This review has been translated into English by electronic means.
This book was a huge question mark for me. I like the author's writing style in general, it's easy to understand, direct and without frills. But!!!
I noticed the changes that have occurred since the beginning of the series until now, and while I like the improvement in the writing since then, I didn't like the drop in quality in the development of the story. I've noticed this not only in this series and with this author, but also with other series by other authors that I'm reading that aren't fantasy. I say this because when you write fantasy it's more believable, within the notion that it's a work of fiction of course, that one person will fall in love with the other at first sight, in that context, of course. And yes, I understand this happening in contemporary romances and all the others, but when you're reading a longer series, which I love by the way, you expect not to have this same concept applied in each new book released.
This bothers me, even more so when the author doesn't use the artifice of the passage of time to justify that emotional dependence in alarming proportions that happens mainly in this book.
I simply loved Zero, he's the kind of character you want to bring to life, cradle and protect. I understood where he was coming from with his notions of protection, his aversion to self-love. I also tried to understand Jack, but it was difficult, because I understood his anger and pain, but I didn't accept it and it doesn't justify the way he took it out on Zero, right away. It was ridiculous. After all, he could have changed everything that happened, if he had just told the truth to his so-called "family". And even with the way he was treated, Zero fell in love with Jack, in practically two days. Come on, it was hard to accept that. And after all that, there was no groveling, apologies or forgiveness on Jack's part.
After the first books in the series, I felt a drop in the development of the story. There is no longer any connection between the books. The characters from previous or later books seem more like extras with meaningless lines to fill pages.
The fact that the passage of time is not properly mentioned has bothered me since the first book. These shorter books should have a well-defined and described chronological order, so that readers can better follow the events and even become more involved with the story being told. But everything happens so quickly, as if your life happened in a week or two and nothing else matters. Sometimes you only focus on the facts of a few moments, so each chapter portrays an hour or day of that week, with internal dialogues or dialogues between characters that are often boring.
I love it when an author manages to develop the story of his characters, no matter how short the book is, with more balance, without getting too fixated. Show their lives in a broader, more comprehensive way, giving more details about their lives beyond that single problem that he decides to use as a backdrop and that probably won't be seen as a problem in the next book.
How can an author imply that a character was abused in all forms, especially sexually, as a child, and eliminate the abuser because he was going to commit the same act with his sister, but doesn't develop this in the story? I was like, 'What?' She mentions the fact, but doesn't elaborate and everyone simply uses it against the victim, victimizing him once again, after everything he went through and being judged as an adult, even though it wasn't considered at the time of the events, even with all the mitigating factors he had in his favor. Yes, there are injustices in the world, but here it just seemed convenient to me.
I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, I like the series, the writing style and, in this case, one of the main characters. But on the other hand, I feel frustrated with the story in general. I expected more for a book that concluded a series.