Hostage to Pleasure by Nalini Singh

Title: Hostage to Pleasure
Author: Nalini Singh
Publisher: Berkley Sensation
ISBN: 978-0-425-22325-3
Pages: 330
Series: Psy-Changeling #5
Type: Adult Paranormal Romance
Source: Purchased
Goodreads

On the surface Ashaya Aleine appears to be the perfect Psy - cool, calm and emotionless. But beneath that cover lies a woman fighting to escape from the clutches of the Psy Council who are holding her son captive to force her to work on an implant that will basically enslave her entire race. Ashaya manages to free herself and her son, only to land in DarkRiver hands. Dorian Christensen may not be able to change into a leopard but he is one of the deadliest most anti-psy members of DarkRiver and when he finds Ashaya he is drawn into the biggest conflict of his life.

This is the fifth book in the Psy-Changeling series (after Slave to Sensation, Visions of Heat, Caressed by Ice and Mine to Possess). This is one of my favourite paranormal romance series, and I was really excited to read this as Ashaya was introduced in the previous book and the storyline about her son set up. Ashaya traded favours with DarkRiver in the previous book and now she has called in her favour - DarkRiver are to rescue her son from his Psy captors.

Ashaya also manages to escape and ends up in DarkRiver territory, but has not only the Psy after her but human groups as well. It took me a long time to warm to Ashaya and she's probably my least favourite heroine of the series so far. I don't dislike her, but I can't identify with her. However I loved how her relationship with Dorian developed, especially as he is so vehemently opposed to all things psy.

Unlike the previous books, this has journal and letter snippets at the start of many of the chapters. While they provide insight into Ashaya's mind I found them distracting and they interferred with the pacing of the book at times. After Ashaya's escape the revelations and development of the world occurs quickly and these snippets were a little irritating.

As usual the world is developed further, with some Psy councillors receiving a bit more backstory along with some changelings, Mercy in particular. Ashaya's actions create major ripples in the psy world so I'm interested in seeing how that plays out, as well as how the new psy and human groups are developed.

All in all, this was another great read and I can't wait to get stuck into Branded by Fire.

Plot: 10/10
Characters: 9/10
Ending: 10/10
Enjoyment: 9/10
Cover: 8/10

Overall: 46/50