Pocket, $1.99, ISBN 978-1-4767-2848-3
Contemporary Erotica, 2013
The Fetish Box Part 3: What Remains concludes the tale of Mary Deupree and her relationship with John Brinks and Max Jobman. Obviously, you shouldn’t read this first without having read the previous two entries into this series. In fact, I may accidentally let loose a spoiler or two of the previous two stories here, so if you have any intention of starting this series from the beginning, you may as well check out my review of the first part instead.
Well, this one is easily the most “romantic” of the three parts, mostly because the author allows Mary and John to do some emotional bonding in addition to all that steaming up the sheets. Mary gets a piece of Max, too, but then again, every woman can get a piece of Max without putting up much effort, so she wisely decides that she is more into John.
Meanwhile, and this is perhaps the most disappointing part of all, the non-relationship aspects of the story are resolved mostly off-screen in a neat and tidy manner. The identity of the villain is utterly predictable and, now that I think about it, is there even a point to the whole suspense subplot other than filler?
The filler thing is my biggest issue with this story – a lot about the whole story isn’t developed well enough for my liking, instead most of it seems like filler material. Perhaps this issue could have been avoided if the whole series had been longer – maybe a six-parter?
I like what I get here with regards to the relationship between Mary and John – they make a sweet couple, especially for two people that seem too cool and poised for the “L” word, heh, and the author manages to balance steamy sex and credible chemistry well here. Alas, it’s time for the curtains to fall when I’m really starting to enjoy the story.
At the end of the day, the flaws of The Fetish Box Part 3: What Remains are also that of the entire series: it feels too half-baked for its own good, with many aspects barely developed in a satisfying manner. There are some good moments here, and the sex scenes are pretty hot indeed, but things don’t come together as well as they should.
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