| Title: | Nothing Left to Lose | |
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| Author: | Kirsty Moseley | |
| Publisher | Self-published | |
| Publication Date: | November 5, 2013 | |
| Publisher's Description | Annabelle Spencer’s life is every girl’s dream. She has wonderful parents, great friends, and of course the perfect boyfriend, Jack Roberts. That all changes on her sixteenth birthday when her life comes crashing down around her. Her dream night turns into a nightmare when Jack is murdered right in front of her, and she’s kidnapped by his murderer, Carter Thomas, a big time drug and arms dealer. After five months of being with Carter, she’s found, but the experience has totally changed her. She’s no longer the happy-go-lucky girl that everyone used to know and love; she’s now cold, hard and suffers from night terrors. It appears that Carter broke not only her body, but her spirit too. A shadow of her former self, her slogan for life is now: ‘If you don’t care about anything, then you have nothing to lose’. Carter is currently serving time for the murder of Jack, a conviction that Anna helped secure. But his retrial is coming up because some key evidence appears to have been tampered with. Unbeknown to Anna, death threats are being received by her father, the Senator. It appears that Carter is still interested in Anna and will stop at nothing to get her back. Ashton Taylor is brought in to protect her. He’s a newly qualified SWAT agent, a bright spark, the agency’s new golden boy. He is assigned undercover, posing as her boyfriend. His job is to help her through college and keep her safe until the end of the trial in eight months’ time. For three years she has been the broken, damaged girl, refusing to feel emotion or pain, but can Ashton help her rebuild her life and finally deal with the grief of losing her childhood sweetheart? Will he be the one to make her see that life is, in fact, worth living and that not all men will hurt her? All the while, the shadow of the trial looms over the both of them, taunting them, reminding them that it isn’t over yet. After all, Carter Thomas will stop at nothing to be reunited with his ‘Princess’. Due to heavy subject matter and sexual content, this book is recommended for ages 17+ |
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| My rating: | *** | |
This is one for the feelings, not so much for the head. There were a lot of thing in this book that didn’t make sense logistically, but I did enjoy the story itself. Annabelle was a sympathetic protagonist, and although her transformation seemed a little too much like magic, it was nice to see such a damaged character allow herself to heal. Ashton really tugged at my heartstrings with his earnest attempts to understand Mia, and his patience with her. Annabelle’s parents annoyed me quite a bit and I wanted to shake them, but I don’t have much patience for overbearing people, even when their intentions are good.
I wasn’t expecting a detailed description of what close protection is like or anything, but let’s be realistic: the child of a front-running presidential candidate has NO privacy. The entire world would have known what had happened to Annabelle, or at least that she had somehow disappeared for a while immediately following the murder of her boyfriend. She would have been watched like a hawk in the months leading up to her father’s election, and even if she wasn’t on the campaign trail with him, she would not have been able to live anonymously.
A large percentage of the dialog sounded British, which makes sense, given that the author is British. Why must all new adult books be set in the United States? Why couldn’t Annabelle’s story have taken place somewhere else? So much dialog/setting weirdness distracted me from the story.
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