After moving to Austin following six months of unemployment back home, Iris Taylor knows she should be glad to have landed a job so quickly... even if the business is owned by a member of the same motorcycle club her estranged father used to belong to. Except Dex Locke might just be the biggest jerk she’s ever met. He’s rude, impatient and doesn’t know how to tell time.
And the last thing they ever expected was each other.
But it was either the strip club or the tattoo shop.
… she should have chosen the strip club.
Comment: I've become a fan of Mariana Zapata's books, not because they are all perfect (they aren't completely, for me) but because I do like the idea of slow burn stories and how she puts the emphasis of the story on characterization. This was next on my reading list by her.
In this story we meet Iris Taylor, the half sister of Sonny, who found her a job after her old one ended. The problem is that the job is at a tattoo shop, owned by a guy she remembers being not too nice. Since Iris is a difficult position, financially speaking, she decides to accept the job even if she dislikes the fact the owner, Dex, as her brother Sonny and a few others in the circle of people she will have to mingle with, are part of a motorcycle club. She has had the experience of her and Sonny's father being a member of a not so cool one and how her mother took her away from that to protect her.
Although things aren't as dire as she imagined, there is some trouble regarding her father's old schemes but she and Dex do develop quite a friendship. Will she be able to trust Dex and to trust what matters is those you care about and not just what they do for a living?
When I think about motorcycle books I imagine mayhem, crime, drugs, women treated as objects and people who like to pretend they are stronger and more important than others because they have expensive bikes. It's quite a reduced and often unfair vision, I am fully aware.
The books in the genre I had read before have not made me change my mind so, with so much to read, this is a theme I avoid conscientiously.
I'm, however, very glad this book by Zapata was not as dramatic or exaggerated as I imagined and that, in fact, it was all more about the character's relationships and not the actions/routines of those part of the motorcycle club.
Thankfully for me, the scenes with actual motorcycle business weren't many and when they happened, I could be selective in th things I cared about so it wasn't so bad to read this book. I'm just glad the motorcycle club featured here had no specific business apart from a bar and some minor details.
Most of the focus was on Iris, since she is the narrator (I still think it's this author's major writing flaw: just the heroine as narrator, so reductive when it comes to romance development) and I'm just very pleased she is a likable heroine, and someone whose personality I liked and someone I could be interested in being friends with, were she real.
The story is slow, as expected, but that leaves a lot of room for the relationships to develop in a believable manner and for the important details of each protagonist to have time to be expanded, such as Iris' past and why she wears longer sleeves and Dex's increased interest in her and in her safety.
I liked how they were together and how things between them evolved. I was actually surprised to see how gentle he was in some occasions.
Like I said, I didn't like much the motorcycle stuff. I also disliked how Iris, someone with issues when it comes to the dynamics of the club and what it means decides to go to their enemy of sorts to try reason. I can understand the need she had to help or to do something but...come one, why was this here except for drama and to force some moves to happen quicker? It was really silly and putting myself in Iris' shoes, with the sort of things we know about her past, her personality, it was really dumb. Oh well, nothing is ever perfect.
After everything is solved, of course there's an HEA, there's a credible closure to practically all situations and emotions involved and I was happy enough things ended up well. The secondary cast of characters was likable to spend time with as well and the epilogue was sweet.
Grade: 7/10
No comments:
Post a Comment