girls. I love the toxic relationship between them, but I swear if this happened in my life, I would cut him off completely, he is the ultimate and biggest red flag ever. The storyline was easy, and it was a quick read. The main plot twist was not what I was expecting. We all thought it would be Peter and yet, it was a big lie, and he was under someone else’s thumb. I will always adore dual POV in romance book. 

I would have liked Wendy to be a bit stronger and more badass, she took a lot of time to grow on me because I didn’t like how stupid and naive she was. I get being blindsided but the clues were so obvious and yet she was still shocked that her daddy dearest was a bad guy. For James to be British, I would have LOVED some more of British slang than him being all half-American. 

I cannot wait to read the next book in this series, however I have never watched Once Upon a Time, so all I kept thinking about was Jason Isaac as Hook.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Violence, and Murder

Moderate: Child abuse, Toxic relationship, Kidnapping, and Death of parent

Minor: Drug use, Pedophilia, and Pregnancy

thecandiegirl's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Sexual assault, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Drug use, Stalking, Pregnancy, and Alcohol

meganlaza's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

hippie_raccoon's review against another edition

dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I read this in less than 48 hours. It's a dark romance, so definitely not a healthy relationship, BUT, I was definitely sucked in and enjoyed the smut AND the plot. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, and Pregnancy

kshertz's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

This one was rough! I love hook, I love the smut. But it was pretty dark and violent, with kink and a lot of painful stuff. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Death, Gore, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Murder, Pregnancy, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

savage_book_review's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I read this series of books last year (and reviews were posted at the time), but recently found the first four were available as audiobooks as part of my Audible subscription. However, they're being removed in a couple of weeks, so I want to try and get them listened to before then! 

The audio version definitely adds a level to the story in bringing it to life, especially where you have a male narrator reading James' chapters and a female narrator reading Wendy's chapters. However, I still cannot understand why you would hire two narrators for that purpose, and then not have them speak the appropriate lines in the other person's chapter (I.e. have the male read James' speech within Wendy's chapters and vice versa). They don't do badly at putting on the opposite voices, but it just grates on my nerves!

I was less convinced by the voices/accents employed for the secondary characters - the male narrator had an especially tough job given that he's a Brit and most of the secondary characters Americans. I couldn't tell you whether the accent was right for the setting (Brit here), but it was quite harsh and didn't necessarily suit the narrators' natural tone of voice. But equally they managed to bring each character to life throughout with different voices for each and, for the most part, they didn't wander too much. 

There were a couple of places where I felt the narrators could have 'acted' a bit more to get the point across, but generally it was a very enjoyable listen.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Kidnapping, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Blood, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, and Alcohol

Minor: Animal cruelty, Bullying, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Car accident, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury

captaininsaneoh's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

0.25

most vile & disgusting piece of trash i’ve ever had the displeasure of reading. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Body shaming, Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, and Sexual harassment

filipa_maia's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

So, this was my first dark romance / smut read, and although this is not my preferred genre, I did appreciate this book.

The characters are complex, with a background that really explains where they are now, they have good arcs, and overall this book has a decent plot. I predicted part of the final plot, but not all, so I still got surprised.

Mostly, I liked the fact that Wendy wasn't completely removed from managing her own life - okay, maybe after what happened she didn't have much of a choice, but still.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Grief, Medical trauma, Stalking, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Drug abuse, Car accident, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcohol

Minor: Infidelity and Vomit