Love like a Rock Star! A Review for ROCK ADDICTION by Nalini Singh
Disclaimer: I received an ARC of this novel from the author in exchange for an honest review.
When Nalini Singh first announced that she had an entire new – contemporary – series underway, I was a little apprehensive but also very excited for this unexpected bonus series, starting with Fox and Molly’s story in Rock Addiction.
The Blurb:
A bad boy wrapped in a sexy, muscled, grown-up package might be worth a little risk…
Molly Webster has always followed the rules. After an ugly scandal tore apart her childhood and made her the focus of the media’s harsh spotlight, she vowed to live an ordinary life. No fame. No impropriety. No pain. Then she meets Zachary Fox, a tattooed bad boy rocker with a voice like whiskey and sin, and a touch that could become an addiction.
A one-night stand with the hottest rock star on the planet, that’s all it was meant to be…
Fox promises scorching heat and dangerous pleasure, coaxing Molly to extend their one-night stand into a one-month fling. After that, he’ll be gone forever, his life never again intersecting with her own. Sex and sin and sensual indulgence, all with an expiration date. No ties, no regrets. Too late, Molly realizes it isn’t only her body that’s become addicted to Fox, but her heart…
The Review:
“She wanted to bite his lower lip.”
Can anyone create characters as hot and intriguing as Nalini Singh? I have read books by a few authors that have come close, but no writer seems to have honed the technique as brilliantly as Ms. Singh. The characters in Rock Addiction, including the supporting cast, are fleshed out, complex and intense. While we get to read the Fox and Molly’s back stories in depth – both of which are unique and heart-wrenching – we only get a small glimpse of darkness surrounding the secondary characters.
Molly’s got legitimate reasons for shying away from the limelight. I’m not talking stage fright, but actual reasons that make you feel for her when they are revealed at least. Fox, on the other hand, is a rock star so publicity is part of the game. From right off the bat, these two seem like an unlikely couple, but Fox and Molly – Folly – seem to make it work.
However, I was a little hesitant to read about a rock star hero. (I’m a little prejudice against “famous” heroes because Hollywood has such a bad rap when it comes to romance and relationships among celebrities.) But, by the third chapter of Rock Addiction, I stopped thinking of Fox as a rock star hero, and started thinking of him as a Nalini Singh hero instead – smart, sexy, and uber-alpha…I was expected him to shift into a changeling at any point in the novel or spout wings! Seriously, Ms. Singh’s got the alpha-male formula down pat!
Likewise, Ms. Singh has a very distinctive voice in the romance genre. She controls her writing the way a poet would control the rhythm on his poem.
“You know when you get the whisper of a melody in your head, or the murmur of a song? And you have the gut feeling that if you could just hear the rest of it, just capture the music…you’d have something fucking amazing?”
There was very little about Rock Addiction that I didn’t find entertaining – thought I had moments of frustration with both the hero and heroine. They both jump a little fast from a one-night stand to affair to relationship – I’m talking Romeo and Juliet fast, although granted that Fox and Molly don’t get married and die in the span of five days. Both Fox and Molly know very little about each other, and seem to jump into this relationship and move in together despite the fact that they have obvious issues to work out.
But just when I would have judged Molly a weak character, she stands her ground so ultimately I was more impressed with her than frustrated. Fox, who had his own trauma to overcome, is so utterly devoted to Molly that it’s hard to stay mad at him for long.
But despite their erotic connection, sex wasn’t the first thing that came to his mind when he thought of Molly. It was her smile.
Fox proves that he is a romantic at heart and that this story, despite the scorching sex is really more about love than lust! (It certainly stole my four fifths of my heart!)
Rock Addiction releases on September 9, 2014, and look out for Rock Courtship – Noah and Thea story – soon thereafter!
-Rika Ashton
Ebooks available through Amazon or Kobo. (Trade paperback links not available yet.)
