MAISEY
YATES
Synopsis
from Goodreads: When
a torrid, possibly dangerous scandal comes to Royal, Texas, Selena
Jacobs is nearly caught in the middle. Until her best friend Knox
McCoy ensures her safety—by moving in! Selena has loved Knox for
years, but she’s never had the courage to tell him. Now the sparks
she’s tried to smother burn out of control…and leave her
pregnant. But with the pain in his past, will Knox finally take a
chance on love…with her?.
Stats
for my copy:
Mass Market paperback, Harlequin Desire, 2018.
How
acquired:
BookishFirst
First
line:
My fake ex-husband died at sea and all I got was this stupid letter.
My
thoughts: I
entered to win a copy of this book on BookishFirst because I see
Maisey Yates' name all the time, and my aunt is a fan of hers, and we
like a lot of the same authors, so I'd been wanting to try her for
awhile. I was excited to win a copy, and waited very impatiently for
the book to arrive. Unfortunately, it did not live up to my
expectations.
On
BookishFirst, to enter for a book you have to read the first few
pages, and then write a brief paragraph about your thoughts. The
first page grabbed me immediately (the first line!). The book opens
with Selena attending the funeral of her ex-husband, having received
a letter telling her she was named as his heir. At the funeral there
are several other women with the same letter. Also in attendance is
Selena's best friend, Knox, who lives in another state and who she
hasn't seen in a long time, and it's an awkward reunion between them.
And then Will walks in. Not dead. Selena and Knox leave, but later a
relative of Will's invites them to a gathering, along with everyone
else who attended the funeral. At the gathering there is just a brief
mention of the mystery surrounding Will's supposed death, and that
someone may have been using his identity, and Knox fears that Selena
could now be in danger, so he insists on going home with her and
staying with her to protect her.
That
mystery is never really revisited, and is never resolved, which
really irritated me. Was it just a plot device to throw Selena and
Knox together? The book is part of a multi-author series, so will a
future book in the series feature Will and that mystery? It was as if
this very interesting situation was introduced, and then just
abandoned.
We
learn from the beginning that Selena and Knox have been best friends
since college. And the fact that they are best friends is constantly
reiterated to the point of also being irritating. They kiss and then
one of them marvels to themself that they just kissed their best
friend! They marvel to themselves that they are lusting after their
best friend! Selena becomes pregnant and marvels that she's carrying
her best friend's baby!
I
never really connected with either Selena or Knox. They are both
damaged souls, which usually appeals to me, Selena having had a bad
childhood with an abusive father, and Knox having a marriage fall
apart after the death of his daughter. The angst level is mile high.
The ending of course is happy and satisfying. But the journey to that
ending was a bit tedius.
Halfway
through the book I posted about it in a Facebook group, and several
other members recommended Yates' Copper Ridge series, and I just
happened to have the first book, PART TIME COWBOY, which I had picked
up at a library sale. So I started it after finishing this book. And
you know what? Five chapters in and I am LOVING it! I love the
characters, I love the story so far, and I have laughed several
times. Out loud. One conversation between the hero and heroine made
me laugh so much I had to reread it twice and laughed out loud each
time. If I didn't know who the author was, I wouldn't have believed
the two books were written by the same person. Maybe THE RANCHER'S
BABY being a category romance* and having a shorter word count meant
the book had to be edited down too much, or didn't allow the author
to flesh out as much detail. I don't know. But despite not
particularly caring for this book, I will continue to read Ms. Yates'
books, and I'm glad that I finally tried her.
*Not
that's there's anything wrong with that! I've been a Harlequin fan
and reader for many many years.
EDIT:
After writing this review, I saw on Goodreads that the book is listed
as Texas Cattleman's Club: The Imposter, and is book 1, and that the
second book is about one of the other women who were at Will's
funeral. So apparently that mystery will be a running theme through
the series. However, that knowledge does not change my thoughts about
it.
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