Bittersweet by Sarina Bowen Review
5 Smooches
Synopsis
If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the orchard.
The last person Griffin Shipley expects to find stuck in a ditch on his Vermont country road is his ex-hookup. Five years ago they’d shared a couple of steamy nights together. But that was a lifetime ago.
At twenty-seven, Griff is now the accidental patriarch of his family farm. Even his enormous shoulders feel the strain of supporting his mother, three siblings and a dotty grandfather. He doesn’t have time for the sorority girl who’s shown up expecting to buy his harvest at half price.
Vermont was never in Audrey Kidder’s travel plans. Neither was Griff Shipley. But she needs a second chance with the restaurant conglomerate employing her. Okay—a fifth chance. And no self-righteous lumbersexual farmer will stand in her way.
They’re adversaries. They want entirely different things from life. Too bad their sexual chemistry is as hot as Audrey’s top secret enchilada sauce, and then some.
Review
‘Once again, Audrey had come and gone. I was left with only regrets and a whole lot of farm work.’
Bittersweet was the first book I have read that was written just by Sarina Bowen (I have read Him and Us that she co-wrote with Elle Kennedy) and I cannot wait to go back and read everything else she has written. Bittersweet was an incredible enjoyable tale of a head strong wannabe chef from Boston and a sexy and grumpy apple farmer. I fell head first for these two and their entire community.
‘Holy cannoli, I was cuddling the world’s grumpiest farmer.’
Griff and Audrey’s tale is a sort of second chance romance in that they had indeed hooked up in college but they were never serious and neither had been dwelling on it in the years that had passed. But now that Audrey has shown up at Griff’s farm trying to buy apples for her big shot corporate employer the two are thrust back together and find that the chemistry that existed between them has never fizzled.
‘She and I were a dangerous combination. We needed cautionary signs like the ones hanging in the tractor shields over the cans of diesel fuel. WARNING: COMBUSTIBLE.’
If I were a poet I would write an ode to Griffin Shipley. I loved his dirty talking, grouchy, family oriented and secret romantic self. I mean I seriously loved him and he completely stole the show for me. He could easily switch from being a smart ass to flawlessly being sweet and yet he never came off fake or “too perfect.” His Vermont farmer lifestyle was a wonderful contrast to Audrey’s corporate restaurant lifestyle. These two were very different and yet melded perfectly. The story as a whole was easy to read and yet not without drama. I am so excited to continue this series as well as catch up on Sarina’s backlog of books.
‘There was something dirty and wonderful about the way he handled me. Every touch was a command, as if I’d been placed on this earth to pleasure him. Judging from the way my body responded to his touch perhaps I had. Maybe I should just get it over with and change my legal name to Tawdry. I’d need a new set of business cards, though . . ‘
Bittersweet by Sarina Bowen is a sweet, romantic, and hot as hell story. You do not want to miss this sexy famer.
~miranda
