Second Chance Boyfriend - Monica Murphy (One Week Girlfriend #2)

Sometimes a book just doesn't live up to its predecessor.  It's unfortunate, but true.  Sometimes the first book in a series just has something, some sort of oomph, that its younger sibling just lacks.  That's exactly what the case was here.

I read One Week Girlfriend back in January, and really liked it.  It was a new-adult romance in which a guy hires a girl to pretend to be his girlfriend over Thanksgiving break in order to keep his family, with whom he has unhappy relations for several reasons, at arm's length.  Of course, they have instant chemistry and a relationship of sorts ensues.  All the while Fable (the female protagonist) tried to untangle what exactly what was going on with Drew (the male protagonist) tries to avoid the issue and get the hell back to school as soon as humanly possible.  I liked how Drew's issues were handled, the relationship between them...most of the aspects, other than the concept that Fable could "fix" Drew.  When the book ended with them splitting up, I wanted to read the next one to see about the reconciliation.

That said, I found this book sadly lacking in the plot that made the first one strong.  The first book had this mystery lurking in the background, something you could probably guess at but that had threads that were continually teased out over the course of the book and helped support the relationship plot.  This book didn't really have a secondary plot going on; there were a few things happening in the background, but nothing big or overarching that kept me reading to know what exactly was going on.  Everything was very explicit here; nothing to be poked or prodded at, nothing to be figured out.  The story is basically about Fable and Drew getting back together and Drew trying to move past what happened with his family when he was younger.  Drew also has a new therapist and Fable has a new job.  They're not together in the very beginning of the book, but they get back together pretty quickly and then there's not a lot of conflict to propel the plot along, just random side things that happen every now and then.  Originally it seemed like there was going to be some plot revolving around Fable's new gig, but that was dropped pretty quickly and in such a weird way.  Murphy clearly set up to use Fable's boss, Colin, for a third book, but it meant that his total weirdness in this one was just left hanging.  And then, at the end, a bunch of stuff happens and BOOM.  Done.  Happily ever after.

So, what did I like?  I liked that, in this one, Drew was seeking actual help for coping with his problems.  His therapist helped him tease out the things that were bothering him so he could face them and not get over them, but move past them to a functional life and relationship.  Drew and Fable's relationship was also depicted as more supportive than as a "fixing" relationship, which was a nice change from the first book.  But Fable needed Drew to do something completely dramatic in order to trust him again, instead of just realizing he'd had a freakout, and that seemed completely unnecessary and I mean, I wouldn't want to be with her if I knew that was what it would take to get her to trust me...

This has some cute scenes, some steamy kisses, but overall it just didn't have the strength of the first book.  I'll probably read the other two books in the series, which have different main characters, but I hope that Murphy recovers the charm that One Week Girlfriend had in them, or they'll probably be a bit disappointing.

2 stars out of 5.

One Week Girlfriend - Monica Murphy (One Week Girlfriend #1)

So, for those of you who don't follow weather news, Winter Storm Jonas has been wreaking havoc on parts of the east coast of the US--namely, the parts of the east coast that aren't used to having winter havoc wreaked on them and therefore are completely unequipped to deal with such winter havoc.  One of those areas is the Washington, DC metro--which happens to be my place of residence.  Work ended at noon on Friday and was cancelled for today (Monday) and it's debatable whether or not we'll be in tomorrow.  And with the amount of snow we got--two to three feet, which is a ton for this area and is higher than my dog is tall, but she loved it anyway--it's basically impossible to go anywhere.  Many streets haven't even been touched by plows yet.  You can't order takeout.  The drugstores are devoid of snacks.  Cabin fever is setting in for many and for me, that means I want to read an endless stream of trashy romances, so I went combing through the pages of my Kindle for something suitable.  And based on the cover...this seemed to fit.  Away I went.

One Week Girlfriend wasn't actually as trashy as I thought it would be, but it was a quick read and I enjoyed it quite a bit.  So, the story follows Fable and Drew.  Fable is known as the campus slut in a college town, even though she doesn't actually go to college; Drew is the football star.  He has to go home for Thanksgiving, something he's dreading because is family is very, very screwed up.  In order to keep his father and, more importantly, his stepmother off his back, he hires Fable to pretend to be his girlfriend for the week.  Fable is in desperate need of money because she pretty much single-handedly supports her thirteen-year-old brother.  Her mother is in the picture but is a deadbeat and spends most of her time with her alcoholic boyfriends, so Fable manages on her own.  For three thousand dollars, she agrees to go with Drew, on the condition that he doesn't expect a real relationship out of the deal.  You can pretty much guess how that goes.

The interesting part of this book wasn't actually the relationship, though Fable and Drew definitely had chemistry.  No, the interesting part was Drew's past and family dynamic.  It's super, super messed up, but I think Murphy did a good job of handling it.  She doesn't glorify Drew's abuse--not really a spoiler, it's really obvious what's going on here from the beginning--and doesn't try to downplay it.  She does make it out like Fable can "fix" him, which is a bit unsettling.  Love, sex, whatever, can't fix abuse victims, who indeed don't need to be fixed because they're not broken, but beyond that I think she did a good job.  The abuse is made out to be just as disturbing as it actually is, and its impact on Drew's life isn't downplayed at all; it haunts everything he does because the consequences of it really are that bad.  As for what comes out later... Was it necessary?  I don't know.  It was certainly an added shock factor (kind of; again, it was sort of predictable, but it was definitely a shock to the characters if not to the reader) but I don't know, it might have been going just a tiny bit too far... Hm.  I don't know about that one.

This is only the first half of Fable and Drew's story; the second half is another book titled Second Chance Boyfriend.  I haven't read the second one yet, but I think I will--though I don't think they needed to be separate books.  They're quite short, with this volume clocking in at 155 pages, and while the place to break it made sense I think it could just as easily have been a "Part 1" and "Part 2" of a single volume.

Overall, an interesting new adult dynamic.  It's very unusual to see the male character with the more substantial problems in a book like this, and I liked the change.  Male abuse is very underrepresented in fiction, and seeing a book that handled it mostly well was very refreshing.

3.5 stars out of 5.