Genre: Sci-Fi, Romance
LGBTQ+ Category: Gay
Reviewer: Linda
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About The Book
Hades is a Slave King, one of the most powerful and wealthy beings in the galaxy. But all he wants is to be left alone with machine servants and his collection of broken robots. So what makes him purchase a flawed vat-grown human slave boy?
Doll, one of the most beautiful of the manufactured Botticelli pleasure slaves, is imperfect. He was pulled from his tank missing his right foot. Not only that, something must be wrong with his brain, because though he was bred to want pleasure, he finds himself filled with a different sort of longing no slave should have. He wants to be loved.
Doll is way outside Hades’ preference for company and sexual release. But when Doll imprints on Hades and falls in love with him, he yearns to find a way to become more to Hades than just another item in a vast and priceless hoard.
Contains: an uncanny pairing, pleasure slaves, age gap, first time, high heat, broken supertoys, and a robot god. Guaranteed HEA.
The Review
Doll, a pleasure slave, finds himself at an auction hoping to be bought because he is imperfect. Doll was grown in a vat – not a robot but a clone – and he was born with a missing foot. Although beautiful to look at. which is how he got his name. who would pay for a pleasure slave with a prosthetic foot? If he’s not bought, he will be dismantled and nothing will remain of him.
At the auction, he and the other pleasure slaves are treated like animals – one man after another touched and prodded – until Doll has enough and finally does the unthinkable – spits at his captors.
Suddenly, his chances of being bought are all but dead. Ready to be removed from the auction, he hears a voice stating that he has been bought by a Slave King. Slave Kings are immortal and believed to be gods, and the Slave King that just bought Doll is one of the wealthiest of them all.
Doll is only two weeks old; he was taught everything his creator wanted him to know. His memories are not his own, but implanted into his brain. Unlike the other pleasure slaves, he dreams of freedom – having a family and being loved. Of course, none of his dreams are destined to come true.
Hades is known for buying humans, and Doll is as close to human as you can get, but for some reason Doll’s imperfection and his act of defiance drew Hades to him.
Thrilled to be bought, and by someone Doll feels connected to, he learns the rules: he is always to be naked, he is to sleep on the couch in Hades’ bedroom, and Hades has no desire to have sex with him but only with his robots. We do discover in time why he doesn’t want to be with a human, and although it makes perfect sense it’s also sad.
Hades sees to it that all of Doll’s needs are met. He is fed, allowed to walk the grounds and the mansion, but his life there is empty because there is no touching, by him or by Hades. A vat-born human like Doll can live up to 200 years, and it will no doubt be a very lonely time. I won’t discuss what ultimately happens between Doll and Hades in this review.
Suffice it to say that this book is beautifully written, and Hades and Doll are amazing characters I can’t help but love.
This story is so unique – a Slave King who only wants to be with robots and a pleasure slave who only wants to be loved, brought together. I did not put it down until I’d read the last word. I highly recommend this book, and am glad that I got to read it.
Five stars.
The Reviewer
I am an avid reader the mother of 3 sons and grandmother to seven grandchildren. Since retiring I have been doing more reading while volunteering as a CASA worker. CASA is an organization that works with the family court system to ensure that children are in the best living situation. There are way too many children that get overlooked in the foster care system and I visit homes and make visits to the parents. I was born and raised in New York and my husband of 50 years and I live in Upstate New York.