Release & Review - Sugar Free (Sugar Bowl #3) by Sawyer Bennett

Image and blurb from Goodreads

Title: Sugar Free
(Sugar Bowl #3)

Author: Swayer Bennett

Publication Date: October 11th, 2016

Publisher: Loveswept

Sela and Beck’s deliciously sinful tale of sex, lies, and vengeance reaches its explosive conclusion in the final chapter of Sawyer Bennett’s Sugar Bowl trilogy, which began with the novels Sugar Daddy and Sugar Rush.

For years Sela Halstead dreamed of revenge, but the quest for payback has been anything but sweet. Now, once again, she finds herself at the mercy of Jonathon Townsend, his hands crushing the very breath from her body. And even though she escapes with her life, Sela fears she may never recover. In desperate need of shelter and comfort, she runs to the one man she can trust. Beckett North has stood by Sela since the beginning. But can he handle the brutal truth?

Beck will do anything to protect what is his—and make no mistake, Sela belongs to him, heart and soul. The passion between them runs hot, even as their world begins to unravel. With the legacy of his ruthless business partner hanging in the balance, Beck stands to lose everything: his fortune, his family, his freedom. But each touch of Sela’s mouth on his skin, her nails down his back, makes it harder to let her go—and it might not even be his choice to make.

Goodreads

Buy Links: Amazon

3 “Happy Ever After” Stars

ARC via Netgalley.

Thank you, Loveswept!

This was a satisfying enough end to this series, but I didn’t like it as much as the previous titles in this series.

There are minor spoilers in this review, but most of them are related to book 2, so if you’re reading this, chances are nothing I say will come as a surprise to you.

My lack of connection with this third book is probably the result of that plot choice involving JT and Sela in the end of book two. It all went downhill after that. I couldn’t get past the fact that Sela acted out of character and put herself in danger like that. It didn’t make sense when I read it the first time, and still doesn’t.

Look, Sela was this smart woman who changed her entire life and dropped everything to pretend to be someone else in order to get revenge on the man who raped her. She had a whole plan that would lead her straight to her rapist. A kickass plan that never took place because when she got her hands dirty, she acted like someone who had never even thought of murdering JT. Her reaction didn’t seem plausible to me.

Plus, she wasn’t portrayed in the first two books (or a book and a half) as silly or stupid. She wasn’t supposed to make rash decisions—she had spent months preparing, losing weight, changing her hair color and all that before she met Becks.  So, I don’t understand how she not only made the most reckless choice ever by meeting JT at his place, but also continued to make horrible decisions throughout book three. Nothing she did made sense to me. She didn’t investigate the consequences of her actions. She didn’t think them through. She simply acted on them without further thought, which made me question everything I thought I knew about her in the first place. Where was that badass woman who was going to destroy the man who almost destroyed her those many years ago?

I’m sorry, but Sela’s actions and reactions annoyed me so much I couldn’t even concentrate on all the drama happening. And there was a lot of drama.

I won’t get into the plot of the third book because it’ll spoil everything, but I’ll say Sela wasn’t the only one acting silly. Becks’ choices following the big twist involving JT were hard to swallow, especially the one about not contacting Dennis right away. I couldn’t understand why he’d do something like that. Dennis was clearly a weapon he could’ve used in that moment. Plus, he was a great character and I wanted a lot more of him before the series was over. As I had predicted, when Dennis finally came into play, he presented a solution for the problems Sela and Becks had caused within seconds. If only they had reached out to him earlier…

Though I wish the series had taken a different path toward the end of book two and throughout this book, I was satisfied with the ending since it gave me what romance books promise and should deliver every time: a HEA. 

*If you liked this review (or not), if you read the book (or not), come say hello and leave your comments bellow.