Wicked, Wild, Wanton, M. Malone and Nana Malone

   

Funny, cute, and wickedly sexy.  Bonding over a love of sci-fi, a disgusting surprise, and a drunken grope...things are conspiring to bring Hunter and Bailey together as more than just friends.  Hunter has been attracted to Bailey right from the start but it's clear she wants a friendship without the sexy benefits and he's not sure how much longer he can hold back.  Bailey is incredibly attracted to her best friend but she knows she's young and needs to be focused on her education and career until she witnesses something she's determined to wipe from her mind with copious amount of vodka.  What follows is full of humorous banter, spontaneous steam in a supply closet (among other places...), a heaping dose of karma, and a love built on all the truly important things.

Both Bailey and Hunter were genuine with one another and genuinely likable characters as individuals.  Bailey was cute and quirky and her ability to kick ass at arcade games was perfection.  She was great in so many ways that she was not only endearing, she was memorable.  Hunter's hotness, vivid imagination, bedroom prowess, and tenderness with Bailey combined with a little bit of geek to make him a fantastic male lead.  Bailey's reaction was believable and I liked the way she listened to Hunter instead of prolonging the angst of the initial knee-jerk/gut-sinking reaction to the big discovery.  There was a great progression in the story that followed an easy plot and conflict so the resolution wasn't far-fetched, rushed, or too simple.  4 stars.

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Sexy and achingly heartfelt with some of the best groveling I've seen in a short story in a long time.  A forgotten kiss as youth, an unforgettable kiss as adults, and there's only one of them that can win.  As Talia desperately tries to embrace everything that's new in her life, Cage is determined to drag her back to being the mousy, utterly forgettable little sister...or so she thinks.  It'll take everything Cage has in him to win the one woman he's always wanted but never let himself believe he could have.

Talia has a bit of a ways to go to fully accepting everything she is.  She struggles with acknowledging that she's physically attractive and desirable and I also think she hasn't truly learned to love the shyer, studious side of herself either.  By the end of the story she's still not all the way there to loving herself and all her facets, but she's making progress.  Especially because Cage is bent on proving to Talia that she's been in his fantasies as well as his heart since they were young.  While I do wish there were a bit longer of an ending, one where we could see a little more of their transition into a true couple on a more solid footing, the story worked well since their history was intertwined before we meet them in college.  And when Cage screwed up, it was his groveling through actions and thoughtfulness that was beyond perfect and sold me on them together.  3.5 stars.

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Sexual tension from the word go, these two deserved the intelligent support as well as the passion they could only get from one another.  With attraction disguised as animosity and seemingly diverging career paths, Trevor and Natalie have an uphill battle on their hands to breaking down their walls and finding lasting happiness together.  Of course you can't forget their intense chemistry.  With passion in spades, it's hard for them to ignore their unexpected magnetism and it doesn't take long before they both succumb.  But will that be enough to sustain them for the long haul?

The synopsis made me feel like this was supposed to be an enemies-to-lovers situation but really it was just two incredibly stubborn people who are enormously attracted to one another.  Their attraction catches them off guard and since neither one of them are in a good place to build a relationship when they meet, they do everything in their power to avoid, deny, and quash anything more than the awkward, tense interactions they create.  I didn't feel like there was a good enough transition from their disappointing interplay to a couple who could handle all the changes and situations a romantic relationship would put them through.  It was either not long enough or was too focused on their antagonism to make me believe that what they had could bridge the distance they may endure as their careers and education advance alongside their relationship.  Despite that, they had potential and incredible amounts of chemistry.  3 stars.

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M. Malone

NYT & USA Today bestselling author M. Malone lives in the Washington, DC metro area with her husband and their two sons. She holds a master's degree in Business from a prestigious college that would no doubt be scandalized by how she's using her expensive education.

Independently published, she has sold more than 1/2 million ebooks in her two series, THE ALEXANDERS and BLUE-COLLAR BILLIONAIRES. Since starting her indie journey in 2011 with the runaway bestselling novella "Teasing Trent," her work has appeared on the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists more than a dozen times.

She's now a full-time writer and spends 99.8% of her time in her pajamas.

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Nana Malone

USA Today bestselling author Nana Malone's love of all things romance and adventure started with a tattered romantic suspense novel she "borrowed" from her cousin.

It was a sultry summer afternoon in Ghana, and Nana was a precocious thirteen. She's been in love with kick-butt heroines ever since. With her overactive imagination constantly channeling her inner Buffy, it was only a matter a time before she started creating her own characters.

While she waits for her chance at a job as a ninja assassin, Nana works out her drama, passion and sass with fictional characters every bit as brazen and kick-butt as she thinks she is.

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