Blurb
USA Today Bestselling Author, Dani René, brings you a brand new emotional taboo, age gap romance with darkness and steam pouring from the pages.
DAMIEN
Handsome. Dangerous. Tortured.
From a young age I learned love is a smokescreen. It does nothing, but bring heartbreak and pain. My solace came from the darkness, from watching fear flicker in their pretty eyes. It’s all I knew.
Until her.
We’re forbidden. We shouldn’t crave this. But there’s no longer a way out.
Unless we find common ground, unless I let her in.
NESRIN
Polished. Pristine. Broken.
From a young age, I found solace in the dark, comfort in pain, and relief with a blade. It became normal to hide away, to watch the crimson trickle out as contentment flooded me. It’s all I knew.
Until him.
It’s illicit. It’s morally wrong. But desire has a mind of its own.
I thought I was free. But this love was a cut so deep, it would never heal.
Review
This was my first time reading Dani René and I had mixed emotions about A Cut So Deep.
First off, I’d like to say that this book has a very important and meaningful message and for that, it was incredibly poignant and beautiful. I appreciated the author’s approach to speaking about mental illness in a very real and raw way and I think Dani René did an excellent job on this front.
Unfortunately, I did not love this book as much as I had hoped to. The premise was very interesting and eye-catching and I couldn’t wait to dive right in. However, very early on, I realized that I couldn’t quite get into the writing style and this persisted throughout the entire book. My main issue was that the story felt like it was stagnant for a major portion of the book. For instance, I was at around 50-60% and I still felt like I was in the 20% area, as far as pacing is concerned. I attribute this to the lack of development in the characters and the romance which, in hindsight, was my most significant issue.
When it came to the romance, it was established really early on (37%) that the characters were falling for each other. Now, when you make the characters fall in love so quickly, there is the difficulty of making sure you allow the relationship to evolve over time so that the feelings at the start develop into something more, something stronger. Otherwise, what is the point of the rest of the book if the feelings are expressed early and them don’t evolve. This is what I struggled with here. Nesrin and Damien claimed to feel strongly for one another early on but then nothing else really happened to grow their romance.
In addition, I couldn’t even buy into their eventual love for one another because I felt like it came out of nowhere. I didn’t feel like they really spent a substantial amount of time together, learning about each other to fall in love. Instead, there was attraction and it was almost taken for granted that the attraction meant emotions were there too. In that respect, I felt like a lot of this book involved telling and not showing and so the connection between the characters didn’t feel natural to me because I didn’t see it happening, I was being told it was there. For instance, Damien claimed Nesrin had broken down so many of his walls but I was like ok, when did this happen and how? Because they didn’t have a huge amount of heart to heart moments with each other especially because they kept pushing each other away.
Essentially, from about 40%, things got really cliché and the characters started making statements about each other that were simply unsubstantiated i.e.:
“She silences my demons when she needs to, but she also plays with them when they seek her out.”
I can maybe understand what these demons of his were but what I didn’t understand was what exactly about these “demons” Nesrin finally silenced? Because he never really acted out or behaved in any way that seemed like the product of “demons”. And when/how did she play with them? It felt more like that was thrown in to make him seemed like the stereotypical tortured bad boy which, honestly he wasn’t. Again, it wasn’t shown, just told.
As for the characters, they were hugely underdeveloped. Damien and Nesrin stayed the same throughout the entire book, half heartedly resisting each other until, out of the blue, they stopped resisting each other and fell head over heels and finally at the end, for convenience sake, became changed people. They could have had a much better, fleshed out arc. Also, the characters seemed not to act there age. For example, Damien, who was 27, seemed more like he was in his late teens and early 20’s, while Nesrin, at times, seemed like she was in her 20’s as opposed to being newly 18.
Then there was the issue of Damien’s brothers with whom, Nesrin spent a very short amount of screentime with before knowing so much about them. When did she learn these things, character traits, personality traits and the like because the scenes that I read between them weren’t filled with deep bonding. I didn’t feel like it was adequately demonstrated enough to indicate how she knew what she did about them personally and how she came to suddenly love them as brothers too.
Finally, I struggled with some elements of the writing. For starters, descriptions of exhibitionism were being termed voyeurism, then there were inconsistencies where one minute Damien’s eyes were caressing then the next they were cold. Other issues were with the sudden mention of family members (no spoilers) that had never been mentioned before but who clearly had an effect on Nesrin. Also, I took issue with Damien constantly saying he tried to steer clear of Nesrin when he obviously didn’t. The ending too was anticlimactic with the surprise because, quite honestly, I guessed what it would be extremely early on. And finally, there was an awkward quality to the writing at times where it seemed like, in an effort to include imagery in the writing, the effect was lost in overbearing descriptive sentences.
Apart from these issues however, the book was still a fine read.
These problems aside, I did really like the storyline and could feel that there were the blossoms of a genuine chemistry between Nesrin and Damien, that if better developed, could have been great. I appreciated that we did see deeper feelings between them, albeit in a fleeting manner, during intimate scenes but even those could’ve been more significant. I will say I was engaged with the book the entire time and it did keep me reading on. I didn’t ever feel like putting it down and for that, it definitely earned points from me. I think I am interested in exploring more of Dani René’s writing because her stories do seem to be very interesting but for execution purposes, this book wasn’t my favorite.
Emotional, sexy and full of angst, A Cut So Deep was a pretty good read.
Overall, I wasn’t blown away by this book but it held it’s own and I do think many will really enjoy it. Unfortunately, I had too many issues with it to wholeheartedly love it but it wasn’t a bad book. I am giving A Cut So Deep 3.5 stars and would recommend it to fans of enemies-to-lovers and forbidden romance.
“Love captures you when you least expect it, and it’s a cut so deep, I’m afraid it will never heal if he were to walk away.”
*ARC kindly provided in exchange for an honest review.*
Buy Links: Kindle Unlimited
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/3hlfWsN
Amazon CA: https://amzn.to/39qAWf7
Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/39gMy4g
Amazon AU: https://amzn.to/39ccC0i
Praise for the novel
“With a Cut So Deep, Dani took me on a hell of a ride. The dirty secrets and the jaw dropping twists were perfection.” – Award Winning Author, India R. Adams
“Dani knocked this one out of the park. She tackles sensitive topics but she deals with them with grace.” – Author, D.L. Gallie
“A Cut So Deep written by Dani Rene, is an all consuming, enthralling and at times, utterly heartbreaking read.” – Jennifer
“With this book, Dani René has showed yet again that she is the master of writing hauntingly beautiful stories which you will remember deep in your very soul even long after you read them!” – Ana
Author Bio
Dani is a USA Today Bestselling Author of a variety of genres, from romantic suspense to dark erotic romance and even BDSM romance. She loves to delve into the raw, emotional journeys her characters venture on, and enjoys the dark, edgy, and sensual scenes that fill the pages of her books. Dani’s stories are seductive with a deviant edge with feisty heroines and dominant alphas.
Social Media Links
FB Group: http://bit.ly/2spZmBq
IG: http://bit.ly/1UnYDbH
FB Page: http://bit.ly/2pN100b
GR: http://bit.ly/2qhttp://bit.ly/2pN100bsdXZG
Amazon: http://amzn.to/2qdauCg
Newsletter: http://bit.ly/2sAy5dU
BookBub: http://bit.ly/2qtefC2
Twitter: http://bit.ly/1QHuMUQ
Pinterest: http://bit.ly/2rM3Gvn
Tumblr: http://bit.ly/2rcy2Gy
Find me on social media:
FACEBOOK – INSTAGRAM – GOODREADS – TWITTER
giving life to new characters and new stories. You know how some things simply makes your heart burst with happiness? A really good book, a puppy, hugging someone you’ve been missing like crazy? That’s what writing does to me. And all the hard work, all the sleepless nights, all the anxiety…everything is worth it at the end. And I’m hoping that reading my books will leave you with that same happy feeling.
The Golden Bookshelves 