“The Testaments" by Margaret Atwood feels both more prescient and more hopeful than "The Handmaid's Tale“. In 1985, women’s rights seemed assured and the world described in Gilead was a strange dystopia. Sadly, Gilead seems like a real possibility now. “The Testaments”, set 15 years after the events of "The Handmaid's Tale," shows that the Republic of Gilead is a theocracy teetering on the brink of self-immolation.

The story this time around is not just one woman's inner turmoil and her often-lonely struggle to stay sane in the midst of a life of religious slavery. In "The Testaments", instead of just the story of Offred, this book features the stories of three radically different women all caught in the same morass.

"I realize now that dying is easy. Living is hard."

-If I stay, (pg 175, US Paperback edition)

If I Stay is a story about love and tragedy, that makes your heart hurt, but at the same time brings you to hope.

My Initial Thoughts: To be completely honest, I wasn’t sure how much I was going to like this book when I first started. I had no emotional attachment to the characters when the accident happened, and everything seemed so rushed and unemotional at first. However, I have to give miss Forman props for the way she carefully wove in the backstory of the characters and how eventually the reader does start to care for them. Everyone becomes a loveable, real person and the loss and tragedy of what had happened just hits you hard.

The Plot: This book isn’t a thriller, the plot isn’t particularly exciting or fast-paced. This book more so causes the reader to feel and to think. It draws you in and doesn’t let you go. It causes you to step back and look at your own life, at the people you love and cherish and makes you contemplate what you would do if you were put in Mia’s position.

The Writing: This book isn’t filled with breathtaking poetic prose, but it has a simplistic beauty to it. Forman’s writing style is very easy to follow and to get into.  It’s not filled with a bunch of fluff or long descriptors, but it has just enough of everything to build the characters and scenes and make the reader understand and tugs at the emotional heart strings.

Overall Thoughts & Rating: I really like this book for what it was, it’s emotional and thought-provoking and I would recommend it to fans of deeper, thought-provoking contemporary. It’s not all gloom, it does have its lighter, cute moments, but the overall feel is quite heavy. I really loved the way the characters were developed, I loved the part the music played throughout the book. I did think it was a little too short, it ended quite suddenly, but that didn’t take away from the impact of the story. 

I give this book a solid 4 ½ stars out of 5.

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Lana Bloom, desperate to save her mom and with no other option in sight, is forced to sell the only thing she has of value…herself. Having a penchant for beautiful women and not above paying for them, her boss, takes Lana up on her offer as long as she complies with his deviant fantasies. Repulsed by her boss and with no other recourse, Lana resolves herself to go through with her plan…That is…. until she makes eye contact with a handsome stranger across the room.

Blake Law Barrington lives a life of wealth and privilege. Handsome, rich and future heir to the Barrington banking fortune, Blake is used to getting what he wants, when he wants it… right now he wants Lana… and he is willing to pay any price to have her.

I’ve long since sworn off reading any books with billionaire, millionaire, or any other type of “aire” in the title but it was something about this particular book that caught my eye. To be honest, I was fully expecting this to be a FSOG knock-off and while there were some similarities in the beginning, this book quickly took on a life of it’s own.

The writing style took some getting used to as I’m not a fan of third person, present tense narratives.(been known to totally ditch a book because of it) However, the more I read ‘The Billionaire Banker’, the more engrossed I became in the story and it’s progression and I really, REALLY ended up enjoying the book.

The story was well-written and the plot truly unique in this age of billionaire meets naive virgin, they have kinky sex, fall in love and well, you know the drill. With ‘The Billionaire Banker’, Carre managed to turn what could have been your usual, predictable billionaire story into a deliciously erotic and intriguing read, full of twists and turns on every page.  Kudos to you Ms. Carre.

The characters were absolutely addictive. Fairly dynamic with a unique richness all their own. When I’m left wondering about even the supporting characters and asking myself .......read the rest at:  http://nightstandnovels.com/erotic-fiction/review-the-billionaire-banker/