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Review: Breathe into Me by Sara Fawkes

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Title: Breathe into Me
Author:  Sara Fawkes
Publisher/Year:  St Martin’s Press  7/29/14
Length:  288 Pages

Overview

How did my life get so broken?  It’s a question Lacey St. James asks herself every day.  Stuck raising her little brother in a trailer park while she works a dead end job at a grocery store, she has a stalker exboyfriend, a bad reputation, and no way out.

And then she meets Everett, who changes her entire existence.

Everett is an outsider who’s housesitting his family’s mansion off the coast, and for reasons Lacey can’t understand, he’s completely captivated by her. He seems determined to show her that life can offer more than she’d ever hoped for, if only she believes in herself.  She desperately yearns to trust him, but what happens when she finds out that everything he’s told her is a lie?

My Thoughts

I’m a bit torn here, and let me explain why.  From my vast experience with Ms. Fawkes, she’s become one of my favorites, because we get really intense stories between characters that have tainted paths, and all the while we get a LOT of passion and heat that really keeps the story together.  What happened here though, i’m still trying to figure out.

We got the first part – the really complicated complex story of Lacey and Everett – so that’s really consistent, but i think i spent the entire time wondering when we’d get what i’ve come to expect as the trademark Fawkes, and really get into some great scening.

So, to get back to what i enjoyed for a bit – Lacey is a really dynamic leading lady – she’s got just about nothing going for her, meaning that she’s had a troubled past, and her present isn’t that great either.  There were a few things that happened in high school that put her life on a downward spiral not just in the sense that she doesn’t trust people anymore, but that she has reason to.  Even with that, her family continues to let her down as well.  it’s the hope that there’s something worth salvaging that keeps her going, but even she knows that it’s not possible to keep that much hope.

We meet Everett one night when Lacey isn’t at her best, and some how he manages to get a foot in the door.  He’s there in the way that she needs, not pushing for something that she’ll never trust, and continues to instill the idea that there’s something great and honest out there.  Of course though, what she doesn’t know is what we don’t know – that there’s darkness in his past, and it’ll most likely come out at the most inopportune time.  I have to say that I had a feeling that there was something big that he was hiding the entire time, and i wasn’t wrong.

So…to get to the other point that i made, given what we’ve gotten in all of the other series that Sara has given us, there’s so much passion that we often don’t last but a few chapters without getting into it.  While i understand why we needed the build up here since it’s a trust thing, i was waiting and waiting….and waiting.  At least when we got there, it was hot, and stereotypical Fawkes.  So, i guess i’ll continue to be a fan.  🙂

Anyhow, the epilogue teased at something interesting with one of the supporting characters, and while this is touted as a stand alone, i wonder what’s next on the horizon.  I’m guessing that there will be a book 2 in the series – with something happening for Clare – but that’s just me wanting to continue with characters that i’ve come to enjoy.  Anyhow, i hope you guys get a chance to pick this one up – don’t dismiss it because it wasn’t true love for me, it’s still a pretty good read

*note – clicking the cover will take you to BN.com to buy!

Review: Anything He Wants (Castaway #4) by Sara Fawkes

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Title:  Anything He Wants:  Castaway #4
Author: Sara Fawkes
Publisher/Year:  Fawkesfire 9/14/13
Length:  121 pages
Series: Anything He Wants #8, Castaway #4

Overview

Forgiveness is sought and deadly deadly decisions made in the electrifying climax of the Anything He Wants: Castaway series!

They say the sins of the father are passed down on the successive generations, and no more so than in the Hamilton family. What little hope remains in Lucy’s heart is shattered by events and the trauma of a madman’s pursuit. Outmatched and outsmarted at every turn, Lucy will be forced to make a terrible choice that will have lasting consequences, no more so than with her heart. For in her hands lies the fate of two men, both of whom she loves, and she must decide which will live, and which will die.

With no light at the end of this dark tunnel, will Lucy be able to choose the right path? Or will she be destined to bring down the Hamilton family legacy?

My Thoughts

I mean, who doesn’t love a story that starts up right after a bomb (or several) have gone off and you don’t know who’s going to survive and to what extent.  That’s the best way to resolve a cliffhanger of the last few chapters.  Where we pick up is Lucy trapped beneath the rubble, trying to find her way out, Lucas trying to help her and we’re not quite sure where Jeremiah is…but we know he’s safe (or so we guess right?)

The CIA, Interpol, all other sorts of agents are mulling around, trying to figure out where to get everyone that would be safe since they know that they can’t trust anyone, that their location is being tracked and they aren’t 100% sure who’s after them, yet they think that it’s Rush – because he’s the evil 3rd brother.  (and yes, we’ve confirmed that he’s a brother).

These final chapters of the story take us on the journey to a hospital to hide out and recover, we try to figure the extent of injuries – we know that Lucy has either sprained or broken her ankle which i’m sure we can expect to hurt her chances of fight or flight in the coming chapters – and we see that Lucas is probably far more injured than he’s letting on since he’s hunched over, holding his abdomen but won’t admit to any pain.  that is until they are all being moved to a ‘safe’ hospital for medical attention and he collapses to the ground.  this should be the first of many bad omens since it means that Lucy and Lucas will be riding in one vehicle to go to the hospital and Jeremiah will be left behind.

who knows what that means for his trip to find them, although if you know these types of stories – you know that he’s not going to make it – and he doesn’t .  the car that he’s in gets stopped and he’s captured.  While Lucas and Lucy are trying to figure out what to do next, they are overcome by some type of gas in their safe house and they find themselves kidnapped as well.  good news – they are with Jeremiah – bad news – not everyone will live.

I’ll leave you with that – but i do have to say one thing.  i really enjoyed the ending – kind of expected it, but i was pleased with where it went.  One of the things that i Love about Sara Fawkes writing style is that she doesn’t feel the need to go overboard on certain bits of the story.  we know that there’s goign to be continued trouble in paradise and we don’t know if Jeremiah will ever forgive Lucy or if he’ll even have the chance, but we don’t dwell on it to much.  we get the other side of the story to continue and it adds to all that anxiety.

We also know what we’re to expect of the ending, and while it’s predictable, it’s not bad – it was well written and thought about in a good way.

What i loved too is not only did we get an epilogue – we got a ‘bonus story’ at the very end and that was great.  it makes me wonder if Ms. Fawkes is going to continue the story a bit more even for a #0.5 book so that we get the missing months.

All in all, even though it was a novella in the way that i read it with a few chapters here and there, and apparently i’m too slow to have realized that this final installment has been out for a month and a half, i’m glad that i took the journey with this family and that we got the story that we did.  It’s nice to see family blown apart, come back together, and not get quite the resolution that we were hoping for.  It’s also nice to see a romance that’s not so clean and pretty – but gives us what we need.

I hope you guys enjoyed it like i did!

Review: Anything He Wants (book 8): Castaway (#3) by Sara Fawkes

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Title:  Anything He Wants:  Castaway #3
Author: Sara Fawkes
Publisher/Year:  Fawkesfire 7/15/13
Length:  136 pages
Series: Anything He Wants #8, Castaway #3

Overview

Secrets are revealed in the thrilling third part of the new Anything He Wants: Castaway series!

Every action has its consequences, and the day of reckoning has come for Lucy. Jeremiah Hamilton is not a man inclined to forgive betrayal, and a broken-hearted Lucy is left shattered and desperate to get back home to her mundane life. There, she can nurse a broken heart and try to go back to normal far away from danger.

But the promise of safety is an illusion. Someone has marked her as much a target as surely as any Hamilton male, and believes her to be their key for revenge against the family. There is nowhere Lucy can hide, but her help comes from a most unlikely source.

With lives on the line, can they outwit a predator who is constantly one step ahead of them?

My Thoughts

Can you believe how book 2 ended?  let’s just say that the cliffhanger that we got there, or i don’t know if that’s quite the right word, but let’s just say that i wasn’t necessarily expecting that, and i’m really excited about what we see as the intro to these chapters.

Suffice it to say, Jeremiah knows how to make an entrance into a room (granted he was already there) and the way that he learned his information and spat it back to Lucy – well that was exactly what i needed!

Anyhow, this 3rd installment takes us from the shaky ground that we’re in both in Dubai and in the relationship with these 3 back to London where even more tension and anxiety are coming from.  In the last book, we see that things are more complicated than even we knew, and that’s because we really don’t know who we’re dealing with (among both the known characters as well as the unknown).   Lucy managed to thwart a kidnapping plan against Amyrah (Rashid’s sister) but that’s not the end of things.  Lucy has gotten her return passage back home and has managed a layover in London.  (due to weather it’s longer than anticipated).  There she encounters a man who everyone believes is the one behind all of the murder attempts, and it’s odd because he’s made himself known to Lucy, yet he’s not able to be tracked.  Being the smart female lead that she is, she puts that thought in the middle of her mind (not quite the end) and figures out what to do moving forward.

While she’s in the airport though, she learns that there was a bombing at the hotel that she just left in Dubai where the Hamilton brothers are supposed to be and this means that she’s even further down her downward spiral.

Luckily, she learns that the brothers are ok, but that’s definitely not where things end.  Folks that seem like they are good guys prove us wrong, folks that seem like they are sharing the full truth are clearly not, and the path that we’re taken on here is either a wild goose chase or something entirely different.

What we get back into in this story though is a deeper conversation around the romantic relationship between Lucy and everyone else, and we learn that there’s a deeper pull there.  We get to see what that means, and who that means it’s going to continue with.

And as i stated in the beginning here, while i semi-considered the ending of book 2 to be a cliffhanger, book 3 REALLY ended on one.  i wonder what’s going to happen next and who’s going to be found to be behind everything and if it makes any difference at all.

I do actually have a few questions in my mind about what we’re going to see

1) What’s the deal behind the leaked information about Jeremiah back in the US?  what didn’t he want shared that’s now public?

2) can we trust the Interpol folks?

3) is the 3rd brother really a brother?

i guess we’ll have to wait and see what comes next from Ms. Fawkes!!!

Review: Anything He Wants (book 7): Castaway #2 by Sara Fawkes

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Title:  Anything He Wants:  Castaway #2
Author: Sara Fawkes
Publisher/Year:  Fawkesfire 4/9/13
Length:  147 pages
Series: Anything He Wants #7, Castaway #2

Overview

Tensions escalate in the second part of the new Anything He Wants series!

Reunited with Jeremiah, Lucy is forced to come to grips with the decisions she’s made in his absence. The billionaire is as insufferable as ever, but just as determined to protect Lucy. From the Caribbean seas of Jamaica to the man-made islands of Dubai, they must travel halfway across the world to find out who is trying to bring down the Hamilton family.

But it may be the woman who comes between them that tears the two brothers apart forever. And can Lucy bear to live with the consequences of her actions?

My Thoughts

We open these chapters with the return of Jeremiah who has somehow managed to locate Lucas’ (Loki’s) ship and has come to rescue her.  The problem of course being that nothing is ever that simple.  especially when dealing with the Hamilton brothers.  Lucy is torn between what she’s done and what Jeremiah means, and it gives us a tension ridden story.

The interesting thing about this installment of the series is that there’s not too much steamy-ness so to speak.  What we get here is a lot of internalization from Lucy’s part on what she wants, what she can admit and deciding what that means in the future.

This story takes us from the ship to the Caribbean (i believe Jamaica) and then overseas to Dubai.  It’s quite interesting to me to see the dynamic there and to meet the folks that we do meet.  What’s even more interesting to me is that we don’t quite know what the role is of the folks that we are introduced (namely Rashid) and what his relationship is with Lucas that has taken them overseas in the first place.

I really enjoyed this middle ground of the series since it gives is a chance to take a break from sexual tension and really get at the heart of things.  you see the brothers trying to make a move against each other while potentially realizing that there’s more to their story – and you see Lucy caught in the middle.  not that she doesn’t know what she wants, but she’s afraid of the implication to her actions.

can’t wait for book 3 in the Castaway series!

Review: Anything He Wants (book 6): Castaway #1 by Sara Fawkes

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Sometimes i really hate it when i read so fast, especially when it’s in the form of these little novellas.  i’ve found that when the story is good, 100 pages or so goes by like it’s 10.

In any event, if you remember where the first 5 installments (combined into the nice long installment of the series), Lucy had told Jeremiah that she loved him (in the heat of the moment), Jeremiah freaked out and told her that she should ‘keep platitudes like that to herself’….Loki (or Lucas), Jeremiah’s brother had stirred up quite a bit of trouble, and as a result, Lucy finds herself in trouble yet again, being kidnapped by Lucas….and with no idea what’s going on her life.

She’s miserable because she allowed herself to fall for Jeremiah and he apparently didn’t feel the same way, because she’s now been captured by Lucas who strongly resembles his younger brother, and she’s scared for her life and for her emotions.

So ‘Castaway’ takes us now to the point where Lucy has to rely on Lucas to keep her safe from the same men that he does business with…..the same folks that live off of doing illegal things.  like being gunrunners, smuggling all sorts of contraband etc.  Lucas had thought that once she was forced to help translate for them that she could be free but the men that were working on this deal had other ideas and as a result, Lucas had to bring Lucy on board a ship that was transporting the goods and try to keep her safe.  The best way that he could do that was to keep her in his room and we of course know what happens when you’re in close quarters with an attractive man, you’re on the rebound and you’re scared out of your mind.

Throughout this installment, we all wonder what’s going to happen with Lucy and Jeremiah, if they are done and she’s going to move on with Lucas or if he’s going to some how come back around.  We also are left to wonder if there’s going to be something with Lucas and Lucy in the future….all great questions…

what this means though is that i have to wait another month for book 7 to come out but i guess i can manage….

happy reading!

Review: Anything He Wants by Sara Fawkes

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I came across this book when i was browsing through titles on Goodreads.com.  I’m not usually one to fall for the banner ads on sites because i know that they typically aren’t ‘organic’ but the cover art just drew me in.  I read the synopsis and immediately found myself downloading the full version (vs. the 5 book minis that make up the larger book).  I haven’t heard of the author Sara Fawkes before but definitely figured that she’s be worth the try.

so we are introduced to Lucy, who is our leading lady.  She works as a temp in NYC for a data entry firm of some sort.  Of course, it’s a large multi-company building that she works in because she finds herself staring at a dashingly handsome stranger in the elevator line EVERY day on her way into work.  For several weeks she’s made sure to be in his elevator just to catch a glimpse of him, and of course even though she’s under the assumption that he doesn’t notice such things, he knows she’s there, and her assumed invisibility is about to go to crap.

While in the elevator with this sexy rich looking man one day, they find themselves alone, he confronts her with the knowledge that she’s clearly drawn to him, and they have the first of many erotic encounters.  Lucy is completely out of her element, not being accustomed to all this kind of attention from ‘sexy’ men, and not being one to ever do things in public, but that doesn’t stop her.  Not much after that, the man finds Lucy after work and they fall into each other yet again.

The following day, Lucy is summoned by HR and taken up to one of the higher up corporate floors.  She finds herself in a part of the building that is unlike any other – more modern and opulent.  then she finds herself in the office of a man…who turns out to not only be the same one that she’s been drooling over for ages, but the same one that she’s been intimate with recently, and well, turns out that he’s the CEO of a major company, a billionaire and none other an Jeremiah (Remi) Hamillton.  our leading man.

Long story short, Lucy is informed that even prior to their encounters, her job had been determined unnecessary and she was going to be out of work.  Jeremiah propositioned her with an opportunity to then be his personal assistant, probably partly due to their chemistry and his draw to her and partly because she really is good at what she does.  So, that same day that Lucy is offered her job, her life turns upside down.

She is flown around the world, finds herself in grave danger, isn’t sure who she can trust….all while having AMAZING sex with Jeremiah of course.  If only it ended there right?

One of the things that i LOVED about this book is that you are drawn right into the story from the onset – the way that Sara talks about Lucy and her impressions of Jeremiah.  The way that the story just gets right into it without feeling like it’s rushed.  Then as the story evolves, you begin to think that you’re putting the puzzle together, yet when things shake out, you find that you weren’t entirely correct.  I like to pride myself on being able to figure out stories and get a sense of what’s going to happen, and throughout this one, i found that i was typically wrong..in a good way.  i read through this really quickly because i was so drawn, and the intense anxiety that happened for the last third really made me want to keep reading

Now what i’m left wondering is whether or not there’s going to be a follow up.  i can’t seem to find out online yet, but that doesn’t mean that i won’t keep looking.  the way that this story left off really lends itself to another book, which i’m praying is what the plan is.  I certainly haven’t had enough of Lucy, Jeremiah and everyone else…..check it out – definitely a 4 out of 5 stars!

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