Review: Stealing Innocents

dark erotica lovers who thrive in sadistic lechery and revel in the carnal destruction of purity @riptidebooks @lisahenryonline 
Stealing Innocents by Cari Waites
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Stealing innocents completely catches the essence of these four stories. There are no happy endings in this book and innocence is cruelly ripped away from each of the characters. Warning, this book is not for romance lovers. Readers who must have a happily ever after should keep moving along. This book is not for you. Those who enjoy twisted, depraved violations, this book is for you. If I did not know better, I would say Ms. Waites' family tree contains Chinese ancestry. Because we do not write happily ever afters and someone always dies horribly. That someone is not the villain either.

The first in this collection is Gamble Everything. This is a BDSM fantasy with non-con sexual slavery involving age-play, piercing, sounding, fisting and a couple of other darker fetishes. The age-play involves regression to a young adolescent, but the way it is presented with calling Archer "Daddy" does dance the fine line of creepy. For the experienced jaded dark reader, these acts are guiltily arousing. The humiliation, degradation and violent violation are all delicious. When a reader thinks it cannot get worse for Danny, Ms. Waites shows why Archer purchased the tasty boy pussy. It is devastating.

The second in this collection with Crazy gives the readers a bit of break. Ms. Waite lightens up the raping as she increases the mind-fuck. I have always thought asylums are run by the insane and this story plays into this fear. Drew is a depressed young man who misses his big brother killed in the Afgan war. Committed to a mental institution to "help" him, instead he is nightly sexually abused by the man supposed to help him. This story is like a bad trip with nightmares and desperation. It ends too quickly, leaving a reader to only speculate that worse degradations are to come.

The third one is dishearteningly sad. There are no winners as David's new wife cheats on him. Just a year into their marriage and their honeymoon is over. Now, this is speculation on David's side but I tend to believe him. David's plan to defile his twink sixteen year old stepson is divine. This revenge plot works well for me even if there is an innocent collateral damage. Then again, will David's wife even care? Doubtful. She sends her son off to boarding school so it isn't as if she knows her son. The seduction in this is slow. The molestation is sweet. The twist and turns as David is yet again betrayed pains me. I realize David is the aggressor here. I just wished he won in the end.

The last one is the sickest and most degenerate one. Falling Angels breaks my heart even as I am slick with arousal. There is nothing safe, sane or consensual about this human trafficking tale. This is Ms. Waites at her darkest as her villains perpetrate heinous acts of body modification as well as sensory deprivation. The decent into hell for Arkady is paved with pain, torture, mutilation and non-stop fear. This is last story may squick out many readers. For me, it is a study in human behaviour. When humans become a commodity, they turn into objects which somehow removes the moral compass for the aggressor. Grace is a disgusting sadist who deserves to die painfully. The descriptions in here are graphic to some degree. It is more the beginning and the end which is exposed whilst the middle action fades to black. This is to protect the readers from the sadistic sensory overload. What breaks my heart is Troy's burn out as a detective working human trafficking cases. He becomes so jaded that the unspeakable acts cause him to be aroused. This causes a schism in his mind and it breaks him. The ending can be encapsulated with one word - despair.

In each of the stories, the writing is tight and imagery powerful. The writing voice is smooth and seductive, just like Lucifer whispering "sign on the line and sell me your soul". Ms. Waites is a magical storyteller who brings nightmares to life. This collection consisting of four tales is a bad omen for the characters. For in Chinese culture, the number four is also linked with death. This book is highly recommended to dark erotica lovers who thrive in sadistic lechery and revel in the carnal destruction of purity.

*provided by NetGalley