Cosmo Red-Hot Reads Week: Fearless by Tawny Weber

This is the second in our week of reviews of Cosmo Red-Hot Reads.

 

Grade: D
Hotness Level: Inferno
Kink Level: No Kink
Genre: Contemporary, novella
Series: not part of a series, but it is one of Harlequin's new line: "Cosmo Red Hot Read"

Published: 9/15/13

Reviewed by Anne

119 pages

 

Gia has a huge crush on Luke.  The only problem?  Well, there's two problems.  First, they work together and their company has a no dating between employees policy. Second, Luke doesn't seem to know she exists.  He's pretty wild, and she's pretty boring.  But Gia's friends have a solution.  See, Gia and her friends (or should I call them "friendz") have created "the Girlz Guide to a Rockin' Life" and when one of them has a problem... it's "gettin' it" time!  No, really, brainstorm solutions to the problem, and they call that "gettin' it".  So, yeah, they drink some drinks and brainstorm and decide that Gia could follow Luke to a work convention he's going to.  She could go undercover and seduce him.  Enjoy a hot weekend of sex, and then go back to being just Gia at work.  They've heard he has a job offer from another company, so they're sure he'll be moving on, never knowing that one of his co-workers was his weekend fling.  Really, what could go wrong?

 

This story was really hit and miss for me. The "Girlz" club and the fact that when they help each other out they call making a plan "gettin' it"... It just made me feel old. (And I'm not that old.  I'm not!) I think it just seemed a little ridiculous, and that pulled me out of the story. I did enjoy the parts where Gia/Vanna and Luke got together in Vegas. I just wanted to see more of them. We were *told* they talked a lot about personal stuff, but it was all off page. The sex was hot, but transitions (not the sexual kind) from scene to scene were awkward. I would have to reread to understand... Ok, there was just one scene on page, and now we've skipped to the afterglow of time #4 of having sex. And it's kind of a spoiler, but I'll just throw it out there 'cause I saw it coming from that initial gettin' it session... after the weekend is over, *gasp* Luke does NOT take the new job offer, and now Gia has to work with him.  Will he recognize her?  What if he does?  What if he doesn't? I was disappointed by Gia's behavior back at work. I know the no fraternization policy was presented as the reason they couldn't get together, but it didn't seem to stop anyone else. Her behavior just didn't make much sense. So, I guess it was more miss than hit. Finally, this was my first Cosmo Red Hot Read and I had high expectations of it. I enjoy novellas and I enjoy hotter more explicit reads, so this seemed like a good match. I want to mention that while this one didn't work for me, I adored Cake by Lauren Dane (we posted the review yesterday). So I will not be judging all Cosmo Red Hot Reads by this one.