Review: After the Kiss
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 28, 2013
Meet Julie Greene, the dating diva columnist for the famous Stiletto Magazine and with friends Grace and Riley make up the triumvirate of Dating, Relationship and Sex.  For Julie, there is nothing more thrilling than dating, the first kiss, the flirting, the cusp of a beginning romance and then kaput she goes to the next one.  Anything more than that was well, simply boring.  Until she was assigned the article that might break her winning streak at Stiletto unless she succeeds.Then there is Mitchell Forbes, the straight guy, a Wall Street fellow, successful and just coming off from a two year relationship.  For Mitch, thats all he's ever had, relationships.  He's never engaged in the fun of a fling. And people around him thinks that he never could until a bet was proposed.These two people could never be anything more than polar opposites, they would never really get attracted to one another at all, or so they thought.This was a funny and engaging read. At first it reminded me of one of my favorite movies. Mostly because of the premise and the romantic comedy vibe that was so prevalent in the book. But all similarities ended there. Julie and Mitchell are so well defined as main characters that you would think you've met them in real life. Here are two individuals who have zero interest in each other initially and probably would not have met but for the fact of the plot device, which was the magazine article for Julie and the bet for Mitchell. It's filled with humor and witty bantering with most of the romantic tropes made fun off by the main characters themselves. Praise to Lauren Layne for being able to give life to two great characters and for writing a very good romance, a lightheartedness balanced with emotional heartbreaking scenes without the cheesy undertones. Looking forward to the next book.***A copy of this book was provided by the publisher in return for an honest review****