Dirty Red ~ Tarryn Fisher

Dirty Red by Tarryn Fisher
My rating: 5 of 5 stars



5 eye-opening, drama-filled stars!

Dear Opportunist,

You thought you could take him from me, but you lost. Now, that he's mine I'll do anything to keep him. Do you doubt me? I have everything that was supposed to be yours. In case you were wondering; he doesn't ever think about you anymore. I won't let him go....ever.

Dirty Red

Once again Tarryn Fisher exceeded my expectations. The second book in her Love Me With Lies series was an angst-filled, emotionally charged journey into the mind of the ultimate anti-hero.



Unlike some readers, I didn't hate the character of Leah in The Opportunist. Truthfully, all three of the main characters were exceedingly flawed and not in any kind of way that endeared me to them. I think that is one of the main things I love about Fisher's writing; her ability to make the readers feel invested in the lives of some truly unlikable people. So, going into this book, I was excited for the chance to get a glimpse inside the mind of someone as cold and calculating as she is.

While many of the things that Leah has done...okay, most of them...are out and out selfish and self-serving, we finally get some of her backstory to enable us to understand why she is the way she is. Fisher doesn't expect the reader to forgive Leah for all of her sins because of her history. But, it definitely gives us the bigger picture.

I have done a number of things to keep this man. I have lied and cheated. I have been sexy and meek, fierce and vulnerable. I have been everything but myself.

My name is Leah, and I will do anything to keep my husband.

While for me, Dirty Red wasn't quite as good as the first book in the series, it was still an amazing piece of work. Tarryn Fisher's writing is just so solid and confidant. I love that she never once backed away from having her characters be the way she envisioned them to be. There is no watering down of the story...Leah, Caleb and Olivia are all far from the traditional romance "hero/heroine". They are all flawed, selfish and conniving. Each lying in various and repeated ways in order to get what they want. But in the end...I cared. I may not like or even understand some of the things they do, but I still care about them, despite it all. That fact...shows how incredibly talented Fisher is as an author.

I was born red: my skin, my hair and my hot, fussy attitude.

I wanted what Olivia had and threw away - someone who adores me even though my insides curl and lash like a poisonous snake.



As with The Opportunist, I found the skipping back and forth from the past to the present quite interesting and it definitely kept up the feeling of dread...knowing that the caca was going to hit the fan in a big way by the end of this book. Leah is such a complex character and I had a twisted sense of enjoyment by spending some time inside her head. Probably more so than I did with Olivia as narrator of the first book.



The ending of Dirty Red was another punch to the gut - the perfect setup for the final part of the trilogy, Thief which is told from Caleb's POV. I'm excited to see how Tarryn chose to end this wild ride on the dysfunctional side of romance.