ARC Review: Roman by Sawyer Bennett

Title: Roman (Cold Fury, Book #7)

Author: Sawyer Bennett

Genre: Contemporary romance, sports romance

Blurb:
New York Times bestselling author Sawyer Bennett steams up the ice all over again as the Carolina Cold Fury hockey team’s hottest bad boy gets his first taste of something good.

In a league full of troublemakers, Cold Fury defenseman Roman Sýkora stands out—at least when it comes to negative publicity. When he’s not chilling in the penalty box, the sizzling Czech skate demon is racking up tabloid headlines for his scandalous behavior with the ladies. But now Roman’s feeling the burn from management to clean up his act, or else. Luckily he’s got an enticing distraction: a fun-loving barista who plays the ukulele and brings out a side of Roman he didn’t know he had.

Lexi Robertson came to Raleigh, North Carolina, to finally meet her father, Brian Brannon, and her half sister, Gray, both of whom work in the Cold Fury’s front office. That’s where she first meets sexy, intimidating Roman—who’s really a big softie at heart. As one relationship takes off, another begins: Brian seems to be clicking with Lexi’s boss at the coffee shop. But when the friction between Roman and her new family heats up, Lexi wonders whether she’s a pawn in their game. Feeling hurt and foolish, Lexi’s ready to quit while she’s ahead. Trouble is, Roman’s not ready to quit on her.

Purchase links:

Amazon | B&N  | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo

  

What I thought about Roman

Roman’s dedication to his sport has left him with an emotional void and his sex scandals and other bad boy  activities have given him a reputation with the GM of the team. On the day he’s meeting with the GM to be told he needs to clean up his act, he runs into Lexi who is there to meet her father and half sister who have no idea she exists.  Talk about family drama! 

Lexi’s father is more accepting of Lexi’s claims, but her half-sister questions her motives. When there’s some mega-attraction between Roman and Lexi, her half sister  isn’t too thrilled about them dating because of his reputation.  So Lexi is faced with the dilemma of going for the guy she is attracted to, or risking her new relationship with her newly found half-sister.

This is definitely an opposites attract (and very sexy) sort of story. Lexi is very independent and makes Roman work for it, which was a nice touch. I liked how he handled these new feelings toward Lexi, even though they scare him.

The story is told in dual POV from Roman and Lexi and with a surprise POV from Lexi’s father which adds a nice treat to the book with a more seasoned romance between Brian and Lexi’s boss Georgia.  The scenes between these two were equally interesting.

Roman works very well as a standalone, as this was my first book read in this series and I didn’t have any trouble following along. If you are a fan of sports romance, you will want to check this out.  I really like Sawyer Bennett’s writing voice and it comes across very well in Roman. 

ARC provided for review.

About the Author

 

Since the release of her debut contemporary romance novel, Off Sides, in January 2013, Sawyer Bennett has released more than 30 books and has been featured on both the USA Today and New York Times bestseller lists on multiple occasions.

A reformed trial lawyer from North Carolina, Sawyer uses real life experience to create relatable, sexy stories that appeal to a wide array of readers. From new adult to erotic contemporary romance, Sawyer writes something for just about everyone. Sawyer likes her Bloody Marys strong, her martinis dirty, and her heroes a combination of the two. 

When not bringing fictional romance to life, Sawyer is a chauffeur, stylist, chef, maid, and personal assistant to a very active toddler, as well as full-time servant to two adorably naughty dogs. She believes in the good of others, and that a bad day can be cured with a great work-out, cake, or a combination of the two. 

 WEBSITE | FACEBOOK | TWITTER | BOOKBUB | AMAZON AUTHOR PAGE | INSTAGRAM

Cover Reveal & Excerpt: Chasing Christmas Eve by Jill Shalvis

 

  From New York Times bestselling author Jill Shalvis comes the next sexy, standalone novel in the Heartbreaker Bay series...

About CHASING CHRISTMAS EVE:

Meet cute...

Run for the hills—temporarily. That's Colbie Albright's plan when she flees New York for San Francisco. Wrangling her crazy family by day and writing a bestselling YA fantasy series by night has taken its toll. In short, Colbie's so over it that she's under it. She's also under the waters of a historic San Francisco fountain within an hour of arrival. Fortunately, the guy who fishes Colbie out has her looking forward to Christmas among strangers. But she's pretty sure Spencer Baldwin won't be a stranger for long.

Make merry...

Spence's commitment to hiding from the Ghosts of Relationships Past means he doesn't have to worry about the powerful—okay, crazy hot—chemistry he's got with Colbie. Just because she can laugh at anything, especially herself... just because she's gorgeous and a great listener…just because she "gets" Spencer immediately doesn't mean he won't be able to let Colbie go. Does it?

…and hope for a miracle.

Now the clock's ticking for Colbie and Spence: Two weeks to cut loose. Two weeks to fall hard. Two weeks to figure out how to make this Christmas last a lifetime

Pre-Order CHASING CHRISTMAS EVE
in ebook or paperback, releasing 9/26/17

 
Amazon | iBooks | Kobo| Barnes & Noble

Add to your Goodreads

  

EXCERPT

The bathroom door opened, and even better than his fantasy, Colbie emerged from a cloud of steam, her willowy body wrapped in one of his towels, her exposed skin gleaming and dewy damp. Her hair had been piled on top of her head, but wavy strands had escaped, clinging to her neck and shoulders.

He couldn’t tear his gaze off of her. There was just something so uncalculated about her, so . . . natural and easy. She was like a beacon to him, which was both crazy and more than a little terrifying.

Clearly not seeing him against the wall, she moved with an effortless grace to the suitcase she’d left at the door. Bending low enough to give him a near heart attack, she rifled through her things, mumbling to herself that she should’ve researched more about how to be a normal person instead of how to kill someone with an everyday object.

“Do you kill a lot of people, then?” Spence asked.

“Motherforker!” she said with a startled squeak of surprise, whirling to face him, almost losing her grip on the towel.

Five days a week, Spence worked out hard in this gym. Mostly to outrun his demons, but the upside was he could run miles without losing his breath. But he lost his breath now.

And that wasn’t his body’s only reaction.

And don't miss the previous books in Jill Shalvis's Heartbreaker Bay Series, SWEET LITTLE LIES, THE TROUBLE WITH MISTLETOE, ONE SNOWY NIGHT and ACCIDENTALLY ON PURPOSE, now available! 

 
Grab your copies HERE!

 

About Jill Shalvis:

 

 New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Jill Shalvis lives in a small town in the Sierras full of quirky characters. Any resemblance to the quirky characters in her books is, um, mostly coincidental. Look for Jill's sexy contemporary and award-winning books wherever romances are sold and click on the blog button above for a complete book list and daily blog detailing her city-girl-living-in-the-mountains adventures.      

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Review: Black Hearts by Karina Halle

Black Hearts is a BRAND NEW STANDALONE DUET - the second book and conclusion, Dirty Souls, releases March 17th.

For Vicente Bernal, truth is all he’s known. The son of an infamous drug lord, Vicente was born to help run the family business, which means he’s been raised on a throne of sordid pasts and dirty laundry, violence and pride. But when Vicente stumbles across someone he’s not supposed to know about – a woman from his father’s checkered past – he sets out to California to find her behind his father’s back.

What Vicente doesn’t expect to find in San Francisco is Violet McQueen, the woman’s twenty-year old daughter. Beautiful and edgy with a vulnerability he can’t resist, Violet tempts Vicente from afar and though he promised himself he’d stay away from her, curiosity and lust are powerful forces. Besides, Vicente has always gotten everything he wants – why shouldn’t he have Violet too?

Soon his wants turn into an obsession, one that sweeps Violet into his games as they fall madly, deeply in love with each other, the type of first love that can drive a person mad.

But it’s a love with tragic consequences.

Both the truth – and the lies – not only threaten to tear them apart, but threaten their very lives.

Someone has to pay for the sins of the fathers.

And they’ll be paying the price with their souls.

Black Hearts is a BRAND NEW STANDALONE DUET - the second book and conclusion, Dirty Souls, releases March 17th.

Amazon

EXCERPT: BLACK HEARTS, SINS DUET #1 Copyright Karina Halle 2017

The fog is continuing to roll in, bringing a briny mist that you can taste. Only the tops of the bridge remain visible, the orange red seeming to glow against grey skies, while shadows of the structure come and go as the fog moves in.

Violet stares in quiet fascination, her dark eyes taking it in. I can see the fog reflected in them, giving her an eerie quality. She appears to be listening but whether it’s the fog horns, the chatter of the fishermen, the lapping waves, or the dull roar of the bridge traffic, I don’t know. Could be something else entirely.

I don’t want to break her concentration or bring her back from whatever world she’s in. I just stand beside her and let her be. If anything, it says a lot about her comfort level with me if she lets herself drift away.

After a few minutes, she slowly turns to me and blinks. “How long did you say you were going to be in San Francisco for?”

“I don’t know,” I say carefully. “It depends if I find what I’m looking for.”

“And what are you looking for?”

“A reason to stay.” I hold her gaze with mine. The sea breeze picks up a few strands of her hair, moving them across her face like a black veil. Without thinking, I reach over and brush them away, tucking them behind her ear.

I could kiss her. I should kiss her. The feel of her skin against my fingers ignites a million torches inside.

Then she looks away, uncomfortable, the silence between us changing.

I steer the subject onto her. “You said your mother is a famous photographer. Does she have a studio?”

She lets out a soft sigh, her eyes back on the bridge. “Yeah. In the mission district.”

“And you don’t want the same for yourself?”

She rubs her lips together in thought before looking down at her hands that hang over the side of the railing. “As I said, I don’t know what I want. I’m not sure I feel comfortable with the idea of having a studio. My mom does portraits of people. That’s not what I like to shoot.”

“Not a people person?”

A wry smile cracks her lips. “No. Not really. It’s too…intimate. My mom is great at it because people feel comfortable with her. She can…I don’t know, manipulate their feelings.”

Interesting. Very interesting.

People like my father.

“So they end up exposing pieces of themselves that they don’t see. I guess I have the same intuition as her but the one on one is too much for me. I prefer to work with nature. With this.” She gestures to the fog. “No one else really understands how beautiful this is to me.”

I look back at the fog, moving faster now. I wouldn’t call it beautiful. Moody. Dark, maybe. If anything, her beauty stands out more because of the bleakness around her.

“My goal is to take photos that show how I see the world. All the beauty in it. The world is such an ugly and beautiful place, horrible and hopeful. I want to show the light in all the dark places.” She pauses and gives me a sheepish look. “Sorry. I know that must have sounded hella pretentious.”

I slowly shake my head because she sounds anything but that. She sounds real. She sounds like something I want to shake loose from her, to let free and run wild.

“You’re not pretentious,” I tell her, my voice low. “Not even close.”

“That’s not what I hear.”

“What do you hear?” I move in closer to her, the distance between us just a few inches. She doesn’t back up. “What does the world tell you you are?”

I watch her swallow, take a moment. “Oh, you know. I’m too self-absorbed. Narcissistic. Pretentious. I live too much in my head, I’m too anti-social, too distant. I feel too much, care too much. My mother has always chided me for being too sensitive and then I was diagnosed with having hyper-sensitivity, so it turns out she was right. I am too sensitive. About everything. And there’s not a single thing I can do about it except know that when I experience reality, it’s not what everyone else experiences. For better or for worse.” She sighs. “Mainly for worse.”

I feel like this is something she doesn’t unload on many people. My instincts about her were right. She’s fragile but not weak, too much a part of the world and too much removed from it. A contradiction.

“I’m sorry,” she says, shooting me a glance. “I didn’t mean to blab away like that. I know you probably think I’m crazy now. Hell, I think I’m crazy half the time. I really wish I could just be like everyone else. To just…shut it all off.”

“You’re not crazy,” I tell her. “I’m just understanding you better.”

Her mouth quirks up into a dry smile. “I’m surprised you understand me at all. We’ve only just met.”

“True,” I tell her as I reach out and run my fingers along her jaw, tipping her chin up. “But I’m sure you of all people would know that sometimes you can connect with someone in ways you didn’t think you could. Or should.”

She barely nods, her eyes focused on mine, anticipation on her brow. I’m met with the overwhelming desire to protect and shield her which is extremely inconvenient, if not unwelcome, given the circumstances. One minute I need to fuck her, the next I need to protect her, and in the end, what I really need is to do the job I set out to do.

What I thought about Black Hearts

 This is a new-to-me author. I was immediately intrigued when I saw the cover of Black Hearts and thought this would be a good title to check out.

In this spin-off of the Dirty Angels series, Vincente is next in line to inherit his father's crime cartel, but there are some mysteries he needs to unravel before he takes his place in the family. The answer to that mystery is in San Francisco.  I loved the location for this!

When Vincente meets Violet McQueen, there's attraction between them from the start, which leads to plenty of steamy sex and falling in love.  I loved how Vincente fought his feelings for a while -- he wasn't supposed to fall in love.

There are secrets to unravel and Vincente's father to contend with that kept things interesting.  The second half of the book is nicely paced with tension-filled twists and turns and I liked this aspect of the story very much.

Black Hearts worked as a standalone for me and it did end in a cliffhanger, but the next book is out in March.

An ARC was provided for review. 

 

About Karina Halle

Hit her up on Instagram at @authorHalle, on Twitter at @MetalBlonde and on Facebook. 


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Release Blast Review, Excerpt & Giveaway:Nova by Rebecca Yarros

The only heart he wants is the one he already broke...

NOVA

The Renegades #2

Rebecca Yarros

Releasing February 20th, 2017

Entangled Embrace

The only heart he wants is the one he already broke...

He's Landon Rhodes.

The Renegade they call Nova.

Sinfully gorgeous, broody, tatted-up, professional snowboarder.

Four-time X Games medalist—

Full-time heartbreaker.

They say a girl broke him once—

That's why he's so reckless, so driven, so careless with his conquests.

But I'm that girl.

They can call me his curse all they want.

He and I both know the truth—

He's the one who destroyed me,

And I'm not the sucker who will let that happen again.

***NOVA can be read as a standalone***

Excerpt 

“Right. I’ll be quick—you’ve got to be getting cold. My point is that what happened back then...what I did to you. It was wrong. I was wrong. I did the wrong goddamned thing for what I thought was the right reason, and I’m so damn sorry—”

The door opened, and I stepped back in shock. Maybe I should have led with the sorry in the first place.  Rachel stood there, gloriously nude, water dripping down her petal-soft skin, and it took every ounce of willpower from every man in the world to keep my eyes on her face. She openly glared at me then lifted a single eyebrow, bent to grab her clothes off the floor—holy shit, her ass could stop traffic—and walked right past me, her head held high.

My mouth actually watered with every step she took, and I snapped my lips closed to avoid drooling. I barely contained my groan, unsure of what was sexier—Rachel’s perfect body that I knew fit mine like a damn puzzle piece, or her I-don’t-give-a-fuck confidence as her hips swayed down the hall.  I should have known that a bathroom door was no match for her tenacity.

Point made.

My heart sank when I looked closer at her lower back. There was a vague, silvery mark, but no tattoo. She’d had it removed. Erased it. Erased us.

She slammed her bedroom door, and I followed until my head rested against the wood. “Fuck, you are so stubborn,” I whispered, but it came out as more of a compliment than a measure of my frustration.

What I thought about Nova

Landon is reunited with the girl he crushed..and she's determined to keep him from breaking her heart again.  Most of the book is a slow burn with Landon using some sweet tactics to get Rachel to forgive him and give him a second chance...or at least acknowledge they still have feelings for each other.

Landon is a very likeable character even though he's done some crappy things. Rachel got on my nerves with her unwavering attitude and sometimes unreasonable responses. I got it, it just got old after a while.

The best scenes by far are the action scenes. After all, these are the Renegades and Landon is one of the best.  I also really liked that Rachel loved to push the envelope and was a really great partner for Landon on his stunts.

When all the secrets are finally told, it will take a huge sacrifice on Landon's part to have a chance with Rachel. The question is which will he pick -- the girl he loves or the action he craves. 

I liked this story, although at times I thought the pace was slow. I wanted more of the exciting action sequences. That's when these characters really popped off the page for me because it fit their characters so well.  

This is my honest review. An ARC was provided.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Rebecca Yarros is a hopeless romantic and a lover of all things coffee, chocolate, and Paleo. She is the author of the Flight & Glory series, which includes Full Measures, the award-winning Eyes Turned Skyward, Beyond What Is Given, and Hallowed Ground. She loves military heroes and has been blissfully married to hers for fifteen years.

When she's not writing, she's tying hockey skates for her four sons, sneaking in some guitar time, or watching Brat Pack movies with her two daughters. She lives in Colorado with the hottest Apache pilot ever, their rambunctious gaggle of kids, and an English bulldog who is more stubborn than sweet. They recently adopted their youngest daughter from the foster system, and Rebecca is passionate about helping others do the same.