The Curvy Bookworm

Ready or Not by Sheridan Anne: Book Review

Author: Sheridan Anne
Series: Hide and Seek Duet, Book Two
Genre: Dark romance and romantic suspense
My rating: ★★★½☆
Spice level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

I started Ready or Not immediately after finishing Hide and Seek.

Considering how much the first book hooked me, there was no way I was going to leave that ending sitting there while the second instalment was already available.

I enjoyed this book, and I am glad I read it as the conclusion to the duet. However, it did not work quite as well for me as the first.

Major spoilers ahead

This review reveals the truth about Harper’s stalker and discusses major events from both books.

Continue at your own risk.

When the imagined stalker becomes real

In Hide and Seek, the stalker Harper believes she is seeing is initially a product of her imagination.

She begins seeing a therapist, who writes down the details of everything Harper thinks she has experienced. At the end of the first book, Elias steals those private therapy notes and uses them as a blueprint, turning Harper’s imagined stalker into a very real threat.

That is such a disturbing idea.

Elias does not simply decide to start stalking her. He studies her deepest fears and deliberately recreates them, knowing that Harper may question whether any of it is actually happening.

He knows what she has seen, what she fears and how easily the people around her might dismiss her. It is an incredibly calculated way to frighten and destabilise someone.

Unfortunately, once the stalker became real, I did feel that some of the uncertainty that made the first book so addictive disappeared. In Hide and Seek, I genuinely did not know whether Harper was in danger or whether everything was happening inside her imagination.

In this book, we know Elias is real and dangerous. The mystery becomes less about what is happening and more about when he will strike again.

Her mother is truly awful

Harper’s mother was already frustrating in the first book, but Ready or Not reveals just how terrible she really is.

She effectively hands her daughter over to a man who wants to sexually assault her.

God, what a sick woman.

In the first book, I found the relationship between Harper and her mother strange, uncomfortable and slightly annoying. I could not understand why her mother acted the way she did or why she was so unwilling to support her own daughter.

Now, I understand that the difficult relationship was building towards something much darker.

Her earlier behaviour was not simply thoughtless parenting. It was part of a much bigger betrayal, and the truth made me dislike her even more.

My thoughts

The main problem I had with Ready or Not was that Harper repeatedly walked into situations that were very obviously going to end badly.

At times, it reminded me of a badly filmed horror movie.

You know the scene. A young woman hears a strange noise coming from the basement, decides to investigate in her underwear and then everyone watching starts shouting at the screen because she is clearly making the worst possible decision.

Harper does not die, but she does keep walking into traps and getting hurt.

After everything she experienced in the first book, and once she knew that someone was actively targeting her, I found it difficult to believe that she would continue putting herself in danger so easily.

There is being brave, and then there is repeatedly making decisions that seem specifically designed to help the villain.

Where was the surveillance?

Knight knows there is a dangerous man out there.

He places Harper under surveillance and has members of his SWAT team watching her, which should make her one of the most protected people around.

And yet Elias still seems able to get away with almost anything.

He hurts people, kills people and repeatedly manages to get close enough to Harper to cause serious damage. Somehow, the surveillance never seems to stop him when it actually matters.

I understand that Elias needs to remain dangerous for the story to continue, but the security setup made his continued access to Harper feel increasingly unrealistic.

Knight and his team are meant to be highly trained, yet Elias still finds ways around them far too easily.

Either the surveillance was not particularly effective, or Elias had an almost supernatural ability to appear wherever the plot needed him.

Harper never seemed truly frightened

Another thing that surprised me was Harper’s emotional response to everything happening around her.

Elias has taken the fears she once believed were imaginary and made them real. He is stalking her, hurting people and killing anyone who gets in his way.

Yet I never really felt that Harper was terrified.

Most of the time, she appeared more angry or irritated than genuinely frightened.

There is nothing wrong with writing a heroine who refuses to crumble under pressure. Harper is confident, stubborn and determined, and those qualities are a major part of her character.

However, given what Elias was doing, I expected a little more fear or vulnerability.

Her lack of terror sometimes made the threat feel less intense than it should have. If Harper did not seem particularly scared, it became harder for me to feel the full danger of the situation on her behalf.

The romance and spice

The relationship between Harper and Knight remains central to the story, and the book fully commits to the dark, possessive dynamic established in Hide and Seek.

There are plenty of explicit scenes, kinky moments and strong “touch her and die” energy.

Knight is fiercely protective of Harper, even though his ability to actually keep her safe is occasionally questionable.

The step-uncle and step-niece dynamic still did not add much for me personally. I understand that it creates forced proximity and makes their relationship feel more forbidden, but I still think the story could have worked without the family connection.

That said, readers who enjoy taboo relationships and highly possessive love interests will probably find plenty to like.

The supporting characters

The loyal friendships remain one of the more enjoyable parts of the duet.

Harper has people around her who genuinely care about her, and those relationships help stop the story from becoming entirely focused on the romance and Elias.

I also appreciated seeing her brother finally understand what was happening and stand up for her.

After being so frustrated by Harper’s family in the first book, it was satisfying to see someone finally recognise how badly she had been treated.

Was it as good as Hide and Seek?

For me, no.

Hide and Seek had a stronger sense of mystery because I genuinely did not know whether Harper’s stalker was real or imagined. That uncertainty kept me reading late into the night.

The reveal that Elias had stolen Harper’s therapy notes and used them to make her imagined stalker real was genuinely disturbing. It was a clever way to connect the two books and turn her private fears against her.

However, once the truth was revealed, some of the tension disappeared.

The story became more focused on waiting for Elias to attack again, while Harper continued walking into obvious traps and the supposedly extensive surveillance repeatedly failed to stop him.

I still needed to know how everything would end, but I was not as hooked as I had been during the first book.

Would I recommend the duet?

Yes, with a few conditions.

I would recommend the duet to readers who enjoy:

It is not a series for anyone looking for a realistic police investigation, a healthy central relationship or characters who always make sensible decisions.

My final verdict

I enjoyed Ready or Not, but it did not quite live up to the first book.

The idea of Elias stealing Harper’s private therapy notes and using them to bring her imagined stalker to life was twisted and genuinely sinister. The revelation about her mother also made their difficult relationship in the first book finally make sense, although it confirmed that she was even more awful than I had thought.

However, Harper’s repeated habit of walking into traps, combined with the surprisingly ineffective surveillance around her, became frustrating. I also struggled to feel the full danger because Harper rarely seemed genuinely terrified by what was happening.

Did I enjoy it? Yes.

Am I glad I read it as the second half of the duet? Also yes.

Will I reread the series? No.

Would I give Sheridan Anne another chance when I come across one of her other books? Probably.

Would I recommend the duet? Yes, particularly to readers who enjoy taboo romance, kinky sex scenes, loyal friendships and extremely possessive men.

My verdict: A dark and spicy conclusion with a genuinely twisted premise, even if its heroine repeatedly leaves her survival instincts at home.

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