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Leave Me Breathless |
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Jodi Ellen Malpas |
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November 5th 2019 |
| From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the This Man series comes a sexy and emotional follow up to her wildly popular standalone romance The Protector.
Ryan Willis has spent years in the protection business, a job that requires constant vigilance and quick thinking. His only chance to truly relax is at his secluded cabin in a small town where there are never any surprises. So when Ryan returns after an assignment and encounters a beautiful stranger, he isn’t only surprised, he’s also instantly intrigued. Hannah Bright is a breath of fresh air, and Ryan is soon completely consumed, unable to stop from falling for her. As the two grow closer, his instinct tells him something is amiss. Yet nothing could prepare him for what he discovers when he starts digging into her past. Hannah spends her days painting, running her arts and crafts store…and hiding too many secrets. It’s why she won’t let the ruggedly handsome bodyguard get too close. But their chemistry is undeniable, and Hannah quickly finds herself caught up in a whirlwind romance with Ryan. He is peace personified, a balm to her battered soul. Yet the gorgeous, captivating man who has swept Hannah off her feet doesn’t even know who she really is. And the moment he finds out, both their lives are at risk. |
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Since “This Man” Jodie Ellen Malpas has been a “Go-To” Author for me – her writing is always flawless. I have always felt that she creates two very different story settings – either her male leads are Alpha to the core or the female leads are unconventional. Either way, her characters are always so well developed it almost hurts to leave them when the book ends. “Leave me BREATHLESS” as Standalone follow up / spin-off from “The Protector” is no different. Ryan and Hannah are great characters and well written –yet this time for the first time ever the characters were outrun by the story setting. Ms. Malpas created such an utterly charming small town that I feel the need to move there myself. I could see almost all the places while I was reading about them. And if this book is ever chosen to be filmed like “The Protector” was – I wish the crew the best of luck finding the places to film – as they seem almost as important as the characters at times. The plot of the book is not unique but told in a typical “JEM-ish” way that makes it fresh for readers – still, there were a few moments where I wondered about certain things because it felt as if the author was trying to find a different style. Also, some strings in the plot were still open – ok strings sound big they were tiny really and probably I am the only one in the whole world overthinking things again – but still in total, I am wondering if there was more plot? Did I overlook anything? Misunderstood something? Are more standalones in that series to come? In total it feels like a more quiet book than the previous books by this author especially compared to “This Man”. While the setting was perfectly charming and the characters were great there was just a little something missing in it for me. I hope Ms. Malpas will forgive me for saying that and I hope she knows I adore her writing. Following the story the readers will also meet the characters from “The Protector” again so there will be spoilers as to what happened in that book but there is no need to read the story before reading this one – this is just a warning to those who do not want to have spoilers and still want to read the previous book. Lovers of “The Protector” will also love “Leave me BREATHLESS” of that, I am pretty sure and I would recommend reading both in the right order. As for me, I hope there will be another book in that series that gives me those tiny details I was looking for but it might be that it was left open on purpose because not everything needs to be black and white. |
