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Covet by Alison Ryan

elenajohansen's review against another edition

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1.0

I can't think of a single good thing to say about this book.

The characters are thinner than plastic wrap. We have the image-obsessed gold-digger; the more-perfect-than possible sexy billionaire; his Disney-villain-wannabe mother; a distant and uninvolved father; and finally, our heroine, the sweet, virginal intern at billionaire's company.

They meet in their early twenties, and fall in "love" in a mere four days. Some mystery issue made her leave him after a single summer together; they run into each other again five years later, and when he demands they talk, so he can get some closure, they fall back into bed together. Then there's a mostly ridiculous plot involving a secret love child, adoption, kidnapping, betrayal, and oh yeah, a little murder as well.

I can't even begin to describe how contrived it all was, so I'm skipping it. The plot is actually the least of this romance's problems.

The sex scenes are hyperbolic and repetitive. I can sum them all up for you: they constantly switched positions, it was always a ridiculously hard f*ck, billionaire boy can hold off his orgasms for an hour or more, they go bareback from the very first time even though she never tells him she's on birth control, and every orgasm is better/longer/harder than the last.

There's never any emotion. They say they're in love, they talk about it constantly, but they never do anything but argue (sometimes, when the plot calls for it), eat meals together, and have sex CONSTANTLY. There's no tenderness, no thoughtfulness, no small gestures or cuddling. It's just sex or talking.

Okay, other issues. I'm used to dual POVs in romances, no problem. But the first three chapters of this are all from different characters who aren't either of the leads. First is the gold-digging receptionist who's angling for billionaire boy; then the heroine's aunt, who's also billionaire boy's former nanny and current administrative assistant; then the heroine's mother, who also works for the company. Then, finally, we get a chapter from the heroine.

Ninety percent of those first three chapters are backstory dumping or intense focus on every habit and thought of these three side characters.

WHY WOULD YOU WAIT THREE CHAPTERS TO ACTUALLY INTRODUCE A LEAD CHARACTER? Why should I care about how these side characters are related to the lead characters when they haven't even shown up yet?

Next up: the dialogue is terribly stilted. Everyone speaks basically the same, including a four-year-old girl. There's no real personality to anyone's dialogue, but I guess that's fair, because the characters themselves don't have much personality to begin with.

Finally: SO MUCH EXPOSITION. Nothing is shown, everything is told. Characters constantly state how they feel or what they think about each other. No subtlety, no nuance.

Also, I suspect, no editing. My ebook had several intermittent formatting errors, a few typos, and numerous instances of incorrect punctuation.
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