The little things that I forgave in book 1 bugged me more here without better plots, dialogue or characters to get beyond trashy tropes.
Annoyances:
-repetition that became more cringe than cute: how often does he call her “sweet Val” or “lioness”?
-made up “fleck” that is used exactly like the F word (mother flecker, fleck you, etc) – if you’re going to make up swear words, at least put the effort into making exclamations original. Otherwise, why bother? Just use the F word, because that’s what the translator is for, right?
-F bombs (of the Earth and flecking variety) saturate his and her dialogue, making this feel very low class
-Seriously: the number of unnecessary F bombs is off the charts.
-the oral fixation from book 1 continues here, but it’s not sexy at all,
-the nooky in general is devoid of chemistry or sexiness, which is tragic for alien romance
-I get that alien romance is a wish fulfillment thing, but it’s too perfect: alien males who’ve lost their females, who nonetheless are expert at pleasing gals with their long tongues, peirced members?
-Insta-mates and insta-love?
-Val’s too much of a damsel, doing TSTL things like charging directly toward the ray gun.
-The story is just the two of them, instead of having interactions with the other couples in the series,
until the final half hour, where not much happens except to prep for the next book.
Sadly, this series ended up on the very okay end of the alien romance spectrum. I guess I need more than just comic level plots and hyper speed progression to nooky. I preferred The Clecanians, Corsairs, and Dark Planet Warriors series to this one.