Mini-review: Last Will and Testament (Radleigh University #1) by Dahlia Adler

Title: ast Will and Testament (Radleigh University #1)
Author: Dahlia Adler
My rating: 2 of 5 Stars

MY THOUGHTS

Last will and Testament could be so much better. Despite it being the forbidden love story and I’m a sucker for this kind of stories, this book didn’t work for me at all.

The life of Lizzie Brandt, college student is spiraling down. She is partying, drinking and on top of that she is sleeping with Trevor, who has a girlfriend. Sudden death of her parents brings a jarring stop to her life. Now Lizzie is a guardian to her two little brothers and she needs to keep her scholarship which means to straighten her grades. Here comes Connor Lawson. He is TA in Lizzie’s class. Unexpectedly Connor helps Lizzie to find an apartment and helps her to study. The more time they spend together the more difficult it is to stay apart.

The first thing that didn’t work for me was writing style. Actually it remained me of Price of a Kiss (Forbidden Men, #1) by Linda Kage. The same upbeat style with swearing, which made very difficult for me to connect with Lizzie. I wanted to feel her feelings, but she came as this shallow, too optimistic person.

My next complaint is how grieving was portrayed. Lizzie just lost her parents, so I expected to feel for her loss, her pain. But I didn’t. The same was about her brothers.

The romance didn’t work for me either. There was no chemistry between Lizzie and Connor. This was a forbidden romance: he is a teacher, she is a student. There was so much at stake for both of them. I wanted a big conflict; I wanted turmoil of emotions… But there was none of that.

Also there was all that unnecessary angst. As I’ve told not once I like angst. But, and it’s a big BUT, I don’t like angst for the sake of angst. I want my angst to have some purpose in the book. I don’t like when the author brings some bitchy ex-girl who makes unbelievable stuff to tear apart our couple.

All in all this wasn’t a book for me.

Review: To Professor, with Love (Forbidden Men #2) by Linda Kage

Title: To Professor, with Love (Forbidden Men #2)
Author: Linda Kage
Publication date: April 26th 2014
My rating: 2 of 5 Stars

SUMMARY (from Goodreads)
Junior in college. Star athlete. Constant attention from the opposite sex.

On this campus, I’m worshiped. While seven hundred miles away, back in my hometown, I’m still trailer park trash, child of the town tramp, and older sibling to three kids who are counting on me to keep my shit together so I can take them away from the same crappy life I grew up in.

These two opposing sides of myself never mix until one person gets a glimpse of the true me. I never expected to connect with anyone like this or want more beyond one night. This may be the real deal.

Problem is, Dr. Kavanagh’s my literature professor.

If I start anything with a teacher and we’re caught together, I might as well kiss my entire future goodbye, as well as my family’s, and especially Dr. Kavanagh’s. Except sometimes love is worth risking everything. Or at least, it damn well better be because I can only resist so much.

MY THOUGHTS

I think this is where Linda Kage and I go our separate ways. I’ve read her another book Price of a Kiss (Forbidden Men, #1) and didn’t like it much either. When I read the blurb of To Professor, with Love, I was intrigued. I usually cannot walk away from a story with forbidden romance and I’ve read a lot of books with student/teacher romance. Never the less I found this one unique, because I’d never read a book where the teacher is female and the student is male. In truth, I wasn’t expecting much from To Professor, with Love. I wasn’t expecting depth and meaningfulness, I wanted my dose of romance, angst, steam, real characters and I wanted to feel emotions. Instead I found myself irritated, more than ones I found myself rolling my eyes. One particular scene was so stupid that I wanted to close my book and mark it as “did not finish”.

I think my main problem with Linda Kage’s books was that I couldn’t connect with her characters. I didn’t feel compassion for them and their problems, for that matter I didn’t feel any emotion toward them.

My other complain is that this book deals with a very serious problem, and the author throws this issue at the reader only to add more drama. Also there is the usual: “our heroine meets her prince who miraculously solves all her problems”.

In To Professor with Love the reader meets with Reese Randall and Mason Lowe, main characters of the first book in this series Price of a Kiss. Actually we meet them a lot; several scenes especially featured their problems. In my opinion they didn’t add anything good to the book; on the contrary they distracted me from the main story.

All in all To Professor with Love wasn’t a book for me. But if you liked Price of a Kiss, probably you would like this book.