Title: Drive Me Crazy
Author: Tracy Wolff
Publisher/Year:  Random House Publishing 2/24/14
Length:   250 pages
Series:  Shaken Dirty #2

Overview

Former rivals Quinn Bradford and Elise McKinney are not friends, at least not anymore. As teens, all they cared about was psyching each other out before concerts. But when Quinn—now the keyboardist for Shaken Dirty, the hottest rock band on the scene—returns to his hometown and hears about the car accident that shattered Elise’s career, he’s determined to make things right.

Elise wants nothing to do with an arrogant rock star, despite how bad she so clearly wants him, so Quinn kidnaps the stubborn little piano player and whisks her back to his mansion. A little seduction might be just the thing to keep Elise under his care…and in his bed. But amid pranks both childish and very adult, their past comes rearing back to haunt them. And it might be more than either of them can forget.

His rival’s in his bed, and this rocker is ready to play.

My Thoughts

I like how this series is progressing, giving us a peek into the lives of these band members as they begin  to ‘grow up’ and find their own identities while on hiatus from the tour.  In this next installment, we see that there’s a more human side to Quinn, although we started to see that from the first book and how he was with Jamison.

Anyhow, it’ opens in the hospital as Elise wakes up from surgery which is a result of a car accident that she was in.  What i think it’s tough here though in the flow of the story is that we don’t ever learn exactly what happened, and all that, but we just know that it happened.  In any event, we see that Quinn is there by her side, which is a surprise given that they haven’t seen each other for 10 years, and their last time together wasn’t necessary an exit on good terms. (i.e. Quinn dipped out without so much as a goodbye).

Fast forward to the present, we get to see that Quinn and Elise still have chemistry and a really strong friendship, and Quinn wants to be there for her while she’s recuperating – and maybe more?  The nice thing between these 2 is that they are both feisty – we get to see some nice banter between them, and we get to see that while there’s hurt and fear between what they were and what they could be, they are both able to put things aside in order to just ‘be’ for the moment.

There’s the subplot of both of their careers in the mix here as well which keeps the main story going – Elise being a professional pianist and of course Quinn’s situation with Shaken Dirty, and the rehab/member situations going on. We get to spend much of the book wondering ‘what will happen’ for both of them, and as we saw in the previous book, our author gives us a peek in the epilogue.

That all being said, along with the great subplot that we have to keep the bigger series going, we have the intense chemistry with these 2 that keeps this one installment going.  while it’s not as ‘animalistic’ as Jamison and Ryder, it’s still hot in a romantic sort of way.  There’s something that’s more ‘romance than heat’ with these two, but it works.  and it’s nice.  I think that of course there’s the expectation that someone’s going to get scared off, and it’ll be a question of how they will find their way back together if it’s meant to be, and what that will look like, but it’s a nice progression that Ms Wolff gives us to get there.

So on that note, i’m off to find book 3 and see who’s next.  Enjoy!