I had such high hopes for this one, as I used to read this author when she had that rock star romance series and I ADORED those books. But this book just felt like a hot mess. It was all over the place and I just wasn't enjoying it that much but I pushed through it. I just found this one to be such a disappointment and I am not even wanting to read the rest of the series, so I might try looking through her backlist and see if she has other series that might appeal to me more. I know she can write great things so I think I just had such high hopes for this one here. And I expected so much from it and it just didn't work for me. So many aspects of it just made no sense to me. But I will try some other books. But I am more picky about books these days and just won't stick with a series if a book isn't doing it for me. It might have been a "me" issue. ( )

All in all, this is a pretty sweet CR. There are flaws, sure, but I felt pretty satisfied overall, and I haven't really connected with this author's work yet. When I was reading, I was reading this-which at the moment is more than I can say for most books.

If I had to name an issue here, while I enjoyed the central conflict because I thought it was reasonable I sort of couldn't get on the bandwagon of where the blame lies. The hero makes a very human, family-centric choice at 17, when the heroine is choosing her future and career. Fin remains family-centric and never gives up on his high school girlfriend, six years passes, and she returns.

So they are 23 or so, and I liked how they read believably, and yet I couldn't shake the notion that her expectations were a little "off" for their age and stage in life, and that his confidence in her was unwavering. I suppose that was part of the appeal of the book, but it left me a little cold that it felt like she was afforded all her own choices and he was expected to ride along - or that they'd compromise simply because of their choices.

It's a good foundation, but for me, it wasn't enough to see very little give in her idea of careers and relationships.

I know that is all a criticism, but it really was sweet and angsty, even comforting to read. I thought she built lovable characters and look forward to reading on about these brothers. 3.6 ( )