Reviewed by Stephen K.
TITLE: Feel My Pain
SERIES: Cursebound #1
AUTHOR: K. A. Merikan
PUBLISHER: Acerbi & Villani Ltd
LENGTH: 370 pages
RELEASE DATE: March 28th 2020
BLURB:
Two enemies cursed to feel each other’s pain.
Zane. “I will burn your life to the ground.”
Roach. “I’m a cockroach. I’ll survive.”
Two years ago, the Rabid Hyenas MC ripped Zane apart like a pack of starving wolves. But he’s not only a survivor, he took revenge that same night.
Turns out, one of the bikers is still alive, and as long as that’s the case, Zane will not know peace. Especially since Roach is the dirtbag who caused all the mayhem in the first place.
When an act of revenge meant to close that chapter of Zane’s life takes a shocking turn, all hell breaks loose.
Roach’s pain is his.
When Roach bleeds, he does.
When Zane suffers, Roach screams.
So until Zane can figure out how to lift the curse and kill Roach, he’s stuck caring for the dumbass who drinks too much, works like a dog, and hasn’t moved on an inch since he lost his motorcycle club.
But Roach has other plans for the man twisting his miserable life around. For him, Zane is hope, lust, and love combined, so Roach will gladly stay bound to him forever.
Even if it kills them.
Dirty, dark, and delicious, “Feel My Pain” is a gritty M/M dark romance novel with magical elements and a happy ending. Prepare for violence, intense jealousy, and scorching hot, emotional, explicit scenes.
REVIEW:
Trigger Warning: This story contains scenes of violence, offensive language and morally ambiguous characters as well as sensitive topics of child abuse, addiction, and suicide
Having read the blurbs on both books 1 and 2, I was curious about both but was MUCH more intrigued by book 2. So I started with book 2. I loved it, now it’s time to eat my vegetables.
As I sort of intuited, book 1 features two characters that are harder to love than the characters in book 2. Reed, (known by almost everyone as Roach) is a bit of a doormat. He’s a survivor of child abuse. At the beginning of the book he’s really the human equivalent of the Omega-dog of the Rabid Hyenas Motorcycle club. His dad fathered him on a woman who’s long dead and is nameless throughout the book. His dad and older brother delight in tormenting him, and Roach is gay but deeply closeted. Roach’s early experiences with sex were m/m, painful, and strictly non-consensual.
When he’s discovered fooling around with the stranger Zane, one night, he panics. He throws Zane under the bus, accusing the man of trying to steal his wallet and coming on to him. He disappears leaving Zane to his fate.
With a bit of magical assistance, Zane survives the ensuing beating and sets fire to the gang’s clubhouse, killing the entire gang with the exception of Roach. Flash forward two years and Zane is back, mostly recovered and looking to finish the job.
This book proves (in more ways than one) that you can’t really hate someone as easily when you understand their viewpoint. For that concept alone this book is worth the reading.
Neither man is all that likable. In real life I’d probably devote less time getting to know these two guys than I did in this book. Perhaps that’s an aspect of their “curse” as well. It’s clear by the end that Reed(Roach) is really a decent guy who’s been badly damaged by his upbringing. By the end he deserves the name Reed, though his behavior in the beginning is fully Roach-like.
Many critics will find the physically attractive Zane even harder to like. His dyscalculia may well be at the root of his problems, but he’s clearly a mercurial character, driven primarily by fear and a quick temper. This, combined with his ability to use his looks to charm strangers, makes him pretty insufferable throughout much of the book.
Personally, I’m a bit of a lazy reader who dislikes spending time with difficult characters and would probably not have finished this one if I hadn’t felt a bit obligated by having agreed to review this. But I’m glad that I did stick with it. This is probably not a book that I’ll re-read as I do so many of the books that I enjoy, but the author accomplished their goal here.
By the end you really have a “walked a mile” in each of these guys shoes. Though you may not really like them, you understand them a bit, and are willing to accept some of their less attractive qualities. That alone makes it worth reading once. But now I am curious… I’ve discovered that there’s an audiobook version of this narrated by the boyishly charming Kirt Graves. I can’t imagine him narrating this, so I may just have to check it out.
RATING:
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