Even good narrators can't save this mess.

This is not a good book, and if I wasn't reading it for a challenge I doubt I would have finished it.

The attitudes toward women are offensive. Many other attitudes were irritating as well.

The story makes little sense, things happen for no discernible reason. There's an entire story line about a stalker that has no reason to exist, especially as it's never explained. Dante's father is a complete monster until the last chapter maybe and then it's like everything he did is forgotten and forgiven because "he's my dad". The mother however is just unforgivable apparently.

The whole Daddy/Boy thing consists of them calling each other by those terms and a few spankings, the actual dynamics of that type of lifestyle are never explored in any meaningful way.

Dante is seriously addicted to various drugs and has been for years but three days with Cash and he's over it. That's not how that works.

Cash is ex-military, pretty much all of a sudden, and that means he's not only a great drummer who's just above "all that" but he can keep Dante safe because he's got "skillz". Ugh.

I'm just done. The more I think about this the more I dislike it.

Audio: Toma is Toma, I like him but he really doesn't have a ton of range. Cooper North is really good but he seems subdued here, still enjoyable though.

6 people found this helpful

Huh?

this story didnt make a lick of sense. especially Drake (no redeeming qualities, so Im skipping his book). Yet, the characters were cute, both Dante and Cash, and I loved Rafe and Chaz (only reason Im gonna give it a go to the next installment). The narrators were flawless, that was its biggest saving grace.

2 people found this helpful

Loved the narration, but the story? Eh.

This was a re-read for me. I’ve already read the whole series as ebooks. I was surprised that the narrators for this book were Iggy Toma and Cooper North. I’ve listened to them separately with other audiobooks before so this was the first time listening to them narrate a book together. As with an narration where narrators read their own chapters for the characters, the voices for the characters change between chapters. But it’s not TOO noticeable. I really liked Iggy Toma voicing Dante and Cooper North as Cash.

I’m looking forward to listening to Breaking Drake especially on audio because Drake (Dante’s father) has a British accent. I really enjoyed listening to this book as an audiobook and can’t wait for the others to come out in audio too!!

***The rest of this review is from my first impressions of the story through e-book***

This started out really strong, but I got bored about halfway through? I do think you need to read this book before reading the second book. And I loved the second book, so just push through this is my recommendation if you feel like you’re not loving this one.

Trigger warnings for drug addiction, mentions of self-harm, mentions of alcoholism, withdrawal, a kidnapping scare, bomb threat, stalker, receiving threats, a shooting, and mentions of suicidal ideation.

It is baffling to me that this book has zero warnings in front of it to let readers know what they’re getting into. I am aware the author writes darker romances and I’ve read their previous works under this penname but it seems incredible irresponsible to not include them for this book either in the book, on GR, or even their own website. The start of this book is very rough going because of its content.

The main character, Dante, is the lead singer and songwriter for a rock band after his name called Dante’s Infernal. He’s addicted to oxy and with the way he’s carrying on, even HE believes he won’t live to see 30. His dad, Drake, is the band’s manager and has a conservatorship on Dante and comes across as crass, uncaring, and only in it for the money. The band needs a drummer and Dante, while a drugged up prodigy is not accepting of just anyone coming into the band, and keeps running everyone off. This leads to Drake in hiring a more seasoned drummer for the tour, someone who can act as Dante’s bodyguard for the stalker, and someone who can have a firm hand to keep Dante from OD’ing. This is how we meet Cash.

Cash is caring for his younger sister and just trying to make money to see his 17-year-old sister, Bonnie, off to college. When Drake offers Cash enough money he can’t refuse, he takes off with the band on tour while Bonnie conveniently goes on a vacation with a friend and her family in Europe. The whole sister angle is kind of weird. We hear how overprotective Cash is of his sister and then off she goes to Europe and we never really hear from her again until the epilogue. It’s weird.

I read this series all out of order because what really grabbed my eye was book 2 about the other band mates in Dante’s Infernal - Chaz and Rafael. They’re two of Dante’s best friends since high school and they started the band together. They weren’t particularly interesting in this book to me, but I adore them in the next book. I think it was just hard to get a good grasp on all the characters and the kind of people they are when we’re dealing with a lot of things in this book.

I think there was just too much happening when we have to contend with a storyline that deals with drug addiction, the recovery, falling into BDSM, just a whole rock band tour piece of it, daddy issues, AND a whole stalker situation. It just felt like the story didn’t have room to breathe and made the Dd/lb and age regression scenes all feel rushed and a bit forced to me.

At the end, what was the stalker’s game even? It seems so weird and that he’s been following Dante for YEARS and then at the end there, it was like, an abrupt and clean ending that meant nothing really. And the whole deal with Drake? Don’t care for him at all here. And like I said in my review for book 2, I didn’t even like Drake until the middle to end of that book when he starts coming across as more caring and more human?

I feel like I never really had a chance to know or like Dante here. And Cash seems to be an enigma still. He just falls head over heels for Dante and becomes his Daddy all of a sudden when Dante is going through withdrawals. And I don’t love that? The BDSM and how it comes across in this series is pretty sketchy. I can actually relate to Drake in this area because it would absolutely seem like Cash was taking advantage of Dante at a vulnerable state.

So, yeah. Didn’t love this book but you need to read it before reading the read of the series; otherwise, you feel like you’re missing out on a piece of the story. But, I really enjoyed book two and I’m excited for book three. I think this series just gets better as it goes, but definitely had an unfortunate over ambitious start that didn’t deliver.

2 people found this helpful

Tamed by abuse

The protagonist in this story is no better than the stalker! If you kidnap someone to prevent a kidnapping, you are literally a kidnapper.

Freedom of expression. If a talented writer wants to create trash like this they can. Too bad the awesome narrators spent time on this.

1 person found this helpful

A great book

Loved both narrators and the story was funny , hot and heartwarming . The Daddy/ boy dynamic was very interesting.

Hard Pass…Trust Me!

Definitely not worth a credit! I purchased it by accident. What a complete waste of time.

Terrible!

This has to be one of the worst books I have ever heard. Don’t waste your time! If there was a zero rating, I would give it!
And no, I doubt seriously that this review will stay!

Not your ordinary rock star romance!

I normally don’t gravitate towards rock star romance books of any trope, but I’m a big fan of Joel Albernathy’s so I wanted to give it a try. Oh my goodness! I love the Daddy/little storyline usually and this one is very touching. I loved Cash of course but Dante took a little while to love. He was out of control in so many ways. It took Cash to realize what Dante needed and take control. I eagerly await the next book/audio from Joel Albernathy.

Love this book

I loved this book when I read it a while ago and I loved listening to it as an audiobook I’m already ready to listen to it again

Great story

New to me author. I listened to the audio book. This was a MM contemporary story set in the USA in the rock music industry. Main characters are Dante, a young, out of control lead singer and Cash an elder war veteran, in charge of his younger sister and general music specialist. Cash is hired to Tame Dante as the title suggests. The book as at bit on BDSM and daddy kink. great read.