Sunday, September 20, 2015

Review: Unlikely Venture (The Venture Series #1) by Kristen Luciani


Here's the thing about keeping secrets...

After learning Jessica's been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, her fiancé bolted out of her life as if he was on fire. She finds solace in her career--no distractions or romantic entanglements there!

But the universe has its own agenda.

Three thousand miles away from home and in the most unlikely of circumstances, Jessica meets Silicon Valley rising star James Callahan and her world is instantly turned upside down. Things go further awry when she encounters a ghost from the past. That one night of reckless abandon is back to haunt her and the control she fought so hard to regain is now in the hands of another.

Plagued by betrayal and guilt over his dad’s untimely death, James left Cambridge in search of a new beginning. With laser-focus, he built a cutting edge technology company now on the brink of financial success. Romance is the last thing on his mind…until he meets Jessica.

Fate brought them together, awakening their dormant emotions. But Jessica’s scandalous secret consumes her and threatens the very happiness she feared she’d never find with another man. Can James handle the truth about her past? Or did she pick the wrong guy yet again?







 
This marks the first and last book that I've read by Kristen Luciani. Just saying that makes me feel like a big jerk. Authors work so very hard on their book(s) and here I am, ripping it apart. Reviewing books is an awesome little hobby to have ... at least until you get your hands on a book that you just don't mesh with. Well, I guess I better stop stalling and get on with this. 

From the very beginning of Unlikely Venture, I had a super hard time connecting with the characters and the story. The book was reading ... flat ... I just didn't get any kind of emotion from any of the characters. I was just reading sentences and I wasn't being immersed into the novel. This continued throughout the entire book for me. There were times when you could tell that emotions should be high for the characters due to what was going on but even then, I got nothing. No emotional connection. 

It was even worse when James came into the picture. The conversations between him and Jessica didn't have that spark ... I didn't feel any pull between them. It read like they were brother and sister in the beginning. I was expecting something ... anything ... that would signify some sort of attraction between them and I just didn't get that. Hell. I'll be honest, I found myself 15% into the novel and I had no clue what the main character's name was. I couldn't even differentiate between Jessica and her friend Lisa, they both read like one person rather than two different ones. And not knowing their names until I was a quarter of the way through didn't help. I'm not saying that their names weren't given, they were. They were just completely forgettable to me. 

The whole story was forgettable. So very sad. There were quite a few elements that should have made this an unforgettable novel for me but for some reason, it didn't connect. I mean, this book had everything: romance, illness, estranged family, broken relationships ... I wish that I had liked it. 

Keep in mind, a lot of people really did like this one. Don't take my word for it, read some more reviews and then make your decision about reading Unlikely Venture. Maybe I'll pick this one up again and change my opinion but that isn't happening right now. 

As a side note ... I accidentally wrote a status update for this book on Goodreads for 37% and it was actually for another book ... mistakes happen and Goodreads update mistakes can't be deleted apparently because I can't find where to do it. Oops.

* I received this novel in exchange for an honest review *



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