Lita's Book Blog: Blog Tour: Review: Burn (Bayonet Scars #5) + Excerpt

Blog Tour: Review: Burn by J.C. Emery + Excerpt

Tragedy cuts deep. Revenge burns deeper.

The blood of their enemies coats the leather of their cuts and a trail of bodies lie in their wake, but the Forsaken Motorcycle Club isn't done yet. Carlo Mancuso still needs to pay for his sins. Nobody knows that more than Ian Buckley, the Treasurer for Forsaken.

Ian prefers his pleasure mixed with pain and he's only ever at peace when he's doling out justice. Convinced that he's too unstable and sadistic to take an old lady, he keeps his trysts, like all of his relationships, brief and anonymous. But with his club at war, and the stakes being so personal, Ian's feeling the events around him more deeply than he expects.

Mindy Mercer is the sweet daughter of Fort Bragg’s most respectable cop. At least that’s how the town sees her. Very few people know the Mindy who hides her tracks and battles her cravings by lying to everyone around her. She thinks she has control of her addiction until she suffers an attack that leaves her searching for a way out of her own personal hell.

Mindy has never been more desperately in need of a savior and Ian has never seen a more beautifully destroyed creature in his life. Their attraction is intense, but their damage is extreme. Some scars never heal, and some people never get better.

Love is never more painful than when it can kill you.

:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･｡,★゜･:*:･

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Excerpt:

“You ride?”

I shake my head. He turns his face toward mine and waits as though I haven’t answered him. Maybe he thinks I haven’t. I guess I’ve been silent too long because he squeezes my hand and continues to stare at me with searching eyes. I shake my head again and this time he sees it and nods his head in return. He drops my hand and climbs on his bike. He nudges the kickstand up and holds the bike upright. He has a helmet in his outstretched hand.

“Wear this, then climb on like I did and place your feet here,” he says and points to a cylindrical black peg that juts out of the bike. “Don’t drop your feet and let your body lean into the turns.”

He’s patient with me as I stand here and psych myself up. I’ve had maybe a fantasy or two about a sexy man on a motorcycle, but until Ian it was just that—a passing fantasy that went as quickly as it came.

With his pointer finger, he summons me forward and sets the helmet on the tank between his legs. His eyes aren’t kind exactly and they’re not dark and sexy. They’re something else that I’m desperate to place, but can’t. I close the distance between us and stand before him. Slowly, he reaches out and brushes a lock of hair from my face and tucks it behind my ear.

“Tell me where you’re at,” he says quietly. He tucks my hair behind my other ear as well. I let out a soft, unintentional sigh. I barely hear the question—or order rather—and instead have all my attention focused on his touch. Being able, and even wanting, to be touched is such a wonder. “Tell me I help.”

There’s such a vulnerability about him in this moment as his fingers lightly weave through my messy hair and he’s asking for reassurance. My breath halts in my lungs. I both loathe and love the sound of his plea. I didn’t even know he was capable of this. Ian is always so strong for me that I think I sometimes forget that he’s human.

“I need you.”

★★★★★

My Rating: 4 of 5 stars

The crime was intense, the intimacy was even more so.

This story did not play out like how I expected it to. It's on a whole other level.

The tortured soul sob story is not what this is. This is more of a tortured soul comeback.

Hitting real issues fiercely and accepting that these things do happen, to anybody, and not letting the bad and evil things effect life negatively.

The story is of Ian and Mindy, two people with their own problems, issues, darkness or whatever you want to call it. Some of their baggage was brought on by an unfortunate situation, therefore, bringing them two together in the first place.

The situations the main characters were put in made them seem more in the background, especially at times when either main character was having to interact with a group of other people, regardless of whether it was with family or a friend. This made the interactions between Ian and Mindy seem as if they were literally in their own world, more intimate as well as more acknowledged when talking with another character in the story. It's not just useless dialogue or a fill-in scene that isn't significant to the plot which also shows the author's talent in not wasting a single word, so brownie points for that, JC.

I didn't quite get the revenge concept of the story. I mean, I understood the reasons why the characters felt the way they felt, but I didn't really see the point the author was trying to make. All I got was that Ian and Mindy needed to cope and accept all that went down, together, and the fact that their relationship was going to happen but needed to just take off from a good starting point. Unless the revenge was all about the fire scene, then I guess I did get it. Yes, because that would have been the 'good starting point' for Mindy and Ian and for finally seeing things the way each other saw it, and being accepting of everything. Bamn!

Overall, I ABSOLUTELY enjoyed reading the 5th installment of the Bayonet Scars series. There was so much intensity with Ian and Mindy. Their connection with one another was so beyond electric, they have shocked each other many times, but in the end, all that kinetic energy got them where they needed to be.

About the Author:

As a child, JC was fascinated by things that went bump in the night. As they say, some things never change. Now, as an adult, she divides her time between the sexy law men, mythical creatures, and kick-ass heroines that live inside her head and pursuing her bachelor's degree in English. JC is a San Francisco Bay Area native, but has also called both Texas and Louisiana home. These days she rocks her flip flops year round in Northern California and can't imagine a climate more beautiful.

JC writes adult, new adult, and young adult fiction. She dabbles in many different genres including science fiction, horror, chick lit, and murder mysteries, yet she is most enthralled by supernatural stories-- and everything has at least a splash of romance.