Review: Brutal (Variant, #5) by Sandra R. Neeley. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Brutal by Sandra R. Neeley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Brutal is one of many elite soldiers subjected to DNA manipulation against their will. His DNA was mixed with that of wild predators, making him Variant. He’s now head of security at Alliance, the Variant community they all live in. He’s dominant, and prides himself on control. He shakes his head, laughing at the antics of others like him when they meet their one female.

Now he’s met Ginny, it’s not so funny anymore. She continually holds him at arm’s length. Ignoring her insistence that he stays away, he invites himself to a party she’s attending, and things go well — really well. Only now, after having actually claimed her, she refuses to answer his calls and messages. Either she’s gone missing, or she’s just done with him. Unfortunately, he believes the latter. All of his control means nothing when he discovers she’s been taken.

Ginny has worked all her life to keep her heart buried deep inside, untouchable by any and all. It’s not that she doesn’t want love, in fact she craves it. But she’s afraid. Her mother walked out on her and her father, leaving him a shell of the man he once was. After seeing her father fade away, she’s determined it won’t happen to her. To fill her days, she spends more hours than she should caring for others as a nurse in a very large hospital. Which is how she got involved with the Variant, and ultimately Brutal.

She was ‘all in’ where Brutal was concerned until he made it clear he wanted a forever relationship. But she doesn’t do forever relationships. She does a couple nights and ‘it’s been nice to know you’ relationships. But suddenly, her world is turned upside down, and unfortunately the only person who can save her is the one she’s all but blocked from her life. Will he even notice she’s missing?

The doctor who created the Variant people now has Ginny in his grip. He intends to use her to further his advantage in his attempts to manipulate the Variant — if she survives. Dr. Waller has no regard for anyone’s life. Time is crucial, she’s been labeled a reward to the squads he maintains control over. Will Brutal be able to find her? And if he does, will she still be alive, much less his?

This book is intended for mature audiences. This book contains violence and abuse both real and implied, and sexual situations that may be disturbing for some readers. If you are offended by these subjects, please do not buy this book. While some aspects of this series and the beginnings of the world it is set in are dark, this series is ultimately a tale of survival, revenge, healing, and love.

Brutal

Awesome character development and world building!




The following ratings are out of 5:
Romance: 💙🖤💚
Heat/Steam: 🔥🔥🔥
Story/Plot: 📕📗📙📘
World building: 🌏🌍🌎🌍🌎
Character development: 😔😅😂🤣🥰

The Hero: Brutal – he is a Variant, meaning he is no longer human after he went through some military experiments in genetic engineering and his DNA was mixed with a bunch of predatory animals. He is now the head of security for the Alliance where all the Variants live on a large ranch in Texas where they have built a community.

The heroine: Ginny – she is a nurse in the cardiac care unit at a hospital in town near the Alliance Ranch. She spent some time there while she helped Celia who had lung cancer and heart problems. She met Brutal at that time, he immediately told her that she was his mate and insisted that she stay there, though she has her own life, so she denied him. Ever since, they have been talking on the phone, where he is often overbearing, and she enjoys pushing back at him and fighting him at every turn.

The Story: when Ginny won’t agree to go out on a date with Brutal but tells him instead that she is busy and is going to a formal event at a ritzy hotel without any escort, he decides to get an expensive Italian tuxedo and show up to be her escort. Ginny wanted him to show up even though she knew what he offered was not for her. Her mother walking away from her family when Ginny was a small child had affected her greatly, especially seeing how her father wasted away after that. She knew she could never have something like that happen to her. She just wanted one night with him.

The story between Brutal and Ginny was good but, in this book, I was a bit more interested in some of the side and ongoing storylines which merged with the main storyline. We got to find out more about what Dr. Waller was up to and we finally found out where the rest of Sin’s and Honor’s teams were. We also got to find out more about Feral and why he has been acting so mysteriously in the last book.

We also got to see more of Hermit and Nancy as well as Law and Laurel, Ice and Phee, so other of the Variants are finding their mates, which is nice. All the characters in this series are so well developed and so interesting. I hope the author writes more books in this series. There are so many more good characters that still need mates.

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