My rating: 2 of 5 stars
I really haven’t enjoyed Iced nearly as much as I enjoyed others in this series. First, I have to say having read the book and listened to it on audible Natalie Ross as a reader absolutely drives me nuts when she tries to do an accent that is anything other than an American dialect. Dani is supposed to be Irish, born and raised….but Ms. Ross gives her an accent that is unrecognizable, somewhere between Aussie/Irish/English…whatever it is, it’s definitely not a good Irish accent but it is distracting to listen to. Phil Gigante on the other hand does do better at accents for the male characters.
To the story itself, I hate to say it but this one really could have been left out of the series entirely. It’s not so much that I think the story is a bad one per say (honestly, I’d give it 2.5 stars but the 2 star rating here says “It’s ok” and that’s truthful for me) but I do find a story based on a 14 year old obnoxious teenager’s perspective to be an annoying one and well, dude at times….boring. I kept getting distracted from the story dude. I mean, dude! Really…how many times can one person say Dude!? Yes, I know teenagers (one of which Dani is) do say things like “like” and “dude” very frequently but that doesn’t mean it translates well in written form or audible form continually. Seriously, for me it was right up there with Anastasia’s “Oh my!” from Fifty Shades of Grey. Find something else to say that still maintains the characters personality and conveys their feeling…I promise there are other creative ways to do this!
In my view Dani should have stayed a support character, she’s great as a support character but not quite strong enough for her own stand alone book in this series. At least, not without a serious ick factor with two grown men finding this 14 year old girl attractive. Granted, these men do talk about waiting for her but as a mom myself I just found that creepy. I mean DUDE, she’s barely a teenager…ewwwww!
I’m just glad to see the next in the series is back to Mac.