Review: Crave (The Fallen Angels #2) by J.R. Ward

Synopsis (via Goodreads):

Seven deadly sins. Seven souls that must be saved. One more no-holds- barred battle between a fallen angel with a hardened heart and a demon with everything to lose.

Isaac Rothe is a black ops soldier with a dark past and a grim future. The target of an assassin, he finds himself behind bars, his fate in the hands of his gorgeous public defender Grier Childe. His hot attraction to her can only lead to trouble-and that's before Jim Heron tells him his soul is in danger. Caught up in a wicked game with the demon who shadows Jim, Isaac must decide whether the soldier in him can believe that true love is the ultimate weapon against evil.

My Thoughts: For the love of things that go bump in the night!  How can one goddamn book have so much awesome stuff happen in it?  HOW?  And how can an entire cadre of characters some so ALIVE?  Dammit, J.R. Ward, you have eaten part of my brain and I'm going to need it back soon.  Please?

I am honestly amazed at how much I loved all the different characters.  Let me go through the list...

• Jim Heron - The guy is fantastic- strong in mind and body, willing to sacrifice himself for someone he doesn't give two shits about, anguished at being forced to leave an innocent behind in the hell below.  If I ever have to go battle some badass demons in Hell, I totally want him at my back.
• Isaac Rothe - *swoon*  The guy takes his boots off before going into Grier's house because he doesn't want to get her floor dirty.  You can feel the weight of his past dragging at him.  You can see how he doesn't think he's good enough for her and it's heartbreaking.  Since I'm gathering my army of defenders for my descent into Hell, I'm taking him along also.  Even if he doesn't have wings.
• Adrian Vogel - Holy crap!  I want to take him home and give him hugs until he's not the broken mess of a man that Devina left him.  The emptiness inside him was so well written and vast.  I felt it.  I could almost smell it.  That he was able to push aside that emptiness and go to Jim knowing what shape he'd be in after he'd been in Devina's clutches just made me even more firmly into his camp.  The fact that he's got all those sexy piercings aren't a turn-off either.  Because I like piercings.  And tattoos.  But that's another story.
• Eddie Blackhawk - I haven't reached total love for him yet but that's mostly because he still has so much hidden about him.  Two moments stand out of me, though- the glimpse Jim got of the scars on his back and how he's trying so hard to save Adrian from the demons gnawing bits of his soul off.  The fact that he regularly has threesomes with Adrian and the girls he seduces makes me smile.  Big time.

The entire book felt so layered and fast paced.  Everything that happens impacts something else.  Half the time you didn't see things coming until it hit you in the face and then when you went and looked back on what just happened you saw loads of setup.  It was beautiful.

I'd have to say that this book outdid book 1 by leaps and bounds.  I liked Covet, don't get me wrong, but there was so much foundation building in that book that the entire first half dragged.  This one didn't suffer from that at all.  The players were already in motion and it was just a matter of giving them things to hit and shoot and maul.

So, yeah.  I liked the book.  Just in case you couldn't tell from the extreme gushing above.

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Other reviews in this series:
Book 1: Covet

More books by J.R. Ward