Image and blurb from Goodreads
Title: The Billionaire's Package
(Thirsty Thursday Series #1)
Author: Kyle Autumn
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: January 25, 2017
Shiree
One day, I'm doing my job and minding my own business...
Okay. Maybe sitting behind the desk of the richest, most powerful man in our city isn't considered minding my own business. But I'm only here because I'm doing my job. That part is true. I'm a package handler at National Express, and today, I have a package for Mr. Charles Masters, billionaire and CEO of Launchpad Systems, biggest tech company in the nation. And, when I'm caught red-handed getting a little too comfortable behind his desk, he looks at me like he wants me to handle his package. It's too bad he turns out to be a pompous caveman. Except he's an incredibly hot pompous caveman. And I can't stop thinking about him. I can't wait to tell my girls about this at the next Thirsty Thursday... -----
Chaz
The board of the company I built from the ground up doesn't approve of the way I'm living my life. In fact, they don't just disapprove—they want me to change. Their plan is to throw me a fake engagement party to show the world I'm a changed "family man" now. And my right-hand man sends that plan spiraling out of control when he sends the local package delivery woman into my office. It's too bad she turns out to be so sensitive and unresponsive to my charm. Except she's incredibly sexy when she's upset. And I have to make things right. Maybe the board was right about this "family man" stuff after all...
2.5 "My fake billionaire fiancé” Stars
ARC provided by the author.
Thank you!
I thought there'd be no way I wouldn't enjoy this book because it had a billionaire love interest (love those) and a poor, but down-to-earth main character (love those), and one of my favorite romance tropes (fake relationship).
It even reminded me of a book with a similar concept that I read last year and enjoyed, The Billionaire Bachelor by Jessica Lemmon.
Even with all of that, I ended up not connecting with this book.
The idea behind the story is that Shiree, a package handler, meets billionaire CEO, Charles Master when she goes to his company to deliver a package. Since he isn't in his office at the moment, Shiree decides to feel what it'd be like to be him. Of course Mr. Master walks in and catches her with her butt on his super comfortable chair. This interaction is pretty funny and it had me going "oh, this is off to a great start".
Shiree's no-shit-allowed attitude was also pretty entertaining, especially when she lets Charles know that, although he isn't used to hearing it, the word "no" is part of the English vocabulary.
Warning: Minor spoilers ahead.
My problem with the story started when Charles' ARC came into play. Look, like I said before, the whole fake relationship arc is a favorite of mine, so I wasn't annoyed at having it there. On the contrary, it was one of the reasons why I'd requested the book. My deal was with how it was handled.
First, Shiree had nothing to gain by agreeing to be Charles' fake fiancée. There wasn't even a discussion about what'd be in it for her. Charles simply walked into her apartment two (more or less) days after meeeting her and had a whole fake proposal thing going on. Granted, the fake proposal was cute, but it still didn't answer why Shiree said yes. Did she feel compelled to help him keep his company because....she was a good person? Even if that's the case, it isn't a strong enough argument. She barely knew the guy, and though he apologized time and time again, he had been a jerk to her the day they first met.
Did she agree to that because she was hoping he'd fall in love with her eventually? If so, then talk about insta-love!
Shiree's lack of motivation to carry on the fake relationship really kept me from fully engaging with the narrative, which was sad, because Shiree had a lot of promise as a character. She was funny, down to earth and snarky. All traits I admire.
It also didn't help that there was so much slut shaming here, especially on Charles' part. I lost track of how many times he called the women he slept with in the past "gold diggers", "users" or worse. Dude. You slept with them and now you're calling them names. Not nice.
As you all know, I'm all for alpha males, but Charles was going from alpha to asshole quickly. Not only he shamed his past girlfriends, but he went to Shiree's work to talk to her after they first met (and involved her boss in the drama, which was completely unecessary), then he (probably) broke some rules to get her address, showing up at her place without even asking her, then broke some more rules by thinking for a second that it was okay to make the decision to have sex without a condom without asking her about it first (good thing Shiree was smarter than that). It was just a bit too much.
Not that Shiree didn't break some relationship rules herself. The whole checking his phone behind his back? Immature. And then ranting about how he only wanted to fake a relationship with her because he wanted to keep her company? Made no sense. Again, this takes me back to my biggest problem with the story: why did she agree to do it and why did she think he was doing it in the first place?
Because of these questions, I couldn't connect with the story, which was a shame. With all the right elements to get me interested, the way the situation was handled ended up making me dislike a book I was pretty convinced I would've loved.
It even reminded me of a book with a similar concept that I read last year and enjoyed, The Billionaire Bachelor by Jessica Lemmon.
Even with all of that, I ended up not connecting with this book.
The idea behind the story is that Shiree, a package handler, meets billionaire CEO, Charles Master when she goes to his company to deliver a package. Since he isn't in his office at the moment, Shiree decides to feel what it'd be like to be him. Of course Mr. Master walks in and catches her with her butt on his super comfortable chair. This interaction is pretty funny and it had me going "oh, this is off to a great start".
Shiree's no-shit-allowed attitude was also pretty entertaining, especially when she lets Charles know that, although he isn't used to hearing it, the word "no" is part of the English vocabulary.
Warning: Minor spoilers ahead.
My problem with the story started when Charles' ARC came into play. Look, like I said before, the whole fake relationship arc is a favorite of mine, so I wasn't annoyed at having it there. On the contrary, it was one of the reasons why I'd requested the book. My deal was with how it was handled.
First, Shiree had nothing to gain by agreeing to be Charles' fake fiancée. There wasn't even a discussion about what'd be in it for her. Charles simply walked into her apartment two (more or less) days after meeeting her and had a whole fake proposal thing going on. Granted, the fake proposal was cute, but it still didn't answer why Shiree said yes. Did she feel compelled to help him keep his company because....she was a good person? Even if that's the case, it isn't a strong enough argument. She barely knew the guy, and though he apologized time and time again, he had been a jerk to her the day they first met.
Did she agree to that because she was hoping he'd fall in love with her eventually? If so, then talk about insta-love!
Shiree's lack of motivation to carry on the fake relationship really kept me from fully engaging with the narrative, which was sad, because Shiree had a lot of promise as a character. She was funny, down to earth and snarky. All traits I admire.
It also didn't help that there was so much slut shaming here, especially on Charles' part. I lost track of how many times he called the women he slept with in the past "gold diggers", "users" or worse. Dude. You slept with them and now you're calling them names. Not nice.
As you all know, I'm all for alpha males, but Charles was going from alpha to asshole quickly. Not only he shamed his past girlfriends, but he went to Shiree's work to talk to her after they first met (and involved her boss in the drama, which was completely unecessary), then he (probably) broke some rules to get her address, showing up at her place without even asking her, then broke some more rules by thinking for a second that it was okay to make the decision to have sex without a condom without asking her about it first (good thing Shiree was smarter than that). It was just a bit too much.
Not that Shiree didn't break some relationship rules herself. The whole checking his phone behind his back? Immature. And then ranting about how he only wanted to fake a relationship with her because he wanted to keep her company? Made no sense. Again, this takes me back to my biggest problem with the story: why did she agree to do it and why did she think he was doing it in the first place?
Because of these questions, I couldn't connect with the story, which was a shame. With all the right elements to get me interested, the way the situation was handled ended up making me dislike a book I was pretty convinced I would've loved.
*If you liked this review (or not), if you read the book (or not), come say hello and leave your comments bellow.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment