Consumed by Deception (Deception Trilogy 3), by Rina Kent | Free Audiobook
Consumed by Deception (Deception Trilogy 3)Audiobook
Everything he kept from her, and the last of it
The last volume starts with everything already broken and one question left standing: who exactly has been lying to whom, and for how long. Adrian has been keeping a version of events from the woman in his house since the first page, and by now the reader knows enough to be certain that the version he tells is not the true one.
What follows is the convergence of everything the first two books set up, including the questions about her past that were left deliberately unanswered. Adrian narrates more of this one than he did before, and the effect is a villain's-eye view of his own obsession, which is either the most interesting thing in the trilogy or the most uncomfortable, depending on the reader. It runs 7 hrs and 15 mins, read by Jason Clarke and Desiree Ketchum, and it is the shortest of the three.
It closes the trilogy and does not stand alone: this is the book that pays off the cliffhangers of the first two, so start at the beginning. And the content is as dark as the series has been, so the warnings attached to the trilogy apply here as well.
Final volumes of a book club trilogy have one job, and this one does it: it answers the questions the first two books spent their time avoiding. The people who finish the Deception Trilogy are the people who were willing to sit through two books of confusion for that payoff, so the honest question is not whether it resolves things, but whether you are the sort of reader who wanted them resolved.
The verdict from the blogs that covered the trilogy at release is warmer than the reaction to the first book. One long review of the full trilogy says simply that "the final book, Consumed by Deception, was the perfect conclusion", and that matches the ratings: this is the best-loved of the three on Amazon, at 4.5 from over twenty thousand ratings, against 4.3 and 4.4 for its two predecessors.
The reason it lands is structural. The first volume ends without resolving anything and the middle volume escalates without resolving anything either, which means this one carries the whole load, and it does it in the shortest book of the set. What the author does with Adrian's point of view is the part I would point a new reader to: hearing his version directly, after two books of watching him from outside, changes the shape of everything that came before, and it is the one thing the trilogy could not have told from anyone else's eyes.
An honest note about the criticism: I could not find a documented complaint specific to this volume. The complaints attached to the trilogy are attached to its first half, and the reviewers who disliked the opening mostly either stopped there or report that the series improves as it goes. So rather than inventing a blemish to balance the review, the accurate thing to say is that the objections you will find online are about the first book's pacing and its heroine's role, not about this one.
Two practical points. This is not a standalone, and starting here would make no sense at all: the whole point of the book is the answer to a question you have to have been asking for two volumes. And the content warnings carried by the trilogy reach their peak here: Worth knowing before you start, because reviewers of this trilogy always list it: there is a dub con dynamic throughout, a rape scene that turns out to be a nightmare rather than something that happened, and references to child loss, alcoholism and mental illness, on top of the usual violence of the genre.
Read Vow of Deception and Tempted by Deception first. If the trilogy works for you, the site also has her Royal Elite series, which is the other corner of the same universe.
Consumed by Deception closes Rina Kent's Deception Trilogy, and it is the volume that pays off everything the first two books set up: who the woman in Adrian's house really is, and what he has been hiding from her the whole time. It is the shortest of the three, at 7 hrs and 15 mins, read by Jason Clarke and Desiree Ketchum.
It is the final instalment of a story told across three books, so it does not stand alone at all: start with Vow of Deception and Tempted by Deception.
This is the best-rated book of the trilogy on Amazon, and the content matches its predecessors: dub con dynamics, references to child loss and mental illness, and several dark scenes. With the free trial, you can pick any title you want, this one included, cancel whenever you like, and the audiobook stays in your library afterwards.
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