Review: Trust by @Sherri_Hayes

by Donna Huber

I have been following this series for a long time. All the way back to when I met Sherri in an online forum and Finding Anna was going by a different name and was in its earliest of drafts. I stuck with the series to see where it would go, what Sherri would do with the characters, how she would resolve the plot.

I've mentioned several times I'm intrigued by captive stories, particularly what comes after rescue. That is what drew me originally to Sherri's series. Slave (see my review) starts with the rescue of Brianna and Need (see my review) and Truth (see my review) follow her journey back to life.

In Trust, the final installment of the Finding Anna series, Brianna has been separated from Stephen - her rescuer and love interest. Their reunion is contingent on the investigation surrounding Brianna's original disappearance and Stephen's subsequent involvement which included paying her capture a large sum of money.

Buy Trust at Amazon

Overall, it was a nice wrap up of the series. However, it felt like there were too many scenes. Some just didn't need to be there. For example, the plot line with the misunderstanding with Stephan's ex-girlfriend. There was so much other conflict, bigger conflict, that having Brianna think he has moved on with an ex-girlfriend seemed contrite. In my opinion, it is an overdone plot device in romance novels.

A big pet peeve I have with romance novels is unnecessary sex scenes that go into so much detail that they are excruciating more than hot.  One well written, emotion filled sex scene (for an example read Gabriel's Inferno) can raise the sexy level of a romance so much higher, than 10 mediocre scenes (I'm exaggerating; I didn't count the number of sex scenes. In fact I started skimming them to get back to the main story).

You may recall that I was not all that pleased with Truth. And perhaps some of the action that occurred in book 4 would have been better in book 3. It might have paced the story better. It was interesting to see that a couple of big complaints among reviewers of Slave was included in this final installment. It has been debated with each installment whether Stephen's Dom-technique really was helping Anna recover or keeping her more dependent on him. She suffered extreme psychological torment along with the physical torture. And while the structure he provides gives her stability during the transition, it was never evident if she would be able to fully function as an individual without professional help. The other complaint was if Stephen loved Anna enough to give up the BDSM lifestyle if she was unable to participate in the lifestyle due to her trauma.

Though I thought the story could have been more streamlined by cutting some of the extraneous scenes, overall Trust held my interest. It is another quick read and if you like to have a series wrapped up all pretty then you will want to read Trust.

Book info:
ebook and paperback (310 pages)
Published March 2014 by The Writer's Coffee Shop Publishing House 
ISBN13: 9781612132228
Source: Netgalley
Read: February 2014



Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small fee is earned when purchases are made using the link above. A free book was obtained from the source.

Related articles

• Brand New Release From Sheri Hayes- Trust (finding Anna #4) Is Here. (sookie72.wordpress.com)
• Slave By Sherri Hayes (shelligodinho.wordpress.com)
• My Thoughts - Truth Finding Anna Book 3 By Sherri Hayes (shelligodinho.wordpress.com)
• Need By Sherri Hayes (shelligodinho.wordpress.com)
• Tour Stop: Truth by Sherri Hayes (talkingsupe.com)
• Truth Finding Anna Book 3 By Sherry Hayes (shelligodinho.wordpress.com)
• A Christmas Proposal - Sherri Hayes - Promo (michbookreviews.wordpress.com)

Review: Truth by Sherri Hayes

I have been following this series since day one and was happy when I saw the ARC available on Netgalley. I read Slave (read my review) and Need (read my review) in just less than a day. I think I read Slave in like 5 hours.

I was fully prepared to spend my day reading Truth. However, I couldn't read it straight through like the other ones. It just didn't hold my attention. I remember some of the early reviews of Slave saying there was too much mundane detail. While I didn't feel that with Slave, I did see it in Truth. I didn't need to be told repeatedly that Brianna read during the day and in the evenings her and Stephen talked about what they were reading.

I felt like Truth was just filler. I don't think there was much in the way of character development or moving the plot forward. Pretty much there was reading and sex happening in this book. And the sex scenes felt forced, kind of like the scene was mandated. It was mechanical, maybe. It was like there was a prescribed number of pages before another sex scene was required.

Thankfully there is only one more book in the series. If there had been a few more scheduled I might give up the series after reading Truth. I think there is a lot of ground to cover in the last book in terms of Brianna and Stephen's relationship. I don't think they communicate about the important aspects of a relationship. For most of this book, she still thinks that it is either be his submissive or be out on the streets. I'm pretty sure a responsible Dom would make sure the person he was considering as a submissive understood she had options. Also, from what I've read about the lifestyle, the D/s is just one part of the relationship - that they love the person unconditionally. If one of the partners develops a condition where they were unable to physically, emotionally, or mentally to continue in their role as the dominant or submissive that the relationship would not end. That is what it means to be in a committed relationship based on unconditional love. I don't get that feeling from Stephen. I don't think he loves Brianna unconditionally.

So I sort of caught off track, but it bugs me every time I read Stephen saying "I love you" or reading how much he loves her. Because the truth is, if she can't be his submissive he won't be with her and to me that isn't love, it's lust. And there is too much lust and not enough love in this world for me to want to read about a couple in lust with one another.

My recommendation: If you are keeping up with this series, then definitely read Truth by Sherri Hayes. (If for no other reason, than to have the cliffhanger from Need resolved). If you haven't read this series, you might want to wait until the fourth book is out to see how it turns out.

Buy Truth at Amazon

Book info: ebook & paperback, published July 2013 by The Writer's Coffee Shop Publishing House
ISBN13: 9781612131610
Source: Netgalley
Read: May 2013

Girl Who Reads is an Amazon advertising affiliate; a small fee is earned when purchases are made at Amazon through the link above. A free digital galley was by provided by the source above in order exchange for an honest review.

Related articles

• Tour Stop: Truth by Sherri Hayes (talkingsupe.com)
• Meet the Author: Sherri Hayes (girl-who-reads.com)

Meet the Author: Sherri Hayes

If someone would have told me growing up that I would one day be a published author, I wouldn’t have believed them. English was a subject I always struggled with in school, mainly because I wasn’t good at spelling. In school, especially elementary school, spelling was often lumped together with grammar and literature, and no matter how hard I tried, it would always drag my grade down. It was so bad, in fact, that my second grade teacher dragged my parents in two weeks into the  school year, and told them that I would most likely be held back because I couldn’t spell what were considered basic words in a second graders vocabulary.

As I got older, I learned to cope—adjust—to my difficulty spelling. Often times, I would realize I couldn’t spell the word I wanted to use, so I’d have to find a word that would mean the same thing, but was easier to spell. It was frustrating, not being able to express myself through writing the way I wanted to.

Two things saved me—My memory and my ability to express myself well through writing, even if I was handicapped by my lack of ability in the area of spelling. My memory not only served me well when trying to memorize those dreaded spelling words, it also helped me remember story and plot lines in books. It helped with studying for tests. As much difficulty as spelling has given me over the years, it also forced me to hone other skills that I didn’t have to work at so hard.

To this day, I have trouble spelling. I love interacting with my readers at events and book signings, but there is often that twinge of fear that I’ll be asked to write something that I can’t spell. The last thing a reader expects is for an author to have difficulty spelling. Most think of it as a natural thing that goes hand-in-hand with the other, but for me, it’s not.

I am grateful that I have been given this gift of being able to tell stories that so many readers love, but I am equally grateful for spell check, my beta, and my editors. I couldn’t produce the stories I do without them.

About the Author:

Sherri is the author of four novels: Hidden Threat, Slave (Finding Anna Book 1), Need (Finding Anna Book 2), Behind Closed Doors (A Daniels Brothers’ Novel), and a short story, A Christmas Proposal. She lives in central Ohio with her husband and three cats. Her mother fostered her love for books by reading to Sherri when she was a child. Stories have been floating around in her head for as long as she can remember, but she didn’t start writing them down until five years ago. It has become
creative outlet that allows her to explore a wide range of emotions while having fun taking her characters through all the twists and turns she can create. When she’s not writing, she can usually be found helping her husband in his woodworking shop.

Facebook
Website
Twitter
Goodreads
Blog

Mixed Feelings: Need

Need (Finding Anna #2) by Sherri Hayes
ARC from Netgalley.com
Published July 2012 by The Writer's Coffee Shop
ISBN 9781612130989
Read July 2012
Goodreads and Amazon

I mentioned when I reviewed Slave (Finding Anna #1) that I wasn't sure if I would review the rest of the series because it is listed as erotica and eventually the story would become more focused on sex. When I saw the ARC on Netgalley, I thought I would read it to see if it was still more on the romance side of the line or not.

 Need left me with a lot of mixed feelings. If you read my review of Slave you know that I read it in about 5 hours. Need took me a week. I remember reading other reviews of Slave that mentioned that there was too much day-to-day detail. While I didn't get that feeling from that book, the first 30 percent of Need did feel that way to me. Need starts off the morning after Slave ended. Brianna is trying to come to terms with what Stephan means when he says she is not his slave, but he wants a submissive.

I once heard that any story has 3 acts and most books contains all three acts. For me, the Finding Anna series gives each act it's own book. I was ok with it in the first book as I felt like the end was the closing of a chapter for Brianna. However, in this book it didn't work as well for me. I felt like too much filler had to be put in to, well, fill out the story. Need read more like a novella for me. The whole focus of the second book was Brianna's sexual healing and her ability to have sex. There were hints of possible dangers, but never enough attention it to make there seem like any urgency or real threat to Brianna.

My mixed feelings about the book continued with the way Stephan was handling Brianna PTSD and anxiety. I have no problem with a book making me question my own opinions so this is not a negative comment at all. First, I question whether Stephan is letting his one experience (it seemed like he only tried 1 psychiatrist) with therapy get in the way of what Brianna possible needs. He isn't even giving her the opportunity to make the choice. Though anxiety medication might be recommended she wouldn't have to take it or even see a psychiatrist. My hang-up here was is Stephan doing the right thing by not allowing Brianna to decide for herself. This leads me to another point of contention within myself.

(Again, this questioning should not be construed as negative - I love books that make me think).

Stephan treats Brianna as a submissive even though they really haven't talked through what all that would entail. From everything I've read (and I don't mean just in fiction), BDSM couples stress laying out the ground rules within the first few meetings and definitely before playing. While the situation is a bit different for Stephan and Brianna, I think Stephan is overstepping. There are times Brianna needs the "control" because it is familiar to her. But like in the last book when she was punished for daydreaming (I saw it as something that should be praised since she felt comfortable enough to not be hyper-aware of her surroundings - something abusive victims struggle with), I thought Stephan shouldn't have punished her for not answering his calls or calling him right back. I felt that he was being the Dom by default rather than true consent.

The last part that I didin't agree with is how those in the lifestyle don't seem to love their partner enough to give up the lifestyle should that be what their partner wants or need. Instead the "vanilla" partner must be willing to engage in the lifestyle. I get compromise and all that, but it was something Logan said about loving Lily so much that he had to become a Dom for her. Now, what if he really could not embrace that role? Would Lily love Logan enough to be more vanilla? For all that Stephan says he loves Brianna, it does not look like he loves her enough to let her decide she cannot be a submissive to him. Just as Logan's statement gave me pause so did a statement Brianna made - that she would do this for him. For the lifestyle to be mutually beneficial and pleasurable for both parties, Brianna is going to need to want to be a submissive for herself not just because that is what Stephan wants.

As you can see this book gave me a lot to think about. The sex was more descriptive than I cared for, but not really more so than many adult romances. And though I didn't enjoy it as much as Slave it hasn't turned me off the series, I'm still curious as to what will happen (especially since it ends with a cliffhanger).

Related articles

• Vlog #20: Exciting News

  ---

• Ali Talks Live with Sherri Hayes

  ---

• Review: Need by Sherri Hayes

  ---

Too Tempting: Slave

Slave (Finding Anna) by Sherri Hayes
paperback, 267 pages
Published July 2011 by The Writer's Coffee Shop Publishing House
ISBN 9781612130484
Read November 2011

The publishing house I work for sent me some of their damaged stock to see if I could figure out what to do with it. I knew some of the books are missing pages and I have a cool idea for them (I just hope it turns out as well as it does in my head). So I was flipping through the books in the box to see which ones where cosmetically damaged and which where missing pages. Slave was in the box. And it was too tempting not to sit down and read it. So that's what I've done for the past 5 hours. (It's Saturday; I can be lazy!)

I first learned of Sherri's writing in our online writing community about 2 years or so ago. She was working on this story. I was intrigued because as you know I have an affinity for books about troubled people - if the character has been kidnapped, abused, suffers from mental illness, then I have to read it. Sherri took an extra step with hers and placed her troubled heroine in the world of BDSM. I'm a bit fascinated with the lifestyle. Not so much for the kinky sex, but the deep emotional connection the partners have with one another.

Outside of some kissing and a few mentions of masturbation, there is no sex in this romance novel. It was all about the two main characters learning to communicate and connect with one another. However, this is just book one of the series, so I can imagine that it could get rather steamy in future books.

Like I said I read a draft of this story through our writer's group, but as it is meant to be a forum to explore your creativity and hone skills often the finished product is quite different than where it started. Though the general back bone remained in tack, the fleshing out of the story was quite well done. Many of the questions readers in the writing group where left with were addressed in this published version. Like I said, it's a series and so not everything was answered. But I was quite satisfied. I was happy to see a particular part near the end. It was something that was not included in the original draft and many readers were upset about it.

As it is the publishing house I work for who published Slave, I have read many reviews. Some readers seemed upset about the ending. I thought that it was a great ending. It it tied up some of the story lines presented in the book, while at the same time setting the stage for the next chapter in Brianna's and Stephen's lives.