Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: October 15, 2017
~Blurb~
The army taught me discipline. Order. Control.
None of that matters the day I walk into her classroom.
Or her bedroom.
What's more important than my grade?
Not failing her.
None of that matters the day I walk into her classroom.
Or her bedroom.
What's more important than my grade?
Not failing her.
~Book Review~
3.5 Stars
Danika Anderson, 26, is a free spirit and pacifist, indulging in her nomad lifestyle of traveling and teaching. Trent Milner, 22, her brother’s best friend, is fresh out of the army and on a new but sobering mission to track down the girl he’s always crushed on. Once he finds the class she’s teaching, he’s about to become her student if that’s what it takes to reach her.
This is a hard one to rate for me (which is why I’m rounding it up). It’s also one of those times where I stress that it’s the words in a review that are more important than a number rating. As a love story, this is poignant. I believed that Dani and Trent were right for each other; they just had to find their way and work through both their separate and shared experiences.
Told via their alternating dual first person POV, when they finally got together, it was hot and beautiful all in one. The love scenes were just that—rooted in love yet sensual at the same time. They weren’t cheesy clichéd sex scene dialogue; they were well written and what more romance writers should strive for.
“And my soldier let go of his restraints. Frenzied, he pounded into me, so impossibly hard, so impossibly strong, and still tender at the same time.”
Dani is a strong, independent heroine, although she did frustrate me at times. Trent is aww… a total sweetie, a devoted romantic hero, and most definitely a book boyfriend. Protective but not possessive or demeaning. Loving, understanding, and full of integrity.
Despite the premise, this isn’t a smutty teacher-student taboo tale. It’s much deeper than that. I’ve also read the author’s The Stars in the Sky, which is largely different from this one as in it’s light-hearted and fun. The two stories do share a common theme of bridging two characters who seem to be fundamentally different. That’s an inspiring message that’s probably needed more today than ever. I also strongly appreciated how a positive and constructive approach to serious issues was handled.
The overall tone of the story is what deterred from my overall enjoyment. This one is very melancholy as it deals with heart-breaking subject matter and fully depicts the grief process. As someone who’s experienced similar distressing feats many years ago, yet in different circumstances, there were aspects that were just hard to read because I related to them. I don’t like books that make me cry, and this was one that took me back to experiences that aren’t ones I like to relive. Readers less sensitive to grief will probably appreciate the depth to the story and the feeling the characters share though. While acknowledging that it was a tough read for me, I must also praise the focus on the character’s inner struggles. Yes, it felt emotional and angsty and that’s not my style, but the angst was fitting for the topic. And I also must praise that there was no unnecessary drama (like of the OW/OM kind) that creeps up far too often in romantic fiction. This was a journey the hero and the heroine had to undertake; it was a sad yet thoughtful and beautiful one.
Leslie McAdam is a California girl who loves romance, Little Dude, and well-defined abs. She lives in a drafty old farmhouse on a small orange tree farm in Southern California with her husband and two small children. Leslie always encourages her kids to be themselves – even if it means letting her daughter wear leopard print from head to toe. An avid reader from a young age, she will always trade watching TV for reading a book, unless it’s Top Gear. Or football. Leslie is employed by day but spends her nights writing about the men you fantasize about. She’s unapologetically sarcastic and notoriously terrible at comma placement (that’s what editors are for!). Always up for a laugh, Leslie tries to see humor in all things. When she’s not in the writing cave you’ll find her fangirling over Beck, camping with her family, or mixing up oil paints to depict her love of outdoors on canvas.
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