Title: Savage
Author: Anna Ray
Publication date: July 7th, 2021

Summary: He scares the living daylights out of me. But not for the reasons he might think. And that scares me even more. Hazel He’s magnetic. Tall and commanding. Heartbreakingly gorgeous.
Borne of ice. Ruthless. Dangerous. And his dark, mesmerizing gaze is locked onto me. This man is fantasy in the flesh. Callum O’Daire.
Darling of Boston’s moneyed society and king of the underworld. And I’m here to ask a favor from this soulless creature. Beg, if I have to. I despise him. Body and soul. Callum Hazel Brentwood. Even from a distance, she’s striking. Stands out. Eyes like dark gold that glittered with fire and untapped passion. She needs my help.
But I hate the Brentwoods. All of them. Old money that covers sins and crimes that will never be answered to The very thing keeping Hazel so pampered and pretty. Blood money. If anyone’s going to tear her to shreds, to destroy her, it’s going to be me. My way. Sultry stares, passionate embraces, and suspense await you inside Savage.
This enemies-to-lovers mafia romance will have you flipping the pages, begging Callum or Hazel to make the first move!

Review: I really want to like this book. But it's super repetitive, on one page it will say something then repeat it on the next page like they forgot they wrote it or were trying to hit a word quota. I really don't see how this book qualifies to be in the Mafia sub-genre. The story itself is nice. The book took me a day to read, so it was nice and quick. I really like Callum, but both characters had their annoying qualities. I would have to give this book 3 stars.

Loved this enemies to lovers story with so much angst and backstory which brought out the imperfections and perfections in the characters.

Hazel Brentwood and Callum O'Daire are from two different worlds, but they both need each other. Hazel is well kept in high society. Callum is a self proclaimed "street rat" who has risen above and has become a powerful entity in Boston's high and low societies.
Hazel is adopted. After finding some leads left behind by her deceased brother (who Callum may or may not have history with), she is in need of Callum's help to identify her birth parents. Callum is also in need of information in regards to the death of his father and childhood friend. (Both of who died at the same docks that Hazel's adoptive father owned.)
Callum agrees to work with Hazel, as long as she sleeps with him. Hazel is hesitant, but their instant and unexplained attraction for each other, and her desire to find answers, keeps the story going and readers on a steamy and interesting ride.

My takeaways and thoughts:
The couple is the epitome of light vs. dark. The banter between Hazel and Callum was steamy and fun to read. Their hate/"love" relationship that they have was what kept me hooked.
This is labeled as a mafia, enemies-to-lover romance, but I do not believe that much of the mafia world was added to the story. However, it is very much an enemies-to-lover story which I am here for.
I believe that this world the other set up had a lot of potential, but it wasn't explored as thoroughly and that's what made me give 3 stars.

I have literally just finished reading this novel. Oh my goodness, it is so exhilarating and passionate. Just reading it gave me a rush. The thrill, the adrenaline and just the story in general ticks all the boxes for me. I thoroughly enjoyed the read. It more the exceeded my expectations. It was that good that I almost didn't get to go and do my shopping because I was so entranced and glued to this book out of sheer fascination and intrigue. I would highly recommend this book. Well done on a great book.

*read as an ARC via. Netgalley*

All in all, I would say that this book reads like a first draft. It's as if the process of rereading and editing was skipped entirely.

I think this book had potential. I like the writing style and the characters for the most part. Unfortunately, it seemed very underdeveloped. The plot was predictable and it seemed very disorganized and strangely paced. Certain things were either explained too much or not enough at all. Callum is described as the lord of the underworld, implying he's some mafia king, but that isn't shown at all aside from the reactions he gets from other characters and I'm still unsure what he does for a living even after finishing the book. The characters were given back stories but they weren't given depth. The romance was also paced inconsistently. They moved very fast in the beginning but then remained stagnant until the last few pages of the book. It was stated that they came to love each other, but nothing about their actions towards each other really changed at all from the first chapter. This book had a lot of "say it don't show it" which is something I don't like in books at all because, in my opinion, it's lazy writing.

If this book had gone through more edits to develop the story more, I probably would have liked it a lot.