JakeI’m Jake Morgan. The man they all loved to hate. A movie star.I’m ridiculously rich and famous.I takes full advantage of it all drugs, sex, booze, pills, clubs, orgiesAnd enjoy every minute of it. People see me as an asshole. Prickly. But all women fall at my feet. All, yes. Except one. Who is this woman who dares to stand up to me?Tandy O’ Hara. A novelist.They’ve tapped her to write the … A novelist.
They’ve tapped her to write the script of her last book.
And guess who’s gonna be the leading actor of this film?
But…
I can’t bear how she acts with me. Who does she think she is?
Of course, I want nothing more from Tandy, than to ravish her body.
That’s what I believed…
Tandy
I was hired to write the screenplay of my book, A Moment in Time.
Am I excited to work with Jake Morgan?
Not really.
He’s a walking cliché. Even if he’s really hot.
And everything about him spells trouble.
If you think I’m gonna fall at your feet, think again, Jake.
I just want to get through this job.
Or, we’ll be on set together.
Sadly, that’s the reason I can’t stay away from him.
Well, maybe there is something more..
more
Hollywood’s beautiful bastard squares off against a spunky author in Beautiful Bastard by N.L. Blake.
Tandy O’Hara is a smart, self-assured author who pens political thrillers. She has been approached by a movie studio to write the screenplay for her latest successful novel- A Moment in Time. Initially, she refuses, but after some pushing by her agent Stephan, she relents, on the condition that she won’t have to deal with the lead male actor, Jake Morgan.
Spoiled, rich, and entitled, Jake Morgan is a Hollywood superstar. He knows that he can get whatever he wants using his “charm” and good looks. He buries himself in drink, drugs, and women, but he still can’t outrun the “darkness” he feels within. Jake is completely put off his game by the sassy little screenwriter who shows up at the pre-production meeting with her attitude, motorcycle boots and leather jacket. He determines to figure out why she isn’t interested in him, and decides that he will use her up and crush her.
When I first started reading, I was quickly taken in by Tandy’s snarky character. I burst out laughing several times, and I was tickled that she was putting Jake the jerk in his place. Jake went out of his way at every possible opportunity to be a crass, disgusting pig to everyone around him.
Sadly, once Jake decides he “will have” Tandy, this self-assured, spunky woman turns into a spineless doormat. No matter that Jake is a complete douche to her, cheats multiple times, and is never sober enough to actually figure out who he is or what he wants… when he crooks his finger, she comes running. Ugh. Who is the bigger fool? Hard to tell.
The sex scenes were hot, but there really wasn’t a believable chemistry between the characters. Their “relationship” was like watching a train wreck- I wanted to look away, but couldn’t. The ending really made no sense- I was left saying, What?? I’m sorry- I just didn’t buy it. There was no lead up to his miraculous change, so it rang false to me.
I wanted to like this one, but it just didn’t work for me.
I received an ARC of this novella, and I voluntarily chose to leave an honest review.
:: UPDATE ::
After the author contacted me because they didn’t like my review, I was informed that the reason I didn’t like this story is because the novella has, and I quote “dark romance elements, with a dark universe”.
This novella has been promoted on social media, and the arc sign up as a “hot and steamy, full-length standalone” and a “romance /new adult/collage/ contemporary” on Amazon, a total contradiction to the dark genre.
The “hero” is a jerk who treats everyone like crap until the very end, that does not make him dark, that makes him an asshole.
I read dark all the time, dark, disturbing and unforgivable is my comfort zone, this has no dark elements.
I stand by my original honest review, my rating came from a combination of editing and storyline, which is what all of my reviews always consist of.
I agreed to re-read this once it was final so I could remove my issues on editing, there wasn’t much of a change.
70’ish pages doesn’t give you a lot of room to create depth and growth, I get that. But this was more like the author has tried to squeeze a novel size storyline into a novella size word count and that is where this all fell short. Because no matter how much the author tried to school me on the “evolution” of Jake, this story (and Jake) still lacked development.
<3
:: Original Review ::
So . . . I have no clue where to begin with this one.
I was sent this as an ARC and dug in right away, I mean it’s releasing really soon, it’s super short and I had the time.
Now, while I understand some arcs are un-proofed and unedited, those are Always stated. This one was not, the first I received turns out to have been a beta edition (wasn’t aware), so a lot of my problems and low rating comes from the sloppiness (yes, I know I said this about her first book, Addicted, but it is the same for this one too) and lack of editing and proofreading.
Even after receiving the second arc, the edited – final edition, I am still finding inconsistencies, repetitiveness, missing/incorrect words, and spelling and grammar issues. And before someone bitches at my grammar, I am Not an author trying to sell my work.
So with all that editing issues out of the way, let’s get to the story.
From the description, I was ready for a short steamy romance.
I did not get that.
Tandy O’Hara is an author whose book has been picked up for a movie deal and her best friend roped her into working on set doing the screenwriting, which she is less than happy about, especially when she finds out who they have cast as the leading man.
Jake Morgan.
Jake is your typical arrogant, self-entitled rich brat you always hear about. Though this one has zero redeemable qualities and spends almost the entire novella either being high, drunk, having sex, or should I say using women or being a complete unprofessional knob on set, especially towards Tandy.
He has some serious trust issues, believing everyone, Tandy included is only out to use him for their own gain, hypocritical in a lot of ways seeing how he uses women the entire novella.
Anywho, Tandy gets under his skin. She has a backbone and doesn’t just fall at his feet hoping to get at least a one-nighter with Mr. Movie-Star Jake. All Tandy wants is to get this movie under wraps so she can get back to her writing and get the hell away from him, you know until she doesn’t, that is.
As I said, Jake has zero redeemable qualities, seriously, he is all over the place with a different girl on his junk every other scene all while trying to “prove Tandy is a user” (insert eye roll). Thought this could be because the second Jake stops being a complete tool, you are like in the last few pages.
There was no real growth for Jake, Tandy too, it went from hate to love in a mere turn of the page without any real progress. Trust me I get insta-love, but this was Not instalove.
Overall, if this was more polished, and yes again, given some more time for them to actually grow, this could have been a good read.
* REVIEW BASED ON THE ARC PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR FOR AN HONEST REVIEW *
DON’T BE SO COCK SURE!!!
Ok guys, I’m just gonna jump right in. I could sit here for hours telling you about the story. How it plays out, what goes down. But come on guys you read the blurb. You’ve seen what the other readers have said. You know the score. So now I’m running this show. No, I’m kidding. There’s no show. If you’re in the mood to knock a hot movie star down a notch. You’ve come to the right place. This read has it all. The characters and scenes realistic. The storyline solid. You have action galore and heat to keep you warm. Then you have that rollercoaster of emotions that keep you on your toes and focus on the read. I loved how the characters and plot played out. It was smooth flowing and vividly described. NL did an amazing job bringing this tale together beautifully. Great job and thanks for sharing.
I received this book through ARC but I’m voluntarily leaving this review. This book was about an author having to deal with a mood actor while producing her book into a movie. Instead of just producing a movie they produced some really hot scenes and maybe a little love.