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Hard Candy
Miel Conde doesn’t exist.
There’s no record of her birth, life, or crimes. The only evidence she’s left behind is carved into my flesh.
Armed with a name, a blurry photo, and a gnawing need for revenge, I’ve spent the past year searching for a ghost. A ghost that haunts both my dreams and my nightmares. A ghost that was just caught on security cameras in Miami.
Miel Conde tortured me and left me for dead. When I punish her, I won’t be taking any chances.
This time, only one of us is walking away alive.
There’s no record of her birth, life, or crimes. The only evidence she’s left behind is carved into my flesh.
Armed with a name, a blurry photo, and a gnawing need for revenge, I’ve spent the past year searching for a ghost. A ghost that haunts both my dreams and my nightmares. A ghost that was just caught on security cameras in Miami.
Miel Conde tortured me and left me for dead. When I punish her, I won’t be taking any chances.
This time, only one of us is walking away alive.
- GenresDark
300 pages, ebook
Published January 1, 2021
1 person is currently reading
25 people want to read
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
June 25, 2021
Hard Candy is an edgier, darker followup to the Caged Trilogy that can definitely be read as a stand-alone.
Francesca Baez has created a fascinating character in Miel Conde. Introduced as Javier Vega’s bitchy and dangerous right hand woman in the earlier books, we learn so much more about her substance in this one. We re-live her past as human-trafficking slave, we come to better understand what Javier and Selina meant to her as her first and only friends, and we get to see how she has tried to re-invent herself in the Miami underworld.
Her greatest trouble lies in ex-cop Reggie Andrews, a loose thread from Atlanta. He has been hunting her for retribution and has finally found her. To him, Miel is a monster to be punished and eliminated. To Miel, Reggie understands nothing about the inequities of the so-called justice system and the underworld needs her own version of a female Punisher.
Reggie’s plans include a kidnapping, payback for his own torture, and a death. Sex was not part of the plan. But somehow Reggie and Miel are both drawn to the darkness they sense in the other. This will be eye-opening for both of them.
I really enjoy this author’s writing style. However, this one did not resonate as well with me as some of her previous works. It’s a lot darker than I would usually choose for myself. The hero (anti-hero? villain?) was at times misguided, ambivalent, or hypocritical and failed to secure my reader allegiance. This is all fantasy - in real life there is no way I should be cheering for a murdering vigilante, so maybe this will work better for others.
I’m giving it 3.5 stars. ⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
(Beta read. Reviewed purchased final version.)
Francesca Baez has created a fascinating character in Miel Conde. Introduced as Javier Vega’s bitchy and dangerous right hand woman in the earlier books, we learn so much more about her substance in this one. We re-live her past as human-trafficking slave, we come to better understand what Javier and Selina meant to her as her first and only friends, and we get to see how she has tried to re-invent herself in the Miami underworld.
Her greatest trouble lies in ex-cop Reggie Andrews, a loose thread from Atlanta. He has been hunting her for retribution and has finally found her. To him, Miel is a monster to be punished and eliminated. To Miel, Reggie understands nothing about the inequities of the so-called justice system and the underworld needs her own version of a female Punisher.
Reggie’s plans include a kidnapping, payback for his own torture, and a death. Sex was not part of the plan. But somehow Reggie and Miel are both drawn to the darkness they sense in the other. This will be eye-opening for both of them.
I really enjoy this author’s writing style. However, this one did not resonate as well with me as some of her previous works. It’s a lot darker than I would usually choose for myself. The hero (anti-hero? villain?) was at times misguided, ambivalent, or hypocritical and failed to secure my reader allegiance. This is all fantasy - in real life there is no way I should be cheering for a murdering vigilante, so maybe this will work better for others.
I’m giving it 3.5 stars. ⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
(Beta read. Reviewed purchased final version.)
Displaying 1 of 1 review