MAKE ME FALL #2

MAKE ME FALL                                EMBER LEIGH

There’s one rule in my family.

Stay away from the Daly brothers.

We were raised to know them as users. Manipulators. But I only ever saw Connor as the enigmatic senior hottie who dropped into fifth period to teach us about the perils of drunk driving.

When my first big girl job out of college ends up with us working at the same company, it’s heartthrob city all over again. Except he’s way ahead of the game. Successful, talented, put together. I’m just a frumpy twenty-something in a quarter-life crisis who doesn’t know a glue stick from a makeup highlighter.

He would never want me, even though he’s all I ever wanted in secret. So when we cross paths one night at the bar and one drink leads to another, he slaps me with an offer I can’t refuse.

Accompany him back to Bayshore, flight included.

Only stipulation? Pose as his girlfriend.

Our families will flip, but I’m not strong enough to say no to those baby blues, especially if it means I’ll have a chance to go on vacation with my adolescent heartthrob.

We’ve got two weeks to prove we’re head over heels for each other.

Which is just enough time to make me fall?

MY REVIEW:

    I thoroughly enjoyed the book.  The characters are well rounded.  Amusing and full of angst I loved the family dynamics and drama.  As well as the constant need for coemption.

     With all their many flaws imagined or real the kept moving forward.  It wasn’t easy to overcome, and it was sometimes at the expense of the other.  This book starts out with two high school acquaintances who now both live in San Diego and work at the same company as well.  Connor Daly was one of five handsome brothers but the one that Kinsley Cabana had a crush on.  Yup! Since she was a junior and he was a senior.

     Now, she is twenty-five and still gets carded because she looks like a twelve-year-old.  She is so bummed this whole adulting thing is eluding her, and her degree feels wasted.  So, a Rum Chata it is.  She notices him, go sit at the bar after being at the table for a meeting.  He looks down.

     The server lines up three shots in front of him and hits all three one after the other.  She decides to investigate the new adult her.  She finds out his grandma died back home in Bayshore, Ohio their hometown.

     Going home means dealing with Granny’s death but also jumping into the cesspool of competition father so brutally stirred up and still does with all his sons.  Connor comes up with a plan. One that he feels is brilliant. 

     Since he just broke up with his girl, he needs a fake one.  There is at least a three-decade feud going on between the Daly’s and Cabanas, Kinsley’s the one to help him make his mark.

     He can bring home a girlfriend which none of his brothers have, piss off his parents because she is a Cabana, and rub his ex in it with Kinsley her underling at work where there is no love lost between them.  Plus, since he hates flying alone, he will pay for her ticket, but she needs to stay at her parent’s place with minimal PDA.  Win-win.

     Things don’t go according to plan and the plain Jane wallflower becomes his ray of sunshine.  She teaches him to laugh again, to enjoy life again, his plan hits its mark (brothers, parents, and ex) but he questions it.  His cutthroat ways he now questions too.

     For Kinsley, the fake becomes too real.  Lines are blurred and emotions are toyed with.  How can this woman whose past relationship left her voiceless ask if anything is true or ask for what she wants?  When the man she is with is using sexual warfare.

     I enjoyed the transformation that each character goes through. Like watching a caterpillar become a butterfly.  But oh, those bumps were harsh getting there.  A sexual couple just so you know. 

     I give this: 5 ++++ stars.  Provided my netgalley.com.

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