Reviewer: Casee Cherish Hard (Hard Play, #1) by Nalini Singh
Series: Hard Play #1
Also in this series: Cherish Hard, Cherish Hard (Hard Play, #1), Cherish Hard (Hard Play, #1), Rebel Hard (Hard Play, #2)
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: November 14, 2017
Format: eARC
Source: Publisher
Point-of-View: Third
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Pages: 363
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Series Rating:
New York Times bestselling author Nalini Singh kicks off her new Hard Play contemporary romance series with a sizzling story that’ll leave you smiling…
Sailor Bishop has only one goal for his future – to create a successful landscaping business. No distractions allowed. Then he comes face-to-face and lips-to-lips with a woman who blushes like an innocent… and kisses like pure sin.
Ísa Rain craves a man who will cherish her, aches to create a loving family of her own. Trading steamy kisses with a hot gardener in a parking lot? Not the way to true love. Then a deal with the devil (aka her CEO-mother) makes Ísa a corporate VP for the summer. Her main task? Working closely with a certain hot gardener.
And Sailor Bishop has wickedness on his mind.
As Ísa starts to fall for a man who makes her want to throttle and pounce on him at the same time, she knows she has to choose – play it safe and steady, or risk all her dreams and hope Sailor doesn’t destroy her heart.
For some reason I didn’t read this book when it first came out. I thought it was part of the Rock Kiss series, which I didn’t have any desire to read at the time. So I skipped it. Holly, Rowena, and I started discussing it and they enlightened me that it was not part of Rock Kiss, so I gave it a try. It wasn’t my favorite Nalini Singh book. It’s honestly one of those books that I didn’t have very many feelings about one way or another.
Ísa Rain first sets eyes on Sailor Bishop where she teaches poetry. For some reason or another, she decides to walk up to a complete stranger and kiss him. It could have been for a variety of reasons. She feels that her love life is in stasis. She thinks she’s frigid. She wants some action. Or all of the above. Anyhow, Sailor doesn’t object. What man would? Before he can do anything, she takes off. His landscaping job at her school isn’t complete, so he’s sure he’ll see the sexy redhead again.
The thing is, he’s actually seen Ísa before, when he was a teenager. He was just in high school when he was dragged to a college party. One of his friends friend dumped Ísa is the most humiliating of ways and Sailor was witness to it all. When she ran off in tears, Sailor ran after her but she wouldn’t stop. For seven years he hasn’t forgotten her and he can’t believe his luck when she picks him to kiss. He only knows that he’s not going to let her go a second time.
Ísa does have a say in that however, and she’s not sure what she’s feeling. Sailor is everything she’s ever wanted in a man. Except for the fact that he doesn’t put her first. She can clearly see that he is falling in love with her, as she is with him. Still, he wants to get his business off the ground and that supersedes everything in his life. Including her. Ísa accepts that she will never come first in anyones life. It’s just a fact.
That was very sad to me. Ísa just didn’t think much of herself. After the way her parents treated her growing up, she really didn’t have a reason to. They both loved her, but they would forget her too. They would be there if she needed them for something, but they weren’t there day to day. Ísa was just sad. A sad woman. Sailor eventually pulls through which was really heartening to read. The problem with this book is that I just didn’t really get invested in these characters. Which is a bummer to me.
Rating: 3 out of 5.
Hard Play
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