No idea how I ran into this book or why I decided to read it but I did it. Usually I run when I see a book series on one couple dragged out over so many books. But I saw the high ratings and thought why not? It couldn’t hurt to start it and I could always dnf it if I didn’t enjoy it.
The thing is, for some reason I could put the book down. I liked the easy intimacy between Dean and Liv because they’d been together for a while. I usually read about people falling in love and they don’t start with the couple already in a relationship. We get some back and forth between the past and present but I didn’t mind it too much. It was nice to see how their relationship had evolved over the years.
Now, let’s get to the frustrating parts. For how long this book is, there’s not a lot going on. A lot of sex scenes happen but they don’t add to the story. We also get a lot of mundane details I found myself glossing over. How a room is decorated doesn’t need a whole page to itself. It got very repetitive and annoying when the couple had more important things I wanted to see them work out.
There’re also a lot of problems with their communication. If Liv knew how to bring up a topic, they wouldn’t have had as many issues as they did. There’s also the problem of Dean keeping a secret that no one in their right mind would keep from their wife. It made no sense why he didn’t tell her at some point during the 5 years they were together.
The conflict starts off as something fixable and just spirals out of control to include so many things that you wonder how one couple could have all these things happen in a span of a couple months. I also wasn’t a big fan of the “girl being traumatized so closes herself off but this one man can get past her defenses.” It’s overused and I’m tired of seeing it. Why do the women always need a man to save them? Liv plainly states that Dean was her white knight and made her feel safe so she’s codependent on him for that reason.
It must sound like I hated the book but I really didn’t. It was an easy read and I must have liked it enough if I read it in a day. I’ve been in a reading rut lately and this got me out of it. I’ll start the next book soon and I’m really hoping it gets better. Oh, and this one does end on a cliffhanger so make sure you’re ready to get the next book if you’re remotely invested in the characters.
2.5/5
