A Saving Grace (Free At Last #3) - Annie Stone
After a grave injury Hunter is in a bad state. He can’t see the light anymore. Mackenzie can’t accept this and sends him a reason to live. With love and determination Hunter approves, but will life ever be the same again?
I am really torn on this book. On one hand I am so glad I got through the trilogy, and that Hunter and Mac end up together. We all know that this is what the three book buildup was for. On the other hand, they have a LOT of issues that don't get addressed in this book and honestly, I was kind of wondering if this relationship should even happen. If you are an abuse counselor or therapist you will have all kinds of alarm bells ringing with this trilogy.
Alright, this book finds us with Mac, parenting little Hazel who is now around three years old, and Hunter, off doing the war hero thing. (Oh! Let me just throw in here a little note about the time line in this book- it is bizarre. You feel like you're reading about events fairly close in time but no, it's like three years. Never mind that makes this entire weird relationship between five and seven years and you're like, get off the pot, yall.) Anyways. On his way back to America, the convoy he's in is attacked in a surprise ambush and Hunter is seriously injured. Unable to get to America in that condition, he's sent to Germany to have his multiple surgeries and recover. In Germany they notify his next of kin (his brother Casey), who has been living with Mac and Hazel all this time as friends, so he sends Mac to Germany, convinced it'll be this amazing love story ending.
Except it isn't. Hunter isn't at all the same person, war changes someone, and he's become angry and hard. Once he learns the extent of his injuries he's dangerously angry, depressed, and suicidal. Seeing Mac only amps all of those feelings and she decides she's going to win him over with a blow job! (I know, this is as ridiculous reading it as it is me talking about it.) Anyways, so that's bad so she goes back to San Diego, dejected, and still hasn't told Hunter about his damn daughter. Fast forward to him coming to Virginia for the rest of his recovery and rehab, so Casey and Mac decide to temporarily live in Virginia, determined to win him over. Hunter finds out about his daughter, has all of the feels for her, and Mac because he's angry at her but feels like a jerk for abandoning her when she clearly needed him. Reluctantly they go forward with a bizarre relationship.
I'm only giving this book 3/5 stars because while I'm glad we've got the whole happy ending thing, there are so many red flags in this book that I'm uncomfortable giving it a higher rating. So we have Mac, a childhood sexual abuse survivor, now in a highly dominant relationship with a man who readily says he's going to use her how he wants, when he wants, and an orgasm for her is a gift? Oh hell no, asshole. While giving him a blow job he pushes her head onto him to the point where she's struggling and at the end has tears in her eyes? NOPE. I think the draw for Mac to Hunter was that he was kind, and caring, a soft spot to land, but he's become harsh, unkind, domineering, and a "take it or leave it" kind of guy. I just don't see how this would work in real life.Oh well. Overall the series was a fast read and I would recommend it.
No comments:
Post a Comment