Rowena’s review of Such a Rush by Jennifer Echols.
Main Character: Leah Jones
Love Interest: Grayson Hall (Highlight to see)
Series: None
Author: Facebook|Twitter|Goodreads
A sexy and poignant romantic tale of a young daredevil pilot caught between two brothers.
When I was fourteen, I made a decision. If I was doomed to live in a trailer park next to an airport, I could complain about the smell of the jet fuel like my mom, I could drink myself to death over the noise like everybody else, or I could learn to fly.
Heaven Beach, South Carolina, is anything but, if you live at the low-rent end of town. All her life, Leah Jones has been the grown-up in her family, while her mother moves from boyfriend to boyfriend, letting any available money slip out of her hands. At school, they may diss Leah as trash, but she’s the one who negotiates with the landlord when the rent’s not paid. At fourteen, she’s the one who gets a job at the nearby airstrip.
But there’s one way Leah can escape reality. Saving every penny she can, she begs quiet Mr. Hall, who runs an aerial banner-advertising business at the airstrip and also offers flight lessons, to take her up just once. Leaving the trailer park far beneath her and swooping out over the sea is a rush greater than anything she’s ever experienced, and when Mr. Hall offers to give her cut-rate flight lessons, she feels ready to touch the sky.
By the time she’s a high school senior, Leah has become a good enough pilot that Mr. Hall offers her a job flying a banner plane. It seems like a dream come true . . . but turns out to be just as fleeting as any dream. Mr. Hall dies suddenly, leaving everything he owned in the hands of his teenage sons: golden boy Alec and adrenaline junkie Grayson. And they’re determined to keep the banner planes flying. Though Leah has crushed on Grayson for years, she’s leery of getting involved in what now seems like a doomed business—until Grayson betrays her by digging up her most damning secret. Holding it over her head, he forces her to fly for secret reasons of his own, reasons involving Alec. Now Leah finds herself drawn into a battle between brothers—and the consequences could be deadly.
Ever since I read Going Too Far by Jennifer Echols, I’ve been devouring each of her new releases and hoping to fall in love with her books, the way that I fell in love with Going too Far. And it’s finally happened.
This book follows Leah Jones as she tries to survive in life. She’s seventeen years old and she can fly airplanes. She lives in a trailer park with her negligent mother and she works at the local airport. She’s dirt poor and her mother would rather pawn their meager belongings to pay the rent then get an actual job to help support her young daughter. Leah didn’t have it easy but she survived her way through life and she was a fighter. The only parental figure she had in her corner was her boss, Mr. Hall. He taught her how to fly and helped shape a future that Leah could look forward to but when he dies, the future she was working so hard toward is thrown all out of whack.
Leah doesn’t expect Mr. Hall’s two young sons, Grayson and Alec to take over the family banner flying business and she doesn’t expect them to hire her on to help them run it. Grayson and Alec have been around for years but Leah’s not close to either of them. They don’t bother with her and she doesn’t bother with them, but she’s watched them. For years. She’s got the hots for Grayson but when he blackmails her, she falls in line but is pissed off that she still has the hots for him.
Grayson has reasons for everything that he’s doing. Whether they’re for the right reasons or not, they’re his reasons and he’s doing what he needs to do. When his older brother died in the military and then his father died, shortly after, Grayon’s life has been one huge pot of grief. Not wanting to lose anymore family members, Grayson takes over his Dad’s banner flying business and hopes he knows what he’s doing.
Watching this story unfold was exciting. The characters draw you in and you can’t help but want to read on to find out what happens. I was just as invested in Leah’s life as Grayson was and I wanted to know more about Grayson, the same way that Leah did. Jennifer Echols did a great job of bringing Grayson and Leah together. She was patient and she let them work their crap out because when the end finally came around, I was so freaking satisfied with everything that I’d read that I sighed myself to sleep. The characters were great, the storyline meshed well and even the things that I thought were kind of weird (Grayson’s reason for blackmailing Leah) didn’t matter because the book ended the way that it was supposed to end and I really enjoyed the overall reading experience. Kudos to Jennifer Echols on writing another story that just knocked my socks off.
..and that’s your scoop!
Buy the book: B&N|Amazon|Book Depository
Book cover and blurb credit: http://barnesandnoble.com
It sounds like a really awesome read!!
I’ve been hearing so many things about it -mostly good – that I feel like I should give this author a try.
I can’t wait to read this book.
I also want to fall in love with another book by Jennifer Echols. I loved Going too far and Such a rush sounds so good.
@Alex: You totally should, especially this one. I really enjoyed it.
@Sabrina: This is it then, if you loved Going too Far then I’m sure you’ll like this one even more…I did. It was such a good read.
I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I did.