The Boys of Summer Blog Tour

Welcome to my stop on The Boys of Summer blog tour hosted by YA Bound.  Click HERE to check out the full blog tour schedule!

The Boys of Summer (Summer #1)

by C.J. Duggan 

Release Date: 12/17/12

294 pages

Summary from Goodreads: 

It seemed only natural to nickname them the ‘OnslowBoys’. Every time they swaggered in the front door of the Onslow Hotel after a hard week’s work, their laughter was loud and genuine as they settled onto their bar stools. I peeked through the restaurant partition, a flimsy divider between my world and theirs. I couldn’t help but smile whenever I saw them, saw him ... Toby Morrison.

Quiet seventeen-year-old Tess doesn’t relish the thought of a summertime job. She wants nothing more than to forget the past haunts of high school and have fun with her best friends before the dreaded Year Twelve begins.

To Tess, summer is when everything happens: riding bikes down to the lake, watching the fireworks at the Onslow Show and water bomb fights at the sweltering Sunday markets.

How did she let her friends talk her into working?

After first-shift disasters, rude, wealthy tourists and a taunting ex-boyfriend, Tess is convinced nothing good can come of working her summer away. However, Tess finds unlikely allies in a group of locals dubbed ‘The Onslow Boys’, who are old enough to drive cars, drink beer and not worry about curfews. Tess’s summer ofworking expands her world with a series of first times with new friends, forbidden love and heartbreaking chaos.

All with the one boy she has never been able to forget. 

It will be a summer she will always remember.

Warning: sexual references, and occasional course language.

My Thoughts:

I found The Boys of Summer to be a fun and enjoyable way to spend a quiet, chilly afternoon.

Against her better judgement Tess has allowed herself  to be talked into a summer job. While she had envisioned swimming, sleeping in and just being generally lazy she ends up washing dishes, waiting tables and much to her surprise, falling in love. 

While it did take me a little while to get caught up in Tess's story, once I did I was in for the long haul. Duggan writes a very character driven novel and she did a great job of bringing everyone to life. From Tess's occasional whining, Toby's inability to make a move, Alex's pool table dancing and Ellie's promiscuity everyone had very real, very believable flaws. The Onslow Boys were definitely swoon worthy and I can't wait to read Endless Summer to find out what happens with all of them. I hoping for a lot of happy endings. This is definitely a book that should be added to your summer romance reading list. 

This is definitely written for older young adults that don't mind a little hot, sexy time in their books. 

Buy Links:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
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Add An Endless Summer (Summer #2) to Goodreads:

About the Author

C.J Duggan is an Australian author who lives with her husband in a rural border town of New South Wales, Australia.

The Boys of Summer is Book One in her Mature Young Adult Romance Series.

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Blog Tour: Shallow Review and Author Guest Post

Shallow
Going Under Series Book 2
By Georgia Cates

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary

Formats available: ebook

Cover Artist: Georgia Cates

Book Description:

Nick Hawke likes his car fast and his girls even
faster. He blows through females quicker than his
muscle car races down the drag strip in Collinsville and he wouldn’t have it any
other way. Determined to avoid the devastation he has watched his father endure
in the aftermath of his mother leaving, he believes there is no room in his life or
his heart for a relationship lasting more than one night. He seeks happiness in
things that won’t let him down...fast cars, parties and one night stands. To his
absolute dismay, all of that changes when he unexpectedly runs into an old friend
and is introduced to Payton Archer, the first girl he ever wanted for more than one
night. There’s only one catch...she is completely immune to him and his smooth
talking ways.

Payton Archer is looking for what Claire has with Jessie, but she has given up on
finding it...at least until she leaves for college in the Fall because she is certain that
is where she will find the perfect guy to fit into her perfect world. She plans on
Summer being nothing but three uneventful months of fun, but it turns out to be
anything but ordinary when Payton is introduced to Nick Hawke, one of Jessie’s
old Collinsville friends. She is shocked by her immediate and intense attraction
for “Hawke” because nothing about him is what Payton is looking for. Sure, he’s
hot and sexy but he comes from Collinsville and that is definitely not on her list
of prerequisites. Everything about him makes Payton’s heart speed because he is
exciting and dangerous, but his fast car and the dangerous chances he takes isn’t
what scares Payton the most...it’s the way Nick Hawke makes her feel every time
he looks at her. Can Payton find that moment of total fearlessness and make the
decision to leave the safe, shallow end of love to risk going under completely?

My Thoughts:
As a fan of Going Under I was really excited to read Shallow by Georgia Cates. While Going Under was about Claire and Jesse, Shallow is about Claire's best friend Payton and bad boy Nick Hawke. Cates does a great job of writing novels with wonderfully flawed characters that make you fall in love with them despite those flaws.

Payton Archer has to be the most sarcastic character I have ever had the pleasure to read, and Nick Hawke ate it up and dished it out just as fast. The banter between the two in the first half of the story is so much fun and really kept me laughing. While I really enjoyed the chemistry between Payton and Nick I felt like their relationship progressed way to quickly. I would have loved a bit more of a chase between the two.

Plot: A slightly predictable romance that follows the standard romance novel formula 

Characters: The best part of this novel, the characters definitely deliver

Writing: fun, feisty and entertaining

Ending: sweet and then a prologue

Mature Content: This one is definitely for the older young adult crowd. Lots of sexy times and while it's not overly graphic it's not tame either

Overall: I enjoyed Shallow. It was an easy read that kept me entertained. If you liked Jesse and Claire's story in Going Under you'll probably enjoy Shallow as well. 

About the Author:

Georgia resides in rural Mississippi with her

wonderful husband, Jeff, and their two

beautiful daughters. She spent fourteen years

as a labor and delivery nurse before she

decided to pursue her dream of becoming an

author.

Blood of Anteros, Book One in The Vampire

Agápe Series, was her first novel and it was

released in September 2011. She decided to

briefly step away from the paranormal genre

to try her hand at a young adult

contemporary romance when she wrote

Going Under, but returned to the paranormal

romance platform to complete the second book in The Vampire Agápe Series,

Blood Jewel.

Her current works in progress are Shallow (A Going Under Novel) which will

release on September 27th and Blood Doll (The Vampire Agápe Series #3), to be

released in January 2013.

Georgia Cates Blog

Georgia Cates on Facebook

Georgia Cates on Twitter

Shallow on Goodreads

Guest Post by Georgia Cates

Thank you for having me as a guest today. My name is Georgia Cates and I’m the

author of Blood of Anteros, Blood Jewel, Going Under and Shallow. Today, I’m going to

talk a little about what constitutes romantic chemistry between characters.

Characters can be very similar in nature and love the same things, but that doesn’t

make for interesting fictional chemistry. “Conflict. Push and Pull. Desire and

Obstacle.” Do you hear what I’m screaming? Call it what you like, but these are the

basics that make romantic chemistry pop.

There’s always an underlying attraction beyond the hurdle the hero and heroine

must jump. They may believe they hate one another, but the reader knows better and

we can’t wait for the characters to realize it. It’s what we crave, what we need and we’re

just plain pissed when the characters are too ignorant to see what we see, but that’s

what excites us. It’s why we read and root for our characters to fall in love.

For me, the best chemistry is the unwanted kind...the friendship that somehow turns

into more, enemies finding themselves not hating one another as much as they thought

or falling for the bad boy when you know you should choose the good guy. There’s very

little I enjoy more than a relationship with unwanted chemistry. What can I say? It’s my

guilty pleasure.

Whether I’m reading or writing, my choices in heroes tend to lean more toward the

bad boy side. Not everyone would call my bad boy characters “bad” so maybe the

word “troubled” is a more suitable term. I love a tortured hero and who could be a better

match for him than a heroine that can make it all better. Of course, that’s not what he

wants, but I don’t care because I want my chemistry. I want her to have the power to

save him from himself.

Romantic chemistry is attraction that the hero and heroine can’t ignore, hard as they

may try. The harder they try, the more the readers enjoy the chase but in the end, we

want characters that will “fix” one another and find happiness. Otherwise, it becomes a

tragedy.

Review: Time Out by Leah Spiegel

Time Out (Foolish Games book 2)
Author: Leah Spiegel
Release Date: September 22, 2012
Genre: YA/New Adult Romance
Published By: Kindle Edition

Summary from Goodreads:
Joie and her friends are continuing to follow the Grimm Brother’s Band across their countrywide tour. They thought the worst was behind them but they had no idea that things were just getting started. Terrorists’ bombings call for all entertainment venues to be on high alert. With all of the new staff and crew members, the band finds it hard to know who to trust. Meanwhile things begin to heat up between Joie and Hawkins in and out of the bedroom when an ex-fiancé suddenly shows up on the scene but the real surprise has yet to come. If the band wants to continue on the tour, they must figure out who is really behind it all before time runs out…

You can get a copy and you should here

My Review:
warning: this review has a lot of potential for supreme fan girl gushing

Leah Spiegel has become one of my most favorite authors with her Foolish Games YA/New Adult books. I'm pretty sure that I loved Time Out even more than Foolish Games. Right away I was yelling "no! no, no, no! Joie and Hawkins don't need any more complications!!!" I guess I was wrong though because the complications were vast and I loved every minute of it. Really, I'm not exaggerating. Every. Single. Minute.

Time Out pretty much starts off right where Foolish Games ends so we've gotten to know all of the characters and have already fallen in love with them. This allowed for the story to get right to it and  to quickly suck you in. Luckily I started this book on my vacation because there was no way I could put it down once I started reading.

I love how Spiegel writes a book that has it all. Drama, Romance, Mystery, and Suspense! Hawkins and Joie's sexual tensions are as hot as ever. Joie is such a great female protagonist, she's tough, snarky, and loyal to a fault. Hawkins, Hawkins, Hawkins, oh what can I say about sexy sexy Hawkins, I'm so totally in love with Hawkins! Yeah, he makes some dumb decisions but he always seems to make them in the name of love. How can you not love a guy that just wants his girl to be safe. Sexy Sigh!

Another thing that I love about the Foolish Games books are the amazing side characters. The building romance between Riley and a certain someone (no spoilers) is a great addition to the story and I really hope we get to see more of it in the next book. Yep, you heard me, I heard from a very reliable source that there will indeed be another book! Squeal!!!! Lizzie's character was toned down a bit and I'm not sure if I'm glad of that or not but I'm looking forward to where the story is heading for her as well. Obviously I can't wait to read book 3!

Plot: Contemporary perfection

Characters: Perfectly flawed and wonderfully written
Writing: So much fun to get totally lost in
Ending: Wraps up the current situation while setting things up for future wonderfulness
Overall: Really, what else can I possibly gush on about. Spiegel writes a gripping romantic tale with hot rock stars, a beautiful gay best friend, and suspense that keeps you on the edge of your seat. Yeah, ok it's official  I've definitely gushed enough about this one.
Mature Content:The characters in this book are out of high school so the situations are definitely a bit older than the average YA contemporary. However, the sexual scenes while hot are not graphic at all.

Recommendation: If you are loving the New Adult contemporaries the way I am then I highly recommend The Foolish Games books.