What do you think?
Rate this book


ebook
First published March 5, 2016



Their eyes met and Connor remembered the last thing Shawn had said to him, right before he walked out the door an hour ago.
“No matter what goes on between me and Chan, it’s you I’ll be thinking of.” — Connor Finley and Shawn Weller
Warnings: drug use, organised crime, dubcon
Jesus Christ. Jamie Lynn Miller use your warnings. There are mixed levels of consent for drug use and sexual contact. These are heavy drugs cocaine and heroin.
While I quite liked this, it is not for everyone. This is extremely heavy going at points. It has drug use and addiction (cocaine and heroin), something akin to prostitution, murder and explicit sex. I like the characters, Connor is a wonderful boyfriend he's fierce and unrepentant in his want to keep Shawn as safe as possible given the circumstances. Shawn is stronger than he knows, courageous and willing to do what needs to done, even if that means putting his body and sanity on the line. And fighting to do what is right. Their dynamic is very human. It changes with the plot, they have disagreements, moments of softness, anxiety and joy. Connor and Shawn are written in such a way that they know exactly what the other needs, the first smexy scene with them is surprising at first given the plot but a brilliant choice in terms of characterisation. It is essentially Connor showing/teaching Shawn exactly what he is about to walk into with the antagonist of the book, Chan. Jae Chan is a very good choice for a novella like this, he has no redeeming features. Pure, cold evil. Do I wish he had another dimension? Yeah. But with the word limitations in play, I would definitely rather those words used for the ending we got, than extra characterisation for Chan. The plot has some degree of predictability but the style in which it is written is likable enough. That said prepare for a massive aside about one of my fave hangups.
I need to make a note on the use of language and vernacular in Broken Soldier (and the Shadow Unit more widely). Despite Connor being British and Shawn, American Jamie Lynn Miller chooses to use the same American linguistics for them both. So Connor is using Americanisms and American English (o, z). Quite frankly it is a minor thing but I have been truly ruined on this by Enemies Like You by Annika Martin and Joanna Chambers. Their protagonists Kit and Will are British and American respectively, Martin and Chambers use the correct spellings and slang. So British Kit's are written in British English (ou, s). while American Will's chapters are written in American English (o, z). This minor detail makes such a big difference to characterisation. I'm not going to lie and say it would be easy for a single author to write a half-American English, half-British English novella but the results are memorable and well worth it, in my opinion at least. Kit is one of my fave characters, my love of him has never deteriorated and honestly, it is partially this linguistic detail that makes Enemies Like You so memorable. Honestly, if you like Jamie Lynn Miller you will probably like that too, and it is a helluva lot less rough than this.
The armory loomed along the far wall with racks of rifles and handguns and boxes of grenades – both smoke and explosive – and an entire crate of ammunition. Shadow Unit, like a Boy Scout troop on steroids, always arrived prepared. — Connor Finley
A representative gif:
Sergeant Connor Finley and Sergeant Shawn Weller are dedicated soldiers working covert ops for Shadow Unit - a joint UK/US anti-terrorism task force.
Partners in the field and out, they had been through hell together for the last four years and made it through standing side by side. But when their latest undercover op to bring down an arms dealer plunges them into a world of drugs, sex and violence, Shawn must literally get in bed with the enemy in order to complete the mission. And Connor is forced to watch, helpless, as his partner is broken into pieces.
Will love be enough to put them both back together or will this be their final mission?
WARNING: Contains scenes of drug use, graphic sex and realistic situations
