Laura and Lauren's Review of Killing Sarai (In the Company of Killers, #1) by J.A. Redmerski

Laura's Review:

If you love Captive in the Dark by C.J. Roberts, Consequences by Aleatha Romig, and Crow’s Row by Julie Hockley then you will love this book!!!!!!!!

Basic Summary:  Sarai was only fourteen when her mother uprooted her live to in Mexico with a notorious drug lord.  Over time she forgot what it was like to live a normal life, but she never let go of her hope to escape the compound where she has been held for the past nine years.

                Victor is a cold-blooded assassin who, like Sarai, has known only death and violence since he was a young boy.  When Victor arrives at the compound to collect details and payment for a hit, Sarai sees him as her only opportunity for escape.  But things don’t go as planned and instead of finding transport back to Tucscon, she finds herself free from one dangerous man and caught in the clutches of another.

                While on the run, Victor strays from his primal nature as he succumbs to his conscience and resolves to help Sarai.  As they grow closer, he finds himself willing to risk everything to keep her alive; even his relationship with his devoted brother and liaison, Niklas who now like everyone else wants Sarai dead.

                As Victor and Sarai slowly build a trust, the differences between them seem to lessen, and an unlikely attraction intensifies.  But Victor’s brutal skills and experience may not be enough in the end to save her, as the power she unknowingly holds over him may ultimately be what gets her killed.

What I Love About This Book: Great premise!!! It’s really original in a lot of ways so it was definitely a breath of fresh air reading this story.  I thought the characters were written beautifully, from Victor’s actions and demeanor in the book you really get a sense of his life before Sarai, and how talented and dangerous of a man he is.  Sarai as well is a great leading character, and it’s obvious from page one just how desperate her situation is and the very thin line she walks on.  Can she have a normal life after living so long in Mexico under Javier’s control, or will she forever been messed up not being to have normal relationships, and always be on the brink of breaking down?

                This book really delves into circumstance versus nature.  What has made Victor this way, why is a cold blooded killer was it something in his nature that the order was able to recruit it at a very young age?  Sarai has been living in Mexico for years, and has spent the most formative years of her life with a drug lord who beats, rapes, kills, and beats people on a regular basis.  Has this made her into a killer, her becoming to numb to these things have either been survival instinct or something about her that makes it possible to be numb to it all?  I like books that can bend your morals in a way because you love Victor, even though for most of the book he is cold, he lies, and above all is a trained assassin.  Yet there is something about him that almost lets you forgive all the negatives about him and you just want him to Sarai’s hero so badly. 

                The plot was great; I love that slow kind of realization of their love for each other as the story continues.  It’s not all love at first sight for them, it takes many steps for them to get to the point that they realize they mean more to each other than they should.  When they finally get together I just wanted to clap and cheer!!!

Cons:  I feel like this book could’ve been a bit longer.  There were a lot of details that were skimmed over that I felt were important to the story line.  Sarai talks about her mom, and how her mom met Javier, but she doesn’t go into detail as to how she sold Sarai to Javier, how he got them to go to Mexico, or how her mother died.  It’s all just kind of glossed over, and for me it would’ve added to Sarai’s character development, because compared to Victor hers wasn’t as detailed.  There were so many details in this book that could’ve made it such a great book.  I also felt like a lot of the sentences were kind of broken and fragmented and didn’t go with the flow with the plot it almost kind of stilted in a lot of ways for me.  I would’ve liked to have seen more detail of Sarai’s life in the compound, maybe flashbacks to it rather her just talking about it, it would’ve made the horrors of her life more clear and made Sarai more likable. 

Overall:  Great story, who doesn’t love dark and mysterious when it comes to a man?  When you read about Victory, you just want to be that woman who can fix whatever is broken inside of him that makes him so cold at times.  After reading this book you want to cheer for Sarai, you want her to live and be happy with Victor so badly.  The pace of the story was awesome, I like that it got right down to the point pretty quickly, and you had a sense of where this story was going.  Yet at the same time, you have no idea how all of this going to end, when it does who will be alive at the end?  There were so many times in this book where my heart was pounding, and I couldn’t wait to get to the next page to find out what is going to happen!! I cannot wait to read the next book!!!
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Lauren's Review:

Rating: 4 Stars

What I Loved: One of my favorite books of all time is Captive in the Dark and this book brought me right back to what I loved about it.  There is something so infatuating to me about a woman falling in love with her capture.  It's the  idea that she should not be falling in love with him that keeps me so hooked (the forbiddenness of it all). I loved the orginially of the book and I think I needed this after my last couple of reads.  I don't know if I would have loved this as much if the last few books I read were better.  I really enjoyed how action packed this book was, especially right from the beginning and I never knew where Redmerski was going to take me next.   I liked how Redmerski takes her time with Victor and Sarai. You have the opportunity to watch them slowly fall into each other.

Cons:  I didn't fall in love with Victor. Don't go into this thinking Victor is going to be your next book boyfriend.  I wish we were able to drive deeper into Victor and I think this bounces off of what Laura was saying about having more details and the story having more length.  There is so much more I want to know about Victor and Sarai. Hopefully book two will give that to us.

Also, I never get emotional with a book, I did in one specific scene and I had to put the book down for a quick breather, and kind of skip over it. I don't think it would have bothered me as much before I became a mom but now when I read something sad, I can't help but think what I would do if that was my daughter. So kudos to Redmerski for pulling at my heart strings. An author has yet to do that to me.

Hot Scenes:  The piano scene :)

Next Read: Night Owl (The Night Owl Trilogy, #1) by M. Pierce