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A review by corvinascloud
Don't Leave Me by Eden Emory
4.0
similarly to what happened with the previous book being the counterpart of the first installment of the salacious players club series, this one shared similarities with "eyes on me" - bdsm club setting, step-sisters, forced proximity, unrequited love. this time around the dark romance undertones that differentiates the two (aside from the predominantly female world setting) steemed more so from trauma than just the criminal underworld.
this book was all sloan to me. i really had a hard time with lillian, maybe it was my similarities and attachment to sloan, but i believe she deserved better. lillian felt too juvenile for her age, both at 17 and 29, reducing sloan to a fuck toy.
in the wise words of ax “if you had real therapy, maybe you and sloan would finally make up,”. yes, lillian's actions were founded in her trauma, but that's not an excuse and the stereotype of "hurt people hurt people" villainizes trauma. furthermore, we had the other side of the coin, case in point sloan. nevertheless, i appreciate ax and nyx trying to repay sloan the gesture of bringing them together by doing the same for her (otherwise how would the sharing be possible). but avery was to "don't leave me" what sloan had been to "don't stop me", so it's no surprise i am positively obsessed with her.
*i was sent an arc by the author in exchange for a honest review
this book was all sloan to me. i really had a hard time with lillian, maybe it was my similarities and attachment to sloan, but i believe she deserved better. lillian felt too juvenile for her age, both at 17 and 29, reducing sloan to a fuck toy.
Spoiler
she claimed to love her and that the other woman was incapable of love, when she was the one trying to change everything about sloan that made her herself. she repeatedly used sloan's fear of ruining her mother's family against her and exploited herself as sloan's weakness (getting her way by crying when she knew her step-sister couldn't bear it ever since they were young). but the worst of it was her claiming sloan "left" her when she went to college; lillian went as far as begging her to refuse MIT's acceptance. and then 12 years later, after her step-sister confessed her love for her yet again (and yet again her not believing sloan) she was the one who actively left her not once but twice. sloan knew from the start lillian was it for her, whilst the other woman never even imagined a future with sloan in it, she just loved the idea of her. i mean, she's the one who fucked up and at 90% into the book wanted to have sex with another woman to get over sloan. multiple orgasms and she was suddenly sorry? but groveling? she never heard of it.in the wise words of ax “if you had real therapy, maybe you and sloan would finally make up,”. yes, lillian's actions were founded in her trauma, but that's not an excuse and the stereotype of "hurt people hurt people" villainizes trauma. furthermore, we had the other side of the coin, case in point sloan. nevertheless, i appreciate ax and nyx trying to repay sloan the gesture of bringing them together by doing the same for her (otherwise how would the sharing be possible). but avery was to "don't leave me" what sloan had been to "don't stop me", so it's no surprise i am positively obsessed with her.
*i was sent an arc by the author in exchange for a honest review