Review of Rock my Heart by Garett Groves

by Garett Groves

2.5 stars

A jaded singer. A guitar prodigy. A rock 'n' roll romance.

Jamie “Blaze” Cameron has seen and done it all. As the frontman for the hard rock band HEX, he’s toured the world for the last 20 years — and as a result has managed to avoid coming to terms with his troubled past and the one thing he’s spent his career singing about: love.

At 25, Darren Greene’s ambition and skills at guitar playing have led him to do more in the world of music than many musicians twice his age, but it hasn’t been enough to put his name in bright lights. Without a big break, he’s terrified he’ll wind up stuck in his hometown with nothing but his broken dreams.

When HEX’s guitarist is removed from the band unexpectedly right before the first leg of their 20-year anniversary tour for their first record, Blaze and his bandmates find themselves in dire need of a replacement. The band holds open auditions and Darren rocks their socks off — and his life hits a high note when HEX hires him.

As the group adjusts to performing with their newest addition, Blaze and Darren realize it’s not just their chemistry on stage that’s making their hearts sing. Can the two navigate fame, unresolved grief, and their growing feelings for each other to bring the band into a new, golden era? Or will their budding romance and the controversy it stirs up in the media push them off the charts?

Hmmm, we actually don’t know where to start with the one.  We love Garett Groves, and Rockstars, so think this should have been a big win for us, but it really left us scratching our head.  They were together, they were apart, and so much angst…….

What did we enjoy?

- The Band:  We liked how the book shied away from the crazy rock star lifestyle and instead focused on the band.

- May/December Romance:  This is a great example of a May-December romance that works.

- The beginning:  The beginning of this book was so good.  It is fast-paced and engaging.  But somehow it just looses it’s magic.  The second half drags and we lose the momentum of the first half.  And although it is only 285 pages long it feels so much longer.  

What was the not-so-good?

- Blaze: We are not Blaze fans.  He runs hot and cold.  He worries and internalizes so much, that we actually started skipping his internal monologues.  He loves Darren, hold on, does he just love the idea of Darren and loves love? Ugh.  So much back and forth, round and round.  We were no fans.

- Angst:  Kind of mentioned in the above, but the angst.  OMG so so so so SO much angst.

- The sub-plot:  So there is a serious subplot of Blazes sexuality and a magazine article that’ll be released outing him, but with all the build-up in the end it is anti-climactic.  And don’t get me started on the sub-plot of Darren and his dad?

- Falling in Love:  I get insta-love, and I guess that is what this was, but we missed the journey into love.  All of a sudden Darren and Blaze were life partners in love.  Maybe we missed the chemistry between them?

We so wanted to love this book, but Blaze was a major problem for us, his attitude, his internalizing and really just him.  There were lots of ideas that started but never really came to a conclusion, and it really left us scratching our head.  Sorry to say this but all in all, we felt that Rock my Heart was a big miss.

Review of Clickbait by Garett Groves

by Garett Groves

3 Stars

A frustrated journalist. An abrasive internet sensation. Desire even enemies can’t deny.
 
Jeff Taylor is a cable news juggernaut with an ax to grind—particularly with the media industry that made him. After a tough interview with Kile Avery, online troll extraordinaire, Jeff melts down on air and tells the world just what he thinks of the media machine.
 
He’s swiftly fired and blacklisted by every major media organization… except one. NewSpin—the same fluff media company that Jeff most blames for the current state of journalism—wants to hire him to do a piece on Avery.
 
“Avery’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. I’d sooner live under a bridge than work with him.”

Kile Avery is a viral blogger who thinks love and traditional media are dead. He’s built an online empire quickly by posting scathing video takedowns. So when Kile’s approached by NewSpin for a documentary series on his meteoric rise to fame, he can’t say no… even if Jeff Taylor is the reporter assigned to the project.
 
“When we started this, I wanted to destroy Taylor. Now I just want to sleep with him.”
 
The two have nothing in common save for their mutual hatred, but they quickly discover they share real chemistry on and off camera—chemistry neither of them wants to admit to, privately or publicly.
 
Can they set aside their differences and come together to make a ratings hit? Or is their story destined to become yet another clickbait headline?

We had so many high hopes for Clickbait, but man, we struggled to finish this story.  We usually really enjoy everything by Garett Groves, but Clickbait just didn’t come together for us.

So let us start with what we liked!  Kyle and Jeff are enemies, they essentially hate each other, and what the pother stand for and believes in.  There is a sexual tension that is palpable; they truly are enemies-to-lovers.  There are some serious sparks between Kyle and Jeff and it one of the few reasons that we kept us from not finishing this book.  Along with them being enemies, there is also a huge age difference between them, and that whole opposites attract is super sexy.

Even with all these good tropes, there is so much that made us scratch our head.  Honestly, the story doesn’t make sense.  Jeff is fired from his million dollar job, and has to take the first available position – really?  Kyle runs an anti-love blog, we think, didn’t really understand the blog idea.  And really the point of the project that they were working on together; following Kyle’s rise to fame, but they only went to his office once? There was confusion about what day it was, and on and on.  As you can see we were confused for most the story.  Clickbait is about 375 pages, not the longest book we have read, but it just felt like it dragged, and got caught up around other characters, mis-communication and co-workers plotting.  It was too much.

We so wanted to love this book; May-December, enemies-to-friends, opposites attract, how could we not?  But there was so much going on in this book that it left us feeling confused and unfortunately not invested in the actual romance.