Hachette Australia | November 22, 2015 | New Adult Romance
Paradise, book 2
★★★★★
SOURCE: GIVE ME BOOKS
The Road to Paradise is never easy
After a year on the coast, Lexie Atkinson can't settle back into country life. She’s missing the glitzy, gritty nightlife of the big city and the group of misfit friends she’d loved to hate. She knows to move forward she has to go back – back to face the guy who stole her heart.
But when Lexie arrives in Paradise City to work out if her future includes bad-boy surfer, Luke Ballantine, he is nowhere to be found.
With no home, no money and no Luke, Lexie gets a job slinging drinks at the wild Wipe Out Bar. Soon her heartache is eased when broody bar owner, Dean Saville, starts taking an interest and stirs more than just her drinks. But nothing is ever as it seems in Paradise City and when Luke barrels back into town, Lexie has a choice to make. But who will end up with the broken heart: Luke, Dean … or Lexie?
{ about cj duggan } .
C.J Duggan is a number one internationally bestselling Australian author of seven independent titles of her popular New Adult Summer series. In addition to her chart-topping indie novels, C.J is set to publish two titles with Hachette, Australia with her brand-new Paradise Series in 2015 (Paradise City and Paradise Road).
C.J lives with her husband in a rural border town of New South Wales, Australia. When she isn't writing books about swoony boys and 90s pop culture you will find her renovating her hundred-year-old Victorian homestead or annoying her local travel agent for a quote to escape the chaos.
The 'Summer Series'
The Boys of Summer (December 2012)
Stan (October 2014)
An Endless Summer (July 2013)
Max (February 2015)
That One Summer (December 2013)
Ringer (March 2014)
Forever Summer (December 2015)
The 'Paradise Series'
Paradise City (April 28th, 2015)
Paradise Road (November 22nd, 2015)
{ review } .
When I read PARADISE CITY, I had my #team and I was hopeful to watch their story grow in book two, PARADISE ROAD. Epilogue reader that I am..........
Now, when I read book one, I didn't really get into it. I liked the story, I liked the idea... but it certainly wasn't "New Adult" in the American sense of the term. When I think "NA" books, I think super-young twenty-somethings who are living on their own, maybe going to college, trying adult things, starting out life in the adult world...
In book one, Lexie, who'd been homeschooled, was moving in with her aunt and uncle to finish up year eleven in a public high school alongside her cousin. If everything went swimmingly, she'd return for her final school year. So book one ends with the end of the school year, some new friends, and some miscommunication with the men in Lexie's life -- who happen to be at-ends half-brothers. One brother was young and fun and pretty, a bit immature maybe... and the other was older and broody and sexy and had a good job. Both egged on the other, and both wanted Lexie.
When we open up this book, finally we (err, I) feel the American sense of "NA" even though our main character is still in high school.
Lexie was excited to return back to Paradise to finish up school and rekindle the friendships she left behind a few months ago, except she receives news her uncle took a new job, and the family would be moving away from Paradise. Wanting to finish out her school year, and turning eighteen, Lexie asks her parents to allow her to move. They give her a time-frame -- get an apartment and a job by such-and-such date, and you can stay.
I can honestly say...
I loved this book. After being disappointed in my epilogue endeavors, I wasn't sure how I'd feel but I gave it some time and went back, read from the first page this time.... and absolutely fell in love with the characters. I loved Lexie in the situations she finds herself. I did find that her age showed on a couple of occasions, and I was annoyed with her one or two times because she disregards some things when she hadn't previously been thinking about them (and didn't give as much credit to those sexy dreams she'd been having), but beyond that, the story line and the growing up she does, as well as the romance, was refreshing.
As much as I was originally upset with the end, I can say my #team changed; I loved the way this story played out and would love to see these two again.
Let's just say I was a bit disappointed.
Now, when I read book one, I didn't really get into it. I liked the story, I liked the idea... but it certainly wasn't "New Adult" in the American sense of the term. When I think "NA" books, I think super-young twenty-somethings who are living on their own, maybe going to college, trying adult things, starting out life in the adult world...
In book one, Lexie, who'd been homeschooled, was moving in with her aunt and uncle to finish up year eleven in a public high school alongside her cousin. If everything went swimmingly, she'd return for her final school year. So book one ends with the end of the school year, some new friends, and some miscommunication with the men in Lexie's life -- who happen to be at-ends half-brothers. One brother was young and fun and pretty, a bit immature maybe... and the other was older and broody and sexy and had a good job. Both egged on the other, and both wanted Lexie.
When we open up this book, finally we (err, I) feel the American sense of "NA" even though our main character is still in high school.
Lexie was excited to return back to Paradise to finish up school and rekindle the friendships she left behind a few months ago, except she receives news her uncle took a new job, and the family would be moving away from Paradise. Wanting to finish out her school year, and turning eighteen, Lexie asks her parents to allow her to move. They give her a time-frame -- get an apartment and a job by such-and-such date, and you can stay.
I can honestly say...
I loved this book. After being disappointed in my epilogue endeavors, I wasn't sure how I'd feel but I gave it some time and went back, read from the first page this time.... and absolutely fell in love with the characters. I loved Lexie in the situations she finds herself. I did find that her age showed on a couple of occasions, and I was annoyed with her one or two times because she disregards some things when she hadn't previously been thinking about them (and didn't give as much credit to those sexy dreams she'd been having), but beyond that, the story line and the growing up she does, as well as the romance, was refreshing.
[He] was the most real person I had ever met, honest to a fault, but as far as faults went, his was certainly the one I wanted to have in my life...
As much as I was originally upset with the end, I can say my #team changed; I loved the way this story played out and would love to see these two again.
{ giveaway } .
{ previously ... }
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