Day: May 21, 2015

Review: Midnight Alias by Elle Kennedy

Posted May 21, 2015 by Rowena in Reviews | 2 Comments

Rowena’s review of Midnight Alias (Killer Instincts #2) by Elle Kennedy.

She’s smart, seductive, and in way over her head.
He’s her only way out.

An undercover DEA agent has gone off the radar. Suspecting an internal mole, the government needs Luke Dubois and his elite team of operatives to recover their man, and the New Orleans native thinks he’s found his way inside the dark underbelly of Manhattan: Olivia Taylor, the girlfriend of a mob boss and the sexiest woman he’s ever laid eyes on. His new mission objective? Get past Olivia’s defenses and convince her to take a chance—on him.

All Olivia wanted was to finish law school and live a normal life, but that dream was shattered when one dangerous night put her deeply in a mobster’s debt. Now Luke and his team will help her escape—in exchange for intel on the missing agent. But Olivia doesn’t anticipate her intense attraction to the reckless Louisiana charmer or that she’ll be forced to risk everything—including her heart.

Book 2 in the Killer Instincts series follows Luke Dubois, a member of Jim Morgan’s team of mercenaries as he stumbles toward his happily ever after with Olivia Taylor.

Luke is on a mission to find a missing DEA Agent and his last known whereabouts was a stripper joint where Olivia Taylor works at. Olivia has a lot of bills to pay. Tuition, medical bills for her mother and when a classmate tells her that she can make big bucks as a stripper, Olivia becomes one. But living a double life is not an easy life and Olivia finds herself getting deeper over her head with each passing day. She’s got a thug boyfriend that she doesn’t want but won’t go away, she’s got a huge secret that she’s forced to keep and the only way she can think to get out of this mess is to save enough money to get out of the business and out of the city. When Olivia meets Luke Dubois, he promises to help her get out if she promises to help him find the missing DEA Agent. They both were not expecting the chemistry that pops up every time they’re together.

I was really excited to jump into this book because I enjoyed Luke in the first book. I thought he was funny and loved his personality. Getting to know him in this book was even more fun because I liked him so much in the other book. Some great additions to the series is the introduction of the Reilly brothers, Liam MacGregor and Sullivan Port. I adore all of these guys. It was also really good to see Isabel and Trevor again. Oh, those two. I heart them. I love seeing the chemistry between those two. There’s so much of it and it’s got me all swoon happy for their book.

There’s so much to like about this book and this series because there’s so much going on and Kennedy does such a great job with the action stuff, the romance stuff and the characters too. Each character that is introduced in this book serves a purpose to the story. I didn’t feel like we got a lot of wasted page time on characters that bring nothing to the table. Even when we’re getting the low down on the bad guys, they came alive for me.

Luke was a great hero. I love how straight forward he is. What you see is what you get and I loved that he called Olivia “darling” at every turn. I loved seeing him fall in love with Olivia and I loved seeing him try to protect not just her, but her mother too. There was a time or two when he was so distracted by lust for Olivia that I rolled my eyes because hello? You’re a SEAL but the deeper into the story, I got, the more I loved his love for Olivia.

I liked Olivia. I respected what she was trying to accomplish and I thought Kennedy did a great job of showing us just how backed up against the wall Olivia was. She did what she thought was right and she kept to herself because she didn’t trust anyone to help her out. But when Luke comes into her life and kind of plants himself in, I loved seeing him melt her defenses. I loved seeing Olivia finally let someone in.

These two were good together. They were interesting and they made the reading adventure fun because their romance was steamy. But as much as I loved both Luke and Olivia, I gotta say that I’m still so invested in Trevor and Isabel’s story. I loved that they were together again and I really like the way that they are together. I’m SO anxious for their story already. I’m so glad that I have their story to read next. Yay.

Overall, this was another solid story by Elle Kennedy and I’m kicking myself because I can’t believe that I haven’t tried Kennedy’s stuff before now. I am loving all of this Elle Kennedy goodness. This was another winner for me in the Killer Instincts series and I’m looking forward to the next one.

Grade: 4.25 out of 5

This book is available from Signet. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

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Tagged: 4.0 Reviews, Contemporary, Elle Kennedy, Killer Instincts Series, Netgalley, Romantic Suspense, Rowena's Reviews

Review: Heat of the Moment by Lauren Barnholdt

Posted May 21, 2015 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Rowena’s review of Heat of the Moment (Moment of Truth #1) by Lauren Barnholdt.

Before graduation, I promise to…learn to trust. In the first book in the Moment of Truth series, Lyla discovers that trusting her head might be easy but trusting her heart is a whole other matter.

Each book in this paperback original series is told from the perspective of a different girl—Lyla, Aven, and Quinn—former best friends who wrote emails to their future selves back in freshman year about one thing they hope to accomplish before they graduate. When the emails get delivered on the first morning of their senior trip all three girls will spend the next three days trying to keep the promises they made to themselves four years ago. While each book follow’s one girl’s life-changing adventure, you have to read them all to get the whole story, including why they’re no longer friends and whether they can get their friendship back on track.

Lyla McAfee had all but forgotten the email that she wrote to herself freshman year and scheduled to be delivered right before graduation—the one promising that she’d learn to trust by the end of senior year. But when she receives it the first morning of her senior trip to Florida her life is sent into a tailspin. Soon she’s questioning her seemingly perfect relationship with her boyfriend, Derrick; her attraction to the school player, Beckett; and whether ending her friendship with Aven and Quinn, her former BFFs, was one of the biggest mistakes of her life.

The first book in a captivating summer trilogy, Heat of the Moment flawlessly balances romance and humor as Lyla embarks on her totally reluctant but completely irresistible journey of self-discovery. And readers will have a chance to discover whole truth about the fight that ended Lyla, Quinn, and Aven’s friendship in the next two installments of the series, coming out later the same summer!

Lauren Barnholdt is hit or miss with a lot of readers but for me, she’s mostly been a hit. The last couple of books she’s released haven’t been my favorites but I still like her as an author so I try to give her books a go when they hit the review shelves.

This book is the first in her new Moment of Truth series about three ex best friends who are in their senior of high school and have received emails that they sent to each other back when they were freshman in high school. Back before their friendships fell apart.

The first of the friends, Lyla McAfee’s email said, “Before I graduate, I’ll learn to trust”. Lyla hasn’t trusted anyone in a very long time. She doesn’t really have any true friends, not since her friends betrayed her and caused a whole lot of drama in her family. She’s kept to herself and with her boyfriend Derrick.

Lyla is on her way to her senior trip to Florida with her boyfriend and she’s determined to lose her virginity because she feels that it’s time. Things have been going pretty perfect with Derrick but when she misses the bus to the airport and he doesn’t call to check up on her, a girl’s got to wonder…how perfect are things if he doesn’t seem to care that you might miss the senior trip? Lyla has got a lot on her mind and this trip away is supposed to be perfect but when the school play boy, Beckett starts coming around, things get pretty crazy.

Right from the jump, I liked Beckett. I liked him a lot more than I liked Derrick. The minute Lyla wasn’t on the bus and Derrick didn’t call, my spidey senses started going off like crazy and then when they get to the airport and Derrick explained away his non-call, my spidey senses continued to beep beep beep their way around my head. But then the book takes off and then Lyla starts to get on my nerves.

Like, a lot.

She makes every bad decision on the planet and even in the end, she’s making stupid assumptions and thinking stupid shit that pissed me right off. She was so immature and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why Beckett liked her so much. I thought Beckett deserved far better than the likes of Lyla. She was so dumb for so much of the book. She kind of reminded me of Penn from Barnholdt’s book Through to You. Full of dumb shit for far too long.

In the end, I didn’t hate her but I still didn’t really like her and I’m hoping that will change in the next book because I still want to read the other books. The friendship between Lyla, Aven and Quinn is something that is drawing me to continue the series. I think it’s Quinn’s book and I’m looking forward to digging into that one. Quinn and Aven are interesting characters and I can’t wait to read more of them. I liked them more than I liked Lyla so I’m hopeful that they won’t drive me too crazy in their books.

Grade: 2.5 out of 5

This book is available from Harper Teen. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.