TITLE: Since I Saw You (Because You Are Mine #4)
AUTHOR: Beth Kery
GENRE: Erotic Romance
PUBLISHED: May 6, 2014
RATING: ★★★☆☆
PURCHASE LINKS: Amazon,Kobo Books,iBook Store,Barnes&Noble
MOBILISM LINK: Since I Saw You
Description
When enigmatic billionaire Ian Noble sets Lin the task of ‘taming’ his brilliant, yet half-savage brother Kam Reardon, she eagerly accepts. She’s more than curious about the solitary genius and everything she’s heard about him. During their electric first meeting, her fascination increases a hundredfold. Kam practically oozes raw sex appeal. Lin is interested…very interested. But does her intense attraction and willingness to go places with him she’s never gone before in the bedroom really have to do with Kam? Or is her carefully hidden desire to blame for a man she knows she can never have?
An elusive outsider, Kam avoids intimacy, yet never shies away from satisfying his erotic appetites. But there’s something different about Lin—a reserve he’s anxious to break. A woman he’s eager to take his time with…and possess completely. A sophisticated beauty like her would never want him anywhere but in bed, but he finds himself unable to resist her.
Immediately Lin’s smooth façade is undone by Kam’s overwhelming masculinity and by his irresistible erotic demands—a lesson in subjugation that leaves Lin confused, reeling, and open to things she never thought possible. Now, as the unpredictable nights between them grow darker, Lin and Kam are certain of only thing: they’re made for each other.
Review
First, let me state this book was given to me. I have not read anything by Beth Kery before. And while an interesting and unique reading experience, it is best I keep all quotes and this review PG13.
At the start of the book, readers have a thought from the past by Lin. At first I thought maybe Lin was someone who came to America for the education or to escape a bad country. Later in the story readers learn more about Lin’s past.
"You got this hair from your mother," Grandmamma would say, her mouth grim as she dove into her straightening task.
Other than Lin’s last name readers are given the impression that she is American and not from another ethnic race or culture. A few times in the book readers are shown that Lin has a golden skin color. However this could be from many different things, not just her heritage. I enjoyed how the author puts two people together from two totally separate cultures.
Kam is portrayed as a rustic individual with little or no social grace. At first readers are given the impression that he would not know the difference in a salad or dinner fork. He is more comfortable eating at the bar than at a table.
"Look at me. I’m not interested in that world. I don’t cater to fashion or rich bastards," he responded coldly, holding her stare.
This is hard for me to imagine, a Frenchman who is cold, and does not care about fashion or most anything else. Granted most people excuse something like this with a genius, no matter the culture. To me Kam comes off more as a person raised in the early 1800’s era and thrust into modern time and a little lost with everything.
Sometimes details are great at helping readers to have a better picture of what an author is trying to show. Then sometimes details are written in as filler. Here I feel the details are included as filler, but do not understand why. Honestly, does it really matter why a black napkin is handed to a character? Most people know that something white will leave small lint one something black. Why explain about a black napkin when none of the food or wine was explained? As they say “the devil is in the details” and I feel this was not needed for any part of the story.
"Thank you, Victor," she said when the bartender handed her a black napkin. He knew the white ones left lint on her black skirts.
Lin states it perfectly in Chapter 4. Kam was not just acting like a bully, he really was about everything. He has a serious chip on his shoulder and refuses to let it go. Whether it was from his past or something dealing about the meetings in trying to sell his product, I leave that for future readers to figure out.
"I’ll say you weren’t. You were acting like a bully."
Later in Chapter 4 I honestly do not know of any restaurant that would allow a patron behind to counter to try and fix anything. Yes, I understand Kam is a genius and is able to fix stuff. Yes, it was a nice gesture and in fiction anything can happen. In real life, not even the ‘Mom & Pop’ restaurants would allow someone to walk behind the counter who is not an employee or contractor to fix something; too much of a health and safety risk.
He sighed in a beleaguered fashion. "No, it’s not that. Just . . . excuse me for a moment."
"Okay." Was he irritated at her probing? Maybe he was going to use the men’s room. She sat forward curiously when instead of walking toward the rear of the establishment where the restrooms were located, he calmly walked around the bar. The waitress immediately noticed his tall, formidable and uninvited form behind the bar, but the bartender kept wrestling with and poking at a countertop shake freezer and blender, cursing. Kam thumped the bartender on the shoulder.
"Do you mind?" he asked, pointing at the machine.
"Be my guest," the bemused-looking bartender said after a second, stepping aside.
Kam had caught the attention of everyone sitting at the bar now, not just Lin. He stepped up to the machine and opened a utility cover. For a moment, he just studied the whole unit. Lin had the impression he was absorbing the machine somehow. It was a little how she felt whenever he looked at her with his laserlike stare that seemed to see more than just the surface, like he was examining her component parts and analyzing how they all worked together. She couldn’t say precisely what he did next, but if she had to describe it, she’d say he flipped one thing, twisted another, and jerked a third: one, two, three, quick as counting up to something good.
He turned on a switch and the blender made the familiar monotonous roar Lin had heard sporadically when they first entered.
"I hadn’t even noticed it was broken. That was nice of you to fix it," Lin said in amazement when he sat down again next to her at the bar a moment later, waving off the bartender’s profuse thanks with a look of vague discomfort on his face.
I will give the author credit for moving into the sex scenes with lots of grace. They were not just thrown in without lots of thought and build-up. Granted it does seem like every 3-4 pages there is a new sex scene that lasts 3-5 pages. The unique way she described everything was a nice change from the usual erotic read. Readers see that this book was not just written by someone out looking to earn some extra money and have the ‘I’m an author’ status. Regrettably, I believe there is not enough ‘meat’ to the story. Yes, the sex as described was great if you like that sort of thing, but I would have liked more story than just sex.
"Here," he assured succinctly.
His warm, fragrant breath brushed over her sensitive lips in the pitch-black room. "You’ve been driving me crazy all day and night. I won’t wait another second to taste you. All of you."
I know this book is an erotic romance, but still seems like there should be more than just sex in a book. Where is the romance? It seems like Kam and Lin were more interested in being overbearingly wild than knowing more about each other.
A rare example of the author providing some needed depth to the characters...
Lin was the center spoke in a wheel of five other dancers. He knew her immediately, not just from appearance. He recognized her harmony: that smooth, supple, exquisitely controlled movement of her body. All of the dancers typified control, but none more elegantly, nor with such apparent ease, than Lin. That ease was an illusion, Kam realized as he slowly walked down a flight of steps, mesmerized by the dance. The amount of muscular control and balance required for the movements and postures would fell a trained athlete.
Then here with Kam showing some depth to his character...
"Aurore is in the country,” he said thickly after a moment. “There are a lot of out buildings . . . barns, and gardening sheds. Several cats used to live in them, and the gardener allowed it because they helped control the rodents. One of them had a litter one spring, and I kept one of them for my own. A shiny little brown one. I called her Chocolat. My mother wouldn’t let me keep her in our quarters at first, saying we didn’t have the money to feed her, but then Chocolat worked her wiles on her, and my mother grew fond of her as well. She was very warm hearted by nature, and she loved animals."
"You get that from her," Lin murmured.
He nodded before resuming. "During that summer, that kitten went everywhere with me . . . except for inside the big house,” he added darkly. He fell into silence, his fingers still running through Lin’s hair.
There were a few other places with the characters talking about their past, but I felt these were really the most important. Without a past each character and real person are nothing. It is our past that makes us who we are today. With Kam I really connected with his character on that one part. It comes from me being an animal person.
Overall, this is an interesting and erotic read. I believe there is more sex than actual story in this book. There are only so many ways to explain, show, or tell how a couple has sex. After the first few times dealing with 3-4 pages of sex the rest of the sex scenes just seem mundane.
