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Amante Oscuro (2011)

by Brenda Joyce(Favorite Author)

4.18 of 5 Votes: 6

ISBN

8490000891 (ISBN13: 9788490000892)

languge

English

genre

Romance

publisher

Harlequin Ibérica

series

Masters of Time

review 1: Samantha Rose works as a Slayer, meaning her job is to hunt bad guys. Her most recent assignment is to retrieve several pages from a book of power that was recently acquired by some very evil characters and then subsequently stolen from them by the very man they hired to retrieve it in the first place.The suspected thief is a man named Ian Maclean, who is a time travelling Highlander with a dark past. Ian was imprisoned, tortured and tormented by demons for most of his life. His possession of the pages from the dark book leads to his involvement with some of the very people who were responsible for his horrible life. Samantha gets involved with Ian because she wants the pages too (for the good guys), but her attraction to Ian and the pity she feels for him get in the w... moreay of her doing her job, and also drag her into his past.Eventually, Samantha finds herself in a similar position to the captivity Ian once faced, and the only person who can save her is Ian. Ian is forced to face his fears to rescue her, and he must rely on his Father for help, even though he has blamed his father for his captivity for all these years. The biggest problem I had with this story is that the description of the characters didn’t match their actions at all. For example, Samantha Rose was described as a sex crazed woman who constantly uses young men for one night stands. She supposedly has no emotion at all and didn’t even shed a tear or get upset after finding her mother’s murdered body years earlier. We are supposed to believe that this emotionless tough chick is an accurate description of her, but she never actually has random sex with anyone in this book, she gets emotional throughout the whole thing, and she cried more than once. Huh? The other main character, Ian Maclean, is just as contradictory to his description as Samantha was. We are supposed to believe that he is a strong sexy dangerous dark man (hence the title Dark Lover), but then the author gives him panic attacks through the entire book and makes him scared of everything he faces. Again, Huh? If Joyce had named the book “Scaredy Cat”, that would have been a better fit. And trust me, a scaredy cat does not make a sexy alpha male. Furthermore, the whole plot of the book begins with Ian’s career as an unconscionable thief, and yet he lets himself be tormented over something he only stole for profit in the first place. Baffling, and not in a good way.I think we are supposed to believe that Ian and Sam are responsible for the changes in each other, but we never really get a good explanation as to why. They are complete strangers to each other and their interactions are confrontational hateful encounters. Then suddenly **POOF** they’re in love. One last time, Huh?The plot and the characters simply did not add up for me. The word “evil” was ridiculously overused – think broken record – and sounded completely generic as a result. The time jumping also seemed overused with too many people able to do it. And even though there was a lot of activity in the last 1/3 of the book, the first 2/3 was boring and repetitive.I couldn’t find much to like in this book. The big climax/battle at the end was somewhat decent, and I liked Ian’s family. Those are the only reasons I didn’t give this book a 1 cup rating. My recommendation is to skip this series and go straight to Karen Marie Moning’s Highlander Series instead.This was my first Brenda Joyce novel and unfortunately I wasn’t very impressed. I’m still undecided if I will try another of her books, but maybe this was just an anomaly. If you really love another of her books, please let me know and I’ll give it a try.
review 2: Samantha Rose works as a Slayer, meaning her job is to hunt bad guys. Her most recent assignment is to retrieve several pages from a book of power that was recently acquired by some very evil characters and then subsequently stolen from them by the very man they hired to retrieve it in the first place.The suspected thief is a man named Ian Maclean, who is a time travelling Highlander with a dark past. Ian was imprisoned, tortured and tormented by demons for most of his life. His possession of the pages from the dark book leads to his involvement with some of the very people who were responsible for his horrible life. Samantha gets involved with Ian because she wants the pages too (for the good guys), but her attraction to Ian and the pity she feels for him get in the way of her doing her job, and also drag her into his past.Eventually, Samantha finds herself in a similar position to the captivity Ian once faced, and the only person who can save her is Ian. Ian is forced to face his fears to rescue her, and he must rely on his Father for help, even though he has blamed his father for his captivity for all these years. The biggest problem I had with this story is that the description of the characters didn’t match their actions at all. For example, Samantha Rose was described as a sex crazed woman who constantly uses young men for one night stands. She supposedly has no emotion at all and didn’t even shed a tear or get upset after finding her mother’s murdered body years earlier. We are supposed to believe that this emotionless tough chick is an accurate description of her, but she never actually has random sex with anyone in this book, she gets emotional throughout the whole thing, and she cried more than once. Huh? The other main character, Ian Maclean, is just as contradictory to his description as Samantha was. We are supposed to believe that he is a strong sexy dangerous dark man (hence the title Dark Lover), but then the author gives him panic attacks through the entire book and makes him scared of everything he faces. Again, Huh? If Joyce had named the book “Scaredy Cat”, that would have been a better fit. And trust me, a scaredy cat does not make a sexy alpha male. Furthermore, the whole plot of the book begins with Ian’s career as an unconscionable thief, and yet he lets himself be tormented over something he only stole for profit in the first place. Baffling, and not in a good way.I think we are supposed to believe that Ian and Sam are responsible for the changes in each other, but we never really get a good explanation as to why. They are complete strangers to each other and their interactions are confrontational hateful encounters. Then suddenly **POOF** they’re in love. One last time, Huh?The plot and the characters simply did not add up for me. The word “evil” was ridiculously overused – think broken record – and sounded completely generic as a result. The time jumping also seemed overused with too many people able to do it. And even though there was a lot of activity in the last 1/3 of the book, the first 2/3 was boring and repetitive.I couldn’t find much to like in this book. The big climax/battle at the end was somewhat decent, and I liked Ian’s family. Those are the only reasons I didn’t give this book a 1 star rating. My recommendation is to skip this series and go straight to Karen Marie Moning’s Highlander Series instead.This was my first Brenda Joyce novel and unfortunately I wasn’t very impressed. I’m still undecided if I will try another of her books, but maybe this was just an anomaly. If you really love another of her books, please let me know and I’ll give it a try. less

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