Denise Williams (1)

ok so jake is a little too perfect but otherwise this is actually really pretty great. she manages to write a fun, sexy romance with good banter without all the annoying communication problems that so many writers fall back on. the tension isn't contrived or something that could be waved away with two sentences or a short conversation. this is deeper, and i like that the main character is smart (she's an education professor, a phd!) and also has the dv history that she does. i think that was show more worked in well and mostly handled in a good way. (this is not necessarily easy.) the friendship between she and her best friend (and her best friend's husband) is great and empowering. good audio reader as well. all around well done. show less

Had this been marketed as the erotica it desperately wanted to be, I wouldn't be so frustrated. The cover style of this book usually suggests a fun, lighthearted romcom. This book wasn't. It reads like it was written by a young college student who had recently discovered what erotic fanfiction was, but who knew what sexism looked like and had volunteered for an intimate partner violence hotline for a few months.
The protagonist, Naya, discusses her own sexual frustration early on in the book, show more which then goes immediately to her best friend yammering how much she wants to nail her and that hubby agreed to a threeway, haha. This happens multiple times in the book. AUTHOR, THIS IS NOT EDGY. If the three of them are gonna bang, they need to sit down and talk about it like the adults they supposedly are, not the teenagers they have become. Felicia is an adult who insults everyone and it's portrayed as ha, totes okay. If she were written as a teen, she would have been the slightly cruel "edgy" girl who skipped class to smoke cigarettes or even weed on school property. She has very little characterization, anyway. No one really does in this book. Everyone is one-dimensional. No new ideas are raised. Felicia comes across as a perpetually bored and irritated babysitter, not an occasionally annoyed mother. Her husband was featured so little in the book that he didn't really have a reason to be there and could have easily been cut. All he ever did was back up Felicia and fade into the background.

The book switched back and forth between pages and pages at once of PG-13 rated euphemisms for body parts and sexual acts; reflections on Naya's friends' parents; and memories of the abuse her ex visited on her. The author is horrible at writing scene and chapter transitions, if she even tried. It was jarring and I hated it. The reflections on peoples' parents read like the author was trying too hard to be funny, and break away from the dad jokes that characterize Naya and Jake's relationship when they're not giving Naya orgasms. I did appreciate that Naya narrated openly about masturbation.

Naya talks about how much Jake satisfies her sexually. Fine. I got it in the first paragraph. Quit waxing poetic about it for a dozen ebook pages at a time. But she did it often enough that I actually figured out how many pages to skim at once. And then she mentioned that Jake is the only guy to ever get her off. My heart sank as one of my least favorite tropes barged forth: The One True Cock. There's plenty of AFAB people for whom partner-assisted orgasm is tricky IRL. Often, in romance books, the issue is solved in five seconds flat by the nearest cisgender heterosexual male and declared Twu Wuv. It's aggravating. It's an excuse for, "Whee, awesome orgasm by a cis guy who I'm now totes spending the rest of my life with!" and UGH. It's such a common romance trope that I called it in this one fairly quickly. The book doesn't exactly end on that note but I did not care.

Naya's a math education professor, which I fully admit to not realizing was a thing previously. The author squeezed in classroom scenes before racing to the next Jake Has Me Orgasm twenty-page chapter. Judging from the brief time we as readers spend in Naya's classes, Naya comes across as more of a--not a sociology professor, even. She talks like an academic without really saying anything, and sounds a lot like she's midway through grad school, not a professor in her own right. The author tried hard to portray her differently, I can tell, and I encourage her, but she doesn't succeed.

At the 42% mark in the ebook, we find out Jake's still married, but separated, from his totally clearly super evil wife, who cheated on him with a neighbor. Red flags popped up for me every time he talked about her. I didn't believe him at all. Gretchen herself wasn't likeable. I criticized them both as I read. It was a weird subplot. So was the abusive ex subplot. Because the real plot was Jake and Orgasms. Drove me nuts. I had been hoping to read something different than that. The final showdown, I guess it could be called, between Naya and her abusive ex was what a teenager would write. They're a whole mile away from everyone? How big is this place? Why would a faculty meeting where everyone dresses so nicely be out in the woods? Especially when it's discussing peoples' jobs? Why would a management consultant firm be involved in the first place? None of this adds up. I eagerly waited for this incredibly bland, low-stakes book to freakin' end. It was repetitive, poorly structured, poorly characterized, and I'd given up twice on it before reading it all the way through now. I'm glad to be done.. show less

What a cute story. (Cute is not always a flattering word!)

There are some quirky elements that save this book - the insurance agent is the successful romance novelist. The heroine has come up with the nifty, and successful business idea of a pet grooming business at an airport.

But it's the sort of novel that once you finish, you wonder why you wasted the time on something so lightweight.

There is something cringeworthy? creepy? about Bennett, the hero, or is that just me.

Olivia's character show more seems a bit more normal - her concerns, her reflections, and being on the lookout for the same flaws in Bennett as her arrogant former boyfriend, a cheater, had. Bennett has never been in a relationship, as I recall. Which also didn't seem normal.

January LaVoy, who narrates Olivia's side of the story, has a voice that seems a little too serious for the lightweight nature of the book. And Shane East, whom I've heard narrate quite a bit I think, didn't suit Bennett at all. show less

I really enjoyed this read. Characters were wonderfully pun-ny, with strong secondary character personalities in MC Naya's friends. I'm a sucker for character development, so i absolutely loved that we really get to see Naya grow and re-learn how to trust in herself and others over the course of the book. It touched on several hard topics (that I won't name b/c spoilers) in a way that felt respectful and realistic--I really appreciated that the author is willing to acknowledge that "yeah, in show more this situation these issues or -isms or consequences would come up." Definitely delivered on the promise of the girl with no game ending up with the genuinely great guy who's perfectly imperfect for her. As a bonus, he treats her well, is exceedingly competent, knows his way around the female anatomy, and is willing to navigate both their sets of baggage together. Now if only I could find such a unicorn... show less