Don't judge a book by it's cover!I read this after seeing a friends review on Good Reads. and WOW did it not dissapoint. I read this in under 24 hours I was that hooked. The premise is new and an interesting take on the typical BDSM relationship, where it is all legalised and controlled. Gavin and Sam's dynamic was interesting and it took me some time to get my head around it. Then you bring in Alex who Gavin is training and more characters are brought into play. Some of them I would LOVE to hear more from, such as Demetri and certainly more about Sam too.Not sure if there will be more from these characters, but I would certainly buy it if there was. This book has appealing characters, and the alternate universe of contracted slaves is not something I've read before. If BDSM is your thing, I think the story will be hit the right buttons, though the slave structure takes away a bit of the consensual part of SSC. My main objection to the story is that I felt like I couldn't connect to Alex as much as I would have liked. I understood and sympathized with Gavin's struggle, and understood Alex's frustration with how that affected their training relationship, but it wasn't until near the end of the story that it affected me emotionally.Alex came across a bit one dimensional to me - he was after one thing, and was painted almost as a Marty Sue of submissives. I would have liked to experience more doubts and hesitation, feelings of boundaries being pushed, than I felt with him. It would have helped me connect to him more if we had seen more reaction to the specific people he was considering, rather than just a laser focus on the role. Gavin was probably my favorite character, but I did appreciate the group of secondary characters developed by the author - Sam, Dimitri, Noah, even Brian and Rhys added contrast and interest.
