Review: Flawed Heart (House of Obsidian, #1) by Bella Jewel

Flawed Heart by Bella Jewel
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Book Description:

Max & Belle's story

 
This isn't the man I married.
The man I married was strong, beautiful and pure.
The man I married cherished our lives together.
The man I married loved me.


This...This isn't that man.

One night. One accident. It changes everything.

I wish I could tell you the exact moment he fell out of love with me. I wish I could tell you there was hope. That I hung on. That I fought. I wish I could tell you that we fixed it. That happily every after was just out of our grips.

It wasn't. I ran, in the dead of the night, I packed my things and I left him.

Now I'm back. He's still the same man. A deadly underground fighter for the House of Obsidian. He's still dangerous. He's still broken. I still love him.

This is the part where I'm supposed to turn around and run... But I don't.

                                                               "Max?"
                                       "Yeah, baby?"
                              "Can I keep you forever?"

I read book two, Flawed Love, before reading this story. I wasn't a giant fan of the second book however, I felt Flawed Heart was a lot better.

Belle comes back to town, with her daughter in tow, to care for her sick mom. She doesn't want to see her estranged husband, and the plan was working until he shows up at her mom's house. Now Belle has to decided what to do about their daughter, when it comes to Max. She's got enough on her plate between a terminally ill mom, work, and a four year old - who wants to add on the ARSE of a husband? Not Belle.

Max pushed his wife away and now has to live with the consequences. So what does he do? Screws every woman in town, fights everyone at his underground fight ring, drinks himself stupid and dabbles in other things. Now his estranged wife is back and he wants her back but he sure blames her for not being there for him, and when he finds out he has a daughter? Well, he becomes even more of a bigger jerk.

Can these two come together, fix their family, right their wrongs, and find their happily ever after? They just might be able to, if they could stop the blame game, anger, and pigheadedness for five minutes to see straight.

Flawed Heart had me in the feelings and emotions department. I felt the: ANGER, anguish, hurt, pain, blame, and love between Belle and Max. It felt genuine.

I enjoyed the Then & NOW parts together. I'm really not sure why so many people felt like this book was confusing, everything read pretty straight forward to me.

I wasn't a fan of Pippa in book two, but I did like her in this story. I really loved RAIDE and can't wait to see what happens with him and his lovely Bounty Hunter.

I also wasn't a fan of Max in the NOW chapters and towards the end of the THEN chapters. He was a rude, crude, arse of a man. Though, he was so much better of guy when he was with Belle in the early years. I also didn't like the junk he pulls to push his wife away. If I had to live with that, I would have taken a break from him too... until he cleaned up his act.

I will say that Belle taking the blame on herself for so long did piss my right the heck off. Max took too long to shoulder the blame- which is the reason for their down fall, at least 75%. But honestly, I could see why Belle took the route she did. I also wonder if Max hadn't been put on the spot with Immy, would he have gone the route he did in the end with his family? Hmmmmmm ...

Anyway, I felt like this story was written well and better developed than book two in this series. I look forward to seeing what comes next.