DOS

by Violet L. Ryan

Sarah Collins is forced to call her ex because their daughter needs his rare blood for an operation. Thing is, he doesn’t know he’s a father. Dawson Collins, nick-named Dos for his computer expertise, married Sarah for revenge against her father. Goal achieved, he kicked her out on their wedding night. Realizing he’d made a grave error he searched, but couldn’t find her. Now, four years later, the only thing that matters to Sarah is her daughter, so Dos must use her mother’s love to keep Sarah close. Sarah is a strong, sensible woman caught in a vortex of destiny and a battle with unknown forces, but amid confusion and fear, she catches glimpses of a changed man. In spite of impossible odds, will she fall in love with her imprudent husband all over again?

Genres: Second Chance

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

I see you’ve accepted my invitation! Great! Let me tell you just a bit about myself. I live in a small Midwestern town with my husband, Denny. We raised our three beautiful daughters, Lana, Julie, and Debbie, in a bungalow set above Fall Creek a stone’s throw from our lovely city park. We enjoy eating out with friends, Sunday morning church services, and fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ. My favorite pastimes include photography, painting, drawing, reading, and, of course, writing.
Now, about my work. I’ve created stories all my life. It’s second nature to turn even the smallest detail, like a face in a crowd, or a lonely house on a hill, into a full-blown story. I write short stories and novels in many different genres, but if you like romance, we already share a common bond. Whether I spin a tale of mystery, suspense, fantasy, or plain, honest to goodness romance, a developing relationship between my hero and heroine is necessary to the plot. Even as a tot, when I wove stories of magic kingdoms, there were always heroes to save the day and magical queens bestowing favors on their knights.
Between authoring several books, I’ve written articles for newspapers and Christian communications. Published short stories include Rachel’s Return to Christmas, Santa’s Swan Song, Blackjack, The Snake Slayer, and Family Treasure, along with the occasional poem. You can find more about these figments of my imagination on the Books page.When my work is finished, polished, and published, I schedule signings and appearances, hold events and author chats, and present ideas and information at programs for those who wish to learn a new craft or improve their technique.

Reviews

[Vintage · Rating 3 out of 5]

Linda mentions in her review, For the first part of the book you want to put Dos in a burning vat of oil and then…. I never got the and then feeling. A vat of boiling oil, the fire of a thousand fiery suns, a medieval torture rack, I’m not choosy, just get him gone!

As with too many “revenge plots” the only one that experiences any impact from revenge is some poor innocent schmuck. The H is enraged that the heroine’s father stole his computer program so he woos and marries her. Turns out her father hates her too. Chick can’t catch a break. Instead of lawyering up and suing either bastard into the next millennium, again I’m not choosy, she runs for it. She comes back when Baby Girl needs some blood for a serious medical condition and Daddy has the only blood that will do.

How bad is the hero? He threatens to walk out and not donate his blood unless the heroine signs a contract giving him control…of everything. I kept yelling “Duress! Duress!,” but she didn’t listen. They never do.

Hero is mean, cruel, belittling and gets outraged anytime she stands up for herself like pointing out that she didn’t run from him, but that he kicked her out of bed, dropped her off on her father’s doorstep as he no longer wanted the “chubby morsel” the day after the wedding. Rage read alert.

Hero thinks he’s so smart, but his PA who practically has Evil OW tattooed to her forehead masterminds him by planting a Mrs. Danvers-style housekeeper in the house as well as a sadly dowdy nanny who gets bullied.

The hero


The hero’s conscious. He actually calls him Jimminy Crickett. That looks like too many "m's".


The heroine


Baby Girl


The evil OW aka PA


The housekeeper who should have been FIRED!


And there’s a makeover for our plain Jane nanny from Ugly Duckling to Swan…


I literally raged through this book hence the three stars as I know there are readers who love this stuff.

And for a nice palate cleanser…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKh6X...

[KatieV · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was looking for an entertaining wallbanger/trainwreck. This qualified on the wallbanger/trainwreck front, but it wasn't nearly entertaining enough. The premise had potential, but the execution left me kinda blah. Part of the problem may be me. I'm a programmer, so all the inconsistencies bugged the crap out of me.

The H, Dawson, whose nickname is 'Dos' is a programming genius. He wrote some sort of revolutionary operating system while in college and showed it to his boss during a summer internship. The boss, being a slimy POS, stole his work and sold it as his own. And then claimed that Dos had never shown him anything.

Dos was angry and rightly so. He wrote an even better operating system 'Dos Enabled' (lol - "DOS" was revolutionary 30+ years ago) and made uber $. But, he was still obsessed with vengeance against his former boss. He learns the man has a 19-year-old daughter, Sarah, and decides he'll use her for vengeance. He seduces her, marries her, and then just after consummating the marriage he calls her father (in front of Sarah) and basically says he's had his fun with the "chubby little nugget" but now he'll be returning her.

Turns out Dos made a serious miscalculation in his revenge. He assumed that Daddy gave a crap. He didn't. When Dos has Sarah delivered back home, her Dad promptly throws her out. Dos' conscience pricks him that evening and he goes looking for her, but finds she's gone without a trace.

Poor unloved, downtrodden Sarah had wandered the street until a good Samaritan gave her a ride to a nearby town. Then she lived on the streets until directed to a homeless shelter. She finds out she's pregnant and proceeds to support herself and later her little girl with low paying jobs. Apparently, her rich Daddy wouldn't even send her to college since he hated her so much for not being a boy which left her with few options for employment.

When the little girl is 3 1/2 she is diagnosed with a hole in the heart and desperately needs rare AB- blood before she can have surgery. Sarah reluctantly contacts Dos, since apparently no other donor can be found.

Dos is a real piece of work. Turns out he'd never divorced Sarah, because deep down he truly loved her. So, he comes in guns blazing and convinces Sarah that he won't give the child blood unless she agrees to sign a contract to come live with him, have sex with him, and grant him full custody of the child if she leaves. She's desperate, worried about her child, and thinks he's a monster so she doesn't doubt he'll withhold his blood. She signs. Actually he's bluffing, but she can't be blamed for assuming the worst.

He's supposedly trying to win Sarah back, but blows up at her at every turn and conveniently forgets she has every reason to hate and mistrust him. Also, he is constantly speaking to his conscience 'Jiminy Cricket' and often answering him out loud. He's the furthest thing from sexy I can think of. He needed anger management and counseling in general.

This could have been fun in an over-the-top, train wrecky way. There were so many absurd elements, i.e. the evil housekeeper secretly in the pay of the insane wannabe OW, not to mention the lascivious contract Sarah had to sign. But mostly it's just boring, back and forth bickering, lots of focus on the little girl, and Dos acting like a jackass and then arguing with his inner voice. I admit I did a lot of skimming because so much of the bickering wasn't even between the H/h it was between Sarah and the evil housekeeper. :-/

[Preeti ♥︎ Her Bookshelves · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pfffft!
I hate it when a good dramatic plot and angst potential is wasted.
*ETA- Although pretty (very!) frustrating at times, still a decent train wreck. (From a few-days-after-reading perspective.)*

I agree with Katie's analysis here.
The plot has all the essentials of a huge angst trip - dirty revenge, huge betrayal, humiliation galore and ow-drama of the highest order. Throw in an evil parent, a helpless h and a plot moppet with medical conditions - and we get the whole picture.
But the author fails the reader with her inconsistent and confused reasonings that percolate down to her characters - h, H and the ow who act in the most illogical and confused manner.

First the ow - Not the first book though where the ow (very very strangely but conveniently for the story) waits years before making her move. Why not make a move while the wife is out of the scene for past 4 years? A stunning, ambitious and scheming PA who also lives at his home but all is platonic?
Always at hand, at home or out of it, managing his work, home staff and life, he even drapes his arm around her once too often. Not a very boss-PA behavior. Who are they - or the author fooling??
And he calls her by a nickname- Jazzy!

And HOW STUPID IS THIS H? He think threats, control and more cruelty is the way to get his wife back. Because all he needs is more time.

And these 'evil' HP fathers who hate the hs so much because they wanted a son instead? Well, most such fathers are long widowed and so if there's nothing medically wrong, why didn't they ever remarry???

The Story
In the past –
The H wanted revenge on the h’s father for stealing his computer patent/property etc. So, he lures the enemy’s daughter, the naïve plump 19 yo h. After secretly marrying and then consummating the marriage, he dumps her the same night with some really cruel words.
“I married your chubby morsel today. I brought her to my house and used her plump little tail until I felt nauseated. Now I’m finished with her. I’m sending her home to you.”
(Can a 'H' ever recover fro that?)
Of course, her unloving father also refuses to take her back. So, she runs away. But is ofc unknowingly pregnant.

In the Present –
The h’s daughter has VSD and needs surgery. For that she needs blood transfusion and as it’s a rarer blood type, the h grudgingly contacts the H. He lands like the avenging angel and instead of soothing her, lands fresh threats and blackmail. Forget apologies for his past behavior. Yes, there never was a divorce and If she wants his blood, she needs to sign a contract signing over her life and control of their daughter to him. Way to Go!
They move into his home and to aggravate the situation, his scheming (resident) PA and her cohort the evil housekeeper plus their minion the nanny do their best to make her life hell-er! She’s kept away from her daughter and the h/H MUs keep increasing.

Rationed time with her own daughter is most heartbreaking.
The amount of control these three women had over the h and her day grates like chalk over board. The author increases these aggravations to fever pitch for the reader – and I hated her helplessness.
‘You little snot’ is one of the many things the housekeeper feels herself at liberty to call her, apart from scratching her now and then.
Why couldn’t the h try and tell her nice MIL if not the H?
The H is blind to the happenings right under his nose. In fact, he wholeheartedly approves of them separating mother and daughter. He has a vile and uncontrollable temper that make him snarl out hurtful things - seems like his brain-mouth connection is off.
Can this ever be forgivable? He’s pretty tstl for a supposedly smart person.

For the h, he’s not only the cruel monster of the past but from his actions and words, she believes that while he may not really want her, he wants their daughter and her father’s estate. And for that purpose, she refuses to trust any of his overtures. I like that she shows a good amount of spine or let's call it what it is - passive-aggressiveness.
Some clear thinking and talking could have cleared some, if not all their mus and problems but of course that doesn’t happen. Or is always just out of reach. She goes to talk but is unable to find him or is blocked off by the ow etc.
To add to the reader’s disquiet, her betraying body has a will of its own …
And a second pregnancy results when she spines up to leave him. But of course!

Jiminy cricket!
The H has an inner voice btw – a cricket conscience! Cute not!
The cricket always says the right things, makes the right deductions about the past, and the H seems to agree, and accept that all he wants is his wife’s trust. But then, he never behaves in a way that might lead towards that that path. all we get is repetitive cruel insensitive actions and words admixed with tender inner thoughts. So, the author tries to humanize the H but then also keeps sailing the chartered mu-angst path.

Other elements include a nice om (necessary to guilt up the h), the h rediscovers her artistic side and has a gallery showing for her paintings at the end; the H's mom, a nice but mostly absent person finds her own romance with the gallery owner.
The book ends with the crazed, thwarted ow setting up a hostage-chase situation.

At the end, I can buy his regret and redemption, even if the grovel is measly.

[Debbie DiFiore · Rating 3 out of 5]

That hero was pretty un-redeemable really. The words he said, his actions too were unbelievably cruel. Calling her a chubby morsel and then kicking her out? And then her Father won't let her come back home either so she ends up homeless. And her Dad dies the same day really? Just too much. And then the evil housekeeper, and Jasmine the perfect assistant who wants to kill his wife? Overload of drama. I did like parts of it though and the overall theme but I just hated the hero. He got better at the end but I just couldn't get on the DOS boat! His celibacy is unclear but I doubt he was celibate. But who knows. Jasmine was basically up his ass all the time. And why didn't she make a move during those four years? But the minute the wife shows up she's like he's mine. Whatever. I read it in SCribd and glad I didn't have to pay for it. But it actually was an okay read. Loved Libby!

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Where to start... For the first part of the book you want to put Dos in a burning vat of oil and then you silently cheer his behaviors that demonstrate his awakening as a human being, father and husband. He did redeem himself but it took anger management, Jimminy Cricket and some soul searching to begin that task. Unfortunately the author never revealed why the H was so emotionally clueless, seriously needed anger management, and yet could maintain a close and loving relationship with his mother.

The h survived a cold and unloving father and being used as a weapon of revenge by the H. She had grown to love him but had the wedding night from hades as he kicked her out after 1 night. She was pregnant and the now 3 year old child needed heart surgery. This was the stimulus for her to reach out to the H as they desperately needed a match for her rare blood type. Let the games begin.

His secretary, OW and wife wanna-be sought to destroy any feelings the H may have had for the h and that ultimately included her murder if necessary. Nice lady.

There is a hard earned HEA, a redeemed H and a h that has also learned to love and value herself so that she can accept that from others.

This book is not light reading. It grabs you early and wrings you out emotionally. I would recommend not to start it at bedtime for obvious reasons.

[Tony Fecteau · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some potions of the story are drawn out, which is why I rated it 3 stars instead of 4. The relationship from the beginning did not sit well with me.

[Sandie Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unlikable character

From the beginning of this story, I could not get myself to like Dos. He came across as arrogant, controlling, and insincere. Because of this I had a hard time believing this was a romance. He was rude and downright mean to the woman he was in love with. It was very unbelievable that their relationship would last, let alone be a relationship. He kept threatening to take their child away from her when he didn't get his way! I kept trying to find something good about him but couldn't. Along those lines I just couldn't get why the female main character was so weak that she let him tell her what to do, while her life kept getting worse and worse. Spoiler alert-she stays with him-unbelievable storyline.