Series: Standalone
Release Date: January 23rd, 2018
The simplest form of communication.
For some, the most complex.
Undercover cop, Lucia has more secrets than a rat’s nest. She works the beat, works it well, until she infiltrates a gang where she finally finds her place. Jungle justice suits her down to a tee, but the day comes when she has to return to her real life, and brothers in arms suddenly become enemies, as she flounders to find her place in the world once more.
Martinez, a gang boss, one of the most powerful men in the city, has had his eyes on Lucia from the start. His instincts told him she was the rat in his midst, but other, baser, parts of him swayed his judgment. When his brother is sent down thanks to Lucia’s testimony, he can think only of revenge.
When a woman who can’t stand to be touched has to fight for her life in the bed of a man who can kill her in the blink of an eye, everything, even reality, unravels.
On the run, her past as a cop and footsoldier chasing at her heels, Lucia’s safety lies in the hands of the one man who can and will hurt her the most.
Through his raw touch, she has to find a haven where all around her, there is nothing but hell. Can she allow him into the ashes of her life, if it means her survival is at risk?
Find out in The Raw Touch.
Reader Advisory: this full-length novel contains scenes of dubious consent, as well as information that readers might find upsetting.
• Sexual abuse
• Abduction
• Dubious consent – Although, I hate the term. Either consent is given, or it is not given. However, the author warns of a ‘dubious consent’ scene in the synopsis, so I’ve included it here.
• No descriptive sex scene with OW/OM
• Does have the Hero and Heroine pushing away
• Does have a separation between the Hero and Heroine
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.
Rating: 2/5 stars
Warnings of the darkness of The Raw Touch permeated its reviews. Typically, when books are classified as dark, it alludes more towards the darkness of the relationship or “romance” between the two main characters. Therefore, with that being said, I started The Raw Touch with great hesitancy but kept waiting, and waiting for the shoe to drop… for when this seriously dark part of the book emerged. I have to say that if you’ve never read a book that contains any aspect of mobs, crime families, recounting traumatic events in the past (like rape), death or murder… The Raw Touch is dark in those respects; it does have dark themes. However, what wasn’t dark was the relationship between the two main characters, and to be honest, once I knew the past of the heroine, Lucia, I couldn’t conceive of how Lucia could actually have a healthy relationship like that.
I think it’s due to gendering roles that I am more intrigued than disgusted by Lucia’s sociopathic tendencies. The prologue was shocking, but I didn’t associate her as being evil. Instead, it made me fascinated by her life. The story opens up with Lucia as an undercover cop who goes a bit too far to prove her stripes. The fallout is that she has a corrupt stigma associated with her in the precinct (to be honest, rightly so), and has gained the unwanted and dangerous attention of Martinez, the gang boss (that’s what his title is in the synopsis).
Basically, my rationale for the low rating is that the main characters did not have a dark romance, meaning I thought their relationship would be similar to that of the main characters in Meghan’s March’s Mount Trilogy. To be honest, I didn’t really feel that The Raw Touch was a romance. Lucia and Martinez interact and play off one another, but due to Lucia’s past, Martinez has a huge hurdle to overcome if he wants to be with Lucia. In this respect, I felt that the author did an excellent job of fleshing out both their characters by having them attempt to find a solution to Lucia’s past. However, I felt that much of the emotional resolution was off-page… which became particularly evident with the epilogue.
WhileThe Raw Touch was an intriguing and captivating crime story, I wouldn’t really categorize it as a romance, which also contributed to the 2-star rating. For me, in most of my books, some romance is necessary, so for the book to be so far below my expectations (really through no fault of its own) just made me annoyed and confused. The Raw Touch was well written, but in all, the book just didn’t make much sense. Usually, because the book is fiction, you can brush off things that don’t seem realistic. But with the type of plot in The Raw Touch–and the seriousness of the plot–you can’t just suspend your disbelief.
So, in summary, a well-written book but one that annoyed me with its misdirection.
Note: Out of print as of June 2020.
