Saturday, July 18, 2015

review || OPENING UP by Lauren Dane


23119319
Forever | June 16, 2015 | Contemporary Romance
Ink & Chrome, book 1
★★★★1/2

SOURCE: NETGALLEY

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Lauren Dane delivers Book #1 in her Ink & Chrome erotic romance series. 

The men of the Twisted Steel custom hot rod and motorcycle shop are great with their hands...and they're not afraid to get dirty.

PJ is exactly the kind of woman Twisted Steel owner Asa Barrons doesn't need. The last thing he wants to do is mix business with pleasure, and PJ has some of the best custom detailing he's ever seen. But the chemistry between them won't be denied, and soon he's introducing her to a whole new world in the bedroom, pushing her far beyond anything she's ever experienced. PJ finds she can't get enough, but how far is too far before he consumes her completely?

{ review } .

First? Gosh, I love a cover that matches the characters perfectly and this cover? Totally PJ. The lotus isn't the right colors, but eh, the freckles, the hair... that is perfect. That and so many covers feature the male of the book and while, yes, I do love me some good eye candy, I really love that this series is putting the ladies on the covers.

Second..? I'm generally a person who hates huge age differences. In OPENING UP, we have a twenty-five year old PJ and a thirty-seven year old Asa. That's quite the age difference but Lauren does is extremely well -- so much so that I didn't find myself minding it nearly as much as Asa minded it.

PJ is pretty much the odd-one-out in her family. She's the one that her father doesn't really accept. She's artistic and fun, and is quite the spitfire. She changes the color of her hair often, sometimes full color and others just streaks of color in her blond hair. She believes in the innovation side of the tire company her grandfather started and believes that her detailing is something that will bring Colman to the next level. Julia, her sister (the much girlier of the two) and one of her brothers, Shawn, believe in her, but then there's Jay, who is very much the goodie-two-shoes of the four and sides with their father again and again. He constantly belittles her, her designs, and thinks that she's unstable -- by all means, who can trust someone who can't stick with a single color in his or her hair? I hope that at some point in this series, Jay will be knocked down one or two or ten pegs, because I'd like to like the guy, but in this book? Didn't care for him.

Asa co-owns Twisted Steel with Duke, a friend of the Colman's, first meets PJ when she bravely goes up to them and offers her detailing work. He's attracted to the spitfire with the pierced brown, but she's much too young for him. When she is part of a pin-up calendar using his car, he realizes the attraction could very well go both ways. 

Watching Asa fight with himself and go back and forth where PJ was concerned was, quite honestly, fun. He had no reason for holding her back other than her age -- and like Duke points out, she's twenty-five. Twenty-two, sure, maybe, but she's twenty-five and very much a grown up. Asa gives in, only to fight back again. He has more reasons than just her age, but PJ pushes and pushes until Asa fully accepts her.

I really enjoyed PJ's character. She's hell-on-wheels who craves acceptance from her father, but knows that more than that, she wants to do detailing and stands up to her father rather than letting him continue to beat her down. 

I'm excited to read Duke's story next, and am curious where Lauren will bring this series.

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