Early Review: Vengeance Bound by Justine Ireland
Vengeance Bound by Justine Ireland
Cory Graff is not alone in her head. Bound to a deal of desperation made when she was a child, Cory’s mind houses the Furies—the hawk and the serpent—lingering always, waiting for her to satisfy their bloodlust. After escaping the asylum where she was trapped for years, Cory knows how to keep the Furies quiet. By day, she lives a normal life, but by night, she tracks down targets the Furies send her way. And she brings down Justice upon them.
Cory’s perfected her system of survival, but when she meets a mysterious boy named Niko at her new school, she can’t figure out how she feels about him. For the first time, the Furies are quiet in her head around a guy. But does this mean that Cory’s finally found someone who she can trust, or are there greater factors at work? As Cory’s mind becomes a battlefield, with the Furies fighting for control, Cory will have to put everything on the line to hold on to what she’s worked so hard to build.
Cory's life uses to be perfect. Until the unthinkable happens, and she made a devil's bargain with the Furies when she was a child. They live inside her head always waiting and watching for the opportunity to slip Cory's chains and wreak havoc on the male population. She made the mistake of revealing what was going on in her head, and paid for it with a several years long stint in an asylum. But she eventually escapes and tries her best to live a somewhat normal life, if you don't count her weekly quests for vengeance in order to slake the Furies hunger. It isn't much of a life, but it's the best she can manage. But all that changes when she meets Niko, and finds that the first time in her life the Furies are quiet around a male. But the peace she gains with him is only short lived, as when ever she isn't around him the Furies fight harder than ever to reclaim her for their own. It will only take one tiny slip, and they will own her for their own path of bloody vengeance forever.
I just couldn't quite connect to VENGEANCE BOUND, especially when it came to the characters. I mean I did feel for Cory, but honestly her fluctuating inner strength really started to irk me after only a short while. I mean she would be on this path to righteousness and standing firm in her determination to control the Furies to ensure that the people she killed were sent to the other side for judgement. Otherwise, when they are allowed free reign, they torture, maim, and then burn away their prey's souls. And considering how they target ALL men, it really made me sick when Cory would just cede them control simply because it was easier than fighting them. She would get sick with guilt immediately after, and stay strong for a while, but then before you knew it, she would have another terrible lapse. Perhaps if she didn't keep trying to excuse herself, I would have been a bit more understanding. In fact, she never seemed to hold to her guns on anything, and because of that I couldn't seem to grow attached to her, which made it really hard to care about what was going on.
Speaking of not connecting, I could get attached to the romance either. Considering just how much of a character and romance driven person I am, it was rather frustrating. I mean there was supposed to be this incredibly strong connection between them, to the point where neither one could fight the "pull", yet I just didn't feel it. I felt like I was being told about it rather than getting to experience it with them. I would have preferred to have been shown the romance rather than told about it so I could have felt more immersed in the story. I may be a little picky, but when there is romance in a book, I want it to be swoon worthy, and this one fell far short of that mark.
When I first read the blurb for VENGEANCE BOUND, describing it as The Goddess Test meets Dexter being a huge fan of both, I instantly added to my must read queue. There's just something to be said about mixing Greek mythology with a strong quest for justice, and it made for a really interesting premise. While there was so much to like about VENGEANCE BOUND, it never quite made the "intrigued with the premise" stage for me. Considering just how much I wanted to love this book, it was incredibly frustrating when it just didn't quite work for me. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a terrible book, but my disconnect from the characters and the romance just left me feeling rather mediocre in the end.
(Received a copy from the publisher via Edelweiss)
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