Books & Spoons Review: Bender by M. Stratton

Since high school everyone thought Jake Bender would end up behind bars; after all, he comes from a long line of bad boys. He spent years away from the place he called home. When he finally comes back, everyone thinks he's just a punk kid all grown up who’s now running a dive bar called The Night Club. What they don't know is he heads up a special task force, which cleans up neighborhoods and makes them safe again.

Stormy Ryan has always felt more comfortable with her books than with people. She loves to spend her days within the pages of her books. When her second-hand bookstore is robbed for the third time in as many months, her employees quit leaving her to run the shop on her own. With the pressure of having to deal with her shop and people, not to mention the declining neighborhood, she is at the end of her rope.

When closing up her shop late one night, she is held up and the neighborhood bad boy saves her, putting both of them at the forefront of a psychotic’s obsession.
Being bad has never looked so good.

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The worst kind, creepy villains, and a bad-boy fighting against them, while protecting the bookstore owner lost in her fantasy world.
Bender had a hard beginning in life, abusive father he wanted to escape from. He was recruited for law enforcement at the age of 18, and makes a career out of cleaning up the most dangerous neighborhoods in different cities across the nation. From the story I concluded he was now about 38 years old, and ready to retire after this last job.
Stormy is a book-girl, owner of a bookstore in the dangerous neighborhood, rich after her inheritance at 35 years of age.
I liked Bender and Stormy, I think they had chemistry and connection. They understand each other, and the way Stormy brought out Bender's inner-self he had been hiding most of his life, was kind of sweet. Bender does fall for her quickly, or like he wonders later, if he got interested while reading her file. They have some heat in between them, even though that fades into the background.
The villains in this story are grisly, grim, and gruesome, cannibals. Their actions are told in detail matter, their desires described in more detail that I wanted to know. The fear, anxiety, and terror is constant, and while running for their lives, Bender and Stormy make some interesting choices, and made me question myself when it came to figuring out the time line in the story.
The plot and idea for this story is unique and interesting. There were times I craved for more information and details, at times I wished I didn't have so many details, and at times I wondered what did the events have to do with the plot. Yes, I have mixed feelings about the story, even though I can say that I will not forget the villains anytime soon, unfortunately. But even though I felt like lots of important information on the character development was left out, when it came to Bender and Stormy, and their relationship, I liked them together, so for that
~ Three Spoons