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Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Book Review: Hard to Serve: A Hard Ink Novella by Laura Kaye + Giveaway


by Laura Kaye
June 28, 2016
140 pages
To protect and serve is all Detective Kyler Vance ever wanted to do, so when Internal Affairs investigates him as part of the new police commissioner’s bid to oust corruption, everything is on the line. Which makes meeting a smart, gorgeous submissive at an exclusive play club the perfect distraction…

The director of the city’s hottest art gallery, Mia Breslin’s career is golden. Now if only she could find a man to dominate her nights and set her body—and her heart—on fire. When a scorching scene with a hard-bodied, brooding Dom at Blasphemy promises just that, Mia is lured to serve Kyler again and again.

As their relationship burns hotter, Kyler runs into Mia at work and learns that he’s been dominating the daughter of the hard-ass boss who has it in for him. Now Kyler must choose between life-long duty and forbidden desire before Mia finds another who’s not so hard to serve.


Being fairly new to the series (I have only read the first book recently), I didn’t know what to expect from Hard to Serve. While it does include some previous characters from the Hard Ink series and is listed as part of that series, this novella is more at home as part of the Blasphemy series which centers around a BDSM club owned by 12 masters. 

Basically the story is that Detective Kylar Vance is being investigated as part of the new police commissioner’s plan to end corruption within the department. Naturally Kylar feels threatened and stressed so what does he do? He goes out looking for a submissive and finds her at Blasphemy. Mia Breslin is everything Kylar could want in a Sub and Kylar is everything Mia could want in a Dom so everything is peachy keen until Kylar finds out that Mia is his boss’ daughter. Talk about a rock and a hard place right? Yes, I just went there.

Anyway, Hard to Serve wasn’t a bad novella, but it wasn’t stellar either. I’m trying not to compare it to the full length novel I just read from the same series but it is difficult not to. The plot was alright but I felt like I’d read this story before and I’m not a big BDSM reader. I know plots and themes get used and re-used but there was just something about this particular one that fell a little flat for me. It left me with a “meh” feeling versus the “wow” feeling I got from the first book in the series and from this author in general.

That’s not to say Hard to Serve should be skipped, by all means if it’s BDSM or a Laura Kaye story you’re looking for then pick this one up. I did like Kylar and Mia as individual characters but because this was a novella, I didn’t feel like I got to really know them in such a short amount of time. Perhaps a full length story for these two would have made a better impact because I felt there was more about them that needed to be fleshed out to give the romance more of an impact. Then again, novellas are tricky. The author needs to be able to tell an entire story beginning, middle, and end in such a short number of pages. So while this novella may have fallen a bit short of expectations, I still highly recommend Laura Kaye’s work, especially her full length novels.

3 “It was alright” Sheep

Adria Reyes

1
Announcing a New Erotic Romance Series from Laura Kaye…

BLASPHEMY – the club first introduced in Hard to Serve
From the ruins of an abandoned church comes Baltimore’s hottest and most exclusive BDSM club. Twelve Masters. Infinite fantasies. Welcome to Blasphemy…
Bound to Submit is coming September 13, 2016
PRE-ORDER BOUND TO SUBMIT:
Amazon | Barnes & Noble (Coming Soon) | iBooks | Kobo

About the Author:
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HARD TO SERVE on Goodreads
Laura is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over twenty-five books in contemporary and paranormal romance and romantic suspense, including the Hard Ink and Raven Riders series. Growing up, Laura’s large extended family believed in the supernatural, and family lore involving angels, ghosts, and evil-eye curses cemented in Laura a life-long fascination with storytelling and all things paranormal. She lives in Maryland with her husband, two daughters, and cute-but-bad dog, and appreciates her view of the Chesapeake Bay every day.

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2 comments:

  1. This is such a great series. I'm looking forward to reading the latest. Thanks for the giveaway chance and the excerpt.
    Carol L
    Lucky4750 (at) aol (dot) com

    ReplyDelete