The King
This book is the story of how Kingsley started The Eighth Circle. It also (to me) is the story of Sam, his very trusted assistant. The story starts 11 years after the last time Kingsley and Søren see each other as they leave St. Ignatius. Søren had tracked Kingsley down to find him wounded from his time with the French Foreign Legion, and in essence, gives Kingsley his fortune as he has decided to become a priest. Kingsley is suffering from a bit of PTSD, as well as emotions from feeling he was left by Søren. He owns a strip club called The Mobius, which has a secret back entrance for those who want "more" with regard to their alternate lifestyles.
Søren appears again, needing Kingsley help with a certain 15 year old female who has gotten herself into some trouble (Nora). Thus the two rebuild their relationship, and Kingsley comes to realize that he was meant to start and "reign" over a specific kind of club that meets the meets of specific types of people. He hires Sam, who was working as a bartender at The Mobius, to be his personal assistant. Kingsley decides he must buy what was an old hotel - which is currently owned by a religious group that is picketing the strip club, and which also owns camps designed to (in a nutshell) turn gay teens straight. Sam was sent to this camp when she was a teenager and was left with emotional and physical scars.
First, as a reader of these stories, you should know that Nora is a peripheral character in this book. She appears once, but is mentioned throughout. This is all Kingsley's story. His struggles with being harmed while serving the French Foreign Legion, his losses of his parents, his sister... of Søren. His passion to help those like him.
I enjoyed this book on so many levels. I loved learning more about Kingsley. I loved and adored Sam as much as Kingsley did (I wish we would get a book about Sam at some point). You also meet some other characters who either have or have not appeared in the other books; they are the people he chooses as he builds what will become The Eighth Circle - female dominants. Bouncer. Male submissive. All the while keeping his secret of being a switch.
Tiffany Reisz's writing and how she lays out each scene, all the dialogue, never ceases to move me. I feel very much like I know each and every one of these people; that they are a part of my life. They are my friends. I care about them and what happens to them. And how they live their lives, unapologetically, is inspiring.
This story has it all. Very hot sex scenes. Emotional scenes. Getting inside of Kingsley. Seeing how his mind worked and how passionately he feels about getting this club open. How passionately he feels about people such as the religious group depicted in this story - of which there are still plenty out there of.
This is, of course, a must read for Tiffany Reisz fans. And if you are not a reader of her books, then you simply MUST start. Required erotica reading; however, these books go beyond titillating sex scenes. They move you and they make you think.
