Shine Not Burn by Elle Casey

3 Stars

 

is what bwings us together today . . .

Well, actually it’s what brings Andie and Mack together today. A couple of years ago Andie attended a bachelorette party with her besties. While she was there her d-bag boyfriend dumped her via text – putting a real kink in the “life plan” she had all laid out for herself. What better way to forget about her troubles then to get completely blottoed and go in search of a possible one-night stand. I mean, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, right????



Fast-forward to the present and an Andie who is even more determined to make her life plan an actuality. She’s determined, she’s successful, she’s . . . well, she’s a real ballbuster who has lost all of her friends and is days away from marrying a real d-bag. There’s only one little problem. Turns out she may have brought a souvenier home with her from that Vegas trip . . . .



Andie needs to get this problem resolved ASAP and on the downlow before her fiancé finds out. All it will take is a couple of signatures – that is, if she can fight of her attraction to the sexy cowboy . . . .



Shelby's review is the only reason I got this book. Authors, please take note that bad titles and even worse covers will not expand your reader base. Sweet Home Alabama is one of my guilty pleasures and I get sucked in to watching it every time it’s on so the .gifs used in Shelby’s review made it impossible for me to resist requesting Shine Not Burn. My apologies to all of you who were crossing your fingers for a catfight due to her steering me wrong, but there won't be one. While a 3 Star rating may look low, it’s actually really high when it comes to how I generally rate romance novels.

It seems everyone likes a ragey review. Sorry I can’t give you a full-on freakout this time, but here are some items that kept this from earning more than 3 Stars from me.

1. The length. There should be a maximum number of pages allowed for a romance novel. 360? Too long. This story could have easily been wrapped up with 50-100 fewer pages.

2. The tired trope. Not only do we have the “oh, I don’t remember what happened last night” storyline to navigate, but there has also been a lot of clumsy female MCs lately. I don’t mind the “spilled drink on the crotch of the potential love interest” meet-cute (even though it’s been done a thousand times before), but having this supposed rainmaker of an attorney be a bumbling idiot got old fast.

3. Things that make me dry-heave. Lines like this:

“I reveled in the smell of our passion on his mouth.”

Make me do things like this . . .



Also????

“My folds so heavy with passion they were blocking his entry.”



Does anyone find talk like that to be a turn-on? (Don’t answer that. I really don’t want to know.)

4. The sometimes/sometimes not use of condoms. My own personal preference is for the MCs to always practice safe sex, but I’m a 1,000 year old prude who has been married for 147 years so I get that it’s not always going to be written that way. What I don’t understand is the use of a condom, then not, then yes, then no. WTF? Either use them or don’t.

Those complaints aside, Shine Not Burn was a fluffy little way to spend my Saturday afternoon that made me feel like I should probably add some boots to my wardrobe in case I murder my husband ever run into a desperate cowboy . . .



And finally, I’m always a sucker for a HEA . . . .



(Even when said HEA doesn’t really address the issues that will probably cause the newlyweds to get divorced in less than a year.)

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

Thank you, NetGalley!