Angie’s Gladiator by Ruby Dixon (Icehome #4)

I’m starting to think that these books are written by a different ghostwriter. There just something off from them versus the Ice Planet Barbarians. I can’t put my finger on it. It might be the moments of sloppy writing? It might be that the tension is not hitting its usual mark. Something. is. Up.

Angie woke up on Not-Hoth pregnant and surprised by it because she wasn’t pregnant when she went to sleep. This meant the human slavers she was saved from did that to her. She’s shadowed by one of the new gladiator males, Vordis, who is sworn, along with his clone-twin Thrand, to protect Angie. Angie isn’t in a place to accept being romanced and cannot belive Vordis’ awkward advances. Plus, Thrand thinks he needs to compete for Angie too, which makes it a bit of a mess.

I really wish this book had been an thruple. Could have been really really hot. But alas, nope.

Angie was really annoying because she constantly thought about how she couldn’t do anything because she was pregnant. She couldn’t be loved because she was pregnant. That is just so offensive. Made me crazy. Thank gods she wasn’t pregnant for the whole book, just the first half.

It also strongly assumes that all women want to keep their surprise pregnancy. These books are very pro-life in that way. I would have loved the exploration of a chosen abortion.

There is also some pretty heavy-handed emotional manipulation in the form of, “if he can’t have you he’s just going to wander off into the wilderness alone and probably die.” MAJOR EYE ROLL.

If this book was a song it would be Mitski’s “Nobody”. Which is a great song for a bad book and I’m sorta sorry for choosing it for this! - Ford