contemporary

Rock the Heart by Michelle A. Valentine

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Rock the Heart (Black Falcon, #1)
Grade-B
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-No Kink
Series-Black Falcon #1
Genre-Contemporary
Reviewed by Kay
330 pages

If you thought you couldn’t have both, which of the following would you choose?

1.) Stay with your struggling musician first love?

or

2.)Go on to college and get a degree to provide financial stability?

Lanie Vance chose the second. It broke her boyfriend’s heart and her in the process. Now four years later she’s a marketing intern being given her first big chance and her past just slapped her in the face.
Her assignment is to secure her firm to do the marketing for the rock band, Black Falcon’s favorite charity. Noel Falcon, the band’s front man, is the man whose heart she broke.

Noel can’t believe it when he looks down into the crowd at one of his concerts and sees Lanie. He’s never stopped loving her but tried to move on by excessive drinking and man-whoring. But none of that could erase Lanie from his memory. He doesn’t handle seeing her very well. He dedicates the song Ball Busting Bitch to her on stage and later, when she comes to see him about the charity, he has two topless blondes on his lap.

Noel is a really good guy. Almost too good for my tastes but he loves himself some Lanie. To have the chance to reconnect with her is like a second lease at life for him. Lanie has always worried about her place in Noel’s world. As secrets and insecurities threaten to tear them apart again, you see two people who never stopped loving each other get their much deserved second chance.

This book has been sitting on my Kindle TBR list for a long time. I’d see it and think, Yeah I need to read that and then promptly forget about it. Now I could kick myself because I waited so long. This is a good book with second chance love and steamy sex. It reads easily and captures your heart.

Favorite quote of the book:

“The only mistake when it comes to love, is not going for it.”

Throwback Thursday-Behind Closed Doors by Shannon McKenna

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Behind Closed Doors (McClouds & Friends #1)
Grade-B
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-No Kink
Series- McCloud and Friends #1
Genre-Romantic Suspense
Reviewed by Kate
430 pages

Haunted by dreams most of her life, Raine is on a mission to bring the man who killed her father to justice.  Even if that man is her own uncle Victor.  Seth is on a mission to hunt down his brother’s murderer.   And you guessed it, his brother’s murderer is Victor.  Seth has all of Victor’s properties under surveilance and has been watching the new hottie that moved into Victor’s former mistress’s house.  Raine got a job a her uncle’s company, and is staying in housing provided by the company (you guessed it
again, the former mistress’s old house).  So Seth has been watching Raine.  All right, I think we’re on the same page now.  Raine and Seth both want Victor dead. But can romance blossom at the same time?

I’m not a suspense reader, at all. But I decided that I needed to branch out, so as part of my yearly goals I decided to read one suspense book each month (fyi-I’m one month behind already).

I took Kay’s recommendation and tried this one. It was hot and steamy and full of tension and suspense. Everything that I imagine a good suspense is made of. I felt the first part of the story dragged a bit. Raine thinks she’s pulling off this huge con and her uncle doesn’t know who she is. Seth is still just watching Raine from a distance. But once the story picked up the pace, it just wouldn’t let me go. I simply had to keep turning pages to see how everything ended up.

If you’re a romantic suspense fan already, this one sure fits the bill. If you’re looking to give the genre a try, like I was, make sure you have enough time set aside because once you start, you won’t be able to put this one down.

Mine by Katy Evans

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Mine (Real, #2)

 

Grade-B
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-No Kink
Series-Real #2
Genre-Contemporary
Reviewed by Kay
336 pages

Mine. The title really does say it all. All the feelings that these two characters have for each other. You get the beautiful continuation of Brooke and Remy’s love story that’s never an easy road. It starts a little while after the first book, Real, ended, when Brooke comes back to Remy.

Remy is training for his rematch with the man who hurt the people he cares about. I love Remy exactly the way he his: dedicated, loving, so very alpha (complete with growling), sexy and flawed. I love Brooke for her capacity of love and her own imperfections.

“We’re the object of each other’s hurt and each other’s solace.”- Brooke

Finding a way to forgive each other and themselves for not being what they felt the other needed them to be was a big issue here. You know they love one another, that’s evident throughout the whole story.

“You are going to love me until I die. I’m going to make you love me even if it hurts, and when it hurts, I’m going to make it better, Brooke.”- Remy

“I want to live in you.”-Remy

Remy is such a passionate creature. He feels everything as if it’s magnified and given his condition, maybe it is.

“I’ve been through hell, and I’m back in heaven and suddenly I know that’s the way my life will be. After the dark, I will always, always find my light- which is him.”- Brooke

When I reviewed the first book in the series, I said it wasn’t a conventional romance. I think that when a person is in love with someone who is bipolar there’s no way their love can be conventional. The man in this book copes with his illness as best he can and the woman in this story, his woman, loves him because of his illness not just in spite of it. Katy Evans, what a wonderful love story you gave us!