ARC Review: Dirty by Belle Aurora

Book Title: Dirty
Author: Belle Aurora
Series: Raw Family #2
Release Date: October 31th, 2016
Genres: Dark Romance

My marriage seemed perfect from the outside looking in.

People envied me. They wanted my life, wanted to be me.

Mrs Alejandra Gambino.

Wife of Dino Gambino. Daughter of Eduardo Castillo.

Respected. Loved. Mob royalty.

They had no idea of the horrors that lurked behind closed doors.

They didn't know I was at the lowest point a person could reach.

Enter Julius Carter.

Aloof, handsome, blue-eyed Julius Carter.

He saved me.

I screwed him over.

Now everybody was after me. My life was forfeit.

It was only a matter of time. I was a dead woman walking.

The question was, who would get to me first?

I ventured into reading DIRTY knowing it had been almost three full years since I'd read its predecessor, RAW. My old lady memory sucks on a good day so it was a crap shoot if I'd remember the intricate details regarding Twitch and the background story of this series. That being said, I did fine but in hindsight, I'd recommend a re-read of RAW unless your memory is crystal clear of that first book. Yes, DIRTY focuses on Twitch's partner in crime, Julius, but many of the characters in RAW, as well as backstory into mob families, are helpful to recall.

All that aside, I LOVED this book. Not quite as much as RAW but that's a tough one to beat. Here we get an anti-hero that is contracted to do "police-like" dirty work for mobsters and a heroine, that, on the surface, looks like she deserves to be off'ed but when the backstory of Alejandra comes out, Julius, for once, has to choose between mob business and personal bias...and just plain doing what's right or wrong.

DIRTY is action-packed and unpredictable. It's raw and gritty with a side of sweetness to soften the blow that is all things mob underground violence. We got to see characters I fell for in Raw not in little snippets, but an active role within this story. This book most certainly CANNOT be read as a standalone. It's also safe to disclose that with mob underground violence, there's likely triggers in this book for some people. It goes with the genre...

Looking forward to the last installment in the Raw Family series. Hopefully we won't wait three years for that book because I need it yesterday! (This book does not end in a cliffy but you'll surely yearn for the last book.)

Advanced review copy received by the author in exchange for my honest review.

Belle Aurora is twenty-something-years-old and was born in the land down under. 
At an early age she fell in love with reading. Boredom one summer had her scouring the bookshelves at home. She stumbled across Sandra Brown’s Breath of Scandal and fell in love with romance.

Having been brought up in a loud and boisterous family of Croatian descent, she developed a natural love for dramatics and humor. Only some years ago had she discovered a new love. 
Humorous romance novels.

Kristen Ashley and R.L. Mathewson had opened a brand new world where she could lose herself yet feel safe and at home in their stories. Belle has been known to become a screeching banshee while anxiously awaiting their newest titles.

Belle never thought she would write. It had never interested her until recently. Friend-Zoned began to form and in February this year Belle typed the words Chapter One. And she fell in love.
With words.
With writing.
With a creative imagination she never knew she harbored.