Destiny’s Captive by Beverly Jenkins

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Title: Destiny's Captive
Author: Beverly Jenkins
Series: Destiny #3
Published by: Avon
Release Date: September 30, 2014
Format: ebook
Pages: 273
Genres: Historical Romance
Potential Triggers: View Spoiler »rape flashbacks « Hide Spoiler
Source: Overdrive
Reading Challenges: Lenoreo's 2022 Backlist Reader Challenge, Lenoreo's 2022 Diversity Reading Challenge, Lenoreo's Can You Read a Series March 2022
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My rating:

Blurb:

Noah Yates fully believes in the joys of a happy family and a good wife. But that's not the life for him. No, he would much rather sail the wild seas in search of adventure, not tied down. But then the unthinkable happens . . . he finds himself literally tied down. To a bed. By a woman.

And Pilar isn't just an ordinary woman. She's descended from pirates. And after giving him one of the worst nights of his life, she steals his ship! Now Noah is on the hunt, and he'll stop at nothing to find this extraordinary woman . . . and make her his.

My Review:

4 stars — I wasn’t sure how this book was going to play out, but I found 90% of it to be absolutely delightful, and I loved it!  I’ll get to the other 10% later.

I loved learning about yet more pieces of world history that I knew nothing about — in this case the Cuban rebellion.  I was also fascinated (in a horrified way) to see the introduction of segregation following the abolishment of slavery, especially because we got to see it from our characters’ perspective.  It must have been absolutely crazy to be used to one way of life and doing business, and then have things change out from underneath you.  I didn’t realize until recently how up and down things were for black people back then, and this story gave us characters to illustrate it from an everyday perspective.

Pilar was completely not what I was expecting from a heroine, but I did love her.  She was a product of her upbringing, and she was involved in so many crazy things that were just normal for her.  It was interesting to watch her get introduced to American ways, it must have been a culture shock.  I loved that she was feisty and sassy, but that she didn’t hold people at arm’s length (at least not for long).  It was refreshing to not see her fight her attraction to Noah for too long, it gave us lots of wonderful romance and chemistry moments in this book.  I appreciated the mix of her level of independence with her naiveté.  She was fierce, but also loving.  And she didn’t tolerate bullshit.

Noah was intriguing in his own right.  Honestly, there was really only one part of his story that I feel like didn’t get its due, and felt like it wasn’t necessary, otherwise I loved his story.  His past affected him tremendously, and it was hard to watch him struggle with his demons.  I think the demons from being shanghaied and forced into a prison camp were enough for him to be traumatized.  I hurt for how he was just floating through life and existing.  It was wonderful to see him blossom around Pilar.  We got to see what a playful and charming guy he could be again.

I loved the two of them together.  I didn’t feel like they were fighting falling in love, but just because the circumstances of their courtship were a little different, they weren’t sure about their feelings.  Also, b/c neither of them had felt anything remotely like that, and neither were looking for love.  I guess that made it satisfying in that way.  They were as surprised as we were as readers, and their chemistry was fire.

My rating would’ve been even higher if not for the ending with Noah.  I thought the one level of suspense was enough, and because everything was sorted out really easily and quickly, I felt like Noah didn’t need that extra strife to his character.  I get that in that day and age, what else was going to happen right?  But still.  It felt cheap and rushed and unrealistic from a modern day perspective.  Especially given he didn’t actually talk to anyone or confide in anyone.

Truly, minus that one little piece, this might have been my favourite of the series.  It’s hard to say, I really enjoyed Logan and Mariah too.  I loved that we got so many wonderful secondary characters in this series as well.  We didn’t just fall in love with our MCs, but the whole Yates family.