Title: The Darkest Craving
Author: Gena Showalter
Series: Lords of the Underworld, #10
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Publisher: HQN (Imprint of Harlequin)
Date Published: July 30th, 2013
Edition: Paperback
Source: Purchased (Amazon)
Rating:
Having endured weeks of torture in the bowels of hell, Kane wants nothing to do with his beautiful rescuer, Josephina Aisling. The half-Fae female threatens to awaken the demon of Disaster inside him—a beast he’s determined to kill, no matter the price.
Josephina is hunted by a brutal enemy—her royal family—and Kane is her only source of protection. He’s also the only male to ever set her aflame, and even he succumbs to the heat. But as they navigate the treacherous world of the Fae, they are forced to make a choice: live apart…or die together.
My Review:
The latest Lords of the Underworld book, The Darkest Craving, is about Kane, Keeper of Disaster, and Josephina, a Fae with a royal family who’s bound and determined to make her life miserable. After Josephina saves Kane from hell, they both have a lot of healing and change that they need to go through, and they find themselves overcoming it best when they’re together.
I was honestly a little worried I wouldn’t like this book. Like a lot of other fans, I have noticed a change in Gena’s writing since her recent changes in her Faith and while I’m happy for her I am concerned about how it will impact where the series she started writing beforehand (including LOTU) will change direction and style.
I haven’t read her latest Angels of the Dark book, Beauty Awakened yet for that very reason, but since Lords of the Underworld is one of my favorite Paranormal Romances, I had to at least see for myself how it would be. I’m happy to say that I really enjoyed this one and I did in fact sit down with it and couldn’t put it down. There were some things I noticed about it that I think probably would’ve gone differently pre-Gena’s-Faith. But I still wasn’t really disappointed by anything.
One of the things is that Kane and Josephina rather abruptly marry before having sex and although the situation made sense of it, I am a little bit concerned that she’s going to have the rest of the Lords rush into similar situations before having sex. Although I am myself a Christian (perhaps not the strongest Christian, but a Christian nonetheless) I think that times have changed and this just isn’t the way it’s going to happen in every situation. So I’ll be curious if she’s going to make this awkward change in all of her future PNR books or if it was a one-time thing because it made sense for this book.
The other thing is that the sex scenes were a bit less graphic and not as good as her previous books, but they were more graphic than I expected to find given the reviews of Beauty Awakened. So I did notice a change here, but it wasn’t so big of a change (at least for me) that it would merit not reading the books anymore. I know, sex isn’t everything in these books, but it is a part of most PNRs, so I thought it was worth mentioning in this review.
Aside from how this book differs from previous books in the series, it was really good overall. I have never paid much attention to Kane to be honest because he never really got much page-time in other LOTU books, but in this book I definitely swooned for him and he stepped up to the plate as another badass LOTU. He’s super sexy and sweet and after he’s set his sights on Josephina (aka Tink), he treats her like the princess she is.
I also really liked that we got a lot of William in this book because he’s helping out Kane with some things. I adore William and he’s one book that I’m probably looking forward to the most from the series (soon hopefully). So it was good to get more of him. He’s always really fun. Plus, even though they’re not outwardly affectionate, you can just tell that he really cares for Kane as a friend, and it made me love him even more.
There are also some other side stories going on in this one, setting up (I’m assuming) some of the future books. Among these are most predominately Cameo and Torin (separately). Both of their stories seem to be set in motion and I enjoyed reading about them, especially Cameo who has quite a hottie in store for her! 
The one thing that led me to move my rating down a half star was the ending. I know these books are known for their conveniently unbelievable plot twists that allow everything to fall into place perfectly. But this one just seemed a little far-fetched even for this series. I’m happy it all worked out, but at the end there it was just one conveniently placed event after another that kind of left me rolling my eyes a bit.
Probably could’ve gone without the baby re-forming inside of Josephina after she’d already come back to life from a power that she absorbed supposedly temporarily.
Still, most Lords of the Underworld fans should be happy with this installment despite the hesitation I know a lot of fans are experiencing with Gena’s change in writing style. I know I was happy with it and I’m excited for the books to come, although I really hope it’s more than just the three (Torin, Cameo, and William)!
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