Book two of the Stanton series in the follow up from the gripping debut novel by T L Swan, Stanton Adore.
Unconditional love, does it really exist or is it an urban myth. What does it really mean? Do you love someone because of their flaws? Or in spite of them.
And at what point are the conditions more to bear than the love is worth.
This is what I’m trying to decipher, this is my story, I’ll … story, I’ll let you be the judge.
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Joshua and Natasha’s love story is giving me emotional whiplash. TL Swan is a genius at writing emotional angst, and even though I want to shake both of these characters I am so invested in their story I need to see where it goes.
This is book two of the series and it picks up right where Adore left us, with Tash racing to the hospital to Josh and this is where the roller coaster picks us up. The question is are you able to hold on for this ride.
This is a super steamy and emotional book, it is part of a series so there is a bit of a cliffhanger, but book three is already available so don’t let that sway you. Because I have to be honest, you are going to have to read this whole series, you are not going to be ok with not knowing how this ends.
ANGSTY, STEAMY & SWEET!!
Here we are back for more of the Stanton world and what am I doing? Hanging on tight for the ride. Seriously…that’s what it is. ONE HELL OF A WILD RIDE! I honestly don’t know which way is up for 90% of the story and I still can NOT put it down!
I could sit here and justify both Josh & Natasha’s actions and REACTIONS even though most of the time both of them are entirely irrational. We do get to see a side of Joshua in this one that we didn’t see in the first book and it’ll have you internally sighing and outwardly swooning. I think I liked Natasha more in the first book….but then of course I wanted to spit nails at Josh in the first book and love him more in this one. So they just swapped places. Holding out hope that by the end of book 3 I am loving both of them. Of course there’s more drama than you see on Days of our Lives and not surprisingly it’s more entertaining too. I’m hanging on tight for that happy ever after that I feel these two deserve after the hard road they’ve gone down just to be together.
The writing was so much better in this second one too. I anticipated the author’s growth and am glad that it turned out that way.
Ok the editing in this book was SO MUCH BETTER that you could not compare it to the first book. I only say this as I was frustrated with the first book because as much as I was addicted to the story, the writing was just all over the place! But fortunately, it was executed perfectly in this sequel in this steamy romance trilogy.
The sequel picks up right off after the first, where Josh and Natasha are both apart and in the process, are broken. Josh is currently in hospital (I won’t say why as I want to try and make this review spoiler free), and of course this brings Natasha to his bedside immediately. They then start to repatch their romance, realising how broken both are when they are apart. Until a truth comes alight in which you see Natasha (yep you guessed it) go running AGAIN. For someone who states how much she loves Josh, she surely likes to leave him whenever someone gives her a small excuse to.
Josh then returns (when he is well and able too because she left him in a hospital unwell because the world revolves around Natasha), and tries to win her back. I don’t know why he bothers because Natasha is clearly too selfish to open her eyes up to any sort of love movement. With me saying that, they end up going on with their lives without each other for quite some time. Until Josh flies back to Australia for a family emergency and yep you guessed it, Natasha then suddenly wants him back. Even though she is the one who pushed him away in the first place (with a pathetic reason).
Can you tell I still don’t Natasha? Well. My thoughts of her changed about 75% into this book surprisingly. When she finally realises that Josh does love her and he is worth fighting for. She also realises how much of a drama queen she has been, and finaaaaally starts to let him in. It takes a bit for Josh to trust her, but after he reads her diaries (and reads all the communication that they should have had), they both make up and play happy ever after.
The ending doesn’t have a huge cliff hanger like the previous, but still a good cliffhanger to pick up the third book straight away. I am way too invested in not just Josh and Natasha, but also in all the side characters and with this, cannot wait to read the spin offs! In fact, I find myself liking Cam more than his brother, Josh (whoops).
All in All, was I addicted? Yes. Did I love it? No. However, it was still a solid 4/5 star read for me. With 4/5 steam rating (in my opinion, there was actually too many sexy cringe moments).
Natasha has to hold a secret that she knows will hurt Josh, but she does because she loves him and doesn’t want him to go through that pain.
Natasha returns to see if her and Josh can work it out only to find out who he slept with when they broke up and it crushes her, she’s going to let him go.
You also hear about Adrian, Josh’s assistant who meets the sexy psychologist, although you don’t get a lot of his story in the book.
After seeing a very drunk Natasha, Josh wants Tash to do something for him for them to move forward, only she doesn’t know if she can no matter how much she loves him.
Joshua is my book husband! He’s the perfect alpha-male and loves Natasha unconditionally. I love these two and their love story.
I found this to be very angsty and more volatile then the first, I was hoping it would ease up. There’s was so much tension, jealousy and heartbreak. I found some of this hard to read