Happy Release Day to author Lisa Marie Perry. Enjoy this excerpt from Meant to Be Mine on sale today!
Author: Lisa Marie Perry
Series: Guilty Pleasures series
#1
On Sale: August 30, 2016
Publisher: Forever
Formats: Mass Market & eBook
Price: $6.99 USD (MM) / $6.99 USD
(eBook)
Loving him was hard.
Wanting him was so damn easy . . .
Sofia Mercer may have
been sick as a teen, but she’s no delicate flower. And she’s proven it by
making it on her own and starting a new life away from the town that turned
against her, away from the boy who broke her already fragile heart. But when
her aunt Luz dies unexpectedly, leaving Sofia with a mountain of regrets and
the keys to a quirky boutique, Sofia has no choice but to return to Cape Cod.
Only, this new life in her old town comes with complications.
Burke Wolf was Sofia’s
first love—a relationship that burned bright and went up in flames. Seeing him
again, Sofia can’t help but get caught up in that all-too-familiar
tornado of passion and pain. He’s battled his own demons—that much is clear.
But Sofia can’t afford to be careless with her heart . . . and loving Burke
again might just break it completely.
My thoughts:
Meant to Be Mine is the first in a new series about the small town of Eaves on Cape Cod. Sofia is back for her aunt's funeral when she discovers she has inherited everything. Burke was the first boy she loved, but their friendship ended badly. Now she is stuck with a dog, an erotic boutique and some life decisions to make.
I thought this was an enjoyable first in a series. This second chance story was gritty and intense. Both of the main characters have major issues. Sofia had a heart transplant 12 year before and Burke is battling with 10 years of sobriety. I liked that they were both struggling with something. It made them more real. This book also sets up for future books in the series. The secondary characters added a lot of depth to the story. I look forward to reading them!
Enjoy this excerpt:
She hid her scar behind her
clothes, hid her sexual hunger behind mannequins in a window, but eventually,
he would bring Sofia Mercer out of hiding.
Their lips parted and he traced
a finger between her breasts, up the jagged trail of thick, knotted scar
tissue. He wanted to see it, assure her it wasn’t ugly, but he’d given his word
that he wouldn’t look, and he would kick his own ass before he violated that
trust.
“It doesn’t feel ugly,” he said
plainly. “I’ve got scars, too.”
“From fighting. This is
different.”
What had she been imagining, all
these years? Schoolyard brawls? A teenage fight club? Did she define him as someone
so out of control that he’d gone searching for split lips, black eyes, and
fractured ribs?
Yeah, it was different. Her scar
was a result of a lifesaving medical procedure . . . not violence.
Laying his hand flat, he felt
her heart pound quick and strong. Caught up in the moment, caught up in her, he
whispered, “Losing you would’ve killed me.”
He felt her slip away from him
before she moved a single muscle. When she did retreat, sliding off his lap,
fixing her clothes, and raking an arm across her mouth, she said, “I told Abram
we weren’t together. Was that a lie? Can we be together, Burke?”
“Casually, yeah. As friends, of
course. But don’t rope me into more. It wouldn’t be good for you.”
“That’s not your call.”
“It is, though. Tell me
something and be truthful about it. How many panic attacks have you had since
coming back to town?”
“A few.”
“Uh-huh. And how many came on
when I wasn’t near you?”
“Uh . . .”
“Sofia.”
“None.”
“That’s my point. Think it’s a
coincidence that your health teeters when I’m around? I’m harmful to you. I’ve known
for a long time that I’m no good.” She didn’t know all the hell he carried.
He’d do anything to spare her heart the burden of his skeletons.
“Stop it,” she whispered,
getting to her feet. “You’d never hurt me.”
“Not intentionally, but the fact
is I trigger something in you that you can’t physically handle. I meant what I
said earlier—it would kill me to lose you. As much as I want you, and damn it,
you know I do, I can’t keep putting you at risk.”
“Are you sure my health isn’t
your excuse to justify walking away?” she challenged. “Hold me off, resist
what’s good and real and permanent, then take off on your boat. That’s your
plan, right?”
“It’s worked out nicely for
years. You wouldn’t be the first woman to step back because she can’t handle my
career. It’s dangerous, the hours can be shitty, and sometimes I can be on the
water for weeks. I’d never ask you or anyone else to shut up and like it. If
you want to bail now, I won’t hold it against you.”
“That does terrify me,
but I’m not bailing. A career is one thing. Escape is something else
altogether. I don’t think I can love you halfway—either I’m all in or I fold.”
Excerpted from MEANT TO BE MINE by Lisa Marie Perry. Copyright © 2016 by
Lisa Marie Perry. Used
with permission of Grand Central Publishing. All rights reserved.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lisa Marie Perry encounters difficult
fictional men and women on a daily basis. She writes sizzling, deep fiction
featuring flawed heroes brought to their knees by the love of complicated
women. She has received high praise from USA Today and has been nominated for
an RT Book Reviews literary award. She lives in America's heartland, drives a
truck, enjoys indie rock, collects Medieval literature, watches too many
comedies, has a not-so-secret love for lace and adores rugged men with a little
bit of nerd.
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Nine women, One Dress: This was not the book I thought I was getting. I thought it was going to be how one dress affected nine different women. Instead, I got a mess of unlikable stereotypical characters, too many points of view and a lot of lying and cheating. I failed to really find any humor in the story, so I stopped at about 40%. I was very disappointed as I was looking forward to reading this one.
The Disappearance at Devil's Rock: I listened to the audiobook and I got through about 2 parts and realized I had no idea who most of the characters were. A character would say something and I would have to sit there and think about who it was. It was too much work for a audiobook in the car. Also there seemed to be a lot of breaks that weren't clearly defined. The scenes would shift suddenly. It was confusing.
