[5MA]≫ [PDF] Waking Up Married edition by Mira Lyn Kelly Contemporary Romance eBooks

Waking Up Married edition by Mira Lyn Kelly Contemporary Romance eBooks

Download As PDF : Waking Up Married edition by Mira Lyn Kelly Contemporary Romance eBooks

Waking Up Married edition by Mira Lyn Kelly Contemporary Romance eBooks

I was expecting more from this book. The title tempted me and I was very surprised that I rushed through it to see if anything interesting would actually happen. It didn't! I found there was not enough to the storyline, or enough intersting characters and it got to the point where I really didn't care what happened. It could have been a great story as it started well - waking up finding you are married, but then it went downhill for me from there. Sorry - it wasn't enough for me.


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Waking Up Married edition by Mira Lyn Kelly Contemporary Romance eBooks Reviews

If you’ve been following my reviews, you’re probably thinking why, for the love of all that is good and holy, did I pick a romance from Harlequin Romance when I’m always carrying on about how much I dislike romance in books. Please allow me to be clearer on the type of romance I hate in books the insta love and love triangles. Those are the two elements in romance I can’t stand. And even though I’m not a true blue romantic at heart, I do – believe it or not – have a romantic bone or two in my body. There was actually a time in my life, many, many moons ago, when I devoured one paperback romance after the other...and loved it! I’m not talking steamy romance, just swoony, googly-eyed cotton candy fluff.

With that in mind, here are my thoughts on this lovely gem from Harlequin. Firstly, it does have a few raunchy scenes, but it was done tastefully and nothing too explicit. It doesn’t come anywhere near erotica (which I DON’T read). The actual hook for me, and the reason for picking up this book, was the gorgeous cover (of course!), but mostly it was the title that got me curious. I just had to know how the heck it was possible for two people to wake up married, with one of them not even recalling they got married in the wee hours of the morning. In all honesty, it sounded like it was going to be a fun, lighthearted read, which it was, but with a more serious undertone than I expected. This is really a novel about character growth and two damaged individuals being thrown together having to learn to let go of the past and learn to trust and love (yes, Tina Turner, love’s got everything to do with it).

I loved both the main characters. Maybe I liked Connor a little bit more than Megan, but that can most likely be attributed to the fact that most of the story is told from Connor’s point of view. Nonetheless, Megan also makes the reader privy to her thoughts and feelings, and we get a deeper understanding as to why she’s willing to tackle parenting as a single mother. I’d probably have felt the same if my mother got married seven times and I got a new stepdad every couple of years. Megan’s character is a little Mary Sue-ish, but not overtly so. She’s described as a brainiac beauty, confident, modest, independent to an extreme, kind, smart, and funny.

Connor was the real surprise, though. Probably because I imagined Colin Firth in this role (I don’t know why, it just felt like a role Mr Firth would portray perfectly). Connor is motivated, dependable, level-headed, goal-driven and unafraid of confrontation or hard work. Who wouldn’t want to fall in love with a man who has his priorities straight? But oh, wait, Connor doesn’t want love and he doesn’t want to be in love. Due to his traumatized childhood, he has endured several failed relationships and thus has become a jilted man. Sad, but true. Both Megan and Connor not wanting the commitments and strings that goes with loving someone, how will they ever make this quickie Vegas marriage work? That was the question that kept me reading right through to the end.

What I appreciated most from this author is that she didn’t expect me as the reader to fall in love with her characters based on how good looking they are. Yes, Connor has a solid build, and Megan is sexy as heck with her deep blue eyes, but all of this were just a mere mention in the background to give the reader an idea of what the author envisions as her characters’ physical attributes. The bigger focus was heavily placed on what these two were made of, and that on its own brought a certain depth to the story.

Waking Up Married, as you can imagine, has its fair share of sidesplitting moments. Traditionally, people get to know each other more than half a day in advance before taking the proverbial plunge. Of course, Megan and Connor isn’t your traditional couple and so they had to learn to live with each others’ quirks AFTER they got married. Yep, lots of laughter ensued. I loved peeling back the layers on both these multifaceted characters to get a glimpse of what makes them tick.

All in all, this was a terrific read. The only thing I can complain about is that every other sentence started with “Only,...”. I started counting it after awhile, but lost count near the end. It was something I picked up on, but it didn’t dampen my enjoyment of Connor’s pursuit in convincing Megan why this is a marriage worth staying in. I also enjoyed Ms Kelly’s way with words and how she turned it into a story sheer in emotion. I’d recommend Waking Up Married to anyone whose heart beats faster at the mention of the words “sweet romance”. I’m looking forward to reading more books by this author.
This is my first foray into the Harlequin KISS line. I think I saw this book when it first came out, but I didn't buy it right away. I wasn't sure what to expect with this new line of books, but the premise of this one sounded like fun. In fact, I just read another book that starts out similarly - couple meets in Vegas, gets married and then has to deal with the fall out. The cover of this one looked like a nice romantic comedy-type, so why not. But I just couldn't get into it. It felt slow and heavy, like a bad muffin. You keep hoping it turns around, but it just kept dragging.

First up is our heroine, Megan. She's got some guy problems. Seemingly guys just don't stay around with her. She's really nice, looks like a on-track sort of person, but decides that she just doesn't want to deal with the whole romance thing anymore. She just wants to have a baby. I can applaud her for her straightforwardness and her internal decision-making process. She's figured out what she wants and she's going for it.

But as we move through the book, we see that she actually has a lot of daddy issues, boundary issues and she really can't enjoy the beginning stage of a relationship because she's so scared that the guy is going to leave her. With her underlying issues, I'm surprised she was able to have a couple relationships before this one and that she was able to get to the point where the guy left her. It felt to me like she doesn't let herself have that honeymoon period in a relationship. She wants all or nothing - 25 years married couple or single matron. She just can't handle the in between. I could understand the fearful place that was coming from, but she sure takes it to the extreme. If that were the only thing, she'd still seem pretty likable, but then she's got the boundary issues.

Megan's only interaction with anyone not related to her new husband is her cousin and the cousin's two other bridesmaids. (The cousin's wedding is the reason they started out in Vegas.) This trio is a pile of work. They're just nasty to Megan. I didn't mind it too much at the beginning of the book because they were there for the wedding. Megan says she doesn't know them well but keeps the peace for the sake of the wedding. I can respect that, but then when things are going bad for her, she calls these same women. And sits meekly while they ridicule her and have their little cliquey, nastiness to each other about Megan while they're talking. Megan gave me no indication that she had friends or any form of life outside what other people chose to bestow on her. Whether it was Connor or these non-friends, she thinks she's a steady, decisive person because she was going to choose artificial insemination, but every single part of her life that we see in this book shows her unable to care for herself physically or emotionally. She gave one small shove of independence late in the book, but that was it.

Then we have Connor. Typical Harlequin billionaire-type. Used to getting what he wants but he has a troubled past with a broken home growing up. He seemed very strong, arrogant, and unflappable, but often strayed into the douchy category to me.

Connor starts out talking with his friend at a Vegas bar and you can just see him rolling his eyes as his friend asks if he's dating. He starts narrating to himself that his guy friend loses his man-card because he's talking about feelings. And these were simple questions like "how are you holding up since your almost-fiancee dumped you?". Strike one for the douchy-hero.

He doesn't want a love relationship because that's just too messy. But he does want a companion-wife with benefits. He gives a lot of mixed signals with stuff like wanting Megan to "fall for him" (his words), but really, this is just a happy companionship. He's jealous and possessive of Megan almost from the start, which seems to be Harlequin-speak for "I'm falling in love and I don't even know it". I can handle a little bit of jealousy or possessiveness, but it starts straying into "ownership" in this book. He's known Megan for one day and when she gets dressed up for her cousin's wedding, he just can't handle that other people will see some of her thighs or the shape of her butt and goes so far as to try to cover her up with his coat as soon as he can. Strike two for the douchy-hero.

They decide to give the marriage a try, so Megan (obviously) moves part-way across the country to live with Connor. Megan ends up testing Connor with all her worst flaws to see if he can handle who she is. Connor catches on to what she's doing and doesn't really care one way or the other. He'll deal with bad food, facial scrub masks, pajama days when Megan's working all day, just as long as she stays with him. It's meant to be sweet and vulnerable for both of them, but when Connor's internal monologue says he can touch her butt because "he needed a reminder as to why he was going to choke down the coming atrocity. An incentive of sorts.", it veers into objectification instead of caring. Strike three for the douchy-hero.

I liked Connor's friend, Jeff. I almost wish he was the hero instead. It would have served Connor right to lose Megan to Jeff for being such a douche. But then again, Megan didn't show a lot of promise or backbone, so I probably wouldn't want to stick Jeff with her anyway. Jeff showed himself to really care about Connor, even though Connor really gave him no reason. He kept Connor in line even when Connor was a jerk and the times that Jeff makes an appearance in the book are more lighthearted.

The ending was satisfyingly emotional. Megan grew some backbone related to Connor (but not to her "friends"), Connor groveled in a nice way, and I was glad to see them together. But the journey to get there didn't feel worth it. Neither character seemed to grow personally, even if they did resolve some of their afraid-of-love issues.
I was expecting more from this book. The title tempted me and I was very surprised that I rushed through it to see if anything interesting would actually happen. It didn't! I found there was not enough to the storyline, or enough intersting characters and it got to the point where I really didn't care what happened. It could have been a great story as it started well - waking up finding you are married, but then it went downhill for me from there. Sorry - it wasn't enough for me.