I’m over at Dear Author with a review of Hard Candy by Amy Jo Cousins. I adored Bryan. Couldn’t get enough of him.
Tag: contemporary (Page 74 of 122)
I’m over at AudioGals with a review of Cuff Me by Lauren Layne, narrated by Avalon Kingsbury. Fun friends to lovers story.
Monthly Mini Review
Love Me Like a Rock by Amy Jo Cousins – B Austin and Vinnie are suite-mates with Rafi (from Level Hands) at Carlisle college and is the cox for the Junior Varsity boat in the rowing team. He’s short (5’4″) and compact (but fit and strong) and has a mop of curly red hair. He and Vinnie have been BFFs since they met in high school and shortly after, they also became semi-regular fuck buddies. Austin has been waiting for Vinnie to want an actual relationship. Vinnie is only interested in Vinnie in any romantic kind of way when he’s turned in a paper and wants to de-stress, get drunk and screw. Austin figures he’ll wise up eventually. But in the meantime, he’s free to have a fling with the hot model from the latest life drawing class. Sean is a geology senior, taller than Austin but not by a lot and he’s also a redhead – his style is lumbersexual, complete with beard. While Austin makes things clear to Sean, it’s equally obvious that Sean is really, willing and able to go all in. He’s had his eye on Austin for over a year.
Over the course of the story, Austin realises that his fuck buddy relationship with Vinnie is unhealthy and going nowhere. And, as he spends time with Sean, he realises that there are reasons for that, some of which come down to Austin himself. He finds himself a different person with Sean – more relaxed and open about his feelings. By different I don’t mean that Sean changes Austin. It’s not like that. It’s more that with Sean, Austin relaxes and opens up in a different way and learns a new way to be – he’s always himself and Sean doesn’t want or ask for him to change his personality or anything. Continue reading
Why I read it: I was provided with a copy by the author.
Disclosure: I’m friendly with the author on Twitter. We talk often. I know she’s a super cool person who won’t get bent out of shape if I don’t like a book she writes and I feel comfortable that I can say what I think without it being awkward. So I’m reviewing this one. As always, readers get to decide if my opinion is helpful to them.
What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Everyone is virgin at something
This is the story of a man who’s never done it, and a woman with the experience to teach him how.
Reid McGrath is drunk and intends to stay that way. It’s what a man does when the world he built gets ripped out from under him. He’s staked a claim on the back booth at Lucky’s where he can fixate on a dancer who makes him wish things were different.
Zarley Halveston dances under shimmering lights in a barely there costume, but it’s not the gold medal life she trained for. She expected to stand on an Olympic podium, instead she glitters under disco lights, gyrating on a chrome pole. Zarley can’t see the brooding man in the back booth, but she knows he’s there. He’s toxic, but it’s not her job to care, until the night he collapses at her feet and she has to choose to step over him or help him up.
Reid thought he’d hit bottom when he was fired as CEO of his own company, but knowing he’d needed the kindness of a stranger, and realizing she was the dancer he’d lusted after was a new low.
Question: What do a fallen golden girl and a sacked tech tycoon have in common except humiliation and failure?
Answer: The reawakening of a champion competitor and the sexual education of a frustrated geek.
What worked for me (and what didn’t): Reid McGrath is the weird loner guy who starts a multi-million dollar tech company but manages to have almost no people skills. (I’ve met people like him – except with less money.) He’s been so focused on his company and coming up with brilliant apps and other software, he didn’t really have time for women (that’s his excuse anyway). But his woeful people skills collided with his company’s “No Asshole” rule and he was fired. From his own company. Oh the humiliation. The rage! Continue reading
Why I read it: I received a review copy via the publisher.
What it’s about: (from Goodreads) If they looked, would they ever leap?
Good-looking, confident, and doted on by his widowed mum, Michael is used to thinking only of himself. Getting shoved off an Isle of Wight pier by an exasperated ex ought to come as a wake-up call—but then he meets Rufus and he’s right back to letting the little head take charge. Rufus is cute, keen, and gets under Michael’s skin in a disturbing way.
Would-be chef Rufus can’t believe his luck when a dripping wet dream of a man walks out of the sea on his birthday, especially when Michael ends up staying at the family B&B. Life is perfect—at least until Michael has to go home to the mainland.
Rufus can’t leave the island for reasons he’s entirely neglected to mention. And though Michael identifies as bi, breaking his mum’s heart by coming out and having an actual relationship with a guy has never been his plan. With both men determined to keep their secrets, a leap of faith could land them in deep water.
What worked for me (and what didn’t): This book was an audio delight. The narration was, with only small exceptions, excellent and the story entirely suited the audio medium. One of my favourite things about JL Merrow books is her sense of humour and here I was actually laughing out loud in places.
A word of warning however: Michael says things, most especially at the start of the story which are biphobic, homophobic and transphobic. While he does gain something of an education in the book, the time frame is very short and it is not clear that at the end of it, he has resolved all of his issues. He, at least, acknowledges that he has them and he’s working on them but he’s incredibly lacking in self-awareness (awareness in general, really) at the start of the story and his journey doesn’t go into the kind of detail which fixes all of his… rough edges. Continue reading
I’m over at Dear Author with a review of Dirty by Kylie Scott. Sexy and sweet. I wish the queer representation was better but otherwise, great fun.
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
