Review: Goodbye common sense and self respect!
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 01 30, 2014
Complimentary copy provided by author/publisher for an honest review.Becca is a thirty five year old war widow whose husband was abusive. In the seven years since her husband's disappearance in Afghanistan, she has managed to buy and build a thriving B&B; in New Hampshire, along with her ten-year-old daughter, Morgan. Becca has surrounded herself with staff that has become as close as family and life is good, that is, until the day Grayson James shows up.Grayson James is the British nephew of Becca's employee Hazel. Hazel is like a mother to Becca and is excited to introduce her handsome and single nephew to Becca. They immediately hit it off and sparks fly. But while things seem to be off to a great start with Grayson, her friend Ray suddenly decides to make his feelings towards Becca known, thus setting up a love triangle.Meanwhile, a ghost from Becca's past finds himself back in her life and ready to take back what is his. Not Becca herself, mind you, but the life insurance settlement from her husband George's death. Now, not only is Becca's heart at risk because of the love triangle with Grayson and Ray, her life is now at risk, as well as Morgan's.About three quarters of the book is Becca and Grayson breaking up. Seriously, just when you think things are going well for them and they're finally figuring it out, they have a knock down, drag out fight in which Grayson is calling her a who0r3 and she's telling him to get out. I understand relationships have their ups and downs, but we're talking about a relationship in which they're engaged after twenty-four hours and there is a break up in Every. Single. Chapter.One of the biggest disconnects for me was the use of Becca's daughter in all of this. Within a day of meeting each other, Morgan is calling Grayson "daddy" and they're planning their lives together. I'm not a single parent, I pray that I never am, but I can't imagine putting my child in that situation so early in a relationship, especially given her birth father was an abuser (and really, Grayson is right on the cusp of being one as well). No responsible parent should do that to their child, regardless of how lonely they are.Grayson is bordering on downright abusive. Don't get me wrong, I love me some alpha males, but Grayson isn't an alpha, he's an 4$$h0l3. Alphas love control; they don't love demeaning their mate. It's one thing to make a woman "feel" like a wh0r3 in the bedroom (you know, it's o.k. to get naughty as long as you're both consenting!) but to call you a wh0r3 outright because of your actions with others...no, that's not alpha, that's 4$$h0l3, especially when it is from a situation that he put you in.And Ray, the third leg in the love triangle...let's just say Becca knows how to pick `em. At first I was rooting for him. He is a single father and his daughter is Morgan's best friend. He himself is best friends with Becca (although we're not really given a whole lot of history about that friendship until much later in the book), and I'm a big fan of friends turned lovers. But Ray too, is an 4$$h0le. Becca really would be best served gathering her daughter and looking for the nearest convent, she really does have a plenitude of toxic people in her life.There is just so much going on in this book it's like watching a full year of your favorite soap opera take place in a week. There's just too much. The premise of the story is good, and taking just certain parts of it, Goodbye Caution could have been a really great book but it was just overwhelming and there were so many plot twists, of which none are ever resolved, it was just frustrating. I don't know that I could sit through another book like this one to get answers, especially if it will continue to be drawn out into another book.I give Goodbye Caution three stars, not that it was a bad book, it was well written and certainly provided entertainment, but that's exactly it, it was entertainment. At no point did I connect with any of the characters, except for maybe Hazel, she seemed to be the only sane one of the bunch, and the plot bordered on absurd. I had a hard time staying engaged simply because my own eye rolling would get to be too much and I would just have to move on to something else. I'm not sure if I'll be picking up the next book in the series.