New Review! Killing Sarai (In the Company of Killers #1) by J.A. Redmerski 4.5 Cranky Stars

Killing Sarai by J.A. Redmerski
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

4.5 Cranky Stars.


How can something so wrong feel so right?

I keep asking myself that question as I have read through this entire book and even sat on this review. Killing Sarai was grotesquely intense, but the author wrote it in such a way that I was sucked in from the very first page to the last. I couldn’t put this book down no matter how crazy it got. There are parts in it I admit that had me gasping in horror because it was just that… omg… but at the same time, it brought to life a very real and very disturbing truth about some things that take place in this world that normalized society tends to ignore. Like, we know it’s there and we know it happens but we chose to ignore it because it’s not directly affecting us. That brutal honesty is what makes this book that amazing.


Sarai. Poor little Sarai. What a sh** life she was dealt. From the get go she was given a miserable mother who didn’t love Sarai in the way a mother ought to love a daughter. I mean, she literally trades her daughter to a drug and sex trafficking criminal. Sarai is crafted into this deadly version of herself in the 9 years she spends in captivity for survival. That stealthily crafted weapon that her captor never even realizes he has created finally gets free and it is hard to tell if that is a good or bad thing.


Sarai takes her chance when the first American to waltz into the compound she is kept at. She steals away and takes her freedom, without the consent of this American. She takes matters into her own hands and forces him to help her escape to freedom.


Little does Sarai knows, she has fallen into the lap of a trained killer even more deadly than the man she was held captive by. Victor is simply following orders. He has a mission to accomplish and Sarai is not his problem. He is more than happy to hand her back over, until he discovers she can be used as leverage to accomplish his mission.


Things between them get hot and heavy fast. There is a strange, unusual attraction between the two of them. Victor’s mission and Sarai’s wish to return home become conflicted as the two of them use the other to survive from The Order Victor works for and Javier, the Mexican drug lord, both of whom are hunting both Victor and Sarai. Their lives are thrown upside down sprinkled with chaos. Someone though, they find solace in being together and neither can explain the addictive attraction they feel as they scheme, murder, and lie to survive. It is a odd relationship that has you questioning their sanity while at the same time routing for them to make it out. (Side note, am I the only one thinking they are possibly related? His mom in France, her aunt in France?? It’s almost too coincidental.)


I gave this 4.5 stars out of 5 simply because there were a little too many editing errors and structure errors, that I thought maybe this wasn’t a finalized copy. However, errors aside, it does not affect the story being told or the dire need for me to continue onto the next novel in this series! I’m digging in right now, and I do hope I’m not disappointed.

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