Review: Didnt Knock My Socks Off
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 09 8, 2013
I reviewed this book for Martini Times Romance3 OlivesI just got done reading Beneath Your Beautiful and I have to say that I was pleased with it. It didn't knock my socks off, but I enjoyed it. This book is about Huntley and Grayson. They are instantly drawn to each other and due to their recently painful pasts they opt for self-preservation, and attempt to avoid one another, which doesn't work for long. I love the build of their relationship. I can feel their lust for each other, and thoroughly enjoy the way that they develop and grow together. Instantly these two see their pain reflected in the other. They both know that something horrible has happened to them, which seems to draw them to each other even more."I realized then that what's pulling me to her is more than just an attraction. It's an inherent bond created by circumstances neither of us had or have control over."Grayson is so sweet to Huntley, he does not `alpha male' her or take over her life and their love story takes place over the course of almost a year, which I much prefer to instant love in two weeks. Grayson is my kind of guy; he has southern charm and swagger, and is athletic and handsome. Huntley, for having gone thorough what she has, is very levelheaded and silently strong. Where other authors would have made her a fragile mess after the tragedies that she's been through, Tamsyn Bester created Huntley to be more like I would imagine the typical girl to be. Shit happens and she deals with it. She doesn't mope, fester, obsess, or regress from people or relationships. Grayson and Huntley together remind me of Ken and Barbie, the perfect paring. They compliment each other, and develop a healthy relationship. The supporting characters in this book were awesome as well. They played large roles and were well developed and important to the story line. The playful banter and dialogue between all of the characters was so spot on for their age. I felt like I was witnessing an actual conversation and teasing between college kids."I was so lost before Huntley stumbled into my dark world, wearing that white sundress and those damn red cowboy boots. Her light shattered the walls around my heart and showed me how to live again. I'm not me without her. Its that simple."Now to the not so good. There was too much trauma in this book. It seemed that every time something bad happened to Huntley or Grayson, it was followed up by an equally terrible event for the other. I just found it unrealistic that the events that took place would happen at the times that they did, and that so much bad could be crammed into such a short time line. There was also a running theme of events happening in twos. **Spoiler Alert** Ok...Huntley is 19, by the end of the book she has been pregnant twice, she has been beaten twice, she has been cheated on twice, and she has been in the hospital twice. In keeping with the twoness theme, her ex and Grayson's ex show back up in their lives randomly on the same night. The painful pasts that they possess are parallel in the severity of the circumstances. On the night that Huntley catches her ex cheating with her best friend, he beats her and she loses her baby, and then she finds her mom murdered after being released from the hospital. Well not to be out done, but on the same night that Grayson finds his ex servicing some random guy, he then finds out that his sister is raped and dies in a car accident. I just found all of the events that took place to be too well thought out, in reality, these events would have been far more random and likely not have happened in clusters. It was all a little `tick for tat' where the author made sure that they were damaged in equal parts. Another aspect that I did not care for is the fact that Huntley and Grayson both come from well-respected wealthy small town Southern families, and no one seems to bat an eyelash at the fact that Huntley gets pregnant at 19. There are no embarrassed or concerned parents or family members, they all act utterly thrilled that Huntley is knocked up at 19 by her 21 year old boyfriend.  In addition, the 4 main characters are college students that all live in multi bedroom homes and none of them have jobs. Brody apparently comes from a less fortunate family, Huntley has a trust fund that she cant access, they all have adult like possessions with no actual means to pay for them. And the birth scene...Oy vey. Basically, she has some contractions, goes to the hospital, the Dr. looks between her legs, she pushes twice and...boom...they have a baby. The whole book was just one little thing on top of another. This of course is my personal opinion, and what bothers me might not even catch the attention of another reader.Just a heads up, but for those of you picky readers, there are quite a few misplaced and misspelled words in this book, as well as random paragraph brakes.So basically, the reason that I have chosen to reward this story with 3 olives is due to the coincidental timing of all the events. I felt like the plot could have been stretched out so that things didn't occur in clusters. It jumped out at me that all of the bed situations were parallel for Huntley and Grayson. I would have liked for there to have been a little more realism in how everything happens and in the characters reactions.