Ed. note: We’ve been asked to increase our coverage of and discussion of Dark Romance a few times by some of you, so to start, we have a guest review from Kimberly. If you’re a reader of Dark Romance and would like to talk about some of your favorites, please get in touch!

This guest review is from Kimberly! Kimberly works as a student support specialist at a small university where she endeavors to instill a love of reading and encourage self care to college students while continuing to add to her ever growing TBR pile and yarn stash for crochet. Being an avid reader from an early age, Kimberly stumbled upon romance by accident at 11 and has been hooked ever since.

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We have some trigger warnings and content warnings for this review, and for this book.

Before I get into the book itself and my opinions on it, a disclaimer. Dark Romances are just that: dark. Please read the trigger warning or, as in Haunting Adaline, the “Important Note” at the beginning of the book. These romances often deal with situations that can be traumatic to the reader…

…just to name a few. Be sure you are safe when reading and that the items warned about in the beginning of the book will not cause you any harm. Knowing yourself is very important, and knowing what you can handle putting in your brain is a must. In short, these books are often “Not for Sarahs”.

Ed. note: HAHAHAHA I am the standard.

Into the book itself. I felt Haunting Adaline a great place to begin as it was my first foray into Dark Romance. This book combines mystery with hot sex and just a little of the supernatural to flavor the gothic feel. The “danger boner” in this novel is different as the danger is only perceived by Adaline at least in the beginning.

Adaline is an author who has inherited her grandmother’s home in the woods (cue eerie music here). Adaline was very close to her grandmother, Nana; Adaline and her mother do not have a great relationship, but Adaline and Nana did. The house is either haunted or possessed of a spirit, but Adaline loves the house, even if her great-grandmother was murdered in the home.

Adaline also has a small quirk; she loves to be scared. Living in her grandmother’s home in the woods is just the place for her, but makes her a bit vulnerable.

Zade Meadows, the morally grey “hero,” sees Adaline at a book signing and they are both lost from this point on. Zade is a vigilante who specializes in bringing down human trafficking rings. He is not only an expert hacker, but also an “enforcer:”

In the beginning of the book, he is trying to bring down a particularly problematic trafficking ring, but the leader keeps eluding him. He needs a distraction and ends up at a book signing where he instantly becomes obsessed with Adaline Reilly.

Zade begins stalking Adaline almost from the beginning of the book. Zade has no intention of “actually” harming her while being completely obsessed with her. Zade takes possessiveness to the ultimate extreme.

However, Adaline seems fascinated by Zade’s behavior, , even when Zade’s possessive nature becomes apparent:

An ex-boyfriend that she almost has sex with at the beginning of the novel, shortly after Zade begins stalking her. This is where I, personally, started to squirm.

The consent in the book is nowhere near explicit, but is also in that really fuzzy realm as Adaline never actually says “No.” I would like to believe that Zade would have stopped, at least the sexual parts, if she had, but that isn’t really clear in this novel.

Initially, Adaline calls the police, not wanting to deal with a stalker, but as things escalate, Adaline decides not to call anymore. Granted, Zade does make all of the evidence disappear, erasing all of the information from the police databases so there is no record of the previous calls.

It is really unclear, at least to me, if Adaline just accepts that she isn’t getting rid of Zade, or if she actually cares about him in the beginning of their relationship. Zade seems to know how to play Adaline, but also isn’t gentle about the way he approaches her.

The violent nature of Zade’s activities,

along with the rough nature of the sex between Adaline and Zade, add a unique flavor to the novel. The “danger boner” is all on Adaline’s part, not exactly arousal non-concordance, but really close. Adaline, instead of ignoring or not engaging in behaviors, continues to respond and even bait Zade over texts and verbally. Adaline even questions her own behavior several times, wondering why she talks to Zade at all.

All through the process, there is the background story of Gigi (Adaline’s murdered great-grandmother). Seeing the parallels between Gigi and Adaline’s stalkers adds an additional thriller element since I knew through the book that Gigi was murdered. Adaline also knows this and has the suspicion that Gigi was killed by her stalker.

Needless to say, Gigi’s murder is solved in the novel, but really moves from a main storyline into the background as Zade’s life trickles into Adaline’s, overshadowing the tragedy of the past (and the strange parallels between Gigi and Adaline) with the real danger of the present. Zade’s powerful enemies work actively to…

The HEA is building, but not really in sight. The ending really feels like, and is, the middle of the story.

What I really loved about this book was the ability to explore some of the darker fantasies and thoughts I have in a safe way. While I am not sure I would like…

…the idea of having someone so obsessed with you that they lose all sense of themselves is thrilling. Zade actively combats human trafficking and non-consensual sexual acts, but his morality, his very fiber, is lost in his obsession with Adaline. I knew, as a reader, that he would sacrifice anything and everything just to be around Adaline, to just be able to see her. In reality, that is absolutely terrifying, but in the safety of the novel, the dark part of my heart rejoiced in the feeling.

I also found myself, at least initially, reading just because I couldn’t look away, horrified that I was enjoying the book and wondering what twisted thing was coming next. However, as I continued to read, I was able to put the book down as the story line began to get too tangled. The parallels drawn between Gigi and Adaline became redundant. The entries from Gigi’s journal at the end of chapters, instead of adding to the story, felt like they were interrupting the story between Adaline and Zade. Instead of creating conflict, they seemed to tone down the intensity of the plot. I found myself skimming the entries, but not paying much attention as they didn’t add much to the plot line, and I missed the thread of solving the mystery of Gigi’s death.

I also ran into the “what is wrong with me” that I am enjoying something so violent and taboo, and enjoying it enough to read Haunting Adaline and then seek out other books that were similar.

I came to the conclusion that the ungentle part of myself needed the outlet and the fantasy of helplessness while being comforted by the knowledge that I could stop at any time and be safe.

Having read many Dark Romances since, I would say Haunting Adaline is a good way to see if Dark Romance is for you. It is extreme in some places, but not quite as violent or taboo as some of the other books I’ve read that share this genre. While Haunting Adaline held my attention for the most part and was a solid read, I did not feel compelled to finish it in one setting.