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3.16 AVERAGE
3.16 AVERAGE
When you mix enemies-to-lovers with grumpy/sunshine tropes you get explosive chemistry and LOL comedy. L. Steele has blown this one out of the water. I have added her to my 2022 favorite author list.
Isla Bailey is an up-and-coming wedding planner and influencer on social media and she has been hired to host the "wedding of the century" for alpha hole billionaire Liam Kincaid. However, Liam's fiance is getting cold feet and swiftly takes Isla's advice to dump the douche canoe and run. That leaves a very angry groom with a proposal Isla cannot refuse. His proposal is to marry him and have his heir before he turns 40 so he can inherit the family business. In turn, he will not ruin her and her business. Will the stakes be too high, or will they meet in the middle?
In the beginning, Liam is an arrogant SOB who doesn't believe in true love. He could care less who he hurts as long as he gets what he wants. But when he gets to know the defiant and headstrong Isla, he's fascinated, intrigued, and has found the woman of his dreams. Liam has so many contradictions. He is the hard and confident businessman, the sexy and dominant sex god, and the considerate and compassionate husband all in one yummy-filled package. I melted each time Liam fell even more for Isla. I loved that the author added a vulnerable side to Liam. His secret is heartbreaking and I was so annoyed at Isla for not immediately revealing her equally painful secret. However, Liam is not a quitter and I adored his persistence to get Isla to open up. And boy does she finally open up after many agonizing pages of my trying to figure it out. As for the mindblowing sex, Yowsa! Their first encounter in the boat... I think my Kindle caught on fire.
Isla is a hard-working and determined woman and if she has to sacrifice her freedom to make her wedding planner business work, she will do it. However, it wasn't such a sacrifice the more time she spent with her new husband. His kind and well-thought-out gestures and her growing attraction to him were making it hard to stay with him. She believed her secret made her inferior and he didn't deserve that. So she pulls away. Fortunately for her, Liam would not give up on them and when she does reveal her secret for all to see, it's nothing like she expected. And what Liam does to support her is so sweet and moving that this reader shed a few tears.
This book wouldn't be complete without all of the lovely friends and family who give out some well-deserved advice. I adore the back-and-forth snarky remarks between Zara and Hunter who definitely have some hot chemistry going on. Many of the couples in this book appear to have some wonderful stories of their own which I plan to devour soon.
I love, love, love this book. It has it all. Laughter, anger, anguish, secrets, panty-melting sex, and a happily ever after. What more could one ask for?
Thank you to Ms. Steele for giving me the opportunity to read this book with no expectation of a positive review.
Isla Bailey is an up-and-coming wedding planner and influencer on social media and she has been hired to host the "wedding of the century" for alpha hole billionaire Liam Kincaid. However, Liam's fiance is getting cold feet and swiftly takes Isla's advice to dump the douche canoe and run. That leaves a very angry groom with a proposal Isla cannot refuse. His proposal is to marry him and have his heir before he turns 40 so he can inherit the family business. In turn, he will not ruin her and her business. Will the stakes be too high, or will they meet in the middle?
In the beginning, Liam is an arrogant SOB who doesn't believe in true love. He could care less who he hurts as long as he gets what he wants. But when he gets to know the defiant and headstrong Isla, he's fascinated, intrigued, and has found the woman of his dreams. Liam has so many contradictions. He is the hard and confident businessman, the sexy and dominant sex god, and the considerate and compassionate husband all in one yummy-filled package. I melted each time Liam fell even more for Isla. I loved that the author added a vulnerable side to Liam. His secret is heartbreaking and I was so annoyed at Isla for not immediately revealing her equally painful secret. However, Liam is not a quitter and I adored his persistence to get Isla to open up. And boy does she finally open up after many agonizing pages of my trying to figure it out. As for the mindblowing sex, Yowsa! Their first encounter in the boat... I think my Kindle caught on fire.
Isla is a hard-working and determined woman and if she has to sacrifice her freedom to make her wedding planner business work, she will do it. However, it wasn't such a sacrifice the more time she spent with her new husband. His kind and well-thought-out gestures and her growing attraction to him were making it hard to stay with him. She believed her secret made her inferior and he didn't deserve that. So she pulls away. Fortunately for her, Liam would not give up on them and when she does reveal her secret for all to see, it's nothing like she expected. And what Liam does to support her is so sweet and moving that this reader shed a few tears.
This book wouldn't be complete without all of the lovely friends and family who give out some well-deserved advice. I adore the back-and-forth snarky remarks between Zara and Hunter who definitely have some hot chemistry going on. Many of the couples in this book appear to have some wonderful stories of their own which I plan to devour soon.
I love, love, love this book. It has it all. Laughter, anger, anguish, secrets, panty-melting sex, and a happily ever after. What more could one ask for?
Thank you to Ms. Steele for giving me the opportunity to read this book with no expectation of a positive review.
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
At first I found the plot intriguing and that’s what kept me going. The more I read the more I got bored of it and just wanted to finish it. The characters weren’t that intriguing and I wasn’t a big fan of loved them too much. It wasn’t my type of writing style. Good plot idea just badly executed.
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I saw that mediocre "plot twist" coming from the beginning but I REFUSED to believe that the author would make the FMC act this way for such a stupid reason. I shouldn’t have had that much faith in them. Ridiculous.
No conecte con los personajes, y lo intente demasiado. Depronto despues vuelvo a darle otra oportunidad.
Fun, if a little forced
This was a quick, easy read that didn’t challenge me much. It served as a great palate cleanser after a number of very dark books recently. I enjoyed the story, but the writing came across as just a little under-polished, with typos, errant commas and other punctuation getting in the way.
I started this series with a book much further along. It worked fine as a standalone, but there was a lot of background that I realised I was missing so I decided to go to the first book of this series…only to discover there’s a whole lot more books before this in another series. I wish that had been a little clearer when I first chose the books, but it’s all okay - time to go find the *actual* first book!
This was a quick, easy read that didn’t challenge me much. It served as a great palate cleanser after a number of very dark books recently. I enjoyed the story, but the writing came across as just a little under-polished, with typos, errant commas and other punctuation getting in the way.
I started this series with a book much further along. It worked fine as a standalone, but there was a lot of background that I realised I was missing so I decided to go to the first book of this series…only to discover there’s a whole lot more books before this in another series. I wish that had been a little clearer when I first chose the books, but it’s all okay - time to go find the *actual* first book!
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book is so fucking dumb. She couldn’t be with him because SHE WAS BALD?!?! MIND YOU, he was KIDNAPPED AND TORTURED. Yet, he told her on their wedding day. This was so fucking ridiculous. Also the trajectory of their relationship made no sense. It was barely enemies to lovers.
It’s so difficult to rate this book. The story requires a complete suspension of basic logic to buy into-you almost have to just accept the reasons for her agreeing to marry him are utter bullshit and ignore all mentions of those reasons as you read, which is somewhat hard to do because it’s mentioned so bloody much. But once you ignore that, the story isn’t bad.
So why is it difficult to rate? Well, he’s amazing. Swoon worthy. Lovely. Wonderful. Perfection and Flawed and written so damn well it’s jarring at times. I adored him. I didn’t adore her. I 100% understand where she’s coming from but I think they way it’s written and how she handles everything left me disappointed and dissatisfied. Ugh.
He’s a 5. Everything else is a 3.34. So, 3.87 is the final rating. And that’s just sad because he deserves more, but everything else falls below his standards.
I know this says it’s a standalone, and it is but there is mention of secondary characters and storylines that clearly have previous books that are alluded to here and without having read those, I was completely lost anytime those references were made. I didn’t understand the friend group, I didn’t understand who was connected to who, I didn’t understand the interplay between all of them and it left me confused and slightly annoyed each time someone was mentioned without a clear explanation of who this person is.
Lastly, for the love of all that’s holy, I will lose my mind if another damn book has a dude on the cover that does NOT meet the character description. What the actual hell is wrong with just having simple consistency amongst the book. It can’t be that damn hard.
So why is it difficult to rate? Well, he’s amazing. Swoon worthy. Lovely. Wonderful. Perfection and Flawed and written so damn well it’s jarring at times. I adored him. I didn’t adore her. I 100% understand where she’s coming from but I think they way it’s written and how she handles everything left me disappointed and dissatisfied. Ugh.
He’s a 5. Everything else is a 3.34. So, 3.87 is the final rating. And that’s just sad because he deserves more, but everything else falls below his standards.
I know this says it’s a standalone, and it is but there is mention of secondary characters and storylines that clearly have previous books that are alluded to here and without having read those, I was completely lost anytime those references were made. I didn’t understand the friend group, I didn’t understand who was connected to who, I didn’t understand the interplay between all of them and it left me confused and slightly annoyed each time someone was mentioned without a clear explanation of who this person is.
Lastly, for the love of all that’s holy, I will lose my mind if another damn book has a dude on the cover that does NOT meet the character description. What the actual hell is wrong with just having simple consistency amongst the book. It can’t be that damn hard.