Lover Avenged by J.R. Ward
Series Name: Black Dagger Brotherhood
Volume Number: 7
Genres: Contemporary, Erotica, Fantasy, Paranormal Romance, Urban, Vampires
Intended Age Group: Adult
Publisher: Signet/Penguin Group (USA)
Edition: Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-451-22857-4
Rating: 3.5/5
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Description from the Book
Rehvenge is used to living in the shadows and dealing with the roughest nightwalkers around – including the Black Dagger Brotherhood. His fearless reputation is why he’s approached to kill the race’s king, and his bad side is dying to rise to the occasion. As his secret identity as a sympath is threatened, he turns to the only light in his ever darkening world – a female vampire untouched by corruption and the only thing standing between him and eternal destruction.
Personal & Info
At this point, all the primary Brothers have been covered. Now close friends, recruits, and/or family (if they have any) of the Brotherhood are getting some of their own books. My notes for this one were practically non-existent, and I read it last November, so I’ll do my best.
There’s a coded message in the vampire language before chapter one. In case anyone is curious and/or does not have the Insider’s Guide, which I will not be reviewing, I’ll put a direct translation here. I didn’t check for punctuation, and I’m not going to go back and see if there was any. Yes, the typo in the text below was there. I translated it as is, according to my own physical copy.
NO STRONGER ALLIES
NO GREATER FRIENDS
NO BETTER FIGHTERS
OF HONOR COULD A
KING BEHOLD THAN
THESE ASSEMLED
AFORE ME MINE
BROTHERS MINE
BLOOD NO STRONGER
ALLIES NO GREATER
FRIENDS NO BETTER
FIGHTERS OF HONOR
COULD A KING
BEHOLD THAN THESE
ASSEMBLED AFORE ME
MINE BROTHERS MINE
Content Warnings
I’m just keeping a running list of content warnings that have been in the series so far, from what I can remember. If you’re reading the series, or considering reading the series, and you have sensitivities, you might want to know these. The list so far: abuse, attempted rape, drugs, kidnapping, sexual themes, rape, and violence.
Characters
Rehvenge is not a brother, but he is the lead for this book. I’d say he experiences lots of character growth.
Ehlena is a the love interest. She’s a nurse who works at Havers’ clinic, and a member of the glymera whom has fallen on hard times.
Wrath struggles with his role as king, wishing to be out in the field with the Brothers, and life throws him a curve ball.
John Matthew’s book is next, so he’s pretty significant in this one as the final prep for that is taken care of.
Xhex is very obviously going to be John’s love interest, and as a close friend of Rehv, she plays a big role here, and we get to learn a lot more about her as a character.
Lash looks like he’s going to be the primary villain for a while, big promotion from small time bully.
Story & Thoughts
I felt like this one dragged a little in the middle, not a lot, just enough to notice.
It was interesting to see the softer side of Rehv. Before this book, he was always portrayed as an intimidating drug lord, or an overbearing and overprotective older brother.
We started to get an idea of Rehv’s life in some of the previous volumes, but we get an even deeper delve in this one. Because Rehv is half sympath, he must deal with that side of his nature. He can’t be happy with anyone the way things are either, so he must remedy his blackmail situation, and do something about the sympath colony. All while choosing a side: the king, or the council.
More drama ensues around John, Blay, and Qhuinn. Honestly, their sections are part of what I look forward to in every book. It’s unfortunate those parts are minor background plot building. I’m sure they’ll culminate into something later. I just hate the wait.
Notable Issues
I think some details are getting a little warped. Books 1-6 solidly described lessers as smelling like baby powder. This book kind of got away from that a bit, specifically in the early sections.
The mechanics on being able to sense people via feeding has been rather non-specific. I haven’t been reading these immediately consecutive, so my memory might be a little off, but I thought both people had to feed in order to be able to both sense each other. Like, in an earlier volume, Phury fed off Bella, right? And because of that, she could sense where he was. And the BDB ritual includes all the Brothers ingesting the blood of each member, so they can all sense each other.
That leads me to be confused on why it seemed, in this book, using the Phury/Bella example, it was portrayed as, hypothetically, Phury being able to sense where Bella would be. I apologize if my explanation is confusing. I’m trying to explain without using a spoiler as the example. It just seems like the mechanics have either been changed or not specifically explained. If it functions the way it seems to in this book, then it makes the ingestion in the BDB ritual seem pointless.