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Dark Valor
The last time was the final time.
That's the promise I made myself when I left my home and started over anew. I got too bold, too reckless, too close to getting caught. With enough blood on my hands to cleanse a nation, I would bow my head, and integrate into a mundane, regular life.
It was going well. Until I met Lucas Montgomery, and the bloodlust flared back to life.
I'd have to be gentle and careful with him. Bending to his own darkness will take effort, and patience. He's the bravest, most selfless man I've ever met, so full of fire and ready to fight for the little guy. He believes with his whole, sheltered heart he's ready to save the world, no matter the cost.
To see how far those innocent little beliefs could take him was going to be exquisite.
***
Virtuous Sinners is a collection of MM dark romance stories that center on killers who are guided by a virtuous code. These novels are connected only by theme and can be read stand-alone.
The killer's virtue in Dark Valor: Valor.
That's the promise I made myself when I left my home and started over anew. I got too bold, too reckless, too close to getting caught. With enough blood on my hands to cleanse a nation, I would bow my head, and integrate into a mundane, regular life.
It was going well. Until I met Lucas Montgomery, and the bloodlust flared back to life.
I'd have to be gentle and careful with him. Bending to his own darkness will take effort, and patience. He's the bravest, most selfless man I've ever met, so full of fire and ready to fight for the little guy. He believes with his whole, sheltered heart he's ready to save the world, no matter the cost.
To see how far those innocent little beliefs could take him was going to be exquisite.
***
Virtuous Sinners is a collection of MM dark romance stories that center on killers who are guided by a virtuous code. These novels are connected only by theme and can be read stand-alone.
The killer's virtue in Dark Valor: Valor.
109 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 18, 2022
7 people are currently reading
48 people want to read
About the author
Helena Novak
30 books49 followersHelena Novak (she/her) has been making things up and bending people to her will from a very young age. She loves animals, tattoos, music, laughing, and reading, and you can usually find her entertaining one of those muses. She spends an obscene amount of time finding pretty new words and thinking up awful ways to torment her characters, and has the attention span of a gnat.
When not writing every single genre she can get her greedy little brain hooked on, she can be found walking one of her many furbabies, making havoc with her credit union work buddies, or jamming out in her car to Broadway musical soundtracks. She lives in the beautiful state of Colorado with her fur-babies.
When not writing every single genre she can get her greedy little brain hooked on, she can be found walking one of her many furbabies, making havoc with her credit union work buddies, or jamming out in her car to Broadway musical soundtracks. She lives in the beautiful state of Colorado with her fur-babies.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 22, 2022
Well.
Dry fisting:
What more do you need to know - the killer MC (Godric) fists the other dude (Lucas) with only a little spit. Very rapidly too - a couple fingers, then bam! Fist. And then arm to the elbow. He also drags the Lucas around by his arm in his asshole, so.
Mindbreak:
This was, I think, supposed to be mindbreak via making Lucas question his reality/make the Godric into his savior or only thing he can trust. It did not work for me.
The main tactic the killer MC uses is breaking into Lucas’ house, and then …moving things? Being seen but for some reason Lucas thinks he didn’t literally hear and see him? At one point, he sees Godric in the mirror behind him, but the only investigation he does is to turn around and give up.
An incredibly hilarious one is the night after Godric picks Lucas up from a murder scene at the club, dry fists him, and then leaves. For some reason, having the sheets be changed (ok he did laundry in the middle of the night?? pls) is enough to have Lucas go “nothing happened???i am crazy???” MY DUDE YOU WERE FISTED YOUR ASS IS NOT “UNTOUCHED”
Basically, unless Lucas was established to have some sort of already-present susceptibility to doubting his reality, this would never work, and definitely did not work for me. This was gaslighting without paying the utility bill.
Characters/plot/idk:
Lucas has a nebulous sketchy backstory, which was not enough to support his internal doubt of his mind.
Godric is a dumbass - he’s hiding from the cops, but when faced with cops (to give a statement for a drugged girl at the bar), he chooses to be extremely antagonistic. Instead of trying to be uninteresting? Giving them a fake name? If you’re hiding, why are you drawing attention to yourself?
Around the time my file ended, somehow the Russian mob showed up tangentially so uh…not sure where that was going.
The writing:
There’s always some element of personal taste in this, but I found it to be excessively dramatic at times. Some very overwrought metaphors and analogies where they were not needed (all over the place).
The angry irrational obsessiveness did hit some good notes with Godric, so that was nice.
Unfinished file:
When I got to Chapter 11, all I got was
“…check for updates, would ya? Something probably happened here. Thanks!”
as the last page. Mmm…pass. My friend’s file had an extra 20 pages, so I guess technically I didn’t finish it, but I was not compelled to hunt those down. She looped me on the story, nothing significant happened.
There was also a point where the security guard was called “NAME”, so it was feeling a little rough around the edges in general.
Overall, this didn’t work for me. I’ve read surprise fisting before, but never surprise dry fisting. The connection to “valor” as the virtue for this book was tenuous at best, given Godric is obsessed with courage and Lucas is a giant chicken. Such are the perils of babby’s first dark romance and multiauthor series.
Virtuous Sinners series
I Am God’s Dagger ⭐⭐⭐
Dark Valor ⭐⭐
Day of Judgement ⭐
Speak and Obey ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Moment of Truth (i cannot find this??)
Nightingale ⭐
Man of Carnage
Pure Silence
The Right Way to Wrong - n/a
Read more reviews on my blog:
https://horsetalkreviews.blogspot.com/
Dry fisting:
What more do you need to know - the killer MC (Godric) fists the other dude (Lucas) with only a little spit. Very rapidly too - a couple fingers, then bam! Fist. And then arm to the elbow. He also drags the Lucas around by his arm in his asshole, so.
Mindbreak:
This was, I think, supposed to be mindbreak via making Lucas question his reality/make the Godric into his savior or only thing he can trust. It did not work for me.
The main tactic the killer MC uses is breaking into Lucas’ house, and then …moving things? Being seen but for some reason Lucas thinks he didn’t literally hear and see him? At one point, he sees Godric in the mirror behind him, but the only investigation he does is to turn around and give up.
An incredibly hilarious one is the night after Godric picks Lucas up from a murder scene at the club, dry fists him, and then leaves. For some reason, having the sheets be changed (ok he did laundry in the middle of the night?? pls) is enough to have Lucas go “nothing happened???i am crazy???” MY DUDE YOU WERE FISTED YOUR ASS IS NOT “UNTOUCHED”
Basically, unless Lucas was established to have some sort of already-present susceptibility to doubting his reality, this would never work, and definitely did not work for me. This was gaslighting without paying the utility bill.
Characters/plot/idk:
Lucas has a nebulous sketchy backstory, which was not enough to support his internal doubt of his mind.
Godric is a dumbass - he’s hiding from the cops, but when faced with cops (to give a statement for a drugged girl at the bar), he chooses to be extremely antagonistic. Instead of trying to be uninteresting? Giving them a fake name? If you’re hiding, why are you drawing attention to yourself?
Around the time my file ended, somehow the Russian mob showed up tangentially so uh…not sure where that was going.
The writing:
There’s always some element of personal taste in this, but I found it to be excessively dramatic at times. Some very overwrought metaphors and analogies where they were not needed (all over the place).
The angry irrational obsessiveness did hit some good notes with Godric, so that was nice.
Unfinished file:
When I got to Chapter 11, all I got was
“…check for updates, would ya? Something probably happened here. Thanks!”
as the last page. Mmm…pass. My friend’s file had an extra 20 pages, so I guess technically I didn’t finish it, but I was not compelled to hunt those down. She looped me on the story, nothing significant happened.
There was also a point where the security guard was called “NAME”, so it was feeling a little rough around the edges in general.
Overall, this didn’t work for me. I’ve read surprise fisting before, but never surprise dry fisting. The connection to “valor” as the virtue for this book was tenuous at best, given Godric is obsessed with courage and Lucas is a giant chicken. Such are the perils of babby’s first dark romance and multiauthor series.
Virtuous Sinners series
I Am God’s Dagger ⭐⭐⭐
Dark Valor ⭐⭐
Day of Judgement ⭐
Speak and Obey ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Moment of Truth (i cannot find this??)
Nightingale ⭐
Man of Carnage
Pure Silence
The Right Way to Wrong - n/a
Read more reviews on my blog:
https://horsetalkreviews.blogspot.com/
September 20, 2022
Virtuous Sinners is a collection of MM dark romance stories that center on killers who are guided by a virtuous code. These novels are connected only by theme and can be read stand-alone.
Someone needed to explain to this author what "guided by a virtuous code" means. Godric's "code" appears to be "rapists are bad" but only in regards to women or only if it ISN'T Godric doing the raping. Because that is what the sex scenes in this book are. Rape. I don't have a problem with dark. I don't have a problem with Godric murdering people, especially rapists. I DO have a problem with Godric always, every fucking second of his interactions with Luke, lying, gaslighting, manipulating, emotionally torturing him. And then, in his mind, Godric is always seeing everything Lucas does through the filter of "he is doing it on purpose", if Luke breathes funny it is to either 1) tempt/tease Godric OR 2) he is obviously doing it to betray/cheat on Godric (despite the fact that they barely know each other).
this is not dark romance, this is just rape and emotional abuse, and there is nothing virtuous about Godric whatsoever. I truly regret choosing to read this.
Someone needed to explain to this author what "guided by a virtuous code" means. Godric's "code" appears to be "rapists are bad" but only in regards to women or only if it ISN'T Godric doing the raping. Because that is what the sex scenes in this book are. Rape. I don't have a problem with dark. I don't have a problem with Godric murdering people, especially rapists. I DO have a problem with Godric always, every fucking second of his interactions with Luke, lying, gaslighting, manipulating, emotionally torturing him. And then, in his mind, Godric is always seeing everything Lucas does through the filter of "he is doing it on purpose", if Luke breathes funny it is to either 1) tempt/tease Godric OR 2) he is obviously doing it to betray/cheat on Godric (despite the fact that they barely know each other).
this is not dark romance, this is just rape and emotional abuse, and there is nothing virtuous about Godric whatsoever. I truly regret choosing to read this.
September 11, 2022
This was a good dark story, and I enjoyed the build up and the psychological torment Godric laid on Lucas as it was creepy and clever. I just felt the chemistry sexually felt a bit flat as there was no sex apart from a rough fisting scene. Would’ve been nice to have had another chapter that added a bit more to their relationship behind closed doors as felt a little abrupt. But, I love dark books like this and overall enjoyed it.
September 25, 2022
Very unsatisfying
It has a unique story line and I adore Lucas but seriously, he gets nothing from this relationship. Godric manipulated Lucas from the very beginning and by the end of the book has caused Lucas to have multiple panic or anxiety attacks, makes him question his own memory and the police think he is a murderer. I think this has the potential to be a great book but definitely needs work; the story needs to be filled out more, the one sex scene in the book is just... no (a lot more prep is absolutely needed, Lucas is made to think it never happened and there is NO way he would not be feeling that the next day) and it needs to be edited as there are quite a few errors right from the start.
It has a unique story line and I adore Lucas but seriously, he gets nothing from this relationship. Godric manipulated Lucas from the very beginning and by the end of the book has caused Lucas to have multiple panic or anxiety attacks, makes him question his own memory and the police think he is a murderer. I think this has the potential to be a great book but definitely needs work; the story needs to be filled out more, the one sex scene in the book is just... no (a lot more prep is absolutely needed, Lucas is made to think it never happened and there is NO way he would not be feeling that the next day) and it needs to be edited as there are quite a few errors right from the start.
Read
August 19, 2022found a hard limit
January 25, 2026
No sequel
Good story, shorter than what I read but I've had this book for ages (and series) so thought I'd read them.
Really disappointed that there was no ending.
Good story, shorter than what I read but I've had this book for ages (and series) so thought I'd read them.
Really disappointed that there was no ending.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews