Review of The Monster by LJ Shen

Sooooooo… let’s talk The Monster. My very first book by LJ Shen was Sparrow, which also means my very first Shen Book Boyfriend was Troy Brennan. He will always have a special place in my heart, because as I said he was my first Shen man. To say I was ridiculously excited to read the book about his son is the understatement of the year. I mean we’re getting lots of Daddy Troy and I FLOVED it!

A huge part of the book I absolutely did not like Sam. He is probably the meanest asshole LJ has ever written, and I was highly annoyed with Ash that she still came back to him over and over again even tho he treated her like the dirt under his shoes. They didn’t even have the most amazing chemistry but that’s totally my problem because I recently finished a book where the couples chemistry was so off the charts that probably no other book will even come close to these two for a long time. I had some issues with Ash, because the way she was treated by her entire family was pissing me off, her mother was the badest of them all.

What I like about LJs heroines so much is that they are sassy, don’t take shit from the guys and aren’t naive. Sadly until almost the end of the book she was all of that. Anyways. The change in the book for me was after the plot twist. Things were finally starting to speed up and I haven’t seen this one coming and maybe it took a while too long for the twist to come for my taste because the focus where Sams entire attention was pointed to in the first place was maybe a little too obsessed.

I would have wished more cats and mouse games with Ash, seeing more of his walls cracking when they spend time together, like that one time in his Appartement. After said plot twist Sam FINALLY realizes what he really wants. He became the hero I wanted to have from the very beginning and started fighting for Ash. The entire last 30% of the book gave me some serious Vicious vibes and after all this time I still love Vicious and Emilia a lot.

All in all The Monster is not my favorite book of the series, that spot has still Hunter to himself, but it’s a great darkish Mafia Romance book wrapped up with the typical Shen asshole we use to love so much.

Can’t wait for the next and sadly final one in the series.