5 Smooches
Synopsis
Life As I Know It:
Booze
Drugs
Gambling
Easy Women
Such was my life in fabulous Las Vegas. But what do you expect when you’re the daughter of a prostitute. This is not the life I want for myself, and I have a plan.
Life As I Want It:
Go to college.
Get my degree.
Get as far from Vegas as possible.
But life has other plans. Plans that include him. Life isn’t always sunshine and roses and even the best laid plans change.
This is my story. The story of a girl who thought she had it all figured out until life threw her a curve ball. My name is Presley and I refuse to be just another Working Girl.
Review
I do not even know how to start this review! There is so much I want to say and so much I need to keep my big mouth shut about. I want to tell you every wonderfully written detail and how much it touched me! I want to tell you every emotion I went through as I read this book. I want to show you every happy, sad, funny and downright angry message I sent to the author as I stayed up way past my personal bedtime devouring this story! But alas if I do all that what will be the point of you reading it yourself. I was lucky enough to get a chance to Beta Read Working Girl for A.E. Woodward after stalking her and forcing her to hear how much I loved her other books. Getting this book piece by piece was downright tourture because it is the kind of story you can read in one sitting not because it is a fast read but because it is so gripping!
Presley has had a hard life. I mean the kind of hard life you cannot even fathom. Her mom is a prostitute who works in a brothel and she has grown up living in the housing attached to the brothel. Talk about not having a good well rounded upbringing. On top of this is the pressure from the brothel owner to join the business in a more personal (not just working the desk) kind of way. But Presley wants more for herself. She wants a real life and a real job, one she can be proud of. The one thing she doesn’t want is love. Growing up watching married men pay for sex with the women she knows and loves has taught her love is not real and trust shouldn’t be given. This is all too much to deal with when in class at a local college she meets handsome, popular and from a good home Emerson. Emerson is the kind of man you fantasize about but for Presley that is just what he needs to be . . .a fantasy.
When Presley is forced to re-evaluate her plans in life and deal with some insane personal demons she is forced to decide what is truly most important in her life and how much pain she can live with. This story killed me . . . killed me! Presley broke my heart and I wanted nothing more than to help her see her worth. Emerson, oh Emerson . . .I love you. Emerson is poetic and understanding. A.E. Woodward did an amazing job of writing three dimensional characters who just feel real. I honestly felt like I was going through their struggles and was desperate to find a way to survive. I loved every minute of this book even the ones that were hard to read but very necessary.
To date there has not been a book by A.E. Woodward I have not loved but as she grows as a writer I believe her stories do too. This book took me to places I never would have dreamed it could go and I cannot wait to find out what she has in store for me the next time!
~miranda
