Guestreview by Jen
TITLE: Prepared
SERIES: Auctioned Book 6
“You have to understand, I thought I wasn’t going to make it. I said goodbye to everyone in my head.”
Three years ago, Gray Nolan lost all hope of ever seeing his friends and family again. Now, everyone was gathering to watch him become Gray Quinn. At long last. But before his and Darius’s big day, they had one more mission to undertake. Just a simple in-and-out stint. Nothing to worry about.
Certainly nothing as challenging as a two-day bachelor party featuring a pack of wild children, three best men in charge with an abundance of creativity, a hockey game between the younger whippersnappers and the more…seasoned grunts, and a very open bar.
REVIEW:
This is the happy ending finale for Gray and Darius. Many people will love it for that alone. You will have had to read the previous books, especially the first one, to know how these guys made it to this point. Unlike that first book, this one is pretty much the total opposite with plenty of fluff and good feelings.
Have to say that this series has not blown me away nearly as much as Ms. Dee’s other series. While the first few books were dark and edgy, they started going down from there for me. I realize the entire series cannot sustain itself with the same content given the theme, but there were other issues that seemed to become more prevalent as the series went on.
This installment felt much longer than it needed to be. It starts with the guys in the middle of a random extraction mission with the guys who helped Darius with Gray’s rescue. Most of those guys are crossovers from other series – Shane and the Tenleys, etc. This action is over pretty quickly, however, and the pace of the story noticeably changes. It goes from nice-paced action that takes place over a few days in a few chapters to bachelor party preparations and wedding that also take place over a short period of time but include so many details that they span the rest of the book. So many unnecessary details.
The other issue I had trouble with was the jumping in and out of side conversations, some felt like musings by Darius, but others were flashbacks of actual conversations, so it just felt confusing and disjointed at times, jumping from first to third person and pulling me out of the story. This does turn into something at the end, but it was extremely distracting until it got there.
The pros of this story are that Gray and Darius solidify their happy ending with a wedding (the main gist of the musings discussed above were Darius struggling with writing his vows). We get to see the crossover guys quite a bit as they are involved throughout the story – they all play different parts and are responsible for the different aspects of the bachelor party weekend. They each come up with fun and meaningful events from a unique crafty shopping spree to an old v. young hockey game and few other fun things in between.
All in all, I was happy to see this series wrap up. It was awesome seeing the other guys and their connections with Darius and Gray, either by friendship or family, seeing how much Gray and Darius mean to each other and watching them try to find ways to express those feelings. It wraps up with the actual wedding which includes a few fun surprises and ideas of a new direction for the guys.
RATING; 
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