As You Wish Reviews: AWAY FROM THE DARK (THE LIGHT #2) By Aleatha Romig Release Date: October 18, 2016 Women are disappearing. What is happening when they step into The Light?

AWAY FROM THE DARK (THE LIGHT #2)

By Aleatha Romig

Release Date: October 18, 2016

Women are disappearing. What is happening when they step into The Light?

Women are disappearing. What is happening when they step into The Light? Nine months ago, Sara Adams awoke with no memory. The man holding her hand told her she's a member of The Light, a tight-knit religious group led by the terrifying and charismatic Father Gabriel. As a woman in the community of The Light, her duty is to be unquestionably obedient and to submit to the will of her husband. But as Sara's memory starts to return and she remembers her past, she sees that everything she's been told is a lie. The Light is an insidious and dangerous organization, and its corrupting influence reaches well beyond the confines of the remote campus where Sara is being held. With everything at stake, Sara struggles to sort out her true memories from her indoctrination. The desire to escape consumes her, but who can she trust? And what other followers of The Light were forced into this life, brainwashed to believe they belonged? The more she remembers, the mort it becomes clear that Jacob, the man who calls himself her husband, is keeping shattering secrets of his own. But Sara cannot flee alone, leaving innocents behind. She must fight to extinguish The Light.

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Sara

Shrill screams echoed throughout our dimly lit bedroom, accelerating my heartbeat and pulling me from the terrible nightmare. I waited for more, until the realization struck. The screams were my own. “Jacob?” I called, my voice shaking with dread as I reached for my husband. Instead of reassurance, my fingers met cold empty sheets. He was gone—still away at another campus. What just happened? Was it a dream? I clung to the covers as I puffed my cheeks and slowly exhaled. While each breath helped to still the chaos, the exercise wasn’t enough. Who am I? Who is he? Jacob’s questions from months ago came back. They were my security. They’d worked before. I am Sara Adams and my husband is Jacob Adams. Pushing the images from my dream, or nightmare, away, I imagined Jacob’s comforting embrace. Slowly I threw back the down comforter and willed the cool air to soothe my perspiration-drenched skin. From the way my heart galloped in my chest, I might have been running a marathon, not sleeping. In my sleep I’d been battling to escape a vehicle, and then an explosion of heat. It had been a dream, I reassured myself—a nightmare. The accident I’d had, nearly nine months before, had been different. I couldn’t remember it, but I’d been told that I’d been injured and gone unconscious. In the nightmare I had been out and away from the wreckage. I shook my head. It seemed so real. In my dream I hadn’t been able to see past the darkness, yet I’d known I wasn’t injured. My arms surrounded my midsection as the memories replayed like pictures in my mind. Someone was hurting me—purposely harming me, and there was a voice—a deep voice. Jacob’s voice? No. He wouldn’t hurt me. My entire body shuddered as goose bumps peppered my skin. Sitting upright, I reached for the bedside lamp. With trembling fingers I turned the knob and my eyes adjusted as the soft light combined with the sun’s perpetual summer glow. I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on Jacob’s questions. Who am I? Who is he? This time I said the words aloud, praying that if I spoke the truth, the images would disappear. “I am Sara Adams. He is my husband, Jacob Adams.” I pulled myself from the bed and walked to the bathroom. Turning on the light and the faucet, I cupped the cool water and splashed my face. As I reached for the cup and began to fill it, a metaphoric dam that had been constructed to hold back my past burst. My mind was flooded—no longer with simple images, but with scene after scene. For the first time since I could recall, I knew the woman in the mirror.

I knew me.

This book picks up right at the point Into The Light left off. Jacob is frantic looking for Sarah and hoping to find her before the members of The Light find out she has escaped.

How to write a review without giving anything away? Well, for starters, if you have not read Into The Light, STOP READING THIS REVIEW! To continue would be like going to the back of the book and reading the ending before you read the book.

Now that this is settled, let's see... Well, now we know Jacob is one of the good guys. He has truly fallen in love with Sarah and fears for her life. Three years of work is about to go down the drain unless he is able to stop Sarah before his unit is ready to move in on The Light.

Catching up with Sarah, Jacob is able to re-establish some sort of a relationship with her. Now it is up to her to decide whether she wants totally out or if she is willing to stay and fight to save those who are still under the control of The Light. It takes a courageous person to stay knowing what The Light will do to her if they ever find out she left and came back to fight them.

All Sarah (Stella) had wanted was to go back to her normal life and reach out to Dylan. Dylan being a policeman would be able to set everything straight. Her parents for one need to know she is alive and well. Surely they must be going out of their minds with grief.

This book is like riding the express train to the end of the line. This complex and gripping plotline keeps moving and twisting while you keep hoping this train is on cruise control with good brakes. Danger does lurk around every corner. Sarah(Stella) and Jacob MUST play their roles to perfection because not only their lives are at stake, but also the lives of over 1000 members. If the hierarchy of The Light gets an inkling of what is really going on, they will activate their plan to destroy all clues they exist, including its members.

Just like every other series by this author, you are left to wonder what will happen next. Even at the end, you will still want more. Amazingly creative story of a cult clawing its way in the Shadows of Society, looking to take over everything within its reach.

Book 1: Into the Light

An investigator’s search for a friend draws her into a world darker than she could have imagined.

Sara Adams awakes bling, unable to remember the most basic details of her life, but her darkness seems a blessing when she discovers the terrors of The Light.

Stella Montgomery investigates the news on the mean streets of Detroit, where she’s noticed a disturbing trend: young women are vanishing. When her best friend disappears, Stella investigates—despite warnings from her police detective boyfriend—following a twisted trail that leads her through the city’s most dangerous and forsaken precincts. There she uncovers something more sinister than she could have imagined: a shadowy organization known as The Light, led by the enigmatic Father Gabriel.

As Sara struggles to understand her place in these strange world she’s awakened to—an oppressive cult demanding unquestioning obedience—and her feelings for Jacob, the husband she can’t recall and whose harsh and tender attentions confuse and beguile her, Stella risks all to discover the truth. But enlightenment always comes with a price…

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Aleatha Romig is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author who lives in Indiana. She grew up in Mishawaka, graduated from Indiana University, and is currently living south of Indianapolis. Aleatha has raise three children with her high school sweetheart and husband or nearly thirty years. Before she became a full-time author, she worked days as a dental hygienist and spent her nights writing. Now, when she’s not imagining mind-blowing twists and turns, she likes to spend her time with her family and friends. Her other pastimes include reading and creating heroes/anti-heroes who haunt your dreams!

Aleatha released her first novel, CONSEQUENCES, in August 2011. CONSEQUENCES became a bestselling series with five novels and two companions released from 2011 through 2015. The compelling and epic story of Anthony and Claire Rawlings has graced more than half a million e-readers. Aleatha released the first of her series TALES FROM THE DARK SIDE, INSIDIOUS, in the fall of 2014. The standalone thrillers continue Aleatha’s twisted style with an increase in heat.

In the fall of 2015, Aleatha moved head first into the world of dark romance with the release of BETRAYAL, the first of her five novel INFIDELITY series. She also began her traditional publishing career with Thomas and Mercer. Her books INTO THE LIGHT and AWAY FROM THE DARK will be published through this mystery/thriller publisher in 2016.

Aleatha is a “Published Author’s Network” member of the Romance Writers of America and represented by Danielle Egan-Miller of Browne & Miller Literary Associates.