Review: The Sins That Find Us – E.M. Lindsey
by E.M. Lindsey
Series: Madly Ever After #1
Also in this series: Sins That Bind Us
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: January 12, 2023
Genres: Romance
Pages: 211
Source: Grey's Promotions
I received this book for free from Grey's Promotions in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
My rating:My name might be Alice, and this sure as heck isn’t wonderland, but everyone is definitely a little mad here.
My life is a series of near misses. Or, at least, it was. But the man who saved me at the bar from a guy who definitely didn’t have the best intentions, might have even worse ones.
And so do his friends. Knowing who my father is, I know better than to talk to strangers, and it’s just my luck that my knights in shining armor have their own vendetta against him.
The next thing I know, I’m a damsel in distress—a pawn in their game against my father because I’m his one weak link. But the longer I stay on this little island of misfit toys, the more things start to become clear, and the people I thought were heroes might very well be the villains in my story.
Then again, I always did think Wendy might love Hook more, and that the Beauty wanted her Beast, that Ariel deserved a bit of revenge. And, last but not least, that Hades—the King—absolutely deserved his queen.
The Sins That Find Us is the first book in the MFMM, modern fractured fairy tale trilogy that tells the story of how heroes and villains might not always be what they seem. It features spicy MF, MMF, and MM scenes, and ends on a cliffhanger.
I don’t normally read dark romance, but I’m a pretty big fan of this author, so I figured I’d give this book a try. It’s different but still quite enthralling as well as quite steamy.
Kane and his Misfit Toys, as one of them calls them, all have reasons to hate Alice’s father, and kidnapping and hurting her seems like the best way to get their revenge. But the more they spy on her, the more they realize she’s not what they think. Perhaps the ultimate revenge may be even sweeter than they anticipated.
Kane and each of the men have been scarred in some way by Romano’s actions, whether that’s through loss of a limb or the ability to talk verbally, or the invisible scars Kane carries. While they all crave Kane’s attention, they have separate relationships with each other as well with various degrees and flavors of kink. Four heroes, backgrounds and interactions is a lot for one book to handle, but the author navigates it well without shortchanging any of them. Kane, James, Phoenix and Ariel all feel like well developed characters with their own needs and it was fun identifying which fairy tale each drew from.
In comparison, Alice didn’t fare so well. She may be Romano’s coddled daughter, but she’s been kept away from him for years since her mother and sister died in a car accident. We get hints of her personality, like when she sneaks out of her college dorm to explore the town without her Romano bodyguards, but she’s still quite young and innocent and unused to have any say over her life. But events force her to make some big choices very quickly, and while they’re a bit predictable, I liked the hints of who she was becoming.
As someone who doesn’t usually read this subgenre, I suspected there would be a lot of content warnings and this book didn’t disappoint. None of the violence feels superfluous or done solely for shock value, though. It all fits into the characters, their backstories and their views of the world. And given how much backstory has to fit into one book, the pacing still moves quite well, though I thought the ending was a bit abrupt. This is the first book in the series and it ends on quite a cliffhanger.
Overall, while this isn’t my usual cup of tea, I very much enjoyed this and can’t wait to see what happens next. I’m looking forward to seeing more of Alice and Kane and his Misfits!
Content notes: View Spoiler »