Unveiled (Realms of Darkness #1) by R.S. Broadhead
Publication Date: May 9th, 2014
Genre: New Adult Paranormal
Pages: 245
Format: Paperback
Source: Author
Read: June 5th to 8th, 2016
Rating: 2/5
~Summary~
Twenty-one-year-old Reese Salt and her best friends like to party, flirt with boys, and stare at her super hot mysterious neighbor who keeps trying to tell her something in cryptic messages. She doesn't believe him, wanting to continue living her carefree life. But then things get weird when they're at a party and someone--or something--laces the party favors. Suddenly Reese is surrounded by hot guys in tactical gear, looking for one of her boyfriend's childhood friends, who they say isn't human.
After that night, everything changes. The safe world Reese thought she lived in isn't so safe anymore. To take her mind off it, and to apologize for being a jealous jerk, her boyfriend Wheeler takes her on what's supposed to be a romantic getaway--until his jealous tendencies turn violent and he smashes her face, knocking her out. As if things couldn't get any worse, they wake up under attack by what Reese can only describe as monsters. Only caring about his own survival, Wheeler smashes her leg, leaving her for dead. Big mistake. Something inside her awakens, and her body goes on autopilot, literally. She finds a helicopter, and instinct takes over, flying her battered body home, and leaving Wheeler to die at the mouths of the monsters.
Reese and her friends then seek out the help of her hot neighbor, who is the leader of a training program that fights the things that go bump in the night. Reese goes to the facility in search of answers, but she ends up finding so much more. Reese learns about weapons, fighting, monsters, and most of all, herself. Then there's Oliver Steele, her trainer who becomes much more. Reese is scared to open up, afraid she'll only get hurt again.
Can Reese save the world, learn to trust her heart, and find the strength to learn about who she really is? She better. Her life depends on it.
Okay, so the first time I picked this up was a couple of months ago but as I was reading I just couldn't get into it and the story just wasn't sitting right with me, it had some problems (in my liking how it was going, not with editing). So I had to put it down and move on. But then I decided to pick it back up and give it another try.
This time I read it a bit slower, thinking maybe that would help me get into it better. It didn't and those problems I had before were still there. At first I thought it was going well, flowing well with the world building. Had to take some time in getting connected to the characters but I saw potential so I kept reading. But when I got to the moment where the main gal's neighbor tells her and her friends they are special and that he want's to train them, once again I was blown away (not in a good way) with how they reacted to this. They jumped the gun, without asking any questions or asking what the hell is going on (the first thing I would ask is if the world was ending, especially after the second incident Reese had with these creatures), instead they were all into it and couldn't wait to start training. Um, what? Is your town so boring that you'll just say yes to anything without asking questions?
But even though I hated how they reacted, I trudged through still thinking it had potential. It didn't and things for me went down hill from there. If you're thinking they have special powers like wielding fire or water, or able to read minds or have physic abilities then you're going to be surely disappointed. The powers are things you'd be trained for within special government agencies, special ops kind of things. Things to me that don't really qualify as "special", especially if these things can be taught to anyone.
Then this story did a 360 and so much boy drama became the center of attention, caused for me to forget about pretty much everything that happened in the beginning and where this story was leading to at the end. So much boy drama and it just didn't feel right. This story didn't flow well for me and wasn't balanced with the paranormal and romance. They just didn't connect well and so I wasn't able to connect with the story.
Another scene that helped make it harder to get into or take this story serious was when a couple of "special ops" guys were sent to look after the girls when they went to the party, decided to give them a strip tease, on stage in front of everyone and then get drunk afterwards. Okay, and I'm supposed to take these guys serious after that? I don't mind them having fun but wrong time when they're working on the job.
Overall I just couldn't connect to the story, it just felt wrong and the story didn't flow for me and the boy drama. Cue roll eyeing, I don't know how a girl can sleep with a guy and think she's falling in love with him and then the next moment, cuddled with that said guy as he's sleeping, starts thinking about her ex and thinking maybe one day they'll get back together. Um, no. Just, no. And throughout the book I felt like things didn't really get explained so when new speculation came to light in the ending it piqued my interest so since the author was kind enough to send me the second book with this one, then I'll probably give it a try and see if it gets any better.
Also, forgot to mention, in the beginning every character we met pretty much started with the letter "S" so it didn't make things easy to remember who was who. Does anyone else hate when there's multiple characters with the same letter names? There was like 5 or 6 characters in the beginning with the same letter names and boy was that annoying, it's a pet peeve of mine....
*Was given a copy from the author in exchange for my honest review*
Sweet Readings Everybody!
