Title: Beauty and the Professor
Author: Skye Warren
Publisher/Year: Dangerous Press 4/23/19
Length: 200 pages
Series: A Modern Fairy Tale Duet #1
Overview
Once upon a time there was a beautiful college student…
Erin cleans Mr. Morris’s house twice a week to pay her tuition. The reclusive ex-soldier intimidates her, but she can’t help but feel sympathy for him. Then she walks in on him touching himself, and she has much darker, much more sensual feelings.
And a beastly professor with scars he can’t hide…
Blake Morris knows he’s scarred both inside and out. He’s reclusive and surly. Nowhere near good enough for the smart and beautiful young woman who cleans his house.
He receives an offer to return to his alma mater as an associate professor. This is his chance to reenter the world–and to be worthy of the woman he dreams about. He never expected to see her sitting in his classroom on the first day of the semester.
My Thoughts
The summary gives a certain level of romanticism to this story, and while it’s accurate, there are elements that are a little misleading. We do meet Erin while she’s working as a maid, cleaning Blake’s house. We know that she’s attracted to him even though he feels that he’s scarred and hideous and damaged. It’s all due to being in the army, being tortured and yet that still doesn’t seem to be enough for him. What we learn is that he was engaged prior to the accident and the woman that he was with (ironically another professor at the university), she dumped him QUICKLY when he came back and that;s part of what makes the pain worse.
Erin on the other hand has her own struggles. She’s working to pay tuition, being the first in her family to go to college, and we also learn that her mother forged much of the same path. working as a maid – a profession that’s respectable when you need to feed your family, but what she learned quickly is that there’s a disparity when you’re working for a wealthy family who feels like you have to do all they say since they pay your bills. A lesson that Erin’s mom is afraid she’s going to learn from Blake.
This story takes a turn when we see the feelings that Blake has for Erin when she least expects it. She walks in on him pleasuring himself, and out comes her name. We then get to watch how she takes matters into her own hands, makes him realize that what he feels isn’t one sided and a lovely romance blooms from there.
There’s a bit of risk here knowing that he’s a professor now and she’s a student, although not in his class. they manage to keep things under wraps until a new semester starts and Erin finds herself in the last class she needs to take to graduate and it’s Blake who’s the teacher. They play it cool, but what we learn is that it’s not cool enough. The professor that was engaged to Blake before his accident is stil lat the school and we get to see what happens when she realizes that he’s still perfect and yet he’s moved on. She discovers the truth and that’s where our story nets out. There are threats on him, there are threats to Erin and we don’t know what the outcome will be. Romance is off the table and hearts are broken. Off the cliff we go, until we get into the next installment. Enjoy!