While he and Amy don't see eye-to-eye on the best of days, Dax can't help but feel badly when he sees Amy mid-meltdown. Next thing he knows, he's gotten her good and drunk, and they're making out like two teenagers. And since neither of them want anything serious, why shouldn't they be frenemies-with-benefits? Because there is no possible way they could ever fall for each other...
Comment: I've decided to add this book to my TBR after seeing some positive comments and also because I was interested in how the author would portray the romance with characters from different cultural backgrounds.
In this story we meet heroine Amy in the moment she is running from her own wedding right after her husband to be tells her he can't do it. She runs to the only safe place she can remember, her work office, where she feels in control. Many people on that floor are at her wedding and she believes she will be alone, except she isn't. Dax Harris, her nemesis at the office is there and, surprisingly, he ends up being the friendly shoulder to help her and they manage a truce of sorts. However, the more they talk and after Dax takes her to his house so she can be left alone for a little while, the more Amy realizes he isn't that bad. Could it be that they actually have a lot more in common than they imagined?
I knew, as I was adding this book to my TBR, that it would be the second installment in a series of four books, but I had not read the first one and wasn't particularly interested in it anyway. I decided to stick to this one after what someone had said about it and while it wasn't the wonderful romance I expected, it was still readable (and not a long book either).
This is also the first book I try by this author and I had no expectations on what it would be like, so I was happy with the writing style, which seemed appealing and fluid. Perhaps it was simply the matter of the plot not being as addictive to me after all because I liked most elements of the book, just wasn't as fully amazed by the overall result.
Amy and Dax are enemies of some sort, probably this was established in the first book somehow but I get it that the idea was for them to be opposites as well as enemies. Placing them now in the same spot after something so radical happened to Amy was a good way to force them to interact without the usual behavior and I felt this was done convincingly. Is it as well that he would take her to his house just like that, though? Even though the context makes it possible? I just find it hard to buy it somehow, but it does propel them to be closer.
Of course, any romance reader would immediately guess their animosity is partially to hide chemistry and they do seem to be a good match after we get to see them together for a while. I don't think the evolution of their relationship was very romantic or truly convincing, simply because they are both successful, confident people and the worries they have felt like competence alone would solve them. I was counting on more tension somehow, to make it more plausible why they felt the connection now and how likely it would be it would last.
I think their personalities are fine but I did struggle to empathize with their issues. Since they are both successful in their work, I feel there's nothing there - it's an established element. Their personal lives then, had to pick up the slack, and I think this was certainly more promising since Amy has some friction with her family and Dax has a loving one. In fact, part of the story is having Amy interact with Dax' sister (incredibly she helps her to give birth) and with his parents, who are not easily accepting the idea of moving to a more convenient place.
For me, more so than the romance - it does follow a certain predictable pattern from a certain moment on - it was these interactions that made me like the story overall. I confess, though, I expected a bit more on the whole different cultures element. Dax has Asian background because his mother is Chinese and his father is not. I was wondering how this would play out but after all, it wasn't such a vital part of the story which is fine, of course, but then the cover and the descriptions by other readers aren't really suitable, in my opinion.
Sometimes it can feel like more of a letdown when the writing voice (the rhythm of the writing) is appealing to us as readers, and the parts that make the whole seem to work well on their own, but then they don't come together as well as we hope/want/expect.
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DeleteHello! Exactly so, yes. I feel the final result wasn't as strong as the individual elements I liked.
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