shanaenigans's review
4.0
I would normally skip a book with a teenager main, but I really enjoyed the last book so figured I'd give it a shot. I'm so happy I did. I love Owen & Dyma & catching up with the rest of the family. Loved that the drama came from outside sources for the most part. Solid read in a year where I feel like most books have been meh.
bananatricky's review
4.0
Three and a half stars.
I guess this was always going to be a hard book to get across the line and I just felt there was one too many plot lines to sit comfortably. Dyma is nineteen years old, her mother, who got pregnant when she was just a teenager herself, is engaged to NFL quarterback Harlan Kristiansen and the two of them have gone from dirt poor, town pariahs to living in a fancy house in Portland. Harlan's best friend, NFL centre Owen Johnson is besotted with Dyma but the age difference between twenty-five and nineteen, particularly when he's a divorced football player and she's still in high school is a bit icky. So the two of them have been conducting a chaste romance for months.
Dyma is a diminutive vegetarian astrophysics studying, pierced and tattooed ball of fire and fury. She used to defend herself and her mother with her fists, now she just cuts people with her barbed words. But nothing can prepare her for the mean girls at college, or the disapproval of Owen's brother, or the prying journalists, and there's a lot in her family's background to make a juicy scoop, especially for someone who won't hesitate to twist the truth.
Owen is a cattle rancher as well as an NFL player. He's already been divorced after his model wife couldn't bear the idea of living in the middle of nowhere and while Dyma might be the opposite of his ex-wife he can't see an astrophysicist living on a ranch either, especially not a vegetarian one. He also knows the six year gap between them encompasses a huge chunk of experiences, things he wants Dyma to have the chance to enjoy.
This just felt like a crossover book with one too many storylines and curiously I found it difficult to get the energy to finish the book, despite reading it in a single day - go figure!
I guess this was always going to be a hard book to get across the line and I just felt there was one too many plot lines to sit comfortably. Dyma is nineteen years old, her mother, who got pregnant when she was just a teenager herself, is engaged to NFL quarterback Harlan Kristiansen and the two of them have gone from dirt poor, town pariahs to living in a fancy house in Portland. Harlan's best friend, NFL centre Owen Johnson is besotted with Dyma but the age difference between twenty-five and nineteen, particularly when he's a divorced football player and she's still in high school is a bit icky. So the two of them have been conducting a chaste romance for months.
Dyma is a diminutive vegetarian astrophysics studying, pierced and tattooed ball of fire and fury. She used to defend herself and her mother with her fists, now she just cuts people with her barbed words. But nothing can prepare her for the mean girls at college, or the disapproval of Owen's brother, or the prying journalists, and there's a lot in her family's background to make a juicy scoop, especially for someone who won't hesitate to twist the truth.
Owen is a cattle rancher as well as an NFL player. He's already been divorced after his model wife couldn't bear the idea of living in the middle of nowhere and while Dyma might be the opposite of his ex-wife he can't see an astrophysicist living on a ranch either, especially not a vegetarian one. He also knows the six year gap between them encompasses a huge chunk of experiences, things he wants Dyma to have the chance to enjoy.
This just felt like a crossover book with one too many storylines and curiously I found it difficult to get the energy to finish the book, despite reading it in a single day - go figure!
allenfarm's review
4.0
Rosalind always has the most interesting characters and engaging storylines. This book was no different. This story gets its start in Shame the Devil when Owen and Dyma first meet. In this book, Dyma is in college for astronautical engineering. The last thing she has time for is an NFL football player, a teammate of her new stepfather at that. They have nothing in common. The story of how they work through that was told well. The best part of a Rosalind James book is that they are realistic, rich in detail and strong in character development. I always look forward to a book by this author.
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