Review: 4.25 stars-humor and heartbreak
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 6, 2014
4.25 starsPLAY is the second instalment in Kylie Scott’s contemporary, adult, erotic Stage Dive series focusing on the members of the rock bank Stage Dive and the women they love.  This is Stage Dive’s sexy and off the wall drummer Mal Ericson and twenty three year old book store clerk Anne Rollins’s story. Although we had not been previously introduced to Anne, she is Evelyn Ferris’s former neighbor-Ev married Stage Dive’s lead guitarist David Ferris in book one LICK.Told from Anne’s first person point of view the storyline focuses on Mal and Anne’s very new relationship. Our couple meet at a party at David and Evelyn’s condo where Mal is immediately drawn to Anne. Mal is a man who possesses the smooth charm and even smoother tongue to make any woman swoon but it is hyper active/manic personality that draws people like a moth to a flame. A sexy drummer with a reputation for one night stands, Anne isn’t fooled by Mal’s charm-there is something sad hiding behind Mal’s comedic faade-a sadness that Anne recognizes only too well. Mal and Anne’s relationship is a very-quick friends to lovers storyline that is incredibly hot, intimate and intense.Anne will remind many readers about themselves or someone that they know-she has been taken advantage of time and again-from her boss to her former roommate Anne’s life is currently defined by the number of times she has been screwed by the people that she trusts. In this, our couple’s story will begin when Mal makes her an offer that she could not refuse because Mal isn’t accepting anything less. Anne is about to lose her apartment and Mal offers himself up to be her new roommate.The world building continues from the introductory storyline LICK where we were first introduced to the volatile and troubled members of Stage Dive. Most of the previous storyline characters play a secondary role including David’s brother Jimmy and guitarist Ben; Evelyn’s brother Nate; and her BFF Lauren.  As the band members prepare for their upcoming tour, Mal’s world begins to fall apart and he takes his frustrations out on everyone around.  The boys of Stage Dive are fallible, human and not without their own demons and manic histories. These are the stories of real people or your next door neighbors or even your family and friends.Kyle Scott pulls the reader into a compelling and sometimes heartbreaking storyline that is driven by Mal’s sense of humor, sarcasm and playful attitude but the humor is hiding a pain that is changing his world one day at a time.  He is a man in a world of hurt and refuses to let anyone in on the sorrow that is destroying his less than orderly world.  Stage Dive is an addicting series that will captivate your imagination when you come center stage in the gritty and sometimes revealing world  (behind the scenes) of rock and roll. PLAY is not as angst driven as LICK, but it is a storyline that will pull you in –none the less.I was gifted a copy