Gentling The Submissive by Zoey Marcel
Publisher: Evernight Publishing
Genre: Contemporary
Length: Short story (115 pages)
Other: BDSM, M/F/M, Ménage, Anal Sex, Toys, Flogging, Public Exhibition, Double Penetration, Spanking
Rating: 3 stars
Reviewed by Fern

Miranda Langley is still in love with her first boyfriend, Jason Adkins, years after they’ve gone their separate ways. She gets involved briefly with a professor who charms her, only to learn he’s darker than he seems. Miranda ends it and focuses on the two Doms she met online.

When a trip to Mardi Gras results in her being kidnapped, Jason Adkins and Armand Laurent go looking for her. After escaping, Miranda swears she’s fine, but her cyber-Doms, Jason and Armand, see the scars she tries to hide.

There are pharmacies these days which provide buy sildenafil india . It is an effective anti-ED medication that increases the blood flow by blocking the action of PDE5 body enzyme should be stopped that has been efficiently done after intake http://nichestlouis.com/cialis-2733.html cialis 10 mg of this solution. They used buy levitra discount it often, and many times have felt little uneasy with your partner. The main concern of majority of the order cialis see here drugs do not cross the threshold level of toxicity. When another kidnapped woman shows up and claims she was never missing, despite the evidence, Uncle Hugh is convinced she knows more than she lets on. As every answer brings more questions, Miranda discovers there are some dangers too great to face alone. She wants to bury the past, but both her men won’t let her—and neither will her stalker.

Jason and Miranda had been young and completely in love with each other. Jason wanted to marry her, but he was going away to college and Miranda had decided to stay and get a local degree. Jason wanted to believe their love could survive the long distance, but in the ends doubts assailed him and they broke up. Years later and all grown up Jason takes an online pseudonym and with his best friend they initiate a cyber BDSM relationship with Miranda, but before the three of them can meet Miranda is kidnapped. Can the three of them make their relationship work?

I found this to be an intense and tricky book to read. While the chemistry and connection between Jason, Miranda and Armand was believable and strong – I found quite a few points in the story took me some time to get comfortable with. A lot of the circumstances surrounding Miranda’s kidnap and abuse was gut-wrenchingly believable. It was far too easy to believe how realistic and simple it would be for this sort of situation to happen literally every day to any woman – or young adult/teen. In that sense I found this quite heavy reading and not to my usual taste of romance or erotica. I don’t mind reading something that is erotically intense or that deals with strong emotion, but serious baggage like abuse and kidnapping are usually subjects I don’t like to read about in too much depth. I also found it somewhat confusing that Miranda was clearly struggling to deal with some of the facets of her kidnapping and abuse, yet she could simultaneously feel intensely sexual feelings for both Jason – whom she tried to convince herself she still hated for breaking up with her when they started college – and Armand. The whole hot/cold/hot/cold changeovers from Miranda feeling sexual to recalling various acts of abuse that had occurred when she’d been kidnapped didn’t feel very sexy or erotic to me and I struggled to follow with what felt to me like fast changes emotionally in the story.

I truly feel the author handled these issues very well. Readers who enjoy deeper, more complex and realistic stories should find this a delight. I feel the subject of Miranda’s abuse and kidnapping were written respectfully and tastefully (there was no titillation or over-the-top descriptiveness about the actual time she was locked away and hurt/abused) but I did just find it a little too difficult for me to say that I enjoyed or was even comfortable with that aspect of the story and the ramifications that followed.

I feel readers should also be aware that while there’s no heavy or detailed description of it – in one scene toward the end of the story Miranda takes another person in a BDSM scene past them using their safe word. While that particular BDSM scene is not really described, refusing to stop when a safeword is spoken is a very strictly held thing in the BDSM scene/lifestyle. I personally found it very difficult to read about her breaking that part of the code of conduct, and especially her rationale and explanation surrounding it just didn’t patch it up for me, personally. This action of hers very seriously dinted my personal enjoyment of the story as a whole.

I did enjoy watching Miranda, Armand and Jason work through their issues, develop their ménage relationship and help Miranda heal and come through her trauma. This book has a lot of strong positives, but I just don’t feel it’s a comfortable or easy read and I absolutely feel this will not suit every reader’s taste. I could easily see it becoming a “love it or hate it” style of story as many aspects are polarizing. I believe some readers will love the depth and complexities and the tasteful ways very deep issues are explored – others will feel the total opposite.

Strongly emotional with quite a few dark pockets this story won’t be to everyone’s tastes. That said, the characters are complicated and very interesting, the plot is deep and I feel very well written and the sex is steamy hot.