REVIEW: Fighting for Everything by Laura Kaye

Fighting for Everything by Laura Kaye was a knockout first book in her Warrior Fight Club series. It was a story that paired two of my favorite tropes: wounded warrior and friends to lovers, and it was also filled with the raw, honest range of emotions that I have come to crave and expect in Kaye’s work.

“I’m so goddamned angry. All the time. It feels like I could tear the world to pieces. And I want to.” He whirled on her. “Because the perfection of everything around me makes me feel so much more wrecked inside that I can barely breathe.”

I will caution that Noah’s journey might be a bit too gritty and realistic for some sensitive readers. The former Marine had to face down his new limitations after being severely hurt in an explosion (he was deaf and blind on his left side, plus some other issues) but it was the PTSD that was truly heartbreaking to watch Noah suffer through. I thought Kaye did a fantastic job with how she portrayed our hero. And with how his best friend since childhood, Kristina, had his back through it all–if only Noah would have let her help him earlier in the process. But even the way he retreated in on himself and pushed away his loved ones seemed all too real in his situation. Something I think most people could relate to easily.

‘He wasn’t the old Noah, he was totally new. Scars and all, she loved him even more for all he’d gone through to come back to himself, back to her.’

Kristina and Noah’s relationship was as complicated as it was important to them both. I got the sense that they had never really thought too far ahead about how that simmer of attraction between them might’ve worked out if they had pursued it before Noah went into the Marines. And it felt right that after they both had some time away from each other–and gained some life experience–that things might change and grow between them. Kristina was a lovely, loyal and fun heroine who I thought had a lot of courage for stepping up to Noah when he was pushing her away. It broke my heart when things got tough between them, but I loved how everything worked out in the end for the couple.

“I love you and you own me, Kristina. You own every part of me. Everything I am or will be. *Everything* is yours.”
“Then that’s all I’ll ever need. Because you’re everything I’ve ever wanted. And I will fight this fight with you. Always.”

Laura Kaye knows how to put her characters through their paces and that was doubly true in Fighting for Everything. I can’t wait to see more about the people Noah met in the Warrior Fight Club and to find out where this series will take us readers. I have a feeling it will be an exciting ride!

Book Info:

Publication: Published May 22nd 2018 | Self Pub: Laura Kaye | Warrior Fight Club #1

Loving her is the biggest fight of his life…

Home from the Marines, Noah Cortez has a secret he doesn’t want his oldest friend, Kristina Moore, to know. It kills him to push her away, especially when he’s noticing just how sexy and confident she’s become in his absence. But, angry and full of fight, he’s not the same man anymore either. Which is why Warrior Fight Club sounds so good.

Kristina loves teaching, but she wants more out of life. She wants Noah—the boy she’s crushed on and waited for. Except Noah is all man now—in ways both oh so good and troubling, too. Still, she wants who he’s become—every war-hardened inch. And when they finally stop fighting their attraction, it’s everything Kristina never dared hope for.

But Noah is secretly spiraling, and when he lashes out, it threatens what he and Kristina have found. The brotherhood of the fight club helps him confront his demons, but only Noah can convince the woman he loves that he’s finally ready to fight for everything.