Review: Playful and Erotic - A Great Read!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 10, 2013
I recieved an Advanced Reader Copy of Playing the Part from Entangled Publishing under the condition that I give a completely honest review of the book on my blog and Amazon.Playing the Part by Robin Covington features recovering-from-heartbreak romance author Piper James and sexy-as-sin playboy actor Mick Blackwell.Having not read any of Robin Covington's previous books, I came into reading Playing the Part completely fresh and free from expectations. But after reading it, I can guarantee that I'll be picking up all of her books as soon as I can get my greedy little hands on them! It was playful, erotic and sweet and managed to touch on some pretty nasty stuff in a way that came across as organic and real.The premise of the book is that Mick Blackwell is staring in the film adaptation of Piper James's romance book. Mick is struggling with convincingly showing the camera he's in love, and Piper is brought in to help him connect with the male lead character in the book.  There was a lot going on with the plot, and quite a few twists and turns that made it engaging and entertaining and I loved reading a romance book about a romance author! There was one particular plot twist that was so realistic, I could feel the tension, the pain of the characters coming off the pages. It almost took my breath away it was so visceral! And I LOVED the realistic and natural way the characters dealt with the issues that were being thrown at them. It made you want to cheer for them at the end of every page!The thing I loved most about this book was the characters. Each one of them was so vibrant and engaging, it was like you could really feel what they were feeling as you read along. Even the supporting characters were great, particularly Piper's best friend Chris. The love between them was very clear and it practically jumped off the page! Piper had experienced so much pain in the short time before the book was set, and yet she was strong, knew exactly what she wanted and didn't let that fear keep her down. Mick was clearly a product of his past, having grown up with an actor father who played the field as much as he could, he passed those same lessons onto his son, but he was so sweet to Piper and it was clear how much he wanted to look after. The characters develop throughout the book in a way that is really beautiful to see, but was done in a completely cheese-free way. The dialogue was playful and sexy and had a huge dose of humour but was still very appropriate for the more serious plot scenes.Now, I don't want to ruin the surprise, but there was a specific sex scene that well...I haven't seen a scene like that in a contemporary, mainstream romance book before! It was done in an extremely classy way and managaged to be sexy, and hot and very, very intimate rather than cheap or cringe-worthy. Actually, all the sex scenes managed to have a whole lot of naughtiness mixed with class and playfullness, which can be a difficult thing to achieve when you write fairly raw and erotic scenes.My only real complaint about the book was that  we didn't get to find out more about the mysterious Lincoln, Mick's best friend!Overall the book was fantastic,  the ending took my breath away and the growth of the characters was organic and really entertaining to read. It was very well paced with great dialogue and even better sex scenes!