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A review by fishreads
Ice Planet Barbarians by Ruby Dixon
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
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? No
2.75
(Initial rating 3 stars) I never managed to write a review after initial reading so what follows is a review after rereading the story two years later.
The beginning of the book is horrifying as the main character Georgie wakes up in the cargo hold of an alien ship to realize she's been abducted by little green men with a bunch of other girls and witnesses a rape of another female captive by orange aliens who serve as the muscle to their captors.
<blockquote>We’re nothing but cattle to these things. They’re going to sell us to someone else to rape, to eat, or both. Or something else more horrible that I can’t even imagine.</blockquote>
Almost immediately Georgie and Liz, a fellow captive, start hatching up an escape plan which coincides with alien ship experiencing issues and dropping "the cargo" to a safe location to be picked up later.
Georgie, as their de facto chosen leader, ventures out in the cold in order to try to find help. It is only by luck that she wanders into one of the traps and the planet native, Vektal, finds her and frees her from it. Vektal almost immediately recognizes Georgie as his mate, as the symbiont in his chest makes him "resonate" to her which leads to some very dubiously consensual sexual activity. Language barrier doesn't help the matters as the two have trouble communicating with each other but Vektal is determined about taking care of Georgie while she is trying to find her way back to the other survivors. Still the developing relationship between the two is rather idyllic and the two engage in further sexual activity.
Upon rereading I found the relationship between Georgie and Vektal quite boring because if we disregard the troubles in communication there were no major issues between these two complete strangers who only met five minutes ago. What I was more interested in was getting back to the other survivors and seeing Georgie and Vektal being all lovey dovey just made me impatient to get to the more plotty part of the story.
Let's be honest, this is a great introduction to a fun series about blue skinned aliens mating with humans who were "lucky" enough to get stranded on a frozen ice planet in the middle of nowhere, after they were initially being kidnapped and abused by different sets of aliens. But as romance between Georgie and Vektal it was somewhat boring relying too much on sex scenes between main characters for my taste.
Themes: dual POV, alien abduction, stranded, "fated" mates, pregnancy
The beginning of the book is horrifying as the main character Georgie wakes up in the cargo hold of an alien ship to realize she's been abducted by little green men with a bunch of other girls and witnesses a rape of another female captive by orange aliens who serve as the muscle to their captors.
<blockquote>We’re nothing but cattle to these things. They’re going to sell us to someone else to rape, to eat, or both. Or something else more horrible that I can’t even imagine.</blockquote>
Almost immediately Georgie and Liz, a fellow captive, start hatching up an escape plan which coincides with alien ship experiencing issues and dropping "the cargo" to a safe location to be picked up later.
Georgie, as their de facto chosen leader, ventures out in the cold in order to try to find help. It is only by luck that she wanders into one of the traps and the planet native, Vektal, finds her and frees her from it. Vektal almost immediately recognizes Georgie as his mate, as the symbiont in his chest makes him "resonate" to her which leads to some very dubiously consensual sexual activity. Language barrier doesn't help the matters as the two have trouble communicating with each other but Vektal is determined about taking care of Georgie while she is trying to find her way back to the other survivors. Still the developing relationship between the two is rather idyllic and the two engage in further sexual activity.
Upon rereading I found the relationship between Georgie and Vektal quite boring because if we disregard the troubles in communication there were no major issues between these two complete strangers who only met five minutes ago. What I was more interested in was getting back to the other survivors and seeing Georgie and Vektal being all lovey dovey just made me impatient to get to the more plotty part of the story.
Let's be honest, this is a great introduction to a fun series about blue skinned aliens mating with humans who were "lucky" enough to get stranded on a frozen ice planet in the middle of nowhere, after they were initially being kidnapped and abused by different sets of aliens. But as romance between Georgie and Vektal it was somewhat boring relying too much on sex scenes between main characters for my taste.
Themes: dual POV, alien abduction, stranded, "fated" mates, pregnancy
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Confinement, Rape, Kidnapping, and Murder
Moderate: Death, Gore, Abortion, and Injury/Injury detail