Larissa Ione was one of those authors that I continuously stumbled upon in grocery stores and kept grabbing my attention. When I finally did pick up her novel, Pleasure Unbound, I was completely captivated and I have to say she does it again with Desire Unchained.
Though some of the black market killers have been put down, the threat remains, weakened, but growing stronger. When Shade is captured along with an ex-lover who blames him for a terrible betrayal, he is forced to confront dangerous emotions that, if acted upon, could result in a fate worse than death.
From the first moment I picked Desire Unchained up, I was glued to its pages. Ione gives us a unique twist in that our two lovers have loved before and were (in the heroine’s eyes) cruelly separated. When Shade last saw Runa, he didn’t think he would ever come across her again, especially not while they were both chained to walls in the same dungeon. Yet their feelings for each other have shifted during their separation and this change only makes the two even more intriguing.
I think my favorite part about Desire Unchained was the fact that you didn’t have to read Pleasure Unbound to figure out what was going on. True, there were some references to the first novel, but nothing that impacted the story to the point where a new reader would get lost. While I won’t say this could be considered a stand alone novel, I will say that we’re given a new villain with a new agenda that embraces the atmosphere of danger from the first novel and spins it in a whole new way. The events in Desire Unchained further develop a few characters we met in Pleasure Unbound and gives us a hint as to what could happen in the third novel, Passion Unleashed, but these only add to the current story.
Overall, I really enjoyed Desire Unchained, but for some reason I’ve had a hard time writing this review. I read the book a few weeks ago and should have had this up by yesterday, but there were so many things that I liked about this book, that kept swirling in my head, that I had a hard time concentrating on what few things I should write about. I still don’t feel like I’ve done this novel justice with my review, so I will say that if you’re looking for something a little different and fresh (and involving hot Demons), then I would check out the Demonica series by Larissa Ione. If you’ve already read Pleasure Unbound, then I think you’ll going to enjoy Desire Unchained just as much as I did.
Read order:
Pleasure Unbound – excerpt
Desire Unchained – excerpt
Passion Unleashed (3/31/2009) – excerpt
Also reviewed by:
Book Reviews by Jess
Darque Reviews
Leslie’s Psyche
“There were so many things that I liked about this book, that kept swirling in my head” <— I’ve been running into a lot of books like that lately lol. Sounds like an interesting story though!