Hudson by Laurelin Paige

Anybody else feel like Christian Grey and Hudson Pierce would be best buddies? I mean, you’ve got physical pain and punishment on the one hand, and mental manipulation on the other. Although, I feel like if they ever had a disagreement, Christian would probably flog Hudson into submission for the win.

What’s it About? 

“I can easily divide my life into two parts—before her and after.”

Hudson Pierce has led a life few others could even imagine. With money and power at his fingertips, he’s wanted for almost nothing. He’s never experienced love, however, and he’s seen few examples of it in his dysfunctional family. The ridiculous notion of romance has always intrigued him. He’s studied it, controlled it, manipulated it, and has yet to understand it.

Until he meets Alayna Withers. Now, the games he’s played in his quest for comprehension can finally come to an end. Or are they just beginning? Told from his point of view, Hudson fills the holes in his love story with Alayna Withers. His past and relationship with his long-time friend Celia is further revealed and light is shed on his actions during his courtship with Alayna.

First Impressions

I positively adore whenever we have a romance novel where we get to hear the man’s point of view, and with this story in particular it was like we were offered a glimpse into the window of Hudson’s psyche. In my opinion, this was a key aspect that was missing in the previous three books of the Fixed trilogy. By delving into his history we are better able to understand his mindset and attitude towards not only the experiments wherein he manipulated women’s emotions, but more importantly how he thought about Celia. This was the one person who was kind of like him, and it was fascinating to find out more about their past relationship. The juxtaposition of his life before and after Alayna’s arrival was also a unique part of the novel that I really enjoyed.

Inside His Mind

Not gonna lie, at times it was difficult to follow the logic and reasoning behind some of Hudson’s actions. Although this made things confusing every once in a while, I guess it’s probably a good thing I can’t completely understand a man with possible sociopathic tendencies. Yay me!

The main difference between Hudson and Celia was that she played the game to hurt people, and remove herself from feeling her own inner pain. On the other hand, he was trying to understand people and their emotions, which is why he labeled all of his “manipulations” as “experiments”. Whereas the previous novels in this series focused mainly on Hudson and Alayna, in this book we see a lot more of Celia and Hudson’s relationship, including how he played her all those years ago. This telling of the same story, but from a different angle, really helped bring everything together to the point where it just “clicks”.

Series: Fixed, book 4. You definitely need to read books 1-3 first. I must say, I thought it was a little silly that this series is labeled as a trilogy, yet it has a fourth book. It’s shockingly just like 50 Shades wherein the fourth book is told from the man’s POV!

Should you read it? If you’ve read and enjoyed the other books in this series, then I would say that this one is a must read. However, I will say that although I liked reading things from his point of view, I wish it had just been intermingled into the first book, rather than having it as a separate book entirely. There are so many key points presented that would have been extremely helpful to know the first go around.

Smut Level: I preferred reading about his sexual exploits with Alayna more than with the other women from his experiments.

Get it on Amazon: Click Here. $5.99 Kindle Price. Amazon Digital Services. 300 Pages