Series: Flings with Kings #2
Genre: Royal Romance/Contemporary Romance
~Blurb~
Royal. Recklessly Rebellious. Totally Delicious.
SUBJECT: I'm sorry (Marked Confidential) Sat 21 May 02:48 A.M.
From the Desk of His Royal Highness Prince Robert
Aly—can’t stop thinking about tonight. Never thought enemies like us would end up naked together. Again. Know you think I’m cocky, but come on, sweetheart…don’t tell me it’s not the best sex you’ve ever had.
I’m not a good man. But for the first time, I wish I were. Maybe then I’d deserve you. I don’t. Not when I come from a family like mine. All these secrets…
You’re gorgeous. Clever. You call me out on my bullshit, and I bloody adore it.
I adore you, sweetheart.
You have your new bloke. And I’m…me. The playboy prince. We’re not meant to be together. But staying away from you is killing me, Aly. Thinking about him touching you is killing me.
I’ve no right to talk to you like this. Im sorry. It’s the whiskey talking. This is what you do to me.
Rob
P.S.—I can’t send this. But I am thinking of you.
~Book Review~
2.75/3 Stars
Aly Mason (early thirties) is an American working in
England for a design company. There she meets Prince Robert, an irresponsible
playboy, hung up on his grandfather’s faults.
Convinced he’s too much like him, Rob has vowed against monogamy until
he can’t get Aly out of his system.
This book begins after Rob and Ally have been
carrying on a no-strings fling for 5-6 months so the reader misses out on the early
relationship development. Honestly, it felt like the book was starting in the
middle rather than the beginning. Opening a story by summarizing so much background
is never a good writing technique. Now, some of which is a brief recap of book
one (Rob’s brother’s story) which is fine; the problem arises in paraphrasing the
beginnings of Rob and Ally’s “enemies to lovers romance.” As a result, I just couldn’t get invested in
them, and it didn’t help that the first described sexual encounter comes off
cold rather than hot.
While their relationship evolves over the planning of
Rob’s brother’s wedding, the book is filled with a lot of push/pull. There’s a
rinse/repeat of Rob lamenting he can’t be the one for Ally, and Ally fretting about
being lonely and wanting to settle down on top of trying to date someone else. Oh and the absolute worst scene— Rob’s disgusting
puking date. That was just plain gross! (Really, it almost lost me there. *eyes
DNF pile*) Seriously, the H & h cleaning up vomit is NOT a
romantic bonding moment!
While there are decent developed sexy times between
Robert and Aly, the romance suffered with the inclusion of other pointless
scenes that went nowhere. Even the blurb message which initially intrigued me
about the story is a dropped plot point.
To make a connection
with Rob and Aly as a couple, the plot should have started from the beginning with
scenes, not recaps, of the time when Aly arrived and Rob was dealing with his
grandfather’s death and family secrets. The
“enemies” angle was very weak. Confirmation that Rob had been celibate the
whole time they’d known each other would have gone a long way too. Sorely needed
were more scenes where Rob shined instead of faltered, including omission of
that silly, contrived drama at 80%. From there, the timeline skipped around way
too much, dragging things out. While I believed that deep down Rob sensed that
Ally was the “real deal” for him, a bigger wow factor was necessary in the
ending to make up for all his missteps.
Told via Rob and Ally’s
alternating first person POV, I think this story had the potential to be
greater, but stumbled on plotting and execution.
~Also Available~
Free in Kindle Unlimited
Jessica Peterson began reading romance to escape the decidedly unromantic awkwardness of her teenage years. Having found solace in the likes of Mr. Darcy, Jamie Fraser (OMG love the gingers!), and Edward Cullen, it wasn’t long before she began creating tall, dark and handsome heroes of her own. She lives in Charlotte, North Carolina with her husband, Mr. Peterson, and her smelly Goldendoodle Martha Bean. She is the author of the super sexy STUDY ABROAD and FLINGS WITH KINGS series.
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