4 stars

4 stars

“I knew the minute I saw you walk into the bar in that red dress. My heart stopped. And when it started again, it beat for you.”

This book was quite different than my usual reads but I really enjoyed it! I’d say its probably the perfect book to read if you are on vacation, or having a busy week or don’t have time to fully commit 100% to a book because the odd thing about it was that despite finding it very put-down-able, while I was reading it, I really enjoyed it. I loved that I was able to pick this book up, fall right into the story, but easily set it aside without my heart falling to pieces or suffering a nervous zomg-need-to-keep-reading break down. It was just a fun, witty yet serious mystery romance that I enjoyed despite not being completely ‘taken over’ by it.

Lets start at the beginning, this book grabbed my attention right from the first line and by the end of the first page I was grinning to myself and totally knew that I had to read this book.

Ava is just trying to lead a normal life, but when she finds a badly beaten man in the trunk of a car outside her crime lord uncle’s club (his goons had gotten the wrong dude!), she feels compelled to help him. She doesn’t condone her uncle’s illegal activities and besides, the bleeding guy is absolutely gorgeous and only barely conscious enough to be grumpy. So, she does what she considers to be the right thing and drops him off outside a hospital hoping he won’t remember her and drives off.

When Jordan, who as it turns out is a prosecutor, wakes up in the hospital, he has no memory of what happened to him other than the fact that he was beaten and maybe some woman might have tried to help him. But the who, why, where, how questions are just coming up as blanks.

And a whole story is then built up involving a crime lord, a string of chilling serial murders, Ava’s mother’s mysterious disappearance and, of course, the budding romance that begins to develop when Ava and Jordan meet again by chance.

She of course, is forced to fight her attraction to him as the price for keeping the secret of her involvement in his ‘accident’ but Jordan is both persistent and determined to get to know this girl he feels drawn to better.

“Jordan Wellington was a complication she couldn’t afford… And it was just her bad luck that he seemed to keep popping up whenever she least expected.
Did the man have to be so darn cute?
Why couldn’t she have yanked a buck-toothed, mullet-sporting redneck out of the trunk?“

Ava and Jordan were wonderful, likable characters with great chemistry and some awesome banter. Ava was a strong, tough heroine, and Jordan was a sweet, lovable guy with a great sense of humor. I really loved their scenes together.

“You’re like a damn Sheltie,” she muttered.
“A Sheltie?”…
“You’re all cute and playful, and though you look pretty easygoing, you’re really not. You just nudge, nose, circle around and herd your quarry until you’ve got them boxed into whatever corner you’ve chosen. The damn sheep doesn’t even realize what’s happening…”
“I’m not sure which one of us should be more insulted by that analogy.”

I really loved the writing style. The whole book was witty in a very subtle way. It wasn’t funny per say, but had just the right kind of clever spark to keep me reading with a little half smile a lot of the time despite the seriousness of some of the situations. It just has a catchy feel to it, you know? Its all about the little things – the choice of one word over another that just brings a smile to your face.

The book almost a bit of a romance novel meets Law&Order/CSI kind of feel to it.

I have to admit though, this book was less romance heavy than I’d usually prefer but I liked the writing style enough to keep me interested even in the more mystery focused scenes. But at the same time, I had a bit of a harder time becoming quite as fully emotionally connected to the story as I normally do with a full-on romance. I do wish there had been a tad bit more focus on Ava and Jordan.

They were, however, functional as a couple and this book had no unnecessary stupidity or Kindle-throwing scenes. Its all safe!

The point of views switch up a lot without clear breaks – it was enough that I noticed it, but not enough to strongly detract from the story. But in the interest of honesty, I feel I should mention it. There are also some typos and such, but as per my usual way of looking at things, if the story rocks, I’m more than willing to be forgiving on that front.

The author also sets up a whole slew of Wellington brothers, all of whom are gorgeous, hot and alluring do-gooders… we’ve got a lawyer, a prosecutor, an FBI agent, a doctor… as well as other interesting main characters that I’m sure will end up getting their own books.

It was a pretty laid back book. Like I said, I found it easy to put down, but easy to pick back up again. There was a bit of an ending climax but everything was all wrapped up in a resolved HEA and epilogue. No cliffhangers here! *whew*

I’d consider it “New Adult” in terms of steam (despite the couple being in their 30’s). There’s sex and light steam – nothing overly graphic, but at the same time, no closed doors. Oh, and we get a little chapter at the end giving a teaser for the next book.

This is the author’s debut novel and I really enjoyed her writing style and am looking forward to more of her books in the future.

4 stars.

Honest review requested by author.

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CASTING:

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“With everything I am, everything I’m meant to be, baby doll. Always.”

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Another amazing paranormal book by Kristen Ashley!

Finding himself drawn out to the woods one night, Callum, a gorgeous Alpha werewolf prince, comes across a young, blonde child roaming about who ends up saving his life. Little does he know that she is destined to be his queen one day…

Sonia is gifted. Special. She has abilities and heightened senses that others don’t but has been taught her whole life to keep it a secret making her life quite lonely. But when a plot to harm his destined mate is hatched, Callum is forced to intervene and rescue her throwing her straight into a world she never knew existed. And before she knows it, Sonia finds herself claimed, and bound to him, with only one week to familiarize herself with his world, his culture, and him before their mating ceremony where she will become his queen.

But Sonia has a rare blood disease, and with Callum being an immortal werewolf, he is faced with the tragic certainty that no matter how strongly he loves her, his time with her as a mortal will be fleeting.

Despite their physical attraction, they actually took a while to warm up to each other. Poor Sonia thought he was her kidnapper at first. And Callum just didn’t have the time or patience to deal with courting her the human way. But, despite his frustrations, he couldn’t help but fall for her.

Callum was about as Alpha as you get. He was a werewolf King who believed in duty first above all things. He was bossy, bossy, bossy, and arrogant. His duty to his kingdom came first and despite loving to play in bed, romance did not come naturally to him at first.

“It wasn’t simply that Callum didn’t have time for this ridiculousness (which he didn’t). Callum didn’t date. He didn’t court. He seized.“

But the more time he spent with Sonia, the more she warmed him.

Now, I know that the werewolves’ culture is different than ours and I tried my best to be accepting of it, but there were definitely some aspects of it that were just sexist to an extreme and kind of rubbed me the wrong way – how he’d insist on her sitting in his lap at all times (even meal time), how the Queen’s duty was to be silent and basically just be there to fulfill any needs her King might have… it took me a while to get used to the fact that this was just the way of their culture. But the more we learned about it and how utterly different than ours it was, the more I found myself able to appreciate how hard he was trying to make things good for her by her culture’s terms despite it not really seeming so from the outside.

“I believe I told you at e time that it was the way of my people.”…
“Yes, and I believe it was also once the way of my people to treat diseases by using leeches but they found another way that works a whole lot better so now they’re doing that.”

But the way Callum kept ordering her around bothered me. The words “allowed”, “ordered”, “demanded” just didn’t sit right. I didn’t like how he was always making decisions for her without asking her first. Dragging her here and there without explanation. I knew that he loved her and cared for her, but that part of his behavior almost detached me a little from him. And I wish that Sonia had fought him a little harder. She wasn’t a doormat by any means, but she gave in in a lot of places where I kind of wished she’d have just given him the middle finger.

“Did your people skip past the twentieth century?”

“You defy me again, I’ll take you to that bed and make you my queen right… fucking… now.”

But I will say though that when FINALLY, she was able to confront her about how she felt about the whole thing, that he was able to see her side and apologize. That definitely made me warm up to him more.

That being said, if there is any author out there who can turn my head around make me sympathetic to even the biggest Alpha jerk and make me coo and melt over him, its Kristen Ashley.

Callum’s fierce protectiveness and clearly intense love for her gave me shivers on more than one occasion. I liked watching him clue in (albeit very slowly) to the fact that maybe this whole scenario wasn’t as easy on her as he assumed it might be and then how he found all these ways to go out of his way to bring happiness into her life. It was really sweet 🙂

I guess the bottom line about the way I felt about Callum was that, unlike with Lucien in the previous book, he didn’t come out and do anything that really ticked me off but his cultural expectations and nature were just so vastly different that it gave me the squinty eyes on more than a few occasions.

And then the more their story went on, the more open he became to little compromises and accepting more parts of her culture as well. And the more he did that, the more I fell in love with him.

I felt strongly for Sonia. For her frustrations with the world and with Callum. I totally understood why she’d feel the way she did but I didn’t like how every time she’d decide to confront him about her feelings, all he needed to do was breathe the same air as her and her resolve would vanish.

It did take them both a while for their issues to come out into the open but I did love that once it was confession time, EVERYTHING was put out there. No holding back. It was a great feeling.

And you just gotta love a man who can say, “I fucked up, baby doll.” and still retain all his Alpha-ness.

Both Callum and Sonia had very valid view points given their vastly different worlds and I thought that KA did a brilliant job of making you see both sides of a story that seemed so clear cut at first glance.

And I did really love how they compromised in the end. It wasn’t all about one of them giving themselves up for the other, I felt like they both made changes to accept the other’s culture into their lives 🙂

“I’ll make you a deal… I’ll help you understand my people and you help me understand yours.”

Oh, and can I just throw out a HUGE shout-out to Ryon! He seriously gave Cal a run for his money for swooniest werewolf in this story. God, I want a whole book about him!! I totally fell in love!

I loved that the Prophecies we were introduced to in the first book continue straight through to this one. Once the characters were established, we got to see how they fit into the overall scheme of things.

And LUCIEN!!!!!!!!! We get a wonderful (longish) cameo from both Lucien and Leah. I loved seeing them again. Seeing how in love they were, how strong their bond was. It was a wonderful treat to see so much of them after the ending of their book.

There was loads of hotness in this book. I mean between the claiming, and the intense animal attraction and the whole lifemate-can’t-get-enough-of-you bond… *whew* *fans self*

“Baby doll, you’re about to be claimed.”

I really have to say that with Kristen Ashley’s book, you REALLY get your money’s worth. Her books are long, packed with awesome stories and gorgeous characters, and just overall pure win.

“I loved you before you took your first breath on this earth because that was my fate but you made me love you because you’re just… fucking… you.”

I absolutely can’t wait for the third book to see how everything is going to tie in together with the Prophecy. And I predict lots of epic badass Alpha moments with Lucien, Callum and the next hero. SQUEEEE!!

Rating: 4 stars.

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4 stars

This is a very beautifully written YA book about how tragedies can occur and mark you, and how to find a way to accept them and find the strength move on.

Adam lives a quiet life – engrossed in his school work, surrounded a by a few close friends, but always on the sidelines. Never one of the popular kids, not noticed by girls, he’s always the responsible one, a musician, gamer, straight A student with a good heart and a lot of insecurities who constantly feels overshadowed by his nearly identical twin brother Aaron who is basically, what he feels to be, a better version of him. He’s slightly taller, more muscular, more popular, more social, is adored by the girls… he’s everything Adam isn’t.

When Olivia moves to town, she’s all Adam can think about. She’s free spirited, sweet and out going and Adam is absolutely smitten with her. But when there is a better version of him out there, why would she ever notice him?

“What’s wrong?”
I wanted to tell her exactly what was wrong. I wanted to tell her that Aaron liked her, and that I liked her. I wanted to tell her that Aaron liked a lot of people, but I didn’t, making my feelings more meaningful. I wanted to grab her hand and take her back to my room… I wanted to tell her that I was scared that she would fall victim to my brother’s charms and forget about me.
But I didn’t say or do any of those things. Instead, I said, “Nothing.”

And despite Olivia’s happy exterior, there is more to her than meets the eye – something she is trying to forget about. A secret that could change her life forever.

This book was very seamlessly written – the writing style flows smoothly and it immediately drew me into the story.

I loved that this whole book was from Adam’s perspective. It really got you deep into him mind and gave you a full understanding of his character – his desires, his insecurities, his thoughts and feelings.

There is a bit of a love triangle going for a while – one that really hurt my heart. Both brothers were interested in her. Adam, because she was ‘it’ to him. He just fell so strongly for her from the moment he first saw her but was too shy to tell her. And Aaron was interested in her because she was ‘new’ – another conquest to add to his slew of broken hearts.

Adam and Olivia connected very deeply but remained friends for a long time. They had both suffered similar loss in their pass and, although it had marked them in different ways, they found a connection through it.

I wasn’t sure about the twist going in to this, it was bittersweet. Not your classic romantic HEA. I actually thought it would be different than what it was but this book would be perfect for fans of Chasing Nikki or A Walk To Remember.

My heart hurt so much for Adam in this. I guess it was because of how connected the POV made me feel to him but watching Aaron trying to step in with Olivia made me ache. A part of me wished Adam would just man up and talk things out with to tell her how he felt, but another part of me understood why he didn’t and sympathized with what was holding him back.

I’ll say that I didn’t cry ever, even at the end, but there were times when I came close.

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