Crimson Ocean

First off, I love books with interspecies relationship, male pregnancy, and tentacles (when used correctly, which you could argue this book had none of, as it was the Aliens tongue). So I saw the setup for this and I was like Yes!... but it did not take long for that to change to .. O Noes!

As a women, I find this book extremely demeaning and insulting regarding how the species on that planet view the role of a breeder..

Spoilers ahead!

and the fact that the Male Lead eventually gave in, just showed how weak willed he was, and even though the Alien (I am just going to call him that, even though technically the Human was the alien on his planet) basically manipulated him, drugged him, continuedly raped him, and never saw him as anything other then a vessel for asexual reproduction, he still accepted that life with open arms in the end. Basically lost his sanity in my opinion. This was 100% confirmed by the ending in which he betrayed his friend by doing the same thing the company did to him, committed them to being repeatedly raped, with no proof they would come away "appreciating" the experience the same way he did. Which was F'ed UP. And just shows just how far the male lead was out of his mind.

I really wonder what the author of this books goal was with this story. Did they believe they were creating a happy book about 2 people getting past their culture difference to have a happy life together... or did they write it knowing it was a twisted story with an even more twisted ending. Or are they just diluted.

Basically... I wish I had never read this. It only left me with a feeling of disgust.

Breakdown

Art: The art was good (wasted on this book)

Story/Creativity: The setup was good.. then ruined.

Characters: Super flat characters, and the male lead was just sad and unlikeable

Character Development: ... does degrading count?

Smut: Okay smut if you like rape, rape and more rape. I honestly do not see any of their sex as non-rape. Even when it was "consensual" it was lased with manipulation and being drugged (manipulating his state of mind). The smut was only okay because scenes where a bit uncreative for me. They mainly focused on the use of big dicks to spice up the scenes... over and over and over again. Then never really ventured off that path.

Ending: Shit!

4 chapters in and all we get ro see is Jake getting raped. That's it. There's no story. The characters can't seem to communicate and Jake is...just literally laying there, taking it.

He doesn't check out the cave he's in. He doesn't seem to attempt more ways to communicate when talking obviously isn't working. Like, he's just a really, really boring character to follow.

A truly unique but still beautiful story. Well, it says rape, but it's definitely not rape, Jake just doesn't know it yet.
What particularly fascinated me were the poor ones. I had already assumed it was another tentacle thing because then I would have dropped it.
It's just a shame that it ended so quickly when they were just getting more involved with each other. I would also have liked to see the egg hatching 😌or the 5 new guests... smirk 😏

And I LOVE the art. 🥰