Release Event-Review and Giveaway: Pretending Hearts by Heather Topham Wood

Summary:

Delia Bridges is done living in the shadows cast by her ex-convict father and her football star brother. Attending Cook University will finally give her the chance to be her own person and hopefully find love at the same time. When she meets Wyatt Johnston, she knows immediately he’s the one.

Wyatt fulfills all of Delia’s requirements for the perfect man: he’s rich, handsome, and a talented forward for Cook’s soccer team. However, Wyatt turns out not to be the man she thought. When he dumps her and simultaneously ruins her reputation, she has to start over once again.

Levi Caldwell has every quality Delia doesn’t want in a boyfriend. He has no money, works for the maintenance staff at Cook, and has no problem sharing his judgmental opinions about how Delia is living her life. Despite her growing attraction for the tattooed drummer, Delia tries to avoid Levi. But when a new crisis threatens to destroy all she has rebuilt, she finds Levi is the only person she can trust. 

***Standalone New Adult Romance-Ages 17+ Due to Strong Language and Sexual Situations***

Purchase Links: 

Amazon - Amazon UK 

Excerpt:

The rest of the sentence died in my throat as Levi reached for me. Before I could protest, his lips were pressing into mine. He kissed me in a way that made me momentarily forget what an awful idea it was for him to be kissing me at that second. His lips were soft and warm and I could feel the persistence behind his kiss. He wanted me to respond and I found myself yielding. I started to kiss him back. Allowing myself to get lost in the sensation of how good it felt to have his mouth on mine.

He had been a friend at first, but when we kissed, he set my blood on fire. His tongue wrapped around mine and I allowed his taste to consume me. His kiss was full of the promise that Levi would give me everything I always wanted.

My Review:

Take your typical college setting with your typical college jerk (yeah, you Wyatt), but then toss in a sweet townie-type (mmm, Levi...) and shake it up with a whole lot of drama, and you get the impressive story of Pretending Hearts.

There are a ton of new adult college-setting books out there, most that are variations upon the same theme.  But Pretending Hearts takes your run-of-the-mill NA college book and gives it a good twist and shake with the main female character's unique family situation which affects events in the story multiple times to create plenty of drama and angst.  But with Delia being a good, strong, resilient character, she finds her way through-with a little help from Levi.

Ah, Levi.  He is the epitome of the perfect book boyfriend.  Hot, sexy, down to earth, understanding, protective...the definition of swoon-worthy.  He is very much Wyatt's opposite (thank goodness), and so good-hearted and supportive.  Trust me, you'll want to add him to your book boyfriend list ASAP.

And yes, you're going to want to give Wyatt a very large piece of your mind (along with Delia's roommate).  And probably a few slaps upside his head.

What keeps me from giving that last full star is that I felt like Delia and Levi both were very quick to say they loved each other.  It's a bit of a peeve of mine when the main characters get to that point so quickly.  Besides that, the writing is smooth and flows quite well so I flew right through it without even realizing it.  And now I just HAVE to go back and read Autumn and Blake's story (and man, I wish I had read it first...I really need more Blake!).

4.5 drama-filled stars for Pretending Hearts!

Author Bio:

Heather Topham Wood's obsession with novels began in childhood while growing up in a shore town in New Jersey. Writing since her teens, she recently returned to penning novels after a successful career as a freelance writer. She loves creating imaginary worlds where people behave exactly how she wants them to.

Heather graduated from the College of New Jersey in 2005 and holds a bachelor's degree in English. Her freelance work has appeared in publications such as USA Today, Livestrong.com, Outlook by the Bay and Step in Style magazine. She resides in Trenton, New Jersey with her husband and two sons. Besides writing, Heather is a pop culture fanatic and has an obsession with supernatural novels and TV shows.

Follow Heather on Facebook, Twitter and her blog to keep posted on her upcoming works:
https://twitter.com/woodtop255
http://authorheather.com
https://www.facebook.com/HeatherTophamWood

Giveaway

Help spread the word about the release and win a $50 Amazon Gift Card and/or a Fall FabFitFun gift box. The box has some really awesome goodies (pictured below). 

 a Rafflecopter giveaway