5 Smooches!
Synopsis
From the USA TODAY bestselling author of Where Sea Meets Sky comes a new adult novel about a young woman who becomes a nanny in Capri and falls for her charges’ bad-boy brother.
It’s time for twenty-four-year-old Amber MacLean to face the music. After a frivolous six months of backpacking through New Zealand, Australia, and Southeast Asia, she finds herself broke on the Mediterranean without enough money for a plane ticket home to California. There are worse places to be stuck than the gorgeous coastline of southern Italy, but the only job she manages to secure involves teaching English to two of the brattiest children she’s ever met.
It doesn’t help that the children are under the care of their brooding older brother, Italian ex-motorcycle racer Desiderio Larosa. Darkly handsome and oh-so-mysterious, Derio tests Amber’s patience and will at every turn—not to mention her hormones.
But when her position as teacher turns into one as full-time nanny at the crumbling old villa, Amber finds herself growing closer to the enigmatic recluse and soon has to choose between the safety of her life back in the States and the uncertainty of Derio’s closely guarded heart.
Review
Gosh, I love all of these little travel romances by Karina Halle. I love the covers. They are always so gorgeous and unique. I especially love the travel. Karina has a brilliant way of totally immersing you into a place that you have never even imagined before. She makes you want pack your bags, hop on a plane and take a chance on a new place or a new someone. Racing the Sun was no different and Derio just may be my new favorite of Karina’s.
Signor Desiderio Larosa looks like he just rolled off the model runway in Milan and then hitchhiked his way here.
Oh Derio! You hot Italian, troubled, possibly alcoholic stud! I fell for you so hard. There were a lot of reasons. We all love a troubled bad boy and Derio was just aloof and uninterested enough in seemingly everything to have me nearly salivating. So, aloof and mean Derio needs an English teacher for his seven year old twin siblings who is raising. Amber needs a job. She has been traveling the world and has finally ran out of money in glorious Italy. She has an English degree but no experience with children but lands the job anyways. (we meet Amber in Where Sea Meets Sky but all of these books are standalones and you totally do not need to read Where Sea Meets Sky to enjoy Racing the Sun) Amber and Derio have an instant attraction and the sexual tension is smoking hot and so is the angst!
“I need you, deeply. Madly, even.”
OH, this one just has so much drama. Derio was just so messed up and Amber falls for him so hard and I cannot blame her. We all fantasize about the troubled bad boy falling for us and us making him all better.
“I need to know if I can feel anything. I want to feel something.”
Ahhh, the feels. So many. I don’t know if it was all the tragedy or the children, or the magical island, or The House of Sad Lemons but this book just felt so emotional and I was there. I was in it and living it so completely. God, I just loved it. And it was sexy. Just so damn sensual! This book was everything.
“You are like the sunrise when you come.”
“All this light, chasing away the dark.”
So basically what I am saying, is that this book rocked my socks, A LOT! There is a quote in this book that pretty much stuck with me in a big way because I felt really it described all of these travel romances that Karina writes. I think this is why I Iove them so. This one line pretty much sums them up!
Some feelings transcend any language.
Another amazing book from Karina Halle. All I can hope from what I gathered from this book is that the next one will take place in Norway and I can honestly say that I cannot wait for next adventure.
~Amie
