TORTURE TO HER SOUL (Monster In His Eyes #2) by J M DARHOWER

‘I’m going to tell you a secret.
A Secret I’ve never told anybody.
I, Ignazio Vitale, have always been afraid of the dark.
If you tell anyone that, I’ll kill you.’

Gitte: And so it began, the unravelling of Ignazio Vitale. The monster. The enigma.

‘I’m a haunted man. Darkness surrounds me. Figuratively. Literally. It’s dark. It’s that heavy sort of darkness. The kind you can feel when you breathe, the denseness filling your lungs and slowly suffocating you.’

I started falling in love with him in Monster in His Eyes but by the end of Torture to Her Soul he owned my heart. The last third of the book I cried, raged and swooned feeling every word that belonged to this man.

‘The world made me who I am, and the world pays for that mistake every day.’

I truly mean it so I’ll say it. Naz was and still is brilliantly haunting as well as a haunted character. Perfect in his imperfection; beautiful in his ugliness. He has a heart; it brokenly beats despite the man himself being reluctant to heal in the world of distrust, violence, lies and secrets.

“You make something beautiful enough and people forget just how much it can hurt you.”

Now, I have to admit, I found the beginning quite slow and I began to worry as I neared the halfway point. Why? One reason; Karissa. I’m not entirely sure why, but her behaviour and reactions annoyed me as the story progressed. I wanted to slap some sense into her for a variety of reasons. Then….suddenly the story grabbed me by my throat, pun intended, and I inhaled the latter part as it got oh so good and if you’re wondering, Karissa did redeem herself in my eyes. I guess at times I felt overly protective of Naz and thought this man, despite the world he lives in, truly loves in his very own way.

“You can’t smile and act like you love me one second then destroy my world the very next. You can’t do that and expect me to still trust you.”

I was hooked again and reminded why I love everything about this couple and their emotionally raw, violent and highly passionate story. Did you feel satisfied by the end, Jenny?

Jenny:   After a bit of a shaky start I did feel completely satisfied by the end of Naz and Karissa’s gritty and raw journey. I have to agree with you regarding Karissa, Gitte. For some reason Karissa grated on me for part of Torture To Her Soul and I now know why. Despite being a ‘bad‘ man, my heart truly belonged to Naz. I felt every emotion that poured out of him and yes, I felt a little protective of him too. As this was told through Naz’s eyes, every shun, every word spoke in anger, every sideways glance made upon him by Karissa was like a dagger to my heart. Oh I know I should have been as angry with Naz as Karissa was, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Every passionate proclamation of Naz’s love for this woman seared me.  I will say that like you Gitte, Karissa did eventually redeem herself to me.

‘I’ll give her anything. I’ll tear my fucking chest open with my bare hands, rip out my heart and hand it to her, if that’s what she needs. All she has to do it tell me.
All she has to do is ask.’

Naz was such a complex and fascinating character whose inner turmoil and quest for justice/revenge had me warring with myself over his actions, yet I never faltered in my feelings towards him. I felt everything. His emptiness, his loss and the choices he made out of loyalty and duty. He’d certainly become clouded by the demons from his past and once the story gained pace it had me in its clutches and never let me go.

‘I’ve lived a life of darkness already, years where the sun didn’t shine on me, and now that I’ve seen daylight again, I don’t think I could ever turn my back on it.’

Naz’s passion, the desperation of the love he feels for Karissa, a woman who overwhelms him, who affects him with every touch, every look was palpable and moving.

‘She’d be happy living in the clouds, but I grabbed her by the feet and dragged her back down to the ground.’

The suspense towards the end of the book had me gripping my Kindle. I want to say bravo for the ending because I had questions and thankfully they were all laid to rest by the final scenes at the end of the book which was brilliantly done.

‘Besides,  isn’t there a monster in everybody?’

A fantastic series that will be up there as one of our favorites this year.

**Reviewed off an ARC copy provided by the author with thanks**

NB: Torture to Her Soul is a continuation of Monster In His Eyes and told through Naz’s POV. This is not a retelling of Monster in a different pov and as such you must read Monster In His Eyes first.