From bestselling author Kandi Steiner comes a fresh and captivating billionaire romance about a reserved photographer and the powerful CEO who has to have her...
My boyfriend’s billionaire boss always gets what he wants.
Menacingly handsome and unquestionably powerful, Theo Whitman need only snap his fingers to have a flock of supermodels fall at his feet. So when his steel gray eyes first meet mine, I expect him to pass right over me, to not give so much as a second thought to my presence.
Instead, he sees me.
Truly sees me.
And for a girl who prefers to hide behind her camera lens, it’s the most unnerving experience of my life.
Until he asks me to stay on his yacht for the summer.
All I have to do to earn my keep is be Theo’s on-call photographer when he has guests, and I’ll get a free ride through the Mediterranean with my boyfriend. Easy peasy.
Still, my skin prickles in warning when I say yes.
As the humid days fade into balmy nights, I can’t seem to avoid Theo. And when he finds me, it’s like a rabbit running into a wolf.
His intense gaze immobilizes me. The way he speaks strips me bare. Every brush of his skin sears me like a violent flame.
My boyfriend’s billionaire boss always gets what he wants.
And this time, I think he wants me.
REVIEW: 2 STARS
"He treats you like you're nothing to him when I'm dying to treat you like you're everything to me."
"He treats you like you're nothing to him when I'm dying to treat you like you're everything to me."
Man, this one sounded like it was going to be all sorts of amazing for me. If you've followed me for any amount of time, you will know that I gravitate towards heavy, emotional reads - most notably, angsty ones and I love me a well written triangle. Kandi Steiner is one author that has gifted me with one of my top favorite ever triangles (A Love Letter to Whiskey) and it started my love affair with her. It also set the bar incredibly high for triangles and angsty books. So, my love for Kandi goes a ways back and I hold a special place in my heart for her painful but amazing reads. Alas, this one will not hold any special places. I'm disappointed, to say the least, but I'm clearly in my own world with said disappointment, too - clearly, based on the multitude of glowing reviews she's received. So, the long and the short of it: I'll gift out a copy as usual, but I can't and won't pretend I thoroughly enjoyed the ridiculousness of it.
If you’ve followed Kandi for any amount of time, you know she’s traveled extensively. One gift this book tendered was an up front view of her travels as seen through her eyes. That was a wonder to experience because the ability to share her own vision is truly a talent when the reader is able to see exactly where she’s describing - as well as the emotion that view afforded her. She’s so good at describing how engulfing a feeling of desire is. How a pull between two people is a hard fought battle until it comes crashing down all around them. How they meld into one, seemingly without consequence in the dark of night. Kandi is very definitely a descriptive writer, no doubt about it.
But, it's safe to say, I think this is where I feel the love affair ends.....with this book. I was hoping for a true triangle. Not a knight in shining armor against a douche for a boyfriend. That provided exactly zero angst or push/pull for me because she had no reason to not walk away from her douche of a boyfriend. I hate when that’s the easy way out - especially since this was supposed to be angsty. It was not in any way angsty....so I feel let down by that promise. No angst.
The good and the bad: in the beginning, the adventures Aspen was taking were a lot more interesting than the forming relationship between her and Theo. By 22%, it still didn’t have a real pull for me yet. No actual foundation or emotional investment was forming, but I was still curious to see where it was going, so I pushed on. I was enjoying her travels more than the romance that should have been brewing, but I know Steiner is good at setting a foundation for me. So I continued on. I kid you not, 5% later and I was clinging to every word being spoken between the two of them. The crackle in the air was palpable and the sin was floating in the waves around the boat.
And then....nothing. Where'd it go? What happened!? As I got farther in, the sad realization started making itself known: this wasn’t fate - it was all out lust. It didn't read like fate, or destiny, at all. It read like cheating and straight up testing the waters. I mean, we all know how much I love a triangle and the push and pull of right vs. wrong when it comes to meeting someone else that makes your heart flutter. I love those moments. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel like I got to know who Theo was to truly fall for him, so that emotional tug was missing. Was it because it was a different kind of introduction? Well, that introduction definitely intrigued me, no lie, but I just didn't feel like his character's groundwork was laid out well enough for me to form an honest opinion about him, and it wasn't like it added a "mysterious" light to him - it was just Theo. Nothing to grasp onto. {{sigh}}
It wasn’t until I got past the halfway mark that I started to feel some sort of emotion out of Aspen. The turmoil she felt about her world with Joel and their history versus the excitement and the intensity she felt with Theo. The norm vs the new. But that came and went, interchangeably. But I held on. I pushed through. I wanted to get that cherry on top. I wanted to see what this was going to turn into. I had hope...
It wasn’t until I got past the halfway mark that I started to feel some sort of emotion out of Aspen. The turmoil she felt about her world with Joel and their history versus the excitement and the intensity she felt with Theo. The norm vs the new. But that came and went, interchangeably. But I held on. I pushed through. I wanted to get that cherry on top. I wanted to see what this was going to turn into. I had hope...
"I'm not sorry for the way I feel about you, only the timing in which those feelings developed."
This was a tried and true trope with the billionaire and the damsel in distress - a story we've all read, so I was hoping for something more that set this one apart. Him spoiling her with gifts and travel while she opened his heart and mind? Check. Nothing new. It was an enjoyable, easy read to some extent, but boring and cliche as well - but add in petty characters to top it off. It just didn’t give me what I was looking for; what I always hope for in a KS book: angst and a love worth sighing over. This almost felt robotic and didn’t give me any of the emotions I’ve come to expect from her. I’m walking away dissatisfied but accepting of the outcome. In the end, I feel like this one was flat - very one dimensional and surface layered in terms of character development, emotions, and delivery. This didn’t read like a Kandi Steiner angsty read, and for that, I feel jaded now. That was promised and was most definitely not delivered. This was not a triangle in the truest sense. This was two cheating characters, one was a douche, the other was a meek puppet. It gave me exactly zero emotions and quite a few eye rolls. It was almost angering.
This was a tried and true trope with the billionaire and the damsel in distress - a story we've all read, so I was hoping for something more that set this one apart. Him spoiling her with gifts and travel while she opened his heart and mind? Check. Nothing new. It was an enjoyable, easy read to some extent, but boring and cliche as well - but add in petty characters to top it off. It just didn’t give me what I was looking for; what I always hope for in a KS book: angst and a love worth sighing over. This almost felt robotic and didn’t give me any of the emotions I’ve come to expect from her. I’m walking away dissatisfied but accepting of the outcome. In the end, I feel like this one was flat - very one dimensional and surface layered in terms of character development, emotions, and delivery. This didn’t read like a Kandi Steiner angsty read, and for that, I feel jaded now. That was promised and was most definitely not delivered. This was not a triangle in the truest sense. This was two cheating characters, one was a douche, the other was a meek puppet. It gave me exactly zero emotions and quite a few eye rolls. It was almost angering.
I will admit that some of the analogies she used were over the top ridiculous. It was really weird because that isn't something I remember KS doing in her other books. She tried to use a lot of boat/water ones that were kind of cringeworthy, but she used so many analogies... and they were cheesy. Corny. It just felt ridiculous to me. But maybe I was to the nitpicky stage by that point...I don't know.
Overall, I could finish the book - barely, but I did, but it wasn't my favorite. It sounded really good. It was supposed to be really good. I wanted really good. Sadly, it didn't resonate very well with me. The plot was my favorite part - until it wasn’t. Unfortunately, the drama at the end was terrible and left a really bad taste in my mouth for the overall enjoyment of the book. I feel like I'm losing touch with Kandi's amazing storytelling and the to-die-for angst she killed me with every time while reading her earlier books. I feel like that has been missing for some time now, and the pettiness from some of her characters is turning me off more and more. I'm scared to say that I feel like I may have outgrown her voice and that saddens me because I've loved many of them before, but the last few have been DNFs or very low starred and it's just breaking my heart....
"Now that I know you exist in this world, I cannot live without you existing in mine, too."
~MEET KANDI STEINER~
Kandi Steiner is a Creative Writing and Advertising/Public Relations graduate from the University of Central Florida living in Tampa with her husband. Kandi works full time as a social media specialist, but also works part time as a Zumba fitness instructor and blackjack dealer.
Kandi started writing back in the 4th grade after reading the first Harry Potter installment. In 6th grade, she wrote and edited her own newspaper and distributed to her classmates. Eventually, the principal caught on and the newspaper was quickly halted, though Kandi tried fighting for her “freedom of press.” She took particular interest in writing romance after college, as she has always been a die hard hopeless romantic (like most girls brought up on Disney movies).
When Kandi isn’t working or writing, you can find her reading books of all kinds, talking with her extremely vocal cat, and spending time with her friends and family. She enjoys beach days, movie marathons, live music, craft beer and sweet wine – not necessarily in that order.
Join her group Kandiland HERE.
~CONNECT WITH KANDI~
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As always, I love your honesty Bee. I wanted to read this ever since I heard about it. All the more now because of your rating and review.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much, Bunny!! I hope you enjoy it!! <3
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