Review: one to wallow in and enjoy
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 01 10, 2014
Playing for Love at Deep Haven. Katy RegneryReview from Jeannie Zelos Book reviews.I was a teen in the 70's, and at weekends there was always a live band playing somewhere, even in the tiny rural area I lived. So anything with rock bands and romance gets a second look, and this sounded one I’d like....second chances, they always appeal too cos I like the thought of true love, fate and all that ( I know...I'm just a sap really!)Anyway Violet meets Zach after nine years and... he's more than she remembered, stronger, harder, more bad boy than the loving friend and songwriter/composer she remembers from university. Violet – Zach recalls her as bohemian rebel girl, fantastic poet, best friend and lost love, not this tidied up, dull, conventional shadow she is now. By chance they're forced together again for a short while and ...the chemistry is still there, he still loves her though he couldn't admit it at the time, and she's never stopped loving him even though he broke her heart. Slowly they talk, and we see things from a different POV, he wasn't a hard hearted nightmare who left her, but someone frightened by the idea of being loved. He regrets leaving her, did so almost as soon as he'd done it, but was too late by the time he came to talk to her, she moved on..or so he thought. Now they've a second chance if they can just bring themselves to trust and take it. This time Zach's all in – but Violet struggles still with that past rejection.There's some great moments here. Things that feel so real, the way events aren't always as we recall them, people aren't as they seem on the surface, but have different reasons for their actions to what we think. Lots to learn, lots to savour and all wrapped up in some hot, spicy, sensual love scenes. Well written, erotic ones too, not those eurgh ones too often seen. We could feel the love between the two – could they just get it together to realise it? And could Violet get by the past, even when it seems to be repeated? Its a lovely story, full of emotion and heartbreak, tears and laughter, real life and romance. One to wallow in and enjoy.Stars: four and a half.ARC supplied by Netgalley