5 SMOOCHES!
SYNOPSIS:
Man seeking woman: Hot, rich, smart, witty, self-made multimillionaire Internet genius seeks classy, intelligent, sexy, fun-loving woman who’s interested in settling down and sharing all the good things.
There. Best. Ad. Ever.
I will absolutely find the woman of my dreams, someone who’ll love me for me. Even if my sister thinks I need help dating, I’m confident I can pull this off, courtesy of the great worldwide web.
Let me just hit the upload button right now…
***
No. Just no. As a woman and a professional matchmaker, I can’t let Dylan Parker run this ad. He’s the catch of all catches. That’s why his sister has asked me to help her ridiculously good-looking, insanely rich, but socially clueless brother find a woman. As a broker of happily ever afters, I’m known as the Stud Finder since I make a great living pairing wildly successful women with men who won’t fleece them but will adore them. After all, what woman in her right mind wouldn’t fall in love with Dylan?
I mean, besides me. It totally won’t be me.
REVIEW:
At this point in my Lauren Blakely fandom, I don’t even have to read the blurb to know that I’m going to buy and read (and love) the book. A full-length novel or sexy little novella, a new story from her is an event for me, one that I not only look forward to but I also plan the day around. It doesn’t even matter what trope it is – friends to lovers, second chances, best friend’s little sister – I know that I’m going to get wrapped up in whatever world she’s created and enjoy the heck out of the trip. Her writing never fails to entertain me, to make my heart race and to bring a smile to my face. This kind of consistency, both in terms of quality storytelling and reader reaction, is rare and special, and it’s one of the many reasons why Lauren Blakely is such a standout author for me.
In Stud Finder, a standalone novella in the 1001 Dark Nights series, Ms. Blakely takes on the hot nerd trope, and she did it with spectacular results. Her spin on it, with a professional matchmaker heroine who is also a friend of the hero’s sister, was fresh, fun and heart-flutteringly flirty. Don’t let the length of the story deter you, either, because she packed a heck of a lot of story into this perfectly paced, richly developed novella.
“…this woman… She’s the one I want.”
Dylan is the whole package—handsome, smart, rich and an absolute sweetheart—and I found his dating naïveté very endearing. An internet entrepreneur who sold his business for millions at a very young age, he’s a firm believer in the world wide web as the way to find, well, just about anything, so it seems logical to him to use it to find the woman of his dreams. Quickly overwhelmed and a bit disillusioned by the responses to his ad on a dating site, he realizes that he’s going to need some help finding this woman. So, it’s a good thing that his sister is friends with the just person to help Dylan out. What he wasn’t expecting, though, was being so attracted to the matchmaker herself.
“I want this man. I want him so much.”
Evie’s so focused on building her business and other peoples’ relationships, she doesn’t have time for one herself. Even if she did, though, it seems her time is mostly spent with clients, and that is an ethical line she just won’t allow herself cross. She goes all-in to help Dylan, including some one-on-one dating instruction to prepare him for his dates. When their effortlessly witty banter and flirty, fun “practice” dates start to breach the boundary Evie has set for herself, she’s got a tough decision to make—go against the matchmaker’s cardinal rule or give into the attraction simmering between them.
“…there’s nothing more to say. There’s only the sheer honesty of this moment. When you finally give in. When you finally admit. When you finally know.”
Right from the start, I couldn’t help but root for this couple. Stud Finder was an addictively slow burning story, but my Kindle was positively smoking when Evie and dirty-talking Dylan finally gave in to the chemistry sizzling between them. I devoured this sexy, sweet, quick-reading romance in a single sitting, smiling wide and fanning myself the whole way through. Five smooches from me for Lauren Blakely’s Stud Finder!
~ Danielle Palumbo
