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Summary:
"Confessions of a Politician (London Brown #10)
The shattered reality of the truth I sought.
I'm Caden Jacob Carrington (V) the Fifth. The truth is most men's salvation, but not for men like me. Politics is my chosen affliction. I lie for a living, or massage the truth to suit me. The one constant about truth is that it's identical to the theory of relativity: neither uniform nor absolute in the minds of men.
So why is it so important for me to uncover the truth about Desniah Williams, a.k.a. London Brown, when neither will willingly provide facts...
Confessions of a Philanthropist (London Brown #11)
The delicate balance between protection, control and depravity begins to unravel.
I'm Rhys Christos Edward Stowell, a philanthropist on the verge of exile from a suffocating state of corruption. My lack of conformity to perceived norms has earned me a reputation of being difficult. I rather like it that way.
Beguiled by a woman who uses the oldest profession to torture herself and punish those that love her, I'm ever her dutiful friend. But I want much more...
After years of being neatly boxed in the friend category, she offers me surrender. Or the semblance of it....
Confessions of a Daughter (London Brown #12)
She who dwells beneath the surface.
I'm Desniah Williams, the daughter of an influential member of the British Parliament. The devil incarnate got his hooks in me. For the attention and praise he lavished on me, I gave him every last shred of my soul. I was a cheap whore. London commands her weight in gold.
Two men one a politician on the verge of greatness and the other a philanthropist on the cusp of corruption, each own a piece of me."
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Review:
First of all, please allow me a moment of fan-girling:
I am again blown away by Leila DeSint and her intelligence, her talent and mastery of penning these completely amazing and complex characters. I don't know if I'm more impressed by the world and ambience she's created or the characters themselves. You are a goddess!
Every since February when I read her Confessions Collection Vol. 1 (
MY REVIEW) and did an interview with Rhys (
Find it HERE), one of the characters (that is my favorite blog post I ever did), I've been waiting for the next episodes. Back then she really touched me with the story. Her style is impecable; I really like how she's using a more expanded, professional and intelligent vocabulary - it gives the book a more serious feel and it does deal with serious subjects. Desniah is fighting her other-self, her other personality - London. Caden is fighting his own demons from the past that have come back to the present with a hard punch in the face. And Rhys is still the dark, complicating philantropist, his persona as mysterious and confusing as ever, but also stayed my favorite fighting spirit.
Ms. DeSint is still focused on the mind and sexuality of a person and this what I love best about her.
Caden Jacob Carrington (V) the Fifth
"For some of us, the right person only comes around once, and when you lose them, you accept that anyone else would be to pass the time."
The first episode in this novella was Caden's and it showed us more clearly the events of the past and the relationship of Caden and Desniah. In Vol. 1 I still couldn't make out his real goal - only asking for forgiveness, the desire to take back Desniah or something else. I even doubted if he really ever loved her. But he's a future politician and those people don't show emotion to the public. But now, with their life story, Caden's character got more intense. It really portrayed his mind and thoughts and sufferings from the lack of acceptance from the woman he loves and his confusion with her behavior. His only mistake was that he thought it was better to leave her.
"My touch affected her in this way. Enjoying relief with me caused her to be ill."
"Rather than come back, I let my guilt and shame convince me she needed more time. I continued to reach out to her but the silence was deafening."
Also, there were parts about his mother and her death, his father and the responsibility of his job. And then the devastating real truth. I feel like I truly met Caden just now. His character was completely on display and I have to say that I felt sadness and remorse right together with him. I felt HIM. In all my honestly, I think it's beautiful when an author creates characters in such a special way and then you spend time acquainting with them and sometimes they really take a little space in your heart. These characters do it for me.
"My entire life was a series of lies. None of it was real. No wonder Des couldn't stand for me to touch her....For the first time the past was in sharp, high definition and I hated every single truth, but especially my failure glaring straight at me."
Rhys Christos Edward Stowell
"I was a predator trying to fit my deviant needs into a structure meant for those exploring the exchange of power and pain, among other things. I'd always have to rein in my true needs."
Rhys, oh Rhys, you beautiful bastard; the greatest enigma! What am I to do with you?? I can't figure out if you're a demon in disguise or a fallen angel.
I developed a certain affection and liking for this guy. I don't exactly know why. At one point, reading this episode, I thought I found my reason. Every person has a little broken part in himself and the first word that defines Rhys in the introduction is that he's a philanthropist - a person that helps others. I think he's a representation of something all broken people need. The way he cares for Desniah, how he helps her and gives the all right things she needed to get better. And you can tell how he does it with so much love for her. But we can't forget that Desniah's love helps him too, they help each other and it's a beautiful thing.
"What is my number one expectation of you?"
She rocked, taking slow deep breaths. "To trust you."
"The result of trusting someone looks like what?"
"Freedom. Easy. Acceptance."
"My happiness began and ended with her submission to 'us', her and me being together."
"He gathered me into his arms. "I can never lose you." His voice lowered, raw and crackled."
I guess I couldn't help but like him even though he is potentially dangerous. We know that Rhys has demons that try to control him, that give him a hard time in his life and urge him to do things that are ethically not acceptable. With it, he kinda also has a partly weird sense of protectiveness. I admired him for fighting that part of himself but it's still a huge mystery! Why is he the way he is? Those demons are in my opinion so unnatural to the good side of his character!
"I grabbed hold of her. Encased in my arms, she struggled. I grew hard, which was the wrong reaction, given she needed me. I should be in control and unaffected."
"You can't kill anyone for me," she uttered.
"I could hurt or kill anyone for you." I grinned, sure that I'd enjoy doing so. "I'd take pleasure in doing it." Not like the last time where I'd lost control. This time, I'd plan it. Go slow. Not rush the levels of pain I could inflict on another. Not a salsa, but rather a waltz."
In this episode he did something that shocked me. I don't know if I hated him because of acting so unexpectedly or I hated him more because I finally understood that we haven't seen even the half of Rhys. It's still impossible to understand him just when I thought I got a hand with it.
Desniah Williams
We met Desniah in Vol. 1 as a frightened and pshycologically badly damaged person. Basiclly she was very weak but Rhys came along and started ti help her deal with her pain. Caden might have loved her but he didn't have what she needed to heal. And Rhys had it. She toughened up and began to fight London, push her away. Actually, I can't even call it pushing away. London is a sort of defence mechanism against the memories of her childhood. I think the right expression is trying to merge them, trying to kill that need for protection London provided, trying to get strong enough to fight on her own.
"You are right, she's part of you, but it's important you realize you splintered from each other for good reasons. You salvaged all the beauty in you to keep the darkness from consuming you."
See how complex it is? How these people just make you THINK, make you want to understand them. It's genius.
One thing that made me really curious was the words Desniah repeated several times:
"London Bridge is broken down. Dance over my Lady Lee. There will be no
grave stone to mark your passing."
I don't know why but with Ms DeSint and her wicked mind, I just knew there was a story there and I discovered it!! The first two sentences are from a nursery rhyme! You can read it all and the explanation for it
HERE. It's interesting how it's connected to Anne Boleyn, but the one part that I found important was:
"The nursery rhyme 'London bridge is broken down' can be described as an allegory - a description of one thing under the image of another." I think I found the connection with London and Desniah! I just wonder: is this the way London (from the book) got her name?
So this episode brought a problem in Rhys' and Desniah's relationship. It was turn of events I still don't understand. Rhys switched to being a bastard not dealing a little slowly with Desniah.
"From my understanding, he didn't want to marry me, he wanted to own me, and this was his way of making those around us understand I was his alone."
"Whatever emotions Rhys was able to feel toward me, was how he'd feel for someone worthy of being his slave. I was viable option to hold the title of slave in his life. The words fiancé and wife were interchangeable with slave to him. Nothing else. I would love him and he'd never be able to give me the same. "
I felt betrayed and confused just as much as she. I just hope it gets fixed. From what I understood, I think that the next episodes will deal more with Rhys' dark side. I just can't wait for that! This psychological play with my mind is interesting and all and I really can think about these characters and not get bored for hours but I desperately need answers!
About the author:
"Leila DeSint was born in a small town on the east coast of Canada. Her nomadic childhood gave her the ability to ebb and flow with the seasons, people and places she lived in. Most often, she could be found in a corner with a pencil and notepad using words to recreate the dark world around her. Many summers of her youth were spent on the shores of her birthplace collecting seashells, but she always returned them for the next wanderer that happened by.
The pencil and notepad have been traded for a computer, but the words never stop flowing, nor did her interest in conjuring glimpses of the world as she perceived it. The corner is now a desk. And rather than leaving behind seashells for wanderers, she pens dark, gritty erotic literature that examines the complexities of human emotions and sexuality through an ever-changing lens. She delves into the shadowy areas and explores the social-perceptions of taboos.
She threads together the remnants of the world she witnessed in order to shed light on obscure places."
Until next time,
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