The First 100 Kisses by Danielle Bannister
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I received this ARC from Red Coat Publishing and the authors in exchange for an honest review.
I had been a bit behind in my reading and schoolwork and made a little schedule that would allow me to read and do homework yesterday to give me the illusion to at least feel a tiny bit accomplished and less stressed out.
I had it all planned out: go to the coffee shop, get myself a cappuccino, read for an hour, go home, have lunch and then start on my homework. It was a good plan, which I intended on following, until I opened my Kindle and started reading. Before I knew it, I was at home on my couch, inhaling my lunch while reading.
I thought I will read for a bit longer as a sort of after lunch break and before I realized what had happened it was 4:30 in the afternoon. I was so sucked into the story, I lost all track of time and I was glad of it, too.
The protagonist was refreshingly real and very relatable. I enjoyed her blunt and sometimes brash sense of humour and manner of expressing herself. I appreciated reading about a woman, who was in her mid-30’s, struggling and completely non-conventional.
I also noticed some gender reversal between the protagonist and her male friend, which I found very entertaining.
The plot was straight forward and fun to follow. The more I think about it, the more I could see this story as a play; very few scene changes, only two major characters and only three minor characters throughout the entire story makes for a very focused and concentrated character study.
The writing was clean, engaging and hooked me from the first page. I highlighted two quotes I found very interesting and found myself laughing out loud more than a few times.
There are a few explicit scenes described throughout the story, but nothing that isn’t too raunchy or pornographic.
Overall, this story was just what I needed yesterday and I’m not even sorry for having skipped my homework in order to finish it.
As I said before, it was fun, refreshing and surprisingly real as I could see myself in the protagonist more than once. I would definitely recommend this story to anyone, looking for a modern adult contemporary story with a bit of heat, addressing the subject of sexuality and gender roles.
