Series: Resplendence #1
Author: Bella J
Released: November 16, 2015 - Liquid Silver Books
Pages: 182 per Goodreads
Format: Ebook received for review
Juliette Mason had it all—the perfect job, the perfect home, the perfect fiancé. She lived the perfect life. Until everything started to slowly fall apart.
Daniel, her attractive and success-driven fiancé, was the love of her life. For years she wanted nothing more than to finally walk down the aisle, to be Mrs. Daniel Clarke. But as time went by, the cracks in their relationship started to come to the surface, and Juliette found herself in a place she never imagined she would be. It was a place where she started to question everything about her life and her dreams, a place where nothing about her life made sense anymore—a place where she found Knox Taylor.
Knox didn’t count on falling in love. In fact, Knox didn’t count on anything really. He was blissfully happy living a fast life of reckless behavior, impulsive decisions, and beautiful women. He lived the perfect life of a flourishing bachelor—but then she happened.
Well, this was certainly an interesting book. The issue of fidelity wouldn't be for everyone, and things like that are probably known ahead of time. I know a lot of people who won't even pick up a book if it contains infidelity. Aside from that, I found this to be a pretty good "enemies to lovers" type romance.
Juliette is a Manhattan princess, pretty much. She's the daughter of a wealthy man, engaged to a wealthy man, she's chauffeured around in a limo. She leads a life of luxury. While this doesn't exactly endear her to me, I do like that she doesn't act like a spoiled princess. While her mother is more like the wicked queen, and her sister barely acknowledges their wealth, Juliette lies somewhere safely in the middle. She works and lives with her fiance, Daniel. My opinion of Daniel definitely degrades through the book. He's consumed by work, and he leaves little to no time for "the love of his life".
One day Juliette meets Knox, and both of their worlds begin to spin on their axis. There is a bit of hidden identity, because while Knox knows who Juliette is, she doesn't know who he really is. But either way, they are incredibly attracted to each other, and the tension is terrific. The only problem is that they can't seem to stand each other. This sets them up perfectly for some of those arguments we love in the enemies to lovers trope. Knox is a bit of a bad boy, tall, dark and handsome. And a motorcycle. And um, handcuffs on his bed.
OK, so this is where the issue comes in. Juliette is firmly with Daniel. But then Knox comes around, and even though she knows it's wrong etc, she still puts herself in a position for things to happen. And things do happen. Big things. I can understand that she just felt like he was this amazing breath of fresh air, but there is no excuse for breathing new air when you still have old air. And then things get really complicated with the three of them.
I found the authors writing to be pretty good. The beginning was a bit slow for me, but it definitely did start to pick up. After the first third or so, I was definitely into the story and wanting to find out what happened. This book was definitely messy, in terms of relationships and how to handle them, and the problems that come from doing things the wrong way. But hey, that happens in real life, so it definitely had a strong sense of reality to it.
Bella J lives in Cape Town, South Africa with her husband, two kids, & chihuahua. Her love for writing started in eighth grade when she received her first writing assignment—which she flunked. But the positive side of her failure—her newly found passion for writing. The negative side—now she’s completely spaced out half of the time living in her little pretend world of romance, love, & insanely hot heroes.
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