Rhapsodic - Review

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This book almost felt like a flash back to a different time for me. I loved being in my dark romance era. Where all the men are not afraid to tell you that they are dark and for the women to not only be ok with that, but to be just as dark as they are. They have a moral code and no one on the outside would be able to look at them and definitively say that they are evil but if you cross them then you will find out. THAT'S what I like! The Bargainer AKA Desmond Flynn, is not afraid to do whatever it takes to be with Cali. Even if that meant denying himself her. Now I know there are a lot of people who feel weirded out by the whole age gap thing when it comes to supernatural creatures. I however am not. I think that there is definitely a point where these creatures can still experience new things or rediscover their love of something through the eyes of someone who hasn't lived as long and is a heck of a lot less jaded in life. With that being said. This only applies to the world of fiction for me. Real life, underaged people are a no go in romance for me. I think I've seen some criticism in this book to where people believe that Des groomed Cali...it did not feel that way to me. Maybe this was the edited version where she corrected some things but to me, it felt like he was just a protector to her while she was underaged, despite the fact that she was clearly crushing on him. For good reason of course. They are soul mates. Now if Des had crossed the line while she was underaged or did things that would make her open to some of the things that he likes sexually, then that's a different story. I would 1000% be on that train but that's not what happened nor is it the vibe that I got while reading. Anyway, off that topic, we do get a bunch of flashbacks to a teenaged Cali meeting Des for the first time and how she ended up indebted to him out the wazoo. I loved getting the flashbacks before a reveal of something more in the story of these two. Not to mention the mystery/crime that they are now trying to solve. We see some evolution of the Cali by the end of the book and I can't wait to start the next entry in this series!

The spice in this one is minimal. They really only get together at the end of the book. I give the spice a 3 out of 5. Overall, I give the story a 3 out of 5. I feel like this rating is future focused though. There are a lot of things that I know from reading the whole series that when I see them happening in the book I'm upset due to having that knowledge. Reading it without that knowledge it probably wouldn't have annoyed me as much and my rating would have probably been higher. There is another criticism that I see people give this book and it's that they use the "magical black girl" trope. This is directed at Temperance who is Cali's best friend. I don't agree with this either. The reason being, there are a lot of creatures in this book that are magical. Heck the main characters are magical too. So the fact that her best friend is also a bad ass magic/fantasy creature is not something that I think is out of the norm for any character in this book. So that is a little wild. Maybe there are some things that happened in the series that I'm not remembering as clearly but...yeah I don't get that vibe at all. If she was just a random person who happened to be magical and a POC then that would be a different discussion. 
I still would recommend this series to anyone who likes PNR with some fantasy. 


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