Den of Vipers Book Review

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Today I am finally doing a Den of Vipers book review. Back in May I finally decided to read Den of Vipers after a few months of being on the fence on if I was going to give it a read or not. Let’s just say K.A. Knight made me question my sanity a little bit with this book.

“Sometimes you don’t need to find a hero, it’s enough to find someone who will stand with you in the dark and not be afraid of blood and death. No, sometimes you don’t need a hero…you need a criminal, a villain.”

K.A. Knight, Den of Vipers

Den of Vipers is a dark romance reverse harem about villains who get the girl. There are a lot of triggers in this book. Violence, dark kinks, and sexually explicit scenes are throughout this entire book so if that’s not your thing I would steer clear

Trigger Warnings

Since we don’t always get trigger warnings on books I like to give trigger warnings in my reviews. This can help people avoid certain triggers that could hurt their mental well being.

Possible Triggers in this book are:

• Alcohol
• Blood
• Cancer (mentioned)
• Car Accident
• Child Abuse (past)
• Death
• Drugs (none of the main characters)
• Fire
• Gun Violence
• Kidnapping
• Murder
• Needles
• Physical Abuse (past)
• Profanity
• Sexually Explicit Scenes
• Snakes (Imagery)
• Torture
• Violence

For a list of the triggers I look for you can check out this link here. This may or may not be a complete list of triggers for this book, I do my best to make sure I mark anything that could be a potential trigger but I may accidentally miss triggers.

Den of Vipers Synopsis

When Roxy’s father can’t pay a debt he offers up his daughter to the Vipers to pay off his debt. The Vipers kidnap Roxy from her bar and lock her in their penthouse. She might be owned by them but she’s determined to make them wish they never took her.

K.A. Knight gives us a dark reverse harem that might leave you questioning a few things about yourself and might leave you with a new kink or two. However, she has given us some amazing characters, with complex pasts who are villains you’ll likely fall in love with.

Den of Vipers Reading Experience

I personally enjoyed reading Den of Vipers. I noticed a few reviews in which people didn’t know what the plot of the story was so I’m going to make it clear. The plot of the story is how Roxy is taken by the Vipers and how they interact. There are subplots that take place in the story that involve other gangs in the city but the main plot is completely centered around the 4 men and Roxy.

There was a lot of spice with this book and a few scenes that will likely shock you based on the content. There were a few times that I had to stop and ask myself “what the fuck did I just read?” This actually seems to be a pretty common response.

Now while there is knife play, gun play, blood, and other kinks that I could talk about that’s not what caused me to like this book. I’m not a kink shamer. Those things are fine in fiction, they are not for me in anything other than fiction. However, I was extremely pleased with the aftercare that takes place in this book. Oftentimes in fiction that contains BDSM it does not cover aftercare which is a super important part, I’m grateful that this book does have that.

Is Den of Viper the greatest fiction of all time? Absolutely not. Is it a fantastic smutty read with characters that you might fall for? Yes. 

Den of Vipers is 654 pages long so it took me about 10-11 hours to read. It’s a good weekend read that’s available on Kindle Unlimited. I read this over the course of a few days because I was in the middle of dealing with writing my first book while I was reading this.

Den of Vipers Book Review

I would say that Den of Vipers is a Gangland Mafia style book with an urban location that is well described. It wasn’t hard to imagine what the different locations looked like because K.A. Knight did a fantastic job describing them.

Roxy is our female main character and at first I didn’t really care for her. She comes off as trying too hard to be a badass. However, I liked seeing her evolve as we get more of her backstory and see where the story progresses.

Ryder is the leader, Kenzo is the fun one, Diesel is the homicidal maniac, and Garrett is the quiet muscle. Going into this I was absolutely ready to hate Diesel and love Kenzo. However, as we get the history of each of these characters I was surprised to figure out that both Diesel and Garrett are completely loveable. While I may not be into the same kinks as Diesel as a character I found him to be the kindest in the group.

There isn’t much to say about the bad guys in the story. They didn’t really stand out to me at all. I would have liked for the story to have more action with the rival gang. Some scenes were not necessary to the story so it would have been better to use that time to bring in something more with the rival gang.

Star Rating

Before I rate this book I want to give you a bit of background about what my rankings mean. I typically read books that I check out through the Libby app with my local library or through Kindle Unlimited. 

I rarely buy ebooks unless they are cheaply priced or on sale. I also very rarely buy physical copies of books. I’m a bit of a minimalist so I have to absolutely adore a book to buy a physical copy that will be proudly displayed in my home.

So my ranking system is as follows:

• 5 Stars equals I am buying a physical copy of this book. I will read this book at least 10 more times, it is the best ever.
• 4 stars equals a great book. I might buy an ebook version when it’s on sale so that I can re-read it at least one more time.
• 3 stars equals a good book. I likely won’t read again but I appreciate the story.
• 2 stars equals “Meh.” I willDen not read this book again, it had a lot of problems and I did not care for it.
• 1 star equals a bad book. I barely finished this book and I will never recommend anyone waste valuable book reading time on this book.
• 0 stars is a did not finish book. I will never finish that book and it is banished.

Den of Vipers gets 4 stars and 5 peppers from me. I had originally given the book a 5 star review but after sitting with the story for a while I dropped a star because there could have been more with the subplots that would have made the story more than just a smutty instalove reverse harem.

That being said, I liked the book a lot and while I gave it 4 stars I will still likely buy a physical copy because the cover art is beautiful and I’ll likely enjoy a reread. I just felt like there was potential for the book to be better with more in the story line.

Final Thoughts on Den of Vipers

This book is a dark romance reverse harem so the scenes that take place in this book are going to be darker and there are a lot of triggers for this book. I highly recommend reading over the trigger warnings that the author provides for this book before reading it yourself.

If most triggers don’t bother you and you are accustomed to dark romance and like it, this might be a decent read for you. I have found that people either love or hate this book. I fall into the like category because it’s a good easy read.

For more Reverse Harem books check out my Reverse Harem Recommendations here.

Have you read Den of Vipers? What were your thoughts? Let me know in the comments below. Follow me on Tik Tok and Pinterest for more like this and pin this to your favorite book boards.

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