Tag: Contemporary Romance (Page 89 of 98)

Wallbanger (Cocktail #1)
by Alice Clayton
Purchase on: Amazon, iBooks
Add to: Goodreads

“OH GOD.”
Thump.
“Oh, God”
Thump thump.
What the…
“Oh God, that’s so good!”

And so begins this utterly goofy, maddening, and, surprisingly, adorable story. When the opening line is as such, you never really know what to expect for the rest, do you?

I have had this on my TBR shelf for almost a year, and finally, on one fateful day in Target, I saw it was available in paperback, so I took a chance and bought it. And while I’m still a little giddy about Wallbanger himself, I can’t ignore the fact that there was also a lot that annoyed me as I read. There was a lot of good, though, don’t get me wrong-so much so, that I was smiling like an idiot and clapping my hands together whenever something swoon-worthy would happen-which was a lot. So, as you can see, I am a mixed up mess on this particular story.

Caroline is a single interior designer, not decorator, don’t get that wrong, who has recently moved into a new apartment owned by her boss. Everything is grand until the ‘wallbanging’ starts. See, this is even more of a problem, because, let’s face it, she hasn’t had an orgasm in forever. Tension is at an all time high for Caroline when the lights go out every night-she grits her teeth and ignores it, though-for now.

“The first thing I saw was blue. Blue sweater, blue eyes. Blue. Beautifully blue. Then I saw red as I recognized who belonged to the blue.
“Fucking Wallbanger,” I hissed, frozen on the spot.
His grin slid off as well as he played place-the-face for a moment.
“Fucking Pink Nightie Girl,” he finally concluded. He grimaced.

Then one fateful night, enough is enough and she storms over and interrupts one of his sex-capades, resulting in an embarrassing first encounter and heated words…but mutual attraction.

“Beneath the sheet-which was already lower on his hips than should be legal-
He

Was

Still

Hard”

There were so many many moments where I had to take a step back and laugh-just enjoy the ridiculous banter between these two. It was hilarious. They are obviously attracted to each other, but things have to build, there have to be multiple hot close encounters where the sexual tension is amped up a few notches, making us wait until the oh-so-beautiful build up is to the brink, where things will explode if they get any hotter. I loved that aspect of the story. The writing is much like my personality, so I found myself relating to it. Goofy dialogue in Caroline’s head, stupid comebacks that could never be labeled witty-It ALL reminded me of how I would write a story. Fun and flirty.

“I wanted to level him with my eyes, make him beg for mercy. But no…Not Simon, Director of the International House Of Orgasms.

He

Was

Still

Smirking.”

What I couldn’t relate to, however, is the constant “O” factor, the dialogue that just a moment ago I called funny, and not-so-witty-but-it-kind-of-is-witty banter becoming corny, Caroline’s attitude towards Wallbanger-all of that was more than I could handle or relate to. How many times is she going to talk about the damn “O”? It was okay at first, sure, it was in the damn blurb for God’s sake, but when you can predict that she is getting ready to talk about it everytime, it is being overused. I think I read somewhere that this is fanfiction-I think I have a feeling I know what it’s based off of….much like Ana and her ‘inner goddess’, I wanted to strangle Caroline and throw her ‘perked up’ “O” out the GD window.

Last, but not least, I have to bring up the character development. Caroline was supposed to be the mature, working girl, while Wallbanger was supposed to be the man-whore who travels for work never to call again jerk, right? Well I felt these roles reversed somewhere along the way. While Caroline was not an unlikeable character, I still wanted to slap her across the face and tell her to figure her shit out-someone *wink wink* *nudge nudge* obviously has feelings for you-quit frikkin’ running away or disbelieving what people tell you. Wallbanger became sweet, helpful, funny, irresistable…he became so mature within a matter of pages, while I found Caroline to be a tad immature and scared of her own shadow-running from all of her problems when things don’t go as planned. Now, she was also strong in some aspects, but when it came to WB, she got quite flighty.

All in all a very fun read. It was most definitely not what I was expecting, and it grew sweeter with every passing page. I was searching for a fun, light read, and I couldn’t have picked better. Simon was a really great guy who had so much to offer, and I fell in love with him more and more with each passing page. I laughed out loud, I rolled my eyes, and I became engrossed with these two characters. I am very happy I finally gave this book a try-because it was hilarious.

Things I forgot to mention that made me laugh:

Their text exchanges
Wallbanger’s love for bread/food
Music through the walls
Her sassy, know-it-all cat, Clive
Her nicknames for Wallbanger’s Harem

These are what made the book so good, and if I didn’t say it before, I’ll say it now-give this book a chance. If nothing else, you’ll get a good guy and a good laugh out of it. 🙂