Killing Sarai MP3 CD – Unabridged, May 20, 2014

I think the cover looks stunning and haunting. Killing Sarai was definitely a suspense. My nerves were on edge through parts of the novel. I was a little worried going into the book because the title is Killing Sarai. I was worried for Sarai's safety and well being throughout the novel. Sarai is pronounced like "su" in summer and "rai" is pronounced like "rye". The novel was around four hundred pages but it didn't seem like it. It was a real page turner. The story is different from a lot of other new adult books. I would probably give the book 4.5 stars but there is no half star option.In the story, it was mentioned that Sarai lived in Tucson, Arizona and was forced to move to Mexico with her mother when she was fourteen years old. Sarai's mother was a drug addict and she got mixed up with a Mexican drug Lord named Javier. He dealt with drugs, human trafficking, and violence in general. Javier was with Sarai's mother but he always had his perverted eyes on Sarai. Basically, Sarai was forced to become his sex slave. He had a sister name Izel who always tormented Sarai. Javier considered Sarai special from the other girls he enslaved because she was not bought or sold. He would not let any of his other men have her. Javier had a twisted fixation on Sarai.Sarai says, "I was brought here a long time ago... by my mother. Javier saw something in me he didn't see in the other girls. I call it a sickening obsession, he calls it love." ~ J.A. Redmerski, Killing SaraiSarai's was held captive at Javier's compound for nine years. She lived in a tiny room there with no locks. Javier wasn't too concerned with people escaping because he knew that they would not get far. Sarai never really tried to escape before because she was held in a foreign country. She didn't know exactly where she lived in Mexico or how far it was to the boarder. Plus, the streets were dangerous. All Sarai wanted was freedom and to live a normal life. Finally, Sarai sees an opportunity to escape when an American man comes to the compound to speak with Javier. Sarai is faced with the choice of staying at the compound for the rest of her life or escaping and getting a small taste of freedom with a strong likelihood of death.It turns out that Victor, the American who came to see Javier, was a cold blooded assassin. Victor had been an assassin for so long that he learned to shut off his emotions. He never completely trusted anyone not even his half brother Niklas. Victor and Niklas belonged to an organization called the Order. The Order trained assassins and gave the assassins their missions. Victor was recruited by the Order when he was nine years old. Victor is one of the top assassins. Sometimes it's difficult to get a read on Victor even when inside his head. Sarai ends up escaping the compound and sneaks into the back of Victor's car to hide. At first he just wants to kick her out of the car. Then, he believes that she could be of use to him. Eventually, he starts to develop some empathy for her situation. At times he was a little scary and unpredictable. The story was told in dual pov's of Sarai and Victor. Victor did have some emotion buried deep.Victor says, "I thought perhaps I'd get to stay in one place for at least a year this time, but such is the life I lead, a dark and lonely path lined only with the solitude of death." ~ J.A. Redmerski, Killing SaraiSarai and Victor haven't had the easiest lives. Strangely, Sarai trusts Victor even though he is a cold blooded killer.Victor says, "She gets up from the bed and my head falls to the side to see her as she approaches. Not knowing what to do, unable to read her because I'm confused by her actions, I don't speak. She lies down beside me. Her knees are drawn up and pressed together, her hands hidden between them, and she looks at me."Victor, "You should get back into your own bed, I say."Sarai says, "I just want to sleep here. It's not what you think. I'm just afraid." ~ J.A. Redmerski, Killing SaraiThere wasn't a lot of romance in the story. I think given the type of story it made sense that there wasn't a lot of romance. Basically, Sarai was a sex slave to Javier for years. Victor didn't form attachments because it was a liability. The romance was more subtle and slow building which suited the story. There weren't any declarations of love or anything like that. Words didn't always need to be spoken the feelings were their between them. Some of their actions showed that they cared. Sometimes simple gestures hold more meaning than grand declarations. There dynamic wasn't easily defined. Victor wanted Sarai to have a chance at a normal life. Sarai always longed for a normal life. I don't think a normal life could even exist for her after everything that happened to her.There were some nice scenes between Victor and Sarai. There was a lovely scene where Sarai played Moonlight Sonata on the piano. I think that scene shows something simple having a lot of meaning.Victor says, "I stand silent and still at the arched entryway leading into the piano room. And I watch her unlike I've ever watched her before. She owns me in this moment." ~ J.A. Redmerski, Killing SaraiLittle bit of a spoiler. ***Spoiler***There is this part of the story where they go on a mission to L.A. to kill a man. It had my stomach in knots. I didn't like that whole mission in L.A. Victor tells Sarai that if she is a part of the mission she might have to seduce some guy and if worst comes to worst even sleep with the target. I was thinking WTF?!! The thought of that made my skin crawl. She was raped for years by Javier and then might have had to whore herself out on some mission. Thankfully she didn't have to go to that extreme. I didn't like that part at all. I hope Sarai doesn't have to seduce guys in the sequel. It had me so nervous.***End of Spoiler***I'd like to know what Victor's exact age is because his actual age was never given in the story. Sarai was twenty-three. Sarai thought that Victor looked to be in his mid thirties to late thirties. I didn't expect Victor to be so much older than Sarai.There is a little bit of a cliffhanger at the end of the book. It's more of a lead into the next book. There is going to be a sequel. I hope the sequel doesn't take too long to be released.There is an excerpt of Chapter one of Edge of Always at the end of the book.

I reviewed this book at MustReadBooksOrDie with my amazing friend Shelley. We like to talk to each other :D.Shel: Are you ready for a book hangover? If you aren't, then prepare yourself...because this one is gonna suck you in and when you are finished you're gonna be begging for more. Don't believe me? Go check my tweets to J. A. Redmerski and you'll see me doing exactly that--begging for more.Court: It's true...she was a little bit out of control! (P.S. You know that shit is going to end up in a TTT...too good to pass up, so stay tuned!) I am not sure that I was ready for the book hangover, or was in denial, because I made the mistake of starting this book on a lunch break at work! Uh..hello! The worst decision ever! I had to stop! Which means it was hours before I got to delve back into this world of secrets and death and contract killing...and I could not wait!Shel: I'm not gonna lie--I wasn't sure if this was the book for me. But, I'd just finished reading The Edge of Never, and thought....let me just check out the first few chapters of Redmerski's latest release. After two pages I was hooked. I immediately texted Courtney and told her to get it--that we absolutely had to read it and review it.Court: And I did exactly that! I don't even think I fully read the blurb! Or if I read it at all....but I knew at 3% that I was going to love it, and that is the best feeling ever! I want to go into great detail about the story and all of the players and what is means, but words are hard to put down when it could be either a) a spoiler or b) the longest review in the history of the world, likely with spoilers. (And we hate spoilers without a spoiler alert...had a bad experience with that recently! Still pissed off!)Shel: The evening I started reading it I made the crucial mistake of starting it after midnight. Dumb, dumb, dumb move. I "just one MORE chapter"-ed myself into oblivion and the ONLY reason I forced myself to sleep was because I had to be up early to take the youngest to camp. I sorry, love....I so would've been there if I wasn't ADD and had to finish something else! :(Court: So, what makes it so great? Well initially it's the curiosity--who is the American and who is Sarai? Then, it's will he help her or kill her? I was also fascinated with their maneuvering in an underworld of 'hits' and 'missions' and drug lords, sex traffickers, and murders and I was honestly intrigued at how Victor (the American) and Sarai were going to avoid being part of the body count by the end of the story.J.A. Redmerski clarified for us on twitter that the pronunciation of Sarai is Sa - su like Summer & Rai - rye.Court: So, I felt it was necessary to clarify this, because there is nothing worse than having a name embedded into your brain only to find out that you've been saying it wrong for years. So, maybe I did this for a while with Hermione from HP...but that's neither here nor there. I heart J.A. for being so kind as to clarify this for us!! This world is full of all of that stuff Shel mentioned, but the most prominent feature is intrigue. I overuse that word more than any other probably, but that is usually a good thing. I wanted to know more, and we were hand fed a morsel of information at a time so it was a fast paced thrill ride!Shel: Half way through it I realized that I was slowing down my reading pace because I didn't want it to end. My fascination with the criminal underworld aspect was still there but I was also completely enthralled with the how in the heck this was going to turn into a love story without it feeling weird. I was skeptical but I'll tell you what--I bought it. By the end I was trying to plot ways to get Victor and Saria together in a way that left them unharmed, alive, and with something to live for. I'm still plotting that in my mind as I type this.Court: Man, oh man. Who'd have thought it would be the sexiest sex scene ever, without any actual sex when a girl is sitting on top of a guy begging him to be with her or kill her and he holds her hair with a gun to her head....sa-woon...sick and twisted, sure, but I loved it. I was glad that there weren't ever any declarations of love, but I loved their interactions and the journey to each of them finding a little bit of humanity in all of the death and destruction that their world is made up of.Shel: I loved that by the end Sarai was kick ass--even though I hated that it meant she'd been so effed up by her early life experiences that she could be as badass as she was and not even blink. What I did not love (although secretly I do because it means there is more story left--shhh don't tell) is the MUTHA EFFING CLIFF HANGER!!! GAH. I have it on good authority that the next one is coming out before the end of the year so everyone hang in there...I seriously cannot wait and can promise you that I will be stalking the heck out of J.A. Redmerski's social media accounts until it is released.Court: I read a post from her earlier tonight that distinguishes a cliffhanger vs a continuation. To us it feels like the same thing, but I totally get what she meant, sort of! Promise, but that doesn't mean that I didn't flail a bit by the end and freak out about how much it kills me how it went, in the best way possible, and how I am dying for the next book! Our inner drama queens came out in a big way with this one again, so I am in book hangover central!!!!Go get this book and read it! NOW! haha!

Drama. Suspense. Sexo. E ação. Killing Sarai traz tudo isto envolto numa estória de amor não convencional que certamente embaralha as barreiras do certo e do errado. Ele toma vida em um mundo onde sequestro, escravidão sexual e assassinato a sangue frio perfazem o quotidiano de seus personagens. E a intensidade e a originalidade de seu enredo fará com que você torça pelo “cara-mau”. Porque aqui o nosso herói é um bad boy no sentido estrito da palavra.A narrativa conta a estória de Sarai, uma garota de vinte e três anos, que há nove é prisioneira, no México, de um traficante de mulheres chamado Javier. Sarai não chegou a ser sequestrada. Ela foi entregue a Javier pelas mãos de sua própria mãe. Sem nunca ter conhecido o pai, ou ter qualquer família próxima, ela sabia que ninguém nunca a procuraria. Por anos, Sarai acreditou que suas chances de escapar daquele lugar com vida eram praticamente nulas. Isto até ela descobrir que o mais novo visitante de Javier é um americano.Victor mata pessoas por dinheiro. Isso mesmo, ele é um assassino de aluguel que foi treinado desde a tenra idade de oito anos de idade. Apesar de Victor nunca matar inocentes, eu não posso dizer que um traço de seu carácter seja simpatia ou remorso pelo próximo. Em verdade, a primeira impressão que eu tive foi de que ele perdeu parte de sua humanidade há muito tempo.Contudo, Sarai vê em Victor a sua chance de finalmente escapar daquele inferno em que ela vive. Seu plano é se esconder no carro de Victor e esperar que ele a leve para os EUA. O problema é que Victor vê Sarai como uma ameaça. E ele não está nem um pouco interessado em ajuda-la... Pelo menos de início.Para meu grande espanto, foi impossível não me deixar cativar pelo nosso herói. Eu o achei tão intrigante! Sempre no controle, sempre um passo à frente. Inteligente, calculista, eficiente, frio, mas sempre com aquela pontada de algo mais... lá no fundo eu sabia que ele possuía um quê mais profundo, mais humano.De início, foi difícil dizer qual era a dele, o que faz sentido, já que eu acredito que até mesmo Victor estava confuso quanto aos seus próprios sentimentos. Ele encontrava-se constantemente dividido entre fazer aquilo que ele havia sido treinado para fazer a vida inteira, e que fazia sentido dado o mundo em que ele foi criando, e o que a sua consciência estava lhe dizendo. E algo em Sarai aos poucos foi abrindo seus olhos...Victor não deveria se importar com Sarai.Ele certamente não podia se apaixonar por ela.Mas, talvez essa seja e primeira coisa da qual a sua tão controlada pessoa não pudesse controlar...Eu não consigo nem descrever o quão surpreendente e imprevisível esta estória foi. Foi praticamente impossível colocá-la de lado. E eu só o fiz porque estava lendo durante as férias com duas crianças pequenas demandando atenção 24 horas do dia.O livro se desenrola numa séria de terríveis acontecimentos que são engenhosamente desenvolvidos. As cenas são um tanto gráficas, mas em hora nenhuma eu me senti chocada. Esta não é uma estória de amor propriamente dita, mas ela é lindamente executada.Killing Sarai é eletrizante, intrigante, sombrio e completamente viciante. O final não é exatamente um Chiffhanger, mas ele definitivamente me deixou ansiando pelo segundo livro.

I have had this on my "currently reading list" for ages. I read the sample and thought it was readable and then never read any more.Finished in this evening and I liked it well enough.Sarai's introduced as an abductee trying to escape after nine years of "incaceration" at the hands of kidnappers. Victor "saves" her by default practically.Both of the characters are mostly emotionless and "removed". It is hard to feel connected to either of them which seemed to fit with who they really were in the story. Both of them are messed up human beings. So that worked fine for me.The relationship between the two was equally as cold and emotionless. I never really felt the connection between them but again, they were messed up. I don't know that either of them benefited from the relationship they had or if their lives would ever be any better because they had each other. That left me feeling a little cold.I would have liked there to be more redemption for Victor and Sarai but all I really got was a "such is life".

A história me prendeu desde o início, muito boa! Sarai e Victor são simplesmente maravilhosos juntos. Se eu pudesse daria 1000 estrelas!!!!

Oh, I love the mystery, intrigue, action, drama and passion of this story. There are many layers to the characters in this story that I feel I have only just started discovering who they are.The plot twists and turns, enticing me ever further into this world.This is not a light, fluffy romance - so be warned. However, this is a really good piece of storytelling.4.5 stars from me.

For Christmas I got a Kindle and a puppy. This book was my first purchase. I started reading it and was hooked. I just wanted to sneak away from everyone (including my adorable pooch) and keep turning the pages as it was so engrossing. As soon as I had finished the book I bought the next one in the series. Going to have to play hide and seek with the family again.......