“A Dark and Gripping Mafia Romance”
Move over Don Vito Corleone, there’s another famiglia in town. And they’re not here entirely to pay a simple visit. They’re here for their family to protect, honor, and to preserve as each try to achieve their own form of redemption.
Twisted Knight, by R.G. Angel, is the second story of the Cosa Nostra Series and it wastes no time as it sucker-punches the reader right off the bat as it continues down a gripping, trigger infused, dark, and emotional road for Gianluca, Domenico, and Matteo as these, at one time regular young boys, quickly turn into strong mafia men as they enter a world of secrets, pain, sacrifice, love, and ultimately their own redemption.
Wow. This is quite the story as it seems to tease the reader with its slow pace with various forms of trigger points, with off and on page warnings, as this heavy story is in fact a mafia story. And they clearly are exciting yet brutal reads filled with many twists and turns.. Readers need to be aware of the existence of rape, torture, and violence triggers as they come at unforeseen moments during the story.
Twisted Knight, is equally a romance between Dom and India as each damaged soul, one more than the other, bravely embark on their own road to peace and redemption regardless of the twists and turns that attempt to block their path during their newly formed relationship.
Oh boy, what a dark and heavy read this was as the forced actions of Dom’s past continuously haunt him during his self-imposed purgatory and professed need for continued dedication to his extended family to sooth his soul and lack-of-humanity. Gah, I love Dom as he is an intrinsically kind man with such a good heart who craves love and actually a normal life. For this, I was glad for the presence of India who was able to break through his wall of darkness to allow the real Domenico to come to light.
SQUEE!!! I loved the secondary characters as they had a heavy presence within this story, Jude and Enzo being my favorites. I also loved the use of the phrases in Italian to make it a more authentic mafia story. Not having read the first story as-of-yet, it was just as pleasing to see how Luca was healing and for this, I do recommend reading Broken Prince as it is sure to be quite the read as well.
However. While I did thoroughly enjoy reading this story, and as there is so-much-incredible-meat to Dom and India’s background, for such a great need for their relationship, I needed more of their background as well as their developing relationship. I didn’t quite feel as much of a connection with them until the very end and felt something was missing. I felt that I knew more of the secondary characters than of the primary ones.
All-in-all, call me a sucker for dark and emotional mafia romances, but, regardless of a smattering of typos, the writing in this one was addicting with humanized, humorous, and, incredible characters setting the bar quite high for future stories of the Cosa Nostra Series. I really liked it…:)
*star rating: 4.40 ‘I really liked this story’ stars*
