Book Review – Fury (New Species #1) by Laurann Dohner

Sigh. This has only happened to me 3 times before, but I actually could not finish this book.

I really struggled with this one. The world/concept/story was good, but the writing was just so BAD!! And the sex was so beyond cheesy, even from the start, it was literally making me cringe and/or roll my eyes.

I stopped reading at 65%. But if I had to rate what I’d read so far, I’d give it about 2.5 stars – somewhere between ‘barely okay’ and ‘meh’.

It was just to the point where I was forcing myself to keep going and with so many other books out there that I just can’t wait to get to, I couldn’t bring myself to waste time on something I didn’t love.

I actually really liked the concept behind this book. Basically, a pharmaceutical company conducted extensive illegal experiments in their secret labs splicing together human and animal DNA to try and create “New Species” – which ideally would be kinds of super-humans with all the best qualities of both species. Problem was, their experiments were cruel, brutal and utterly abhorrent – the subjects were kept chained up and subject to all manners of abuse. Ellie undergoes an undercover operation to get intel that will prove its existence so that the government can shut them down. While she is undercover, she finds herself attracted to one of the experiment subjects, Fury. But the day she finally got the intel, she is about to get out when she sees him drugged in a private room with one of the scientists who basically attempts to torture, rape and kill him (yes, it gets a little graphic). She saves him by bursting in and killing the scientist but the only way for her to get herself out alive is to blame the killing on him (she basically banks on the idea that the scientists won’t kill him because of how valuable he is)…. Fast forward a year, Ellie’s intel got the evil company shut down and the government has set up a rehabilitation center for all the New Species members. There Ellie and Fury cross paths again. Fury feel utterly betrayed by her for the way she left him because while they didn’t kill him for the murder she blamed on him, they did torture him. But still, they both are intensely attracted to each other and inevitably end up together.

I found the writing style to be very stilted, formulaic and flat. It didn’t pull me in, didn’t make me ‘feel’ for the characters and I hate to say it but the dialogue was just downright bad. And it was actually the reason I stopped reading. It was just so off-putting.

I also found that despite there being a fair bit of sex in the books, I felt the romance took much too long to develop. They didn’t become a couple until after the 50% mark and before then (and after as well), their sex scenes were either making me shake my head, roll my eyes, or just want to face palm and although they clearly were crazy about each other, and I knew that, I just didn’t feel it – which to me is the most important element in a book. I want to FEEL the story.

That being said, I know this will sound weird, but I didn’t hate the book. I actually kinda liked it and its quite highly rated on Goodreads so I was surprised with my reaction to it. The men were very Alpha and possessive and technically, the kind of guy I like but I just personally really could not connect with the writing.

So I just decided to stop. It just wasn’t the book for me.