Review: Made for Sin by Stacia Kane

Made for Sin
Stacia Kane
Published: Aug. 30, 2016 (Loveswept)
Purchase: Amazon
Review Source: Copy provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Reviewed by: Amy

Rating (out of 5): 3 stars

E.L. Speare is cursed. With a demon inhabiting his body, Speare is forced to sin in order to keep the demon assuaged, otherwise all hell literally breaks loose. Fortunately Speare is a PI in Las Vegas, the city of sin itself, so there are lots of opportunities to keep his other half under wraps.

While Speare is investigating some grisly murders for the local mob, he discovers the victims were killed with a demon-sword. Speare enlists the help of thief Ardeth, who was potentially hired to steal the object, to help shed light on the killer’s intentions.

I missed reading Stacia Kane’s stories something Terrible. So there’s the slight possibility, in my excitement, I put too much pressure on this book seeing as how it’s the first new thing from Stacia Kane we’ve seen in a couple of years (I apologize if that statement is incorrect).

Unfortunately, Made for Sin just failed to grab and keep my attention. There were elements that were so promising. The first interaction between Ardeth and Speare is full of so much chemistry and mystery, I was hooked. Unfortunately, shortly after the story just kind of became meh.

Made for Sin is told, third person, from Speare’s point of view. I did like his character, sins aside, and I think that Stacia Kane did a great job of really making the reader understand all that he has to deal with and go through on a daily basis being a host for a demon. How this utterly effects his life, and it really made me think about what his character could become if he were free from his demon. The idea of Speare housing a demon and all the metaphorical connotations that come with that statement (coupled with the sins he must commit) is pretty cleverly done. Kane’s characters quite frequently have vices *cough* Chess *cough*, but in Speare’s case you could totally see that if/when he has a way out of his current predicament, he would take it and never look back. It’s not a crutch or an excuse to do bad things, he genuinely doesn’t like who he has to be when he sins.

Beyond this, what loses the story for me is I felt everything else kind of falls flat. I wanted so much more for Ardeth’s character. The first encounter with her and Speare is so promising, but then I feel like we don’t truly get to know her character. We start to see her as Speare sees her, which is this hot unobtainable woman and even her dialogue and actions don’t get to the heart of her character. I wish this story had been from both Speare and Ardeth’s points of view, honestly.

Since I think the main objective of Made for Sin is setting up Speare’s character, which granted Kane does, I wasn’t really interested in the murder mystery plot either. I think if the true conflict of the story had revolved around Speare’s plight, I would have been more invested.

I’m not sure if there are plans for more stories in this world, but the way things end, it’s a definite possibility. After getting through this first book with everything we find out along the way, if Stacia Kane writes more about Speare, I’d definitely read it. I think that the potential is totally there; just this introduction didn’t completely work for me.

Sexual content: sex