Gabriel's Redemption by Sylvain ReynardMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
This third and final novel was perfection. I liked that it didn't immediately end with its fairy-tale ending, but rather it started off rough and all the characters continued to grow. I think I have found my favorite contemporary romance trilogy for the year! Sylvian Reynard is a phenomenal romance writer. She has taken some incredible characters and shaped them throughout the trilogy in such a remarkable way. The main characters were absolutely superb, but the secondary and tertiary characters were just as amazing. I loved the how the story was centered around Dante and Beatrice and how Italian poetry, artwork and books were woven beautifully into the novel.
Julia has grown so much sense the first novel and it was amazing to see how grew into herself. She finally was able to attend Harvard for her PhD. I loved seeing how she dealt with Christa and stood up for herself finally against Gabriel when needed. She was a lot more emotional in this book, but with everything that was going on it was understandable. Julia is seriously a smart, beautiful, sweet, loving woman. I totally love her, she grew from being shy, timid and push over to a courageous woman even though she does still have her shy moments.
Gabriel is still my favorite male character ever. He not only is a sexy professor, but he also has a temper that he learned to control. He was a lot more vulnerable because of his past and looking into his parents background. I love that he was untied with Kelly and got to learn things about his parents. I love that he was ready for kids and adopting them. Gabriel has definitely grown from that cold-hearted bastard to the ideal loving husband.
Their marriage was not perfect, but I loved that they both were willing to learn and grow together. There were parts when they each frustrated me, but I like that they ever went to bed mad or angry they always tried to resolve their issues, talk it out and have some awesome sex. I loved that they talked about kids and really worked on learning more about their parents. They just were amazing as a newlywed couple and not to mention that surprise they received after Gabriel's reversal just made me jump for joy. Clare Grace Hope Emerson was definitely such a blessing!
I loved Rachel, Aaron, Richard, Tom, Scott, Rebecca and Katherine so much! Paulina definitely has grown and I was so happy for her new life. Loved it. Paul definitely annoyed me a bit -- granted he is such a sweet guy, but he always went too far with certain things concerning Julia. I'm happy he finally moved on in the end, but he took too damn long holding on to Julia even after she was married.
Christa seriously got everything she deserved. I did feel bad for how things went for her, but through all the negativity she put out and always using her body to get what she wanted -- karma served. Natalie is just a sad delusional girl. The fact that she thought Simon would ever openly be with her was sad. She got everything she deserved. Simon was definitely a douche-bag throughout the trilogy, but I felt bad because he finally fell in love with someone only to have his past haunt him and ripe his engagement apart. All three of them treated Julia poorly and they all got what they deserved in the end. Granted I did feel bad for Christa and Simon
Overall, this was such a beautiful trilogy and I am excites to see how everything turned out beautifully. If you're looking for an outstanding contemporary romance with depth, trails, romance and some hot sex -- this is definitely a great read!
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