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Review

3.5 stars

This book follows on from Rolling in the Deep, and is the story of Holly’s best friend, Beth, and Ray’s brother, Tony. I loved these two characters in Rolling in the Deep, and was really excited to watch how they would come together, but this book could also easily be read as a standalone.

Beth lives large. She is strong, sassy and lives her life the way she wants it, revelling in her single girl status and bouncing from man to man, not interested in anything serious. She makes sure the guys are still on the same page, so it’s easy and drama-free, just the way she likes it. But things are changing for her, as one of her flings resulted in a pregnancy and she is now planning for life as a single mother.

Tony is pretty much Beth’s opposite. Always the serious, dependable one who took care of his mother and brother after his father’s death, he is still recovering from a painful divorce and the end of a not-so-happy marriage, and lives his life for his struggling business and his two little girls.

Beth and Tony have been attracted to each other since they met, they just never acted on it, but when they are stuck alone in a house together, conversation, heated looks, and Beth’s mad pregnancy hormones lead to an epic night together.

“I just want you to know…”
I put my coffee down. “Yes?”
“I’d really like to fuck you.”
Wait…The whole room swings out from underneath me and starts spinning. “What?”

It’s a night that is nowhere near enough for either of them, so they decide to do the ‘friends with benefits’ thing, and proceed to rock each other’s worlds as Beth works to get Tony out of his head and cut loose for a while, and Tony shows Beth that sex can be more than just physical.

I really like the set up for this story. Beth is a say-it-like-it-is girl, whether she’s opening up to Tony about her insights on him and his life, or telling him what she wants from him, she holds nothing back, and I really liked that. She doesn’t play games or lead him on in any way, and that’s really refreshing. And Tony is such a nice guy! You’ve gotta love a guy who is not only attracted to, but can fall for a woman who is pregnant with another man’s baby. From the very beginning the UST between them is almost palpable and as they give into each other, it’s freaking hot, and the connection between them is intense and life changing for them both.

I felt what it was like to be wrenched open tonight, and then to be met by Beth in that raw, honest place. I don’t know how to pull back from that feeling now that I’ve experienced it. And I don’t know if I want to.

But Beth doesn’t do relationships, and has made that perfectly clear. And regardless of how they both feel, she’s not willing to budge, and Tony doesn’t want to push her, so where does that leave them? Well, it leaves them both miserable, and this little reader feeling frustrated. But the angst isn’t too painful, it doesn’t go on for too long, it makes sense for the story and you can see where it’s all heading, so it’s just a matter of waiting for it to all come together.

I love the interactions between Beth and Tony and, given that there is such a big focus on Beth’s pregnancy, I like how that all unfolded, with Tony being able to be there for her when she needed him (though I thought it was a little weird that his kids didn’t get more of a mention). I would have liked to have seen a bit more of them together rather than so much internal monologue (the dual POV was a plus), but a lot of this book is about Beth and Tony working through their issues and coming to terms with what it is they want, and I thought that part of the story was done really well.

I never understood the term falling in love. It seemed stupid to me that you would lose control like that. That you wouldn’t fucking catch yourself.
But I see now how the ground shifts under you, how your own body leans into the slide. It’s not something you choose.
It chooses you, and you fall.

My biggest issue with this book was that I really wanted to see more of an ending than what we got. Sure, we get to see all of the sexy time, and some very entertaining non-smutty encounters, and we watch them come to the realisation of all that they mean to each other, but after all of that build-up, I felt like I needed more. (view spoiler). I really would have liked at least an epilogue to show us how it all came together and what their future looked like.

But overall, I enjoyed this one. Like Rolling in the Deep, it’s a short read, and the author did a good job creating the amount of tension and emotion that she did in such a short book. If you were a fan of the first book, I’d definitely recommend giving this one a try.

3.5 stars.

An Advanced Review copy was generously provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

 

The Lopez Brothers