Entanglement

Turbulence, Book 1

By: Lilly K. Cee

Narrated by: Gary Furlong, Angelina Rocca

Brit Delany found some semblance of peace by ignoring the pain of her past.

An American photojournalist working on the international stage, it was easy to distance herself from her traumatic childhood. But she is now heading back to Ireland, home of those turbulent memories.

Thankfully, there are friendly faces waiting for her. Two men, though last she saw them, they were the kindhearted boys who shepherded her through the worst of her dark and tumultuous days. Both look forward to her homecoming, but for far different reasons.

Secrets await in the Emerald Isle, and they will threaten everything Brit thought she knew. Love. Rejection. Obsession. Betrayal. All she's survived will act as her emotional armor for what is to come.

This story is not intended/appropriate for listeners under 18 years of age. Be forewarned that the Turbulence Series addresses a range of traumatic issues. Entanglement ends with a cliffhanger. Tranquility is the conclusion to Entanglement.

©2021 Turbulent Press LLC (P)2023 Turbulent Press LLC

Childish, pathetic FMC.

Six hours into it, there’s absolutely nothing happening. Well, apart from learning that the FMC likes to manipulate and play childish mind-games. She’s whiney and petulant, fickle and selfish. She’s a very difficult character to relate to because she’s supposed to have lived through all this trauma, yet she enjoys war zones and photographing in high risk situations. She makes stupid, brash decisions and plays hard to get, expecting the male leads to chase her—so much juvenile drama. Apparently she’s been all over the world, done all these insanely risky things, but is totally clueless about anything relating to sex, arousal, love, or passion. I’m not sure I understand how a woman who is so freaking oblivious could keep herself alive in the environments she’s supposed to be so accustomed to. I could probably tolerate it if the story line were moving along, but it seems to be at a standstill and her maturity level is regressing with relationship experiences, rather than progressing. She’s so annoying: wanting him to touch her and kiss her, then stopping abruptly, running away, acting like she’s so afraid of him, then leaving her door unlocked, hoping he will come for her—and force her. Then she’s angry when he doesn’t—and also when he does. It’s ridiculous. Nine and a half hours in—still absolutely nothing has changed, except, spoiler alert, she’s accusing him of putting barriers between them because he used a condom—yes, she’s being a bi%*h over A FREAKING CONDOM! He’s a doctor, for crying out loud, and she is adamant that she’s leaving in a week to go back into a war zone in a foreign country. Additionally, she seeks danger and the rush of fear, but acts like she’s afraid of him and it turns her off. Compounding the contradiction, her internal monologues give the impression she wants him to rape her although she acts so dramatic in response to the violence of him punching his cousin for kissing and groping her. What the—what? I can’t figure out why he wastes his time on her. Very anti-climactic. She doesn’t come across as broken, dark, and twisty— but like a selfish, childish drama queen. It’s the same childish game—ad nauseum. She’s dumb as a box of stupid. She’s been all over the world in highly traumatic situations, living for months—perhaps even years alongside men in highly emotionally charged, less than hospitable environs, and we’re supposed to believe she doesn’t know what desire, arousal, and self pleasure are? Then, all of a sudden, she’s so worldly and jaded she gets all philosophical, proposing her “superior perspective” on the possibility that the rapist is a mercy killer. Even Shawn points out that her supposed trauma responses don’t match her level of ignorance. Are we also supposed to forget that she had no issue with taking her clothes off to swim with the boys? Suddenly, she’s so ashamed of her body because of what went on when she was young, but her mom died around the time she would have hit puberty, despite that being such an integral event in her abuse. So the story is weak at best. It’s just a bit anti-climactic and what narrative drama there is is very forced and exaggerated. The love story would be great all by itself—even without the missing drama, at least as far as Shawn is concerned, but her childish responses and justifications make it unbearable because she is just so infuriating and he is so darn swoon-worthy. Her tantrums just take up so much time. The majority of the story is her whining. If she has the perspective to humanize the rapist’s murder attempts, then surely she has the perspective on her mother’s mental illness and subsequent alcoholism. Total Spoiler Alert: As far as the plot twist, or major shock factor at the end, it truly wasn’t that big of a shock. I don’t have a problem with cliffhangers, like so many reviewers do, especially when a book is a decent length (I don’t feel like an author intentionally breaks a story up into 4-5 hour increments for the purpose of selling it at 3-4 $12 credits on Audible). In this instance, there was a lot of excellently written content, but not nearly enough happening. There just wasn’t enough real suspense. The only drama came from her temper tantrums. And honestly, Jasper was a foregone conclusion. It just validates her stupidity. More Spoilers: I’m trying to listen to the second book now, but I don’t know that I can take another 14 hours of her. It only gets worse in the second book. I’ll only say this, since this review is based on the first book, but she’s acting afraid of Shawn now, like she couldn’t see the warning signs with Jasper so she’s second-guessing Shawn. Grrrr. She’s killing me! Funny how she has no self-preservation until it comes to Shawn, then she’s Captain Safety. I was so grateful when her boss told her to stop acting like a toddler and when Shawn began fighting back against her nonsense. She’s such a turd. If it hadn’t been for Gary Furlong’s hottttt narration, I don’t know that I would have finished the book. He’s 🔥.