Barbarian's Concubine by Lisa Cach

Some romance is trashy and that should be okay. I hate the idea that books aren't allowed to be cheesy and camp, that everything has to be high art. BARBARIAN'S CONCUBINE brands itself as Fifty Shades of Grey meets Game of Thrones; it knows what it is and what it's doing, and it does that well: geopolitics and slightly uncomfortable sex scenes that somehow manage to be both hot and cringe.

My favorite thing about this book is the character development of Nimia. She was very naive in the first book (and very much a victim of grooming, which made this worse). In BARBARIAN'S, she figures out that she has a right to be angry with the man who tricked her into thinking he would be her benevolent initiator; that actually, he was a prisoner and a creep. Unfortunately, escape leads her into the hands of an equally ambitious and depraved man who plans to use her for revolution. Also there's some light magic and some rather hilarious, almost culty shenanigans, and ofc, lots of Roman debauchery.

I'm kind of surprised that this book doesn't have more ratings but I think historical romance/erotica tends to be niche, and this is smut-with-plot in the vein of those old Ellora's Cave novellas, where even though a significant amount of focus is on sexual situations, there's also a lot of story, too. The slavery component, SA, and (I feel) deliberately unsexy sex scenes will be deal-breakers for some. The heroine is also hypersexual, and since I'm not, I won't comment on the accuracy of this rep. I think it does feel sensationalized at times, though.

Overall, this has a fun, pulpy vibe to it that makes it curiously addictive. I read both books in just over two days and I'm in a little bit of a reading slump right now. Definitely a 70s bodice-ripper throwback.

3.5 out of 5 stars