Sweet - Review

Sweet (True Believers #2)

By: Erin McCarthy

Published: October 15, 2013 by Intermix

257 pages

Source: Borrowed from my SNL (Sandy @ Somewhere Only We Know)

(Goodreads / Amazon)

Summary:

Jessica Sweet thought going away to college would finally make her free of her parents’ constant judgments and insistence she play chastity club role model for their church events, but if anything, the freedom has made her realize she can’t go home and be a hypocrite anymore. Tired of dodging their questions, she stays at school over the summer and lands in an unexpected crash pad: Riley Mann’s house. 

Sarcastic, cocky, and full of opinions, Riley is also sexy personified with tattoos and biceps earned from working as a roofer all day. Not the right guy for her even if Jessica was looking for a relationship, which she is definitely not. But Jessica knows that Riley hides the burden of having to raise his younger brothers behind that grin and as she helps him get his house in order for a custody hearing, they begin to fall hard for each other, and she is forced to question what she’s hiding herself. 

Jessica has never had a problem getting naked with a guy, but when it comes to showing Riley how she truly feels inside, her fear of rejection may just ruin the best thing—the best guy—to ever happen to her…

MY REVIEW:
Oh yeah - a book about Riley! He is just as yummy as Tyler (one of his brothers) from True.

Jessica is one of the roommates of Rory from True Believers #1. She is NOT your typical New Adult female MC. Where usually the girl MC is naive and almost always a virgin, Jessica broke that mold. She takes on the roll of the typical New Adult male MC. What she learns through this journey with Riley is that there's more enjoyment to be found than just getting her release from whoever she can find it from. She's missing out on the finer parts of being in a relationship. With Riley being 5 years older, and naturally more experienced in life, he helps her to "enjoy the roses" so to say.

Riley is the oldest Mann brother and is trying to get custody of his eleven year old brother since their mother died of a drug overdose and their dad is in prison. He has the weight of the world on his shoulders and he works to provide a roof over their heads for his eighteen year old brother who has down syndrome and his youngest brother. But their home is a rough bachelor pad and children need more than that. Jessica is offered a place to stay for a week with Riley while his younger brothers go on a trip with Tyler and Rory, and she begins to help Riley see their house needs to be a happier home. Not to mention, he has one week to turn his house into something that would be approved by the court system.

This is another fast, enjoyable read. I still had a similar complaint as I did in book one, where the beginning is fun, lighthearted and witty, the middle slows down and then the ending (which is usually the reuniting phase of the relationship) is rushed through the last 5-10%.

Favorite Quotes:
"You want me to paint YUM YUM for the kitchen wall of the Mann brothers? Not that is singularly amazing."

I'd never seen myself as a girl who dug a man with power tools, but there was some kind of just automatic response my body was having to the belt and the work boots. It was like an animal instinct that I knew in a zombie apocalypse I would have a better chance of survival with Riley than a marketing major.


Final Rating - 3.5 stars.