Sacred Sins

Perfect ending for Margie🖤

Wow! I am overwhelmed by C.D. Reiss’ highly emotional Sacred Sins. Since the conclusion of the author’s Submission series, fans have been clamoring for more of the Drazen family. She delivers tenfold with her Saint Margie duet. Sacred Sins is the duet’s dramatic, twisty conclusion. Margie’s story is tortured, beautiful and emotional.

Sacred Sins is told primarily in the present; however, it does start in the past and make a couple time leaps to give readers some needed backstory. The majority of the novel takes place in parallel to Monica and Jonathan’s story in C.D. Reiss’ Submission series, and it is told from the tortured perspective of Margie Drazen. Margie’s life is filled with secrets, regrets, and longing. Her long ago wild fling with rockers Stratford Giliam and Indiana Andrew McCaffrey is a secret she is struggling to keep buried.

I loved the insight into the nefarious patriarch, Declan Drazen. He is still amoral, but you see his attachment to his long-suffering wife and children in a different light. Ms. Reiss made him just empathetic enough for readers to like him a little (and then feel guilty for doing so).

More standout secondary characters are Will Stanton and his adorable daughter, Hannah. I have enjoyed Will’s cameo appearances in other books, and it was a delight to get to know this character better.

All that I can say about the plot is that it is fast paced and chockfull of action. Without ruining the experience, it is safe to say that Margie has her hands full! The woman’s intelligence and gamesmanship has taken her to the top, and her big heart is going to keep her there.

To enjoy Sacred Sins, it is essential to read book one, Secret Sins. This duet is a great place for new-to-the-author readers to jump in. I loved every word of both books in this duet. Brava Ms. Reiss—you’ve created characters that readers care about and a scintillating story line to keep them up all night reading.

When last we left Margie Drazen in Secret Sins , she allowed the love of her life to leave her, believing that she had to do so for her family. It's been almost two years since that book was published, and in that time, I have worried for Margie. I have worried mightily.

CD Reiss puts you squarely back in the Drazen world, bringing all of the family together to help Jonathan. Of course, you cannot have eight siblings together - plus their parents - and not have all manner of emotional trauma and angst ensue. But when it's the Drazens, you turn that trauma and angst up to twelve.

Sacred Sins is part of CD Reiss's Drazen series, but the only book you absolutely must read before this one is Secret Sins. That's the only one I read. Yes, there are times when reading Sacred Sins that you realize that there is more information to be had about some of the Drazens, but that lack of knowledge will not hinder your appreciation of Margie's story in any way. All it will do is stoke a flame that drives you to go purchase the Submission series. You will want to fill in those gaps, but even more importantly, you will want to spend more time with the Drazens, particularly Jonathan.

But the focus here is on Margie, and as you discovered in Secret Sins, Margie merits that attention most completely. She is tenacious, determined, forceful, and loyal. She loves deeply and completely, even when she's been hurt. She rejects her own happiness if it means Jonathan will be happier because of it. And yet hers is a life of loneliness, regardless of how many siblings she has. That loneliness is her choice, mind you. She has neither wanted nor needed to fill the void left by Indiana Andrew McCaffrey sixteen years ago. It's almost as if she believes that she is only entitled to one love more than believing that no one else could take his place.

I won't say more about the plot of this book because you need to savor it. You need to wrap yourself in CD Reiss's storytelling and revel in the way she draws Margie, the way she develops this complicated, conflicted woman. Margie wants to feel love, even as she has tried to close herself off from it: "My heart was encased in a steel fist. It pounded against the crushing pressure, expanding as the first tightened, pushing against my lungs." Do you feel the want, the need? "My feelings picked the lock. Stormed into the room and overturned the tables, wrote on the walls, marred the floor." Oh, Margie. Your feelings deserve to be free, and so do you.

There is hope for Margie. There is possibility.

This is her time, and, thanks to CD Reiss, she gets it.