TBR Challenge: POWER PLAY, by Deirdre Martin

Berkley, Oct-2008

The topic of this month is Impulse Read (The book you bought because of the cover or The book you bought on impulse or The book you cannot remember why you bought in the first place!)

Published: 2008

Genre: Contemporary

My Rating: 3 stars

Part of a series: New York Blades #7

In August we have to look for an impulse read.

I knew this month would be a difficult one for me. I’m not an impulsive person; I’m more on the brainy side, so I thought I was not going to find something for this month.

So therefore it was kind of surprising to find this book and not being able to know why it was in my TBR pile – even although it was a book that I have bought recently.

I guess I must have heard about it in a review or a podcast or an interview and decided to buy it right in that moment.

Deirdre Martin is a new-to-me author. She writes contemporary novels about sports. She has created an imaginary hockey team in NY called the New York Blades and I see this is the seventh of a series.

But it’s more about the girl than about the hero. She’s Monica, a daytime actress, the main character in a soap opera that everybody loves and admires. Even the New York Blades hockey team! She’s gorgeous and blond, but with that name, Monica Geary, and being a soap opera actress, the image I had in my brain all the time was that of Courtney Cox.

Eric is the new golden boy in town. He’s been recently transferred to the team and he thinks he’s going to save the day, but they have sold another well-beloved player in order to have a place in the team for him, so his mates are not very friendly.

He makes a cameo in Monica’s show and just right then and there you find out that this jock is a jerk. Very cocky, he behaves like an asshole. A douche bag. Yes, all those interesting words that nobody teaches you in your English classes and you discover when reading romance novels. Yes, believe me, he’s all of that and more. He gives her some of the tritest and most awful lines I’ve ever heard of in a long time. She’s very cool and polite, and a real lady. So she just says ‘no’, hoping not to see him again.

But the problem is that, although Monica is very talented and the show is great, some problems are lurking beneath the surface. A younger actress with a great physique could be the new it girl, so she can be turned into a secondary character or even be written off the show.

So in order to boost up her popularity, her publicist comes to this idea. Monica will fake a relationship with one of the top bachelors in town. This is, Eric. And Eric sees this as an opportunity to achieve respect and friendship from his teammates.

They start going out and, of course, what it was just a plan to attract media attention in the ends gets both of them having feelings.

But Monica is not, in a sense, very sure of herself. She wants to be a real actress, to be respected for what she does, without realizing that she’s already a good actress, and that she doesn’t need to be in an off-Broadway production to know her real value.

And Eric has never been in a real relationship. He goes from one woman to the next one without thinking nothing else than he is a gift fallen from Heaven to all those women. So having someone like Monica in his life is a challenge he’s not very sure he can cope with. Everything is new to him, and he makes mistakes and he has to grovel. Yes, a lot.

This is a contemporary novel that is funny and sexy. I think the best part is everything related to the TV show, which is very entertaining, especially at the beginning of some chapters, with a little bit of that crazy sauce dialogue in daytime soap opera. Love, secret babies, zombies, whatever the screenwriters can imagine. That part was more interesting than the sports part.

So, generally speaking, I liked this book. Once I picked it up, I couldn’t put it down. The chemistry between Monica and Eric is wonderful. The sexual and emotional development of their relationship was great.

But, as I have to be honest, I didn’t fall in love with the author or the novel. I liked it but I had some problems with the hero. He’s an asshole, really. His words are awful, and I’m not sure his way of thinking changed at the end of the book. He’s in love with Monica, yes, but he keeps on thinking he’s the best thing in the world.  It could be that the majority of the book is told from Monica’s POV more than Eric’s. So you just see the outer Eric, not his inner thoughts. And, on the other hand, Monica is so unsure of herself or of the value of what she does that made me very uncomfortable more than once. In the end the book was a little bit too long for the story that was being told.

So I guess I will read more books written by Deirdre Martin, but only if I see good reviews.

Those were just my minor issues. If you ask me about this book, I’d tell you yes, go and read it. It’s contemporary, funny and sexy.