Series: Backlash*
Release Date: January 24th, 2014
Taryn Starr is not the girl-next-door who unknowingly meets a celebrity. Known as “America’s Sweetheart,” the reigning country music princess and world-renowned superstar knows exactly who Trace is … or does she?
Their worlds collide when the musicians whose paths were never destined to cross are forced by their joint record label to collaborate on a song. The sparks fly and ignite a fire that blazes hotter with every minute they spend together – for better or worse. One thing’s for certain, the two media magnets can’t deny their explosive chemistry, but will life in the spotlight ultimately bring Trace and Taryn together or force them apart?
This contemporary romance new adult novel is for mature audiences. The language alone would make a sailor blush (the guy’s a rapper, remember?) so 18+ only, please.
• Violence
• Blackmail
• Abortion
• Does have OW and OM drama
– An OM in the Heroine’s band wants to date her
– An ex-boyfriend from the Heroine’s high school blackmails the Heroine
– The Hero constantly goes to after-parties with OW who want to sleep with him. One night he gets really drunk and passes out on his bed, he wakes up and finds an OW in bed with him–he’s 100% sure he didn’t sleep with her though.
– A different OW claims that she’s pregnant with the Hero’s child and goes to the media. The child ends up not being his, but it could have been. The Hero met (and slept) with the OW before he met the Heroine.
• No descriptive sex scene with OW/OM
• Does have the Hero and Heroine pushing away
• Does have many separations between the Hero and Heroine
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.
Rating: 4.5/5 stars
*Each novel in the series is Standalone
Wow. Collaboration is my new favourite in the music/rockstar genre. Usually, when I read music/band based books, I get so annoyed with the amount of angst and what seems like millions of women that go bananas over the hero, the crazy fans/ex-girlfriend, or god forbid, ex-fiancée. However, Collaboration was a breath of fresh air!
Sure the heroine was still … innocent in a way, but it was her image in the media. She wasn’t a helpless girl that didn’t understand the media or how the lives of famous people work. She had her own career, her own dreams, and her own plans! And the fact that the hero was the green-monster in this book was laugh-out-loud worthy and just plain awesome-sauce!
However, despite how fantastic Collaboration was… I did have a little bit of a hard time connecting with the characters emotionally. For a lot of the book, they were together but not together, and I didn’t really know where they stood. But the ending saved the book from a 3.5-star rating, and by ending, I’m talking about the epilogue, which is just so cute and is pretty much the reason why I love epilogues.
The pace and overall plot were really well developed, and I think Lynn and Lee did an excellent job of keeping the pace respective to what was happening plot-wise. Some parts I thought were a bit slow, and that’s a miracle unto itself considering its genre, but it worked. And there were so many times that I could see the typical, cliché, rockstar scenarios playing out, but the trust that Taryn put into Trace and vice versa were terrific. I guess it really did help that they were both, generally, in the same business, and had the same level of fame.
But, the most annoying part of Collaboration was the ending (before the epilogue). It was this climactic scene, and then it was four months later… (sorry for the slight spoiler). And then… Taryn dragged it on and on, and I pretty much skipped to the part where I found out what you wanted to find out (I’m trying to mention no spoilers). So that took a few years off my life, but besides that, the story really flowed.
