Fixed Infatuation
Borrowed book from Kindle Unlimited
Molly Hartford was a writer with big dreams, and even bigger aspirations. She had no idea how far out of her depth she was about to be, when she bought a dilapidated house in the Washington Peninsula. It was in desperate need of some help, but she was fully convinced that she could do majority of the work herself. A few self-help videos, and maybe a class at a hardware store -- she'd have this in the bag.
Easy peasy.
Before she even signed the papers, she noticed her sexy neighbor, Blake Whitmore. He was a general contractor with his own business and an eye for detail. Painting walls, repairing cabinets and caulking bathtubs were among his many specialties. Blake was dead set on showing her she had no business remodeling a home.
Playful flirting, sexual innuendos, and physical attraction are all part of the job... right?
Except they both may find out that things aren't all fun and games when walls come down, and layers are scraped away. Relationships are built on solid ground, but not when foundations are full of cracks and there's so much more hiding underneath.
While I have seen this author’s name around for quite some time, I had never read one of her books. I recently saw this book mentioned somewhere or another on social media, and thought I would check her out. I hadn’t ever heard anything (positive or negative) about her books in my particular circles, but she is apparently a bestseller, so I took a chance on a new to me author. How bad could it be?
SPOILER ALERT: Pretty fucking bad.
This book started off rough, and just kept on getting worse. I was bound and determined to finish this book so that I could properly review it, but I can’t give one more second of my time to this. It’s just too painful.
This book reads like the first draft of a bad fanfic of a mediocre novel. The author needs to either start listening to her betas/editors or fire them because this book is a MESS. As a reader, I am insulted that I had to pay money to read this.
Apart from the dull and inept writing, an abundance of awkward phrasing, impossible to understand sentences, and utterly incorrect word usage made this one of the most painful reading experiences I have ever had. The book reeked of a complete disregard for the reader experience. I highlighted over SIXTY passages in this novel that were just WRONG.
For example:
“He was stalky and very burly-looking.
I believe the word you are looking for here is stocky, not stalky.
OR
“Just covering your basis.”
It’s bases.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. Sentences are missing words altogether, phrases refer to something, but we have no clear antecedent, so the reader has no idea what the hell is going on in that passage.
I will only briefly mention a COMPLETE lack of research of Washington, as I have never been, but a Washington resident would have a field day pointing out the inconsistencies in this book, which details things about Washington that are either impossible, or just plain do not exist. (Including a 365-degree view from atop the Space Needle. On which planet are there 365 degrees in a circle? Another spoiler alert: Not this one!)
It is generally my policy that I do not review books that I did not finish, but this one pissed me off to the point that I just couldn’t stay silent on it. Publishing a book in this state and asking readers to part with their hard earned money for the “privilege” of reading it is just a slap in the face, in my opinion.
This book needs a deep edit and a complete overhaul. No amount of sexy man chest on the cover can make this any less of an affront to the reader. Even when I don’t enjoy a book, I feel that there is almost always something that I can glean from it, but in this case, I’m coming up empty. This was a total waste of my time.
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