Title: Hard To Break
Author: Bella Jewel
Release Date: October 13, 2015
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Erotica
Synopsis
Quinn has spent her whole life working in
her dad's garage, leaving her more comfortable with a carburetor than a curling
iron. Her world is turned upside down when her beloved garage is bought by none
other than world famous, sexy as sin, custom car builder, Tazen Watts. He's the
one man she can't stand...even though he makes her hotter than a high
performance engine in top gear.
Tazen has no use for Quinn, at least not
professionally, and he's making sure she knows it. But there's a spark between
them that she's finding hard to ignore. She's determined to prove her talent is
as impressive as her sassy mouth. When she finds out Tazen is hiding a secret
that could bring down his career and everyone involved in it, she wonders: is
falling for him is going to be work the risk?
**Hard To Break is a full-length
standalone romance with a HEA**
Title: Hard to Break
Author: Bella Jewel
Release Date: October 13, 2015
Genre: New Adult, Humor, Contemporary Romance, Erotica
Series or Standalone: Standalone Series (Alpha's Heart #2)
Rating: ★★★★★
Reviewer: Melyssa
I’m going to go on record right now and
say that this just might be my favorite series of books by Bella Jewel ever,
and I’m a pretty big fan of her work.
What sets this series so apart from her others (despite it being a standalone series) is that it contains within its pages these women that are in careers that the world usually deems to be male oriented. The first story was a female bounty hunter, and this one a woman who basically runs a garage, but we’ll go with mechanic since that’s where she does her best work.
You see this strong women characters dominating and at times being even more knowledgeable than their male counterparts and I swear to god it makes my heart flutter. Take the romance, the steam, the angst etc. out of it all and just focus on that and it’s a top marks book alone. I LOVE reading about characters like this, especially when the ideal in romance (usually not all the time) is to lean toward the weaker end when writing a heroine.
So we’ve got Quinn, this badass mechanic chick, who is taking care of business (the family business no less) but while doing so having no idea just how bad things have gotten on the monetary front. How close she is to losing the one thing she hold dear to her heart. The garage and if that didn’t beat all, she finds out in pretty much the crappiest of ways.
Enter Tazen.
Now, when I read Bella Jewel, I know I’m getting an alpha male. There are varying degrees to each one she writes, but they’re always very brash, cocky and dominating in how they come across. Tazen is no different. Only, there are shades in this man early on of having something more under the surface of all of that. He’s softer than some of her previous alphas and I liked that too. You can tell right from their first meeting that while he enjoys being cocky, he’s not wanting to be a total asshat and that invested me. I wanted to see where he would be taken as a character, but also how he would come across with Quinn.
Their banter was funny. The way they’re both gearheads in terms of the mechanics of a car and loving being under the hood (I swear that’s not a dirty reference at all lol), it was fantastic to read and really, watch unfold. They kept each other on their toes, drove each other batshit crazy and fell in love somewhere along the way.
Quinn wasn’t like the women in his past, and he wasn’t like anyone from her past and even though Quinn wanted to hate him (and at one point I felt she had reason, for hating him and her dad), she couldn’t. Equal parts attraction and determination to prove herself and him wrong about her ability couldn’t keep her away from him and I do believe it was those two things that worked the same way for him.
Being such passionate characters anyway, it made their love scenes off the charts in terms of steam. The author never fails in presenting one heck of a steamy read, and this was no exception. It hit all the right notes in that regard, while at the same time developing their love story to where it made it all believable to me. I could believe in them being more than just steam.
This book though, it wasn’t like some of the others. It had more than just the romance element. I mean Quinn’s life, what she had to endure after losing her mother—what her father—became, it gave the book a different feel. Sure, Tazen had his own demons and past to deal with (ohhhhh that ex of his. What a piece of work she was. *rolls eyes*), but I bonded more to Quinn’s journey. It was almost coming of age in how it was written. She had to realize that as much as she thought she was doing the right thing by her old man, he had to want to do it himself. I just think it sucks that it had to reach the point it did for him to wake up. But such is life when you’re dealing with the issues presented here. It happens and I think that’s why I loved this aspect as much as I loathed it. It was real. Good on you Ms. Jewel for adding yet another element to your fiction for me to enjoy!
Pacing, writing style, and all of the other things I enjoy most about a Jewel book were here like always. It was a quick read, one that was over far quicker than I imagined it would be even though I should be used to it by now, and it had just the right amount of love, passion, angst and drama to make you feel complete by the time you turned the last page.
I felt with this book. I wanted to smack Tazen, I wanted to (and actually did a couple of times) cry with Quinn and my heart melted when sweet things happened. Overall, this book gave me everything I wanted, especially when it comes to reading this author.
Fans of this author, fans of erotic fiction, fans of romance or just getting lost in a well-paced book in general will enjoy this I believe. It has a little bit of everything we come to expect from this author and the genres in general along with a few added perks to make it great.
To the author, the publisher and all others involved in giving me the chance to read this before release, thank you so much. It was a pleasure. I enjoyed every minute of it.
What sets this series so apart from her others (despite it being a standalone series) is that it contains within its pages these women that are in careers that the world usually deems to be male oriented. The first story was a female bounty hunter, and this one a woman who basically runs a garage, but we’ll go with mechanic since that’s where she does her best work.
You see this strong women characters dominating and at times being even more knowledgeable than their male counterparts and I swear to god it makes my heart flutter. Take the romance, the steam, the angst etc. out of it all and just focus on that and it’s a top marks book alone. I LOVE reading about characters like this, especially when the ideal in romance (usually not all the time) is to lean toward the weaker end when writing a heroine.
So we’ve got Quinn, this badass mechanic chick, who is taking care of business (the family business no less) but while doing so having no idea just how bad things have gotten on the monetary front. How close she is to losing the one thing she hold dear to her heart. The garage and if that didn’t beat all, she finds out in pretty much the crappiest of ways.
Enter Tazen.
Now, when I read Bella Jewel, I know I’m getting an alpha male. There are varying degrees to each one she writes, but they’re always very brash, cocky and dominating in how they come across. Tazen is no different. Only, there are shades in this man early on of having something more under the surface of all of that. He’s softer than some of her previous alphas and I liked that too. You can tell right from their first meeting that while he enjoys being cocky, he’s not wanting to be a total asshat and that invested me. I wanted to see where he would be taken as a character, but also how he would come across with Quinn.
Their banter was funny. The way they’re both gearheads in terms of the mechanics of a car and loving being under the hood (I swear that’s not a dirty reference at all lol), it was fantastic to read and really, watch unfold. They kept each other on their toes, drove each other batshit crazy and fell in love somewhere along the way.
Quinn wasn’t like the women in his past, and he wasn’t like anyone from her past and even though Quinn wanted to hate him (and at one point I felt she had reason, for hating him and her dad), she couldn’t. Equal parts attraction and determination to prove herself and him wrong about her ability couldn’t keep her away from him and I do believe it was those two things that worked the same way for him.
Being such passionate characters anyway, it made their love scenes off the charts in terms of steam. The author never fails in presenting one heck of a steamy read, and this was no exception. It hit all the right notes in that regard, while at the same time developing their love story to where it made it all believable to me. I could believe in them being more than just steam.
This book though, it wasn’t like some of the others. It had more than just the romance element. I mean Quinn’s life, what she had to endure after losing her mother—what her father—became, it gave the book a different feel. Sure, Tazen had his own demons and past to deal with (ohhhhh that ex of his. What a piece of work she was. *rolls eyes*), but I bonded more to Quinn’s journey. It was almost coming of age in how it was written. She had to realize that as much as she thought she was doing the right thing by her old man, he had to want to do it himself. I just think it sucks that it had to reach the point it did for him to wake up. But such is life when you’re dealing with the issues presented here. It happens and I think that’s why I loved this aspect as much as I loathed it. It was real. Good on you Ms. Jewel for adding yet another element to your fiction for me to enjoy!
Pacing, writing style, and all of the other things I enjoy most about a Jewel book were here like always. It was a quick read, one that was over far quicker than I imagined it would be even though I should be used to it by now, and it had just the right amount of love, passion, angst and drama to make you feel complete by the time you turned the last page.
I felt with this book. I wanted to smack Tazen, I wanted to (and actually did a couple of times) cry with Quinn and my heart melted when sweet things happened. Overall, this book gave me everything I wanted, especially when it comes to reading this author.
Fans of this author, fans of erotic fiction, fans of romance or just getting lost in a well-paced book in general will enjoy this I believe. It has a little bit of everything we come to expect from this author and the genres in general along with a few added perks to make it great.
To the author, the publisher and all others involved in giving me the chance to read this before release, thank you so much. It was a pleasure. I enjoyed every minute of it.
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