Review: Interesting, but lacks emotion
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 08 29, 2012
I found Tommy and Balarie's world very interesting. The author did a great job pulling us into their world, letting us see Balarie in action, instead of using lots of narration and explanation. I also liked that Balarie is a woman who knows what she wants and is unafraid to speak out when necessary. At the same time she's wise in choosing what to say and when to say it, and she isn't mean or self-centred, unlike some ambitious types.It was great to read a romance where the main characters were not overpowered by feelings of lust -- yes, they were attracted to each other, but that didn't mean they lost the ability to form a coherent thought whenever they happened to come face-to-face. Tommy respects Balarie because she's good at her job, and Balarie is respectful of his position as her boss but doesn't simper or try to suck up to him.What I didn't like: (Possible spoilers ahead)I felt that Tommy's inner conflict could have been portrayed more powerfully. The emotion just didn't come through strongly and I couldn't empathise with his struggle to stay true to his no-involvement rule. In the first place we aren't given a clear picture of why he formed that rule (why is it so important to him?) and then we don't really get what suddenly made him decide to abandon it, apart from the fact that he's strongly attracted to Balarie and starts to think about his life being a bit lonely. The loneliness bit didn't ring true as he seems to have liked his life that way and it's never bothered him before. How did meeting Balarie suddenly make him feel lonely? All I saw was that it made him feel horny.I also didn't quite get that scene in his gym. He appears to have been trying to 'test' himself to prove to himself that he could resist Balarie. But why does he feel the need to do that? Again, the inner conflict is not clear. And Balarie constantly turning to watch him exercising just made me roll my eyes because she'd have to keep twisting her body into an uncomfortable position, all the while going through a demanding workout.It felt like the writer decided to throw in Balarie's fear of flying just for the sake of creating a Great Misunderstanding between the couple to drum up some conflict. The explanation for her fear felt flat to me. I couldn't sense the trauma, the agitation, the terror. For someone as strong as her, I'd have expected her to have at least tried to make herself get on an airplane before, even if it had been an unsuccessful attempt. It doesn't seem in character that she flatly refuses to even contemplate flying, especially when this fear could jeopardise her dreams. If the fear were that strong, there should be an equally strong reason for it... and there just wasn't.The ending felt rushed, because both Tommy and Balarie started acting completely out of character. For one thing, as Tommy is such a private man, he wouldn't suddenly give out hints about his private life at a press conference. And I was fully expecting Balarie to feel like he was putting unfair pressure on her or even taking her agreement for granted, making such an announcement before she had given him her answer. Instead, she drops her own bombshell, which was ridiculous because it's easily verifiable -- everyone would find out sooner or later that it wasn't true, unless she and Tommy managed to make it a reality quickly enough. And again, giving such information to the press ought to have infuriated Tommy, who is well-known as a fanatic about keeping his reputation intact and his private life private. But he appears to have blithely accepted what Balarie told the reporters. We never get to see what happens immediately after that press conference, so we don't know what Tommy and Balarie really think about all these strange announcements, or what their actual reaction is once they are away from the media and all their co-workers.Overall, it's an interesting story but short on emotions. Both Tommy and Balarie come across as people who are very controlled and careful with their emotions, and during the course of the story they don't fully let go, so it isn't very believable that they would have fallen in love so fast. We don't see many intimate conversations between them, and in fact Balarie keeps saying she needs time to get to know him better, time for them to talk... yet in the next minute she's accepting his proposal and wanting his babies!