Goodreads Choice Award Finalist for Best Romance *Amazon Top 10 Romances of 2016AAR Top 10 Romances of All Time*From the NEW YORK TIMES, WALL STREET JOURNAL, & USA TODAY bestselling series.Make a deal with the devil and you might get what you want, but will it be what you need?Jennifer Sylvester wants one thing, and that one thing is NOT to be Tennessee’s reigning Banana Cake Queen. Ever the … thing, and that one thing is NOT to be Tennessee’s reigning Banana Cake Queen. Ever the perpetual good girl and obedient daughter, Jennifer is buckling under the weight of her social media celebrity, her mother’s ambitions, and her father’s puritanical mandates. Jennifer is officially desperate.
And desperate times call for Cletus Winston.
Cletus Winston is a puzzle wrapped in a mystery covered in conundrum sauce, and now he’s in a pickle. Despite being convinced of his own omniscience, extortion by the exalted Banana Cake Queen of Green Valley has taken him completely by surprise. So… what’s a maniacal mastermind to do?
Likely, the last thing you expect.
Beard Science is book #1 in the Solving for Pie: Cletus and Jenn Mysteries series and Book #3 in the WInston Brothers series. Each book is a standalone, full length (110k words), contemporary romantic comedy novel, and follows the romantic exploits and adventures of one of the six Winston Brothers.
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THIS IS FREEEEEEEE, GO READ ITTTTTTTT.
I’m starting to doubt this site and actually getting annoyed with it. I’ve lost count of how many times it didn’t show deals and freebies.
XXX
This book is so good I can’t stop re-reading it. Can’t wait for their new story, ‘Engagement and Espionage’. The waiting is killing meee.
Cletus has been my favourite since ‘Beauty and the Mustache’ and I wasn’t disappointed. I freaking loved him! He really is the best.
And now that the series is complete, I’m going to repeat myself, lol.
Still my favourite brother. Still my favourite book.
Cletus is yet another bearded and sexy AF Winston brother. He’s smart, sometimes awkward, and a whole lot manipulative. In the books prior to this one, Cletus was an enigma. I couldn’t wait for his story. I needed to get into his brain.
Jennifer is tired of being labeled The Banana Cake Queen. Tired of living for other people. Sick of trying to make everyone else happy. Ready to take her life into her own hands and live for herself, she does what she has to do. Blackmail Cletus Winston into helping her.
This story had a delicious slow burn that kept me wanting more and more. I loved their interactions. I loved watching their friendship grow. I loved watching that friendship grow into more. And I loved seeing all the other characters – I feel like I’m part of the family. And just like the other books in this series, I devoured this one and dove right into the next.
The time and torture it takes to fall in love with another person is on full display in this story, with torture in the form of awakening and re-forming your ideas of yourself and another person. Cletus became clear – and dear – while Jenn became a fully formed person – and also dear. Most wonderful.
I have had this pretty sitting on my bookshelf for a couple of years now, and slacker that I am, I have only read it this past weekend.
Now, I read Beard With Me (Billy/Scarlett) origin book before I started reading the Winston series, and even though you can read them all without it, it has made my enjoyment of the WB books more.
So, WHY did I leave it so long to read these? I can’t answer that, however I am kicking myself for it.
Cletus is all that and a bag of chips! I loved him as a teenager, but as a man… I LOVED him so so much.
He and Jenn are just everything I wanted for their story. I laughed. I cried. I swooned. I was left wanting so much more.
SUCH A GREAT SERIES!! This is a must read for lovers of romance!! It’s got it all!! Excellent storytelling, characters and world building!!
I can’t possibly express how much I loved this book! Ever since I started the Winston Brother’s series by Penny Reid, Cletus has been my favorite Winston brother. I was so excited to get to his story! Let me tell you, this story does not disappoint. When Cletus gets blackmailed by the Banana Cake Queen, aka Jennifer Sylvester, you just know that it is going to be a wild ride. She wants Cletus to help her get out from under the harsh rule of her parents and to find a husband. What neither Cletus, nor herself plan on, is falling for each other along the way. The more they get to know each other the more they realize they can’t live without the other. Can Jennifer find the strength to break free from her parents and be the person that she wants to be? Will Cletus be able to keep their love alive after a hidden secret threatens to destroy what they have together?
This book has everything that I could have asked for. This is a great addition to the series. As always, the narration is excellent. Joy Nash and Chris Brinkley are so talented and they just bring all of the characters to life!
OK so I am a fan of Penny Reid and Quinn/Janie is my favorite couple. When I read about the Winston brothers in Ashley’s book I was not impressed because beards.. I hate beards. So I decided to stay far far away from the beardy novels and was secretly very miffed the Winston men were bumping back my most anticipated book about Kat/Dan. How dare they!
But then I saw all those glowing reviews and Beard Science was even nominated at Goodreads… and I caved. And bought the book. And loved it….
Cletus was so different than what I expected and I loved him together with Jenn. Her change from obedient daughter, dressed in banana yellow to a woman going after what she wants made me happy. Great book! (2016)
This book started off a little slow for me, but then about halfway in I was hooked and needed to know Jennifer and Cletus’ whole story. I couldn’t put it down till I was done. I’m so happy that Jennifer found her backbone and Cletus came to terms with who he was and wasn’t scared of being with her. These two were super cute!
I loved Cletus in the first book, so I jumped right to his story, skipping the second book in the series. He turned out to be exactly the intelligent, devious mastermind that the first book hinted at, and he was a great hero. Jennifer made a brief appearance in the first book too, and turned out to be completely different from the first impression given. She’s lived all her life under the strict supervision of her parents, but now it’s time for her to struggle free. And she chooses Cletus to help her to achieve her goals. Cletus shows great emotional intelligence in this, but when it comes to him understanding his own emotions, he’s utterly lost. Jennifer has to resort to quite a bit of cunning too, to make him realise that she’s the one for him. Excellent book.
These books are fairly stand-alone, and even though the events of the second book I skipped feature heavily in this one, I was able to perfectly enjoy this book even though I hadn’t read that one.
I cannot recommend this book enough. It’s one of my favorites ever. I read the e-book and then had to order the paperback for the bookshelf in my office. The characters are wonderful and quirky and I was rooting for them all the way through.
Jennifer Ann Sylvester is such a wonderful heroine
I just can’t get enough of Penny Reid’s Beard series. The characters evoke so many emotions: laughter, sadness, anger on their behalf, etc. Choose this series! You won’t regret it.
Loved this!
Cletus and Jen are one of my all time favorite book couples! But I also love all the guys and gals in Green Valley. This is one book series that won’t leave you disappointed!
Love Cletus
I love it when a crafty man meets his match! Cletus Winston is a mental ninja with a kaleidoscope of antisocial behaviors who plays a multi layered long con peppered with bartered favors as easily as making his famous sausage. Jennifer is the sheltered and reluctant local commercially packaged June Cleaver-esque celebrity Banana Cake Queen burgeoning on becoming a next level celebrity if her parents have anything to say about it.
There are so many layers to this delightful story it boggles the mind. The center story is one of blackmail and yearning for the normal life. I loved Jennifer and her need to be loved and her diabolically simple way of attaining her goal from the one person in town least likely to be manipulated. The love lessons made me smile at every turn. I gobbled the book in one sitting and will read it again and again. That is my highest praise.
I loved this book (as well as the other books in the series I have read since). Penny Reid has become a favorite author quite quickly.
I think Beard Science may have eclipsed all others and become my favorite Penny Reid book to date. Going into Beard Science, I already loved these Winston boys deeply. When you already have a love of the characters, I think it can make you more invested in the story. So, no, you don’t necessarily have to have read the previous books in the Winston Brothers series to enjoy this book. That being said, to have a full appreciation of this book, this story, these characters, and their interactions, I truly believe you need to read the whole series. This includes Ashley’s story which is in the Knitting in the City series (Beauty and the Mustache), where readers are first introduced to the Winston brothers.
“This is what we do. We fix things. We’re tinker-ers. If we didn’t tinker with cars, we’d tinker with people.”
For some reason, I connected more deeply with this book than with the others in the series. Penny Reid’s characters are complex. I identified with Jennifer in several ways. Reading about her story (from both her and Cletus’s points of view), brought me weird comfort in a way other books haven’t. There were times I saw myself in her. This book makes me emotional partly because I feel so connected to these characters. I think fans of this series would agree that these characters feel real, like family. When they’re happy, you’re happy; when they’re sad, you’re sad.
“I’m so awkward, my awkward is embarrassed by my awkward.”
This book is funny, weird, sweet, sad, touching, lovely, and happy. It is a love story. It’s a story about two people who fall in love in a real, natural way. No insta-love here, which makes this story feel even more real. Cletus is wonderful, weird, funny, and everything I ever hoped he would be.
“I can’t admit I’m wrong about two things in the same day… It might bring about the apocalypse.”
I am so grateful for what I’ve learned through Jennifer and Cletus. If you like great stories with interesting not “normal” characters who immediately pull you into their lives and make you want to live there forever, then this book is for you.
This was above and beyond, a 6 star read for me!!!! I don’t think I can say enough positive things to explain just how deeply I loved this book and how much it moved me. Book hangover for days!!! The first line in my notes at 14% is “I can’t take my eyes off the page. I feel overcome. I don’t know how else to explain it.” That feeling stuck with me through the entire book. It was so brilliantly written. To me it was perfection. I don’t know how Penny Reid does it but I’m so thankful that she does.
I love everything that Penny Reid writes!