Title: Shredded
Author: Tracy Wolff
Publisher/Year:  Random House Publishing 2/4/14
Length:   304 pages
Series:  Extreme Rish #1

Overview

Twenty-one-year-old professional snowboarder Z Michaels is the bad boy of Park City, Utah. He’s always had his pick of any girl in town—and on the competition circuit. But underneath his cool exterior is a young man in turmoil, trying to take the edge off tragedy by overindulging in sex and shredding the slopes. In fact, Z’s rash behavior is a thinly veiled attempt to blunt his emotional suffering with physical pain.

Ophelia Richardson isn’t like any girl Z has ever met. Though she’s from New Orleans, she’s no Southern belle—and she’s not shy about being miserable in frozen, godforsaken Park City. But after nearly dying in the same drag-racing accident that killed her boyfriend, she needs a place to heal, both physically and emotionally. The last thing Ophelia wants right now is a boyfriend—especially one as rich and reckless as Z. But Ophelia soon discovers that he isn’t what he seems. If anything, Z may be even more damaged than she is.

Feeling alone in the world, Z and Ophelia find a connection unlike any they’ve ever known. But their tormented pasts pull them in every direction, forcing their relationship into a downhill slide before it even begins—unless they can find the strength in each other to trust, grow, and love again.

My Thoughts

As you guys can probably tell by now, i’m a big fan of this author – Tracy Wolff has managed to get me interested and intrigued by all of the characters that she writes and all of the story lines.  there’s just the right amount of passion and heat followed up by a worthwhile story line that keeps me invested.

In this introduction to the series, we find ourselves in Park City at a ski resort with a group of 4 best friend snowboarders (3 guys and a girl) who have a close enough bond to be considered family while there are romantic feelings muddling things up among some of them.

We have our leading man, Z – who’s probably the best boarder in the group but he’s got a lot of baggage that constantly gets in the way.  he’s a manwhore for sure – different girl every night, but he’s also got some trauma in his past that makes things even tougher for ppl to get close and in his head. Then there’s the fact that one of his closest friends keeps making advances on him, and he’s trying to get the attention of a new girl who’s shown up at the resort.

That’s where this story takes us, as we have alternating chapters from Z’s perspective and from Ophelia (the new girl).  She’s got her own history and story that takes some time to come out, but it’s something that makes a whole lot of sense once you get the back story.

As expected, we see a clashing of personalities here underlined by the fact that there’s an intense attraction and a similar thing that they both see in each other.  The heat’s there but it’s a slow build.  And different than what we’ve seen in other series that Ms Wolff has written, this one is a bit more R rated than NC-17 if you get what i’m saying as aside from a few scenes, while it’s hot, it’s not over the top hot.

There of course are a series of crazy, near death experiences that bring this crew apart and together, and it’s the last paragraph or sentence even that makes your heart break – as someone’s just died.  who?  well it’s more than one person, and what will that mean for this budding romance and the crew?  we’ll, have to wait and see in Shattered – book 2.  On that note – happy sunday!