Title: Uppercut Princess (The Heights Crew Book #1)
Author: E.M. Moore
Release Date: February 19, 2020
★★★★½
**Kindle Unlimited
Vengeance is NOT my middle name.
It’s in my blood.
It’s tattooed on my skin.
It’s with me 24/7. The thing that drives me.
It’s also what brings me to Rawley Heights. No one would willingly come here otherwise. But me? I don’t have a choice.
Here, everyone fears the Heights Crew. They’re not just some small-town gang, they’re the real deal. Crime. Sex. Murder. Angry, self-obsessed dudes with bad attitudes.
And they’re exactly who I need to get my vengeance from.
I have my work cut out for me—especially where Bat, Brawler, and Magnum are concerned—but don’t worry, they have no idea who they’re dealing with.
I’m counting on it.
I have to admit, I went through a period about a year ago when I was hammering through dark high school reverse harem books because there was something delicious about them, but ultimately I sort of fell out of that rabbit hole for two reasons. The first was that they were literally all the same premise and execution with only the slightest differences and the second was that the relationships seemed to get more and more boring and unbelievable to me. In fact, I recently rage quit a really well reviewed book because the relationship dynamic was so asinine. Honestly, if I had realized that this was going to be a RH, I probably wouldn't have read it... but I'm so absolutely glad that I did. I've never read an E.M. Moore book before, but I'm definitely already planning on picking up some more.
SO. The main character in this book is Kyla (not her real name, but we never learn her real name in the course of the book) and she.is.a.bad.ass. The book opens with the scene that acts as the turning point in Kyla's life and pushes her in the direction that she's going but then jumps back two days to give some context. I think this was actually really brilliant, because rather than giving the reader a taste for the end, this opening gives us a taste of a really significant moment early in the story to really draw you in, but then jumps back only enough to really explain the why and how that brought us to that scene.
Kyla has just moved to Rawley Heights, a fairly rough, low income town (I think it's a town? Could be a neighborhood...) that tends to be run by a gang called the Heights Crew, whose influence runs deep. Her entire purpose for moving there and enrolling in the local high school is to make her way into the Crew and exact vengeance for her parents' murders and she is pretty singularly focused on her mission.
The thing that I absolutely love about Kyla is that she's dark, but also human. I often find that characters that are intended to be like Kyla end up being really one dimensional, constantly making stupid decisions and acting against their own best interest. Honestly, I like a "strong", bitchy, stupid female lead about as much as I like a twirly mustache villan - which is to say, not at all. Kyla, though her quest for revenge is incredibly dangerous and (some might say) not a particularly smart decision, consistently measures her behavior and makes choices like she's playing chess. On the surface, and to a lot of the other characters, her choices seem like they're the wrong ones, but they're always in service of her ultimate goal.
For me, where a lot of RH romances fall apart is in the male characters, but this book really shined in that department. There are basically four main guys in her orbit, though I feel like there are only three that she's going to ultimately end up with. (Pure speculation.) The thing that really glows to me about all of them is how human they feel and how organic and unique each of the relationships feel. Though my absolute favorite is Brawler, who feels so incredibly human and whose conflict is so adeptly put to the page (and who is also pretty damn swoony), I think the build of Kyla's relationships with him, Oscar and Magnum all build and grow really, really well. There is instant attraction in some cases, certainly, but as a reader we really get to watch them get closer and build on that attraction with connection and chemistry at a pace that makes sense for each pairing. So well done.
The fourth guy in Kyla's life is Johnny and... Johnny is an ass. But what's really interesting about Johnny as a character is that even when he's an ass, it feels human and I can see why he's doing the things he's doing. I can see that there's probably going to be some redemption for him in the next book, we've already seen him be a little bit more vulnerable and less of an ass in little snippets, and I'm curious to see where his arc goes. He's definitely not my favorite and I think I would actually prefer to see him not be redeemed in the end, I find myself trusting the author quite a lot on where she's going to go with this story.
I actually really can't wait for the next book in this series and I'm looking forward to reading it.
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