Blog Tour Reviews & Giveaway: Rule and Jet – Jay Crownover

Title: Rule  (A Marked Men Novel #1)
Author:  Jay Crownover
Genre: New Adult
Publication Date:  May 7th, 2013
Event organized by: Literati Author Services  http://literatiauthorservices.com/
Publisher: William Morrow an imprint of HarperCollins
Reviewer:  Shannon
Rating:

Opposites in every way . . . except the one that matters 

Shaw Landon loved Rule Archer from the moment she laid eyes on him. Rule is everything a straight–A pre-med student like Shaw shouldn’t want–and the only person she’s never tried to please. She isn’t afraid of his scary piercings and tattoos or his wild attitude. Though she knows that Rule is wrong for her, her heart just won’t listen.

To a rebel like Rule Archer, Shaw Landon is a stuck-up, perfect princess-and his dead twin brother’s girl. She lives by other people’s rules; he makes his own. He doesn’t have time for a good girl like Shaw-even if she’s the only one who can see the person he truly is.

But a short skirt, too many birthday cocktails, and spilled secrets lead to a night neither can forget. Now, Shaw and Rule have to figure out how a girl like her and a guy like him are supposed to be together without destroying their love . . . or each other

Reviewer’s Thoughts:

I loved Rule Archer.  There is nothing hotter than an angsty, tattooed bad boy with a mushy center and Rule is all of that in spades.  There are times where you want to smack him upside the head, but then you look past all his BS and find it’s nothing but a smoke screen to hide his hurt and need to be loved for who he is.

If there was ever a heroine for a book that seemed like the most unlikely match up for someone it was Shaw Landon.  She was the seemingly good girl bookworm who did whatever she could to make everyone happy.  And while part of Shaw was a good girl, there was a part of her that wanted to let go of the nonsense with her parents, Rule’s family and just be loved by the only man she’s ever loved and surround herself with her group of friends.  But for Shaw, getting what she’s always wanted meant having to deal with the misconceptions of what her relationship was with Rule’s brother and finally taking a stand for herself and for Rule.  Part of taking that stand also meant taking a stand against Rule and not letting him effectively push her away because he had a hard time dealing with his feelings.  Despite how much she loved him, she didn’t always make the wisest choices when it came to pushing Rule, but she figured it out eventually.

For Rule, he spent the majority of his lifetime living by his own set of rules.  And when his twin died in a car accident, he let his family’s inability to deal with the grief be piled on him.  It was fair, but he figured since he wasn’t the “chosen” son, he would live up to every bad misconception his parents had about him.  He took that animosity out on Shaw, because he saw her as an extension of his parents.  And poor Shaw having to witness Rule at his worst was pretty bad, especially since she was in love with him.  Rule does finally realize there is something special about Shaw and he tries his hardest not to screw it up, but as always, when our bad boy hero claims he’s going to eventually “fuck it up” he does and in spectacular fashion.  Rule knows what he faults are and he doesn’t apologize for them, but he does make a conscious effort, especially after he realizes the depth of his feelings for Shaw, to try to be a better person.  In the end, Rule discovers that the only person he needs to forgive him is himself and to let the only person who ever truly saw him love him.

This was a truly surprising read and the start to a series that I will anxiously follow.  We’re introduced to the Marked men and discover they are all a bit like Rule in same way, shape or form and a group of guys I can’t wait to read more of.

PURCHASE LINKS:

Amazon | Amazon UK | Amazon CA | Barnes and Nobles | Kobo | ITunes

Title: Jet  (A Marked Men Novel #2)
Author:  Jay Crownover
Genre: New Adult
Publication Date:  May 28, 2013
Event organized by: Literati Author Services  http://literatiauthorservices.com/
Publisher: William Morrow an imprint of HarperCollins
Reviewer:  Shannon
Rating:

With his tight leather pants and a sharp edge that makes him dangerous, Jet Keller is every girl’s rock and roll fantasy. But Ayden Cross is done walking on the wild side with bad boys. She doesn’t want to give in to the heat she sees in Jet’s dark, haunted eyes. She’s afraid of getting burned from the sparks of their spontaneous combustion, even as his touch sets her on fire.

Jet can’t resist the Southern Belle with mile-long legs in cowboy boots who defies his every expectation. Yet the closer he feels to Ayden, the less he seems to know her. While he’s tempted to get under her skin and undo her in every way, he knows firsthand what happens to two people with very different ideas about relationships.

Will the blaze burn into an enduring love. . . or will it consume their dreams and turn them to ashes?

Reviewer’s Thoughts:

I knew there was more to Ayden than meets the eye when we were introduced to her as Shaw’s best friend in, RULE.  She was a fabulous “broken” heroine and it was a great turn to see it be the guy having to suck it up and pick his love interest up, rather than the other way around.

Ayden and Jet had an instant attraction when they met.  Ayden, the good ole Southern girl who loved her country music, couldn’t help but be drawn to Jet as he strutted and screamed his metal music across the stage.  But when Ayden decided to unleash the bad girl she was trying to keep under control and seduce Jet, she was devastated at his decision to turn her down.  For a year after that fateful encounter, the two of them had an uncomfortable truce as friends and roommates.  Their friends kept trying to push them together, but Ayden and Jet were convinced they shouldn’t be together and did everything in their power to stay as they were.  But just as fate forced them apart, it brought them together when they needed it.

Ayden was hiding from her past.  Raised in a small town in Kentucky by a mother who had a revolving door of men coming in and out of their trailer, Ayden lived up to the trailer trash label that had been placed on their family.  Most of what she did was to keep her brother out of more trouble than what he was already in.  So when a high school chemistry teacher saw potential in Ayden, he helped her fill out applications and get her to Denver to college.  Ayden did everything she could to make sure that she lived her new life to deserve the second chance that she got.  She studied hard.  She worked and saved.  And she only dated nice guys that had their future mapped out.  Jet was none of the things she claimed she wanted, but he called to her bad girl side.  When she finally gave in to their attraction, it was under the understanding that it was just sex because she knew Jet could destroy her and the life she was trying to carve out.  But Ayden discovered that while you can hide from your past temporarily, it always managed to come back and bite you in the ass.  When it did, she was willing to give up everything under the guise of protecting what she loved, knowing it was going to kill her and seriously piss off her friends.  But Ayden discovered that no matter how bad her past was, Jet was going to be there for her and support her when she needed it.  It was the slap of reality she needed to realize that not everyone was like her brother or mother and could be counted on.

Jet had his own set of family issues.  A father that blamed him and his mother for ruining is his and a mother that was unwilling to let go of a man who made her life miserable, had Jet shying away from anything that looked like a relationship.  He ever set aside fame and fortune with his band because of his fear that something would happen to his mother while he was gone.  But with Ayden, Jet began to see that all the bottled up emotions that made him such a great songwriter and performer because a little easier to deal with.  Unfortunately, he could admit this to himself but could never manage to verbalize it just the right way to Ayden.  He let years worth of hurt and anger make him walk away from her, rather than to fight for what he wanted most.

I really liked Jet and Ayden together.  It was great to see what a cohesive group everyone had become in the year after the end of RULE.  They were all a family and a family that stucked together and told each other when they needed a swift kick.  Jet and Ayden needed quite a few swift kicks to get them to their HEA.  But it was a HEA that was worth it, especially when it was Jet coming to Ayden to prove that he was always be there for her.

The Marked Men series continues to roll on with another great entry.  Given the snippets in the epilogue, Rome and Cora’s book (which is next) is leaving me with some pretty high expectations.

PURCHASE LINKS

Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon CA |Barnes & Noble | Itunes | Kobo

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Jay Crownover is the bestselling author of Rule. Like the characters in her Marked Men series, she is a big fan of tattoos. She loves music and wishes she could be a rock star, but since she has no aptitude for singing or instrument playing, she’ll settle for writing stories with interesting characters and that make the reader feel something. She lives in Colorado with her three dogs.

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