Michael
I’m ambitious, I’m successful, and I know what I want. I’m also frustratingly unsettled, searching for something I can never find. A place where I can be myself. Where I’ll feel at home. My sexy new real estate agent knows what I need before I can say a word. She sees through me.

Adele makes me want to give up control, but trust is a word I’ve forgotten. How can I give myself over to her when she doesn’t tell me anything about her past? How can I trust her? I guess it’s a good thing she doesn’t take no for an answer.

I learned long ago to usually trust me first impression (others call it gut feeling) so when I checked the plots of the previous books I felt that the first two might not be for me – so I refrained from asking for a copy but the third book I wasn’t sure . I like damaged characters – I like them a LOT – but usually I need the male character to be the damaged one – there are very little books that “do it for me” where it is the opposite way – so I was going to also refrain from reading it but then there was the fact that the male lead was a musician – and I have such a hard time saying now to those … #sigh … so I thought – OK let’s try – well needless to say I should have listened to my gut – the book was not for me …  And I cannot even tell you precisely why. One thing was the writing style – I sort of felt like I fell into the book and was missing something. So maybe the book is not doing so well without reading the previous ones? Not sure.

That was the moment when I got kind of scared – because I really liked the plot of the 4^th book “Bursting Out” and there is still the 5^th book to come – the one I originally applied for to read. Not liking the plot of a book is a lot different from not liking the writing style … So when I opened “Bursting Out” I was surprised – and I mean REALLY surprised – this book was perfect for me – I loved the plot – I loved the writing style and I loved the characters.

So what happened – ?

Well I guess Ceri Grenelle is one of these authors where at least I have to really go with my feeling for the blurb – if I am not sure about that one – go with the Beatles and LET IT BE … BUT what does that say about the author? Well I guess I have to read the third book to confirm my thoughts but I really think that this author might have the crazy awesome ability to listen to the characters when writing their story. Which basically means that her writing style changes depending what the leads tell her while their story develops. I know how weird that sounds but believe me I have thought about it for several days and this is the only way to explain it … because at my hands I have two books that are that have connecting yet standalone stories with characters. They appear on and off in the books so their stories are close.

Still I have a (very sorry) 2 Star book and a (must read) 5 star book directly following each other here in my hands – that is what I call a reading experience … crazy right ? So what do I do now ? Well I was asked for an honest opinion so here it is. But to be fair to the 2 Star book I decided to write my thoughts like this so the next person reading this will know – even though “Stark memory” was not for me it is still a pretty awesome book. And I can recommend “Bursting Out” from the bottom of my reader’s heart. And I am really looking forward to the next book in that series to confirm what I am thinking so far …