Beautiful Carnage

Dark Empire #1

(also called The Boys of Sinners Bay #1)

By Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti

~ Can be read as a standalone ~

TheStory

For her entire life, Sloan has been placed in a gilded cage, controlled and kept by her father. The bigges blow to her freedom comes when her father arranges her marriage to Nicoli, the boy he adopted and planned for Sloan to marry in order to allow him to take over the family “business.” 

On the day of the wedding, Rocco and the Romero family plan to blow everything to high heavens. When their plans are interrupted, Rocco decides to make the best of a bad situation. On a whim, Rocco kidnaps Sloan in order to blackmail her father and Nicoli into staying out of Romero business, including their territory.

The kidnapper-captive relationship takes a turn when Rocco and his brothers make a bet to see if Rocco can get Sloan to fall in love with him while being his captive.

TheReview

Starting right off the bat, I truly did not buy that famous mafia brothers would make a bet like that… that’s just lazy writing. But, whatever, at least the kidnapping made sense. Since everything was happening on a whim, perhaps the brothers just weren’t taking anything too seriously. 

The entire first half of the book is Sloan being held captive and treated like ABSOLUTE garbage by Rocco. The brothers too, but they actually seem to like her, so they went easier on her than Rocco. It also flips to the POV of Nicoli trying to find her and rescue her.

Originally, I thought this was just a duet, but I have to imagine that the brothers are going to get their own stories because there was little tidbits of information about them thrown around quite a bit. 

So, the brothers weren’t all bad. They actually added some much needed comic relief. Nicoli is obviously enraged and trying to find her. But man, oh man, is Rocco an absolute buttmunch of a human being for the first half.

I truly had no idea how it was all going to work out. Especially given that Nicoli was like a brother to her and he wasn’t a bad guy. So how it would work out with Rocco and her catching feels and Nicoli being intent on marrying her, I truly had no clue.

Add to that the family history, feuding mafias, kidnapping and blackmailing the father, etc. etc. I knew it would work itself out but I really didn’t know how. 

Therefore, the ending was a good surprise. It had some stuff that I didn’t see coming and it wrapped the story up nicely. 

I fully enjoyed the read, even wanting to scream at the characters half the time. To be honest though, the best part was the ending. The ending solidified my rating, for sure. I was pleasantly surprised and was hit with some unexpected stuff that made it extra enjoyable.

ProminentTropes

Enemies to Lovers

Morally Grey MMC

Forced Proximity

Slow Burn

Forbidden Romance

Mafia Romance

Insta-Hate

TheRating

Storyline: 4/5

Characters: 5/5

Side Characters: 5/5

World Building: N/A

Writing: 4/5

Overall: 📘📘📘📘

Spice: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

Dark Empire Series

Beautiful Carnage

Dark Empire #1

Beautiful Savage

Dark Empire #2