Meet the infamous Ross, black sheep of the family and bully extraordinaire.I drink too much, smoke too much, screw around. I’ve hurt people, been in and out of prison. I’m a bastard, a beast. I’m a bundle of joy.I mean, my own dad tried to kill me, what does that tell you?Then again, my dad did kill my mom, so maybe it isn’t just me. Who the hell knows. The world sucks and I’m giving it the … sucks and I’m giving it the finger in every damn way, except…
Except there’s a girl. Pretty. Hot. Clever. She didn’t get the memo—that she should hate me, shun me, kick me when I’m down. That the world screwed us all over. She believes in the future—and sometimes she seems to even believe in me.
Big mistake. I’m bad news. I made her suffer in the past, and nothing has changed. I’m not an angel, not a saint. No good.
But for some reason I don’t get, I can’t let her go down with me. I find myself trying to be better for her, pretending to be someone I’m not.
And if that doesn’t ring some damn big alarm bells regarding my sanity, well… then I’m done already.
This is a standalone full-length novel in the Wild Men universe that began with Caveman.
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The story of Ross and Luna, totally took my heart and soul and ran with it. If you are easily broken this is not the book for you. If you do not like some triggers, this may not be the book for you. If you are looking for an author who is consistent with just taking you to another world and making you feel like you have never felt before. If you do not mind reading a story that is about real shit and can make you want to jump through the mf’ing book and f someone up… This is totally the book for you!
I laughed. I cried. I cursed. I mourned. This book took me on an emotional roller coaster and it refused to let me off the ride. The beginning of the story had me wondering, wtf Jo will do to me this time. Then it happened, and I had to isolate myself from the world until the ride was over. Ross is a broken, torn up, messed up man, with no clear sight off what his worth really is. Especially since his dumba$$ father tried to end him, literally. He was raised to not show no feelings and to always be the best at what his dad wanted him to do, not what he wanted. He had no clue on how to express himself since all he knew was hate and that is what he gave everyone, especially Luna at a young age. Luna moved away because of his Bullsh!ttery!
What follows is just unheard of and I swear, I wanted to run to Ross’s defense every single time anything ill happened to him. This story isn’t just a story, but it’s life. That is what made this story phenomenal to me. That is what made me connect to the characters and every word.
One Click this bad baby now!
I can’t describe how I was feeling when I started reading this book. It was a mix of emotions all at once. On one hand, I was happy and delighted to have another book from this author but on the other hand, I was nervous. But don’t negatively see this.
I was nervous because of the main character. If you had read The Wild Men series, the 5 books published until now you can imagine how I was feeling but if not I advise you to read them first. You won’t regret it.
Jo Raven has given me some of the hottest books of all time, but she gave me some suspenseful ones as well. Just keep an open mind as well as an open heart.
No Saint is her latest release and it’s the sixth book from the Wild Men series.
This new book explores the lives of Ross and Luna.
Ross has always been a jerk. He’s mean, vicious and with no soul. His childhood and teenage years were spent terrorizing his half brother and sisters as well as binding his father’s demands.
Luna returned after 3 years away. She needed to get away from the bullies who terrorized her through school. Now she’s back in town and…
My heart was so full that I thought it might burst. This book was that good.
Sublime plot, very well written, super engaging here, intense and so dark. It was impossible to no be affected by the chain of events.
I won’t lie and tell you that I wasn’t nervous to read it. I really was and mainly because Ross was a bad person in the first books. How could I like him after that?
Well, let me just say that I had to bite my tongue… Several times actually.
It was a heavy and dark reading, and it will strike your heart and soul.
Through each chapter, you could witness their struggles, their nightmares, the fights they overcome.
There were parts of the book that I saw myself crying and wanting to hold them close and promising better days, but there were others that I wanted to slap someone.
This book will give you love, loyalty, trust, a second chance but it will give you heartache, loss, betrayal, violence, and drama.
It was the perfect story despite all the bad stuff it portraited.
And… Guys… We have some pretty hot stuff just like Jo has given us in the past.
Jo Raven… You my lady rock.
This book was what I wanted for so long and I was well worth the waiting.
Counting down the days to get the new one.I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book
Between 4 & 4.5 Stars.
I have been a huge fan of this author for a very long time. It needs to be said because I might be a little biased. She hasn’t written a book that I didn’t love. Her heroes are so damaged and broken. Their pasts are some of the most horrific I’ve ever read. Jo Raven is not afraid to cross boundaries. Her books are not for you if you’re looking for a sugary read. I guarantee your heart will break and you will be so angry. So, so angry for what her heroes have suffered. And in No Saint, that applies in excess. You have to wonder how these young men survive the lot life has dealt them. They survive because they are strong heroes with strong heroines who will support and love them unconditionally.
In No Saint,Ross Jones is just surviving his days and nights. This isn’t easy to do when he is constantly tormented. The bully is being bullied. We met Ross early on in the Wild Men series when we were first introduced to Octavia. This book can be read as a standalone, however, I highly recommend you read the previous books. Ross has been an important and complex part of each and knowing about who he was will help you understand him. Maybe forgive him too.
Without giving you details, I found a few circumstances in this book to be unrealistic which is why I’m between 4 & 4.5 stars. But this is just my opinion so please take this lightly and decide for yourself. In addition, I wanted to see the antagonists in this book get what they deserved on the pages and not just an afterthought at the end.
Can bullies be forgiven? Can I forgive Ross for all the suffering he has caused? I wasn’t sure that I could. Fortunately, the author painted the pictures of Ross’s past which put me front and center at his own suffering. God, I wanted to hold him and hug him to me tightly. Fortunately, Ross had Luna and after she dealt with her own anger in regards to Ross’s bullying, she helped him to heal. She became his support. Support which he desperately needed. One of the aspects I appreciated was how the author grew and developed Ross and Luna’s characters. There was a lot of pain, a lot of history between them. It took a while before Luna could forgive Ross but not before she understood him.
This book is dark and intense. Very passionate, very sad and sometimes violent. But I promise, you will sigh with great relief and happiness in the end.
This is my honest and unbiased review. Thank you for taking the time to read it. 🙂
“Once you’ve made up your mind about something, once you’ve believed it. Knowing the truth, can it change the past?”
It’s been awhile since I’ve read a Jo Raven book (I know there is something wrong with me ) and I forgot how beautifully broken and honest her characters are; how she gets you right in all your feels every single time & No Saint was no different. From beginning to end you feel every single thing that these two go through. Every emotion (good or bad), the grief, the guilt, the self doubt and all the love, all the butterflies. Ross & Luna will have you all in your feels as we go on this journey of Ross’s road to redemption and Luna moving past her emotional traumas and forgiving. You will root for these two, laugh with them & cry with them…SO SO GOOD
I really enjoyed this book & I hope that you will too
***ARC Provided in Exchange for an Honest Review/ Megan Scandalous Book Blog***
Ross, Ross, Ross, Ross, ROSS. This man! Oh my goodness. I have followed Ross through Jo Raven’s stories since his first appearance and I didn’t like him. We kept following him, seeing him pop up from time to time and a little more was shown to his personality, I started to feel intrigued by him. By the end of Dark Child, I needed more. I am SO so happy Ross got to tell his story, and let me tell you, he broke my heart into a million tiny pieces. Oh this guy is so broken!! Like seriously, so broken. I cried for him, I wanted to hide him away and hug him. He needed the love of someone special and I am so so so happy he found that in Luna. The pain Ross felt, I felt in my soul. I felt it down to my bones. He has definitely been redeemed in my eyes. Luna is so special. I am so glad that she is who our broken man is with.
Ms Raven’s writing is captivating. I couldn’t get enough of this story! I read it in any spare time I had! I was biting my nails wondering what would happen next. The angst had me all over the place. I felt so many emotions while reading this book and I just loved it. I am so so so incredibly happy that Jo Raven is back and is back with a BANG!
I loved seeing past characters, and being back in the small town of Destiny. It’s only been a day since I finished this book and yet I want to go back and experience it all over again. I just loved this book so much, it is definitely in my top reads of 2019!
5 blisteringly bright stars for this fabulous book! It is an epic story of the power of love and redemption, of the depths to which a person can sink when they hate themselves. It caught me up immediately as I had no idea how Jo was going to bring about the changes in Ross that would make him, even vaguely, acceptable. But, my goodness, she does. He truly suffers for his ascension from the hell of his past and present in order to find a way out into the light. And Luna is the key, the light.
I cannot recommend this book enough! Jo Raven has truly outdone herself!
4*
Luna has returned home after 3 years however she was not looking forward to it after the bullying that caused her to leave.
Ross was always the towns mean bully head of the gangs never knowing the childhood he had was the main cause of this.
He can’t believe it when Luna returned to town, he’s not the person he was before but people never forget.
I loved how Luna still had such a good heart & was quick to defend her own.
Ross was certainly not the person I expected and felt the story portrayed him very well.
I voluntarily reviewed an advanced reader copy of this book.
The title of this book certainly fits.
*I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review*
I’m not actually sure where to start with this one. I both liked it and didn’t like it and talk about a confusing emotion for me.
First, this is my first Jo Raven book. Nifty, right?
You definitely can read this as a standalone and not have any idea what went on before. That gives this a huge mark in the pro column for me. That said, maybe it would be necessary so you have some sort of emotion about Ross before the book. I don’t know. But keep that in mind.
So, at first, I couldn’t get into the book. It wasn’t BAD, but until Ross and Luna started actually started having GOOD interactions instead of screwed up ones, I was kind of scared about reading more. It just wasn’t doing it for me at all.
This is probably because I like my books more… unrealistic. Not necessarily paranormal or fantasy, but real life pretty much is difficult enough without using my reading time dealing with MORE realistic stuff. Such as illogical thought processes, emotional explosive characters that make little to no sense at first, etc. For example, the first part of the book Luna comes back to Destiny as a ‘New Me’ she believes, right? She’s changed, she’s stronger. Then she spent the first few chapters pointing out that people DON’T CHANGE! (Regarding Ross). *Bangs head into desk*
It drove me NUTS!
It was a huge, epic hypocritical thought process that I wanted to just walk away from the book. Yes, real people are really blind about their behavior vs. other people’s behavior. Yes, real people are judgy mcjudgy pants over what everyone else does. Yes, real people are hypocritical. I just don’t want it in my books unless it’s the villian or a mean girl or something. Also, Dena was a screaming… bad person that I absolutely hated. Seriously? She had all the makings of that annoying person you are stuck working with that you absolutely hate because she’s actually a jerk to you. Yet, someone calls her a ‘friend’? *bangs head into desk*
Don’t even get me started on her little brother. Rocks, seriously? And Dad does NOTHING?! Just a ‘talking to’. No grounding, no nothing. No wonder kids today run all over Walmart screaming and knocking things over and burning up an entire mountain in Montana (true story, btw) or bullying each other on Social Media. Hello, that could have KILLED Ross. *bangs head into desk*
However, with ARCs I give them more of a benefit of the doubt than books I’m buying or borrowing from the library for fun. So I stuck it out.
After the initial set up part of the book and it settled into Ross and Luna, the book actually got interesting and a LOT better, in my humble opinion. I was into it, I was involved, and I was rooting for them. The sex scenes were great!
So I finished the last half of the book in one read, now that I got into it. But then, I had NO idea what to rate it. 3 stars or 4 stars? Because the first half was crazy and all over the place, sometimes having Luna being hypocritical. It just didn’t do it for me. But the second half DID do it for me.
I did have to remind myself that this is probably my personal taste. People are crazy, illogical, emotional messes and do a LOT of stuff that doesn’t make a ton of sense to people. I know a guy who hates his father because of how they grew up when his father spend all the money drinking booze. Yet this same guy does the EXACT same thing and his kids really don’t like HIM either. It’s like, dude. Most people just are NOT self-aware. I don’t get it, but it is the truth. So perhaps the first part of the book was just a tad too realistic in people’s illogical thought processes and I didn’t like it.
So I settled on 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 stars simply because the second half really did make up for the first half.
So if you’re uncertain about continuing the book, I would definitely tough it out until the romance gets going. After that, it IS pretty dang great!
Jo Raven always seems to know it out of the park for me and No Saint is No Exception. I was a bit jaded on Ross at first, he was a menacing man that bullied and didn’t give a single care in the world to anything or anyone. HE even did the most damage to Luna and yet through it all she saw the best in him and pushed him to start seeing the better man inside himself. Luna is a super strong heroine in this book and I really appreciated that. She too has been broken and together her and Ross try and steer their way through all the blackness and into the light. Definitely an emotional story but dam steamy as well. You will get lost in the story and wont want to put the book down. Well done!! Excellent writing!! highly recommend!!
Big on angst, this enemies to lovers story will tug at your heart strings and make you full head over heels with the bad boy. Ross is a complicated mass of emotions that will bite if anyone gets near. Luna is like a moth to the flame, curious and empathetic to the broken man she now meets when retuning home after being driving away by his nasty actions.
The myriad of feelings felt, hits both characters with great force and their story proved to be captivating, emotional tug of war. I felt their pain, I could visualise their words and I was gripped from the first word until the last.
I love how Jo Raven has her men who are not all good and perfect her guys are tortured, souls who need the good thing in their lives which ends up being a good woman and in this one we have Ross the bully who is now the one being bullied and then he has Luna she was one of his bullying victims and then turns into the one person who Ross needs more than anyone else
WOW what a story. The author gave us the perfect mix of emotions with this one. I am not a fan of books that Bully as I don’t condone it at all, which of course Ross is. As I read along, I learned his actions were a direct result of his upbring. But still I had little empathy for him. But when the one girl that he troubled the most, could see some good in him, I knew I was missing something. Boy was I right. This was not an easy story for me to read, as the main characters were so broken and troubled I worried if there was any light at the end of the tunnel. As Luna becomes Ross’s strength, she not only helped to carry his burden, she helped me see the light. This is an amazing read. Luna’s strength and love for Ross and his determination to be a better person touched me very deeply.
Kudos to the author for giving us an outstanding read. I highly recommend grabbing up No Saint, which by the way is so appropriately named because trust me Ross is No Saint, ASAP. It a heartwarming, heartbreaking, gut wrenching read, but So worth it. 2 Thumbs Up and 5 Stars.
Wow! The author done a fabulous job with this one. The details and emotions she used were amazing. No Saint is a dark and heart wrenching story this will pull at every single one of your heartstrings.
He and his friends bullied Luna in high school. He had his reasons and even he knows they were stupid and not an excuse and didn’t make what he did right. She left town because of her bullies only to return three years later to find out so much has changed, the biggest one being that Ross is now the bullied and he has almost given up. When things take a turn for the worst she goes against her better judgement and decides to help him. One thing leads to another and trust and forgiveness aren’t as hard once he starts letting his walls down and opening up to her. Luna will not give up on the broken boy without reason and when something bad happens she proves herself to him by being the one that won’t give up on him without a fight.
A dark yet beautiful bully to lovers romance.
Jo has done it again with another Heartbreaking, Angst filled emotional Love story.
Wow, what a roller coaster of a ride NO SAINT took me on,
So Many emotions were felt during this read. My heart broke so many times but Jo mended it every time.
Ross was a someone I loved to hate in previous books, he was a bully that took pleasure in humiliating others. He wanted Luna but needed for anyone in his path to feel the mental or physical agony he lived with on a daily basis and it gave him Pleasure to see others suffer like he did.
Of course no one knew this while he was growing up but years down the track when school has ended and people’s lives went on he was alone in every sense of the word – in so many ways, both mentally and physically.
The one person who was continuously bullied by Ross and his cohorts was Luna she however after years away from the town she grew up in has moved back home and Ross immediately noticed her return.
Ross opens up to Luna
slowly and finds himself drawn to her, wanting to change and be a better person even when it seems the whole town wants to destroy him and Luna is there to help him, comfort him and help him
Heal when no one else has ever cared before.Ross doesn’t know how to react to this…
We learn about Ross’s history- growing up with a horrible Father, his daily torture his father put him
Through and I began to not only like Ross but understand where all his anger came from. Ross was a creation of his fathers doing, there was no option in order for him to survive but with his father locked away in Prison Ross begins to feel and his emotions thaw enough to realise he loves Luna and will do anything to have a future with her in it.
Luna is an incredible, strong, forgiving woman who never gives up on Ross. She chips away layer by layer finally revealing the “true Ross” that only she has seen. Questions are continually asked and even though Ross doesn’t want to answer she doesn’t give up. Doesn’t walk away. When Ross releases his defences I swear I whimpered. What a beautiful heartbreaking love story.
A Brilliant read , anyone that can make me love Ross should be given 5 stars!! Absolutely Loved this read. It has ALL the feels, if you love Angst and Emotion then you need to Read this book!
#BloodAndPain
Amount of sex – 3.5 / 5
How explicit are the sex scenes – 4 / 5
Story – 5 / 5
Overall: – 5 / 5
WOW!
I am in complete awe right now, and I’m trying to figure out how No Saint is the first book that I’ve read from author Jo Raven. Seriously! This book rocked, and let me tell you, I ignored everything that I needed to do. I even stayed up way too late and finished it in a day, and it was worth every yawn the following day!
No Saint tells the story of Ross and Luna, and I loved every minute of it. I have read that Ross is the half brother of Merc, Octavia, and Gigi, who are from the author’s Wild Men series. I’m not sure if it’s a benefit or not that I had no prior knowledge of Ross. I didn’t have any negative emotions coming into the story, and I’m aware that those that have read her other stories may have. Ross definitely was damaged in many ways and I think the title was incredibly fitting for him. I also understood Luna and felt for her. I have been in her situation in more than one way, so I know how she felt.
The road to ‘happily ever after’ is not always paved in gold, and it’s sometimes not paved at all. This definitely was the case for Ross and Luna. Their road was, at times, painful, rough, and rocky, but it also was beautiful and definitely steamy!
No Saint is truly unforgettable, and one of my favorite books for 2019!
Voluntarily Reviewed an Advanced Copy!