Reviewed by Cindy
Title: Maddox
Series: Masters & Slaves Vol. 1
Author: Taylor Kinney
Publisher: TK
Length: 133 Pages
Release Date:
Blurb:
Gun saved the Queen’s life, and his reward will be a slave of his own, chosen from among all those for sale in the market. But he doesn’t want an ordinary slave, he wants a strong, handsome one. But the most important thing is a slave that’s not already submissive and obedient – he wants a man to tame.
When he sees Maddox, he immediately recognizes that this is the kind of slave he was looking for. This is the one he wants. Luckily for him, the Queen is prepared to spend any amount to make him happy.
Maddox had been captured and reduced to slavery only two weeks earlier, and he would never dream of submitting without a fight, but as he gets to know his new master, something changes inside him, and perhaps freedom isn’t the only thing that counts.
Two strong men who have to learn how to get to know and respect each other will manage to find common ground and mutual understanding.
REVIEW:
I picked up this review because I am very fond of Master/slave books and I thought one that wasn’t set in a historical period would be interesting.
Gun is a slave, the mistresses favorite and while that comes with some special rights and freedoms, in the end, he is still in chains, just like the slave that is gifted to him. Maddox is a man who was born to a privileged life and doesn’t adjust well to being collared.
I wanted to love this story. The premise is so interesting and I had high hopes about where it could go but for me it just fell flat.
I couldn’t connect to a single character. None of them invoked affection or sympathy in me. In one scene Maddox is angry and insulting to Gun for treating him like a slave but also admits that in his old life, he had slaves and treated them horribly. He doesn’t seem remorseful in the least about that behavior and it bothered me.
Gun goes from cruel to overly sappy throughout the story and it comes across as wishy-washy for me.
Another issue I have with this story is the head-hopping. We end up seeing things from the point of view of almost ever damn character in the book, sometimes all in one page. It makes it very hard to follow when you don’t know who’s head you’re in at any given moment.
There’s no real finesse to the storytelling here. Everything just seems to be thrown at you with no anticipation, no build up, no chance to get invested in the story. And I’ll be honest, the excessive use of pet names got on my nerves after the first few chapters. I felt like if I saw the word sweetie or puppy one more time I would scream.
The story has potential and with some good editing, it might have gone over better for me. I did see at the beginning that the book was translated from Italian and maybe the problem is that something literally got lost in the translation.
RATING: 
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