Tag: romance blogger

new release, Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Jessica Peterson’s Cash, book 1 of the Lucky River Ranch series ✍🏻

professorromance

Overall Grade: A

Tropes: enemies to lovers; hate to love; cowboy; opposites attract; small town; boss/employee (owner/foreman of the ranch)

Jessica Peterson seemed to have cornered the market on intelligent, spicy romance set in the Carolinas. Whether she writes chefs, romance writers, farmers, lux resort owner siblings, or bonds people, she finds a way to infuse romance tropes with deep issues. When she announced her foray into cowboy romance, this reader was excited because I knew she would put her storytelling stamp on this genre. And she did this beautifully in the first book of her newest series, Lucky River Ranch, Cash. What Jessica Peterson didn’t know, through the scope of Mollie and Cash’s wild journey of hate to love, was her impressive ability to capture the trauma of divorce and death in the lives of the children of divorced couples.  Cash provided an apt mirror of my own story; this capacity for storytelling leaves me wanting more stories from Jessica Peterson. 

Peterson’s newest book, Cash, is spicy, perfectly paced, and engaging. Mollie and Cash’s immediate chemistry is the initial draw to the story. Their meet cute when Cash assumes Mollie’s a spoiled socialite who turned her back on her father, sets up the emotional tether between these two. As Mollie moves between grief and ire and grief and loyalty, you can’t help but champion the coupling of Mollie and Cash. From the start of this story, Peterson held me in the thrall of her story. It’s funny, it’s tear-invoking, and it’s sweet. By the end of Cash, you will be hoping for a short time until the next book of the series, Wyatt, because the other characters in the story are just as compelling and engaging as Mollie and Cash. 

There is so much more to this new series from Jessica Peterson. I love a cowboy romance, but I’m sure she will be one of my favorite authors of this subgenre of romance. 

In love and romance,

Professor A

new release, Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Reviews: Devney Perry’s Rally ✍🏻

professorromance

Overall Grade: A-/B+

Tropes: one-night stand to more; opposites attract; surprise baby; new adult romance; sports romance; cinnamon roll MMC; down on her luck FMC

Rally, Devney Perry’s third book in her Treasure State Wildcats series, gifts us with the story of Faye and Rush. If you have read the first book of this series, Coach (my favorite of the series to date), you’re familiar with the broad strokes of their story. However, Rally takes us deeper into its beginning, middle, and beautifully written ending. Seriously, Perry’s endings and bonus epilogues are some of my favorites in romancelandia, and Rally exemplifies this gift well. 

Faye and Rush’s story is one of complication. Perry has beautifully penned the trials of Faye becoming pregnant while struggling through life. Thankfully, Perry partners Faye with Rush whose background is less uncomplicated and filled with love so he can learn to love her through her struggles. Rally is a roller coaster ride of emotions as Faye learns to depend on Rush, even though she struggles to become vulnerable and willing to rely on someone. Thankfully, Perry crafts Rush to be uncomplicated and stalwart through Faye’s journey. This adds a sweetness to Rally that feels quintessentially Devney Perry. 

My only issues are the oft-used “we’ll rally” or “need to rally” as it feels a bit “on the nose” in this story. I know it’s the battle cry of their relationship, but it seemed too pedantic for Perry. Secondly, there are moments when Rush’s actions are inconsistent with the overarching sense of his character as a noble, compassionate fellow. He sometimes retreats from Faye when, as the quarterback of a successful college team, that seems contrary to who he is. Beyond these issues, I loved Faye and Rush’s story.

Devney Perry’s Rally and its predecessors continue her tradition fo writing palatable, engaging romance. I love her stories, and given Rally and her story, Crossroads, published earlier in the year, I won’t stop reading her stories anytime soon.

In love and romance,

Professor A

new release, Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Kristen Ashley’s Rock Chick Rematch, a 1001 Dark Nights/Blue Box Press novella in the Rock Chicks Universe ✍🏻

professorromance

Overall Grade: A

Tropes/Characteristics: soulmates; morally gray MMC; single mom; standalone in an interconnected series; found family

I didn’t realize how much I needed to read Kristen Ashley’s Rock Chick Rematch. If you’ve read her Rock Chicks series, Darius Tucker is the silent yet present, morally gray character who keeps on giving to the resolution of trepidatious situations. Yet, until now, his story along with his soulmate, Malia’s, has been unknown. Reading Rock Chick Rematch was like returning home after a long time away. Unlike many of my fellow Rock Chicks, I don’t do an annual re-read of Ashley’s stories. That’s simply because her book list is so prolific that I find myself working through it still after beginning to read her a year and a half ago. Even more, whether you are reading one of her novellas from 1001 Dark Nights/Blue Box Press or independently published full novels, Ashley treats her readers to a full meal of story. I can’t tell you the number of times I leave a novella wanting more. This isn’t the case with Rock Chick Rematch; instead, she gifts you a story between two long-suffering, but deeply-in-love characters who receive the happiest of endings. It has everything you love about the Rock Chicks and the Hot Bunch: an undying love, an MMC who protects beyond any measure of his own happiness, and a quirky, but independent FMC who keeps him and his “brothers” on their toes. 

What did I love about Rock Chick Rematch?

  • Malia is fierce. Kristen Ashley knows that you can’t gain entry into the Rock Chick world unless you can go toe to toe with a possessive, alpha-male Hot Bunch guy. I love strong female characters, and Kristen Ashley’s portrait of Malia and the Rock Chicks is exactly that. While Malia doesn’t know herself when she’s young, she figures it out quickly, and she doesn’t suffer fools, namely Darius. In fact, my only disappointment was how quickly she forgives Darius for a secret, and I understand this is a novella so KA has only so much space to write this story. However, I felt Malia’s pain and hurt, and I wanted her to revel in it a bit more. Even more, I wanted it seen and acknowledged more by the participants in that secret. Kristen Ashley has written a saint in Malia.
  • I loved Darius’s journey. That we are gifted his story is a treasure. My favorite moments of Rock Chick Rematch are Malia’s realization that Darius has become the best of his father. I won’t divulge more details, but Darius’s swooniness comes through his need to protect and care for Malia and their son, Liam. A morally gray character is always one of my favorites, and Darius has taken a top 10 spot of morally gray romance heroes for me after this book. 
  • The reunion with the Rock Chicks and Hot Bunch. This is the sweet cream of this story. If you’ve read this series from Kristen Ashley, you know that it never lets go. It sticks to your ribs forever. Being granted the opportunity to return to it, to recognize the parallels of other stories as Kristen Ashley divulges Malia and Darius’s story is the thing that will make bubbles in your soul. Everyone is here. Everyone. And there’s a nod to the future. For me, this is Kristen Ashley’s superpower: developing her universe and allowing us continued access to it even when a particular world seems closed. She knows her reader fans, and she gifts us stories such as Rock Chick Rematch constantly, earning our undying love.

Rock Chick Rematch is all caps DIVINE. I inhaled this story of lost love and love regained. I am so thankful to Kristen Ashley for writing this beautiful book about soulmates who needed to wait for their time. In the end, they find it and a wealth of happiness that will absolutely warm your soul.

In love and romance,

Professor A