Title: Bitch Slap
Author: J Kenner
Publisher/Year: Martini & Olives  5/31/17
Length:   158 Pages

Overview

The first time I met her I wanted to slap her.
The second time, I knew I had to have her.
As for the third time, a gentleman doesn’t tell.
So I guess it’s a good thing I’m no gentleman … right?

Let’s get this out of the way, right off the bat: I love women.

I love the way they look. The way they smell. The way they feel. Especially the way they feel. And I’ve pretty much made it my mission to give each and every woman who shares my bed the ride of her life.

Then I met her. Bitchy as hell and completely uninterested in me. And damned if I didn’t want her. Crave her. I told myself I only wanted to tame her. That it was all about the challenge.

I never expected to break through that ice queen exterior and find the softness underneath. Never expected how wild she’d be between the sheets or the way she’d cry my name with such sincere intensity when I totally rocked her world.

Most of all, I never expected to fall for her.

But I did.

And the question is, now that I know I want her, how the hell do I go about keeping her?

My Thoughts

So i’m a huge fan of all things tied to J Kenner since we have some of the best series by her so i was excited to get into this standalone.  It’s an interesting story – honestly, i think that it felt VERY VERY different from all that we’ve read by J Kenner, and i wondered at times if it was actually written by her.  It was only the tie back to Jamie and her boyfriend Hunter to help out with some security things, along with teasing back to Stark through needing help getting into a hotel that made them all blend together.

So what we have here is a story of a guy, Pierce, who’s had his heart broken in the past, was military as well, so we know that he’s got more walls than anyone.  He’s looking for ‘something’ but not sure what it is, and he knows that he only wants ‘one night’ with anyone so that he’s not able to grow bonds.

Then there’s Jez – the leading lady of this saga, the older sister of a hollywood starlet who’s on the bad end of a scandal, and the sister just wants to find a way to protect her sister and keep things from getting any worse.

Its through a wrong encounter that we see these two cross paths, thinking that each is someone else and it’s clearly all for the best as we see.

So, Pierce and Jez show us that they have interesting chemistry – both for the fact that they are strong willed and the fact that they’re looking for something without knowing that they are looking for it.  meaning they both clearly need a release as they’re high strung and they both need to find comfort in someone and trust in someone, so it’s nice that they are able to avoid admitting it here and just do it. for now.

With this book, it’s sweet-  and quite expected but i don’t know – there’s something about it that didn’t feel right with me.  We usually have good highs and lows when we get stories from Ms Kenner and that’s not really the case here.  there were maybe a few seconds of grief sure, but nothing that was uber climactic and i feel like it’s a miss on her part.  The ending though was nice since it wasn’t the expected ending for some of the characters – so that was played nicely.

so all in all, a decent novella, and i think that as a tied me over to something out from the bigger series about nikki and damien, i’ll take it.  enjoy!