![Beautiful Bastard (The Beautiful Series Book 1) by [Lauren, Christina]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51JEnr63dsL.jpg)
I…I…I’m so embarrassed. This book is a horror and encapsulates so much that is wrong with the romance genre. I devoured it quickly and hated myself the whole time. Basically, I feel about this book the way the heroine felt about the hero the whole time – this is SO wrong for me, but I just can’t keep away.
Chloe Mills is a business school student finishing up her degree with an internship at a marketing company. Her boss is Bennett Ryan, the titular Beautiful Bastard. They have unprotected hate sex within the first 20 pages. Guys, come ON! This is not ok. This should have been where I noped right out of there. It’s a library book. I have no skin in this game. And yet. I CAN’T STOP READING. I deserve this for liking this book:
There’s no progress in this book. There is no plot. He is her boss and they have public sex all over the place at work; conference rooms, stairwells, the parking garage. Come ON! That phrase just went through my head over and over. Also – the unprotected thing. This is not ok. I was actually shocked since most authors can now work condoms in seamlessly, or at the very least a discussion of health status and whether the heroine is on the pill.
Here’s the thing: Christina Lauren write really great sex scenes. When (if?) I grow up I want to write scenes like they do. But I should not be able to forgive everything else about this book. In good erotica it adds to the story and advances the relationship. This was just gratuitous and did not change their feelings for each other.
The CBR romance ladies introduced me to Lauren’s Wild Seasons series last year and I loved them. While some are better than others, I highly recommend all of them. Unless I get really desperate I don’t think I’ll be reading the rest of this series.
I have read ALL of these books — Bennett and Chloe’s angry sex, Sara and Max’s public sex, Hanna and Will being freaking adorable and
ALL of the filler books. I hated Chloe and Bennett and I KEPT READING! You’re not alone. I am by your side. Take what comfort or further shame from that you will.
My library has the other two full novels – there is a very good chance I will have a bout of amnesia one day and decide to read them.
this review was glorious :)
I read this a few years ago, and all I could think about was that he rips her underwear every. single. time. they have sex.
That would piss me off.
I work hard for my $5.99 Target underwear.
Isn’t there a scene at La Perla? So, she is wearing hundreds of dollars worth of lingerie and he is ripping it apart. It’s completely ridiculous and I liked Chloe and Bennett least of all. They’re like Christina Lauren’s starter couple. I quite liked Will and Hanna though. She’s a pip.
There is a scene at La Perla. And an elevator. And, like, a dozen other totally inappropriate places.
And in each one he rips her very expensive lingerie.
That she bought on an intern’s salary.
Because Christina Lauren is totally grounded in financial reality.
Well done on the Shaming. I still can’t believe how fast you read this one. And it’s so not okay. Thanks for taking one for the team.
I wasn’t being hyperbolic about being unable to put it down. :(
If you want to feel better, we can talk about how I keep reading Jennifer Ashley’s Mackenzie books. Guilty pleasures are fun and shameful and FUN.
Interesting – I read the first of that series last year and couldn’t even come up with enough to say to write a review. And they were the couple I was most interested in. Though if my library had them I would probably read them all.
Oh, this was a published Twilight fanfic. The Office, if I’m not mistaken.
I read it way back then, but really can’t remember much about it – she probably got better at writing over time but left this just as it was a fanfic. :(
Yep, I thought this one read very much like Twilight fanfic. I hated this book as I was reading it (possibly because it was so obviously Twilight fanfic) but also kept going. I found the rest of the series much better.
This review and comments are cracking me up! And I can’t with romance books with the two leads having unprotected sex. Come the hell on people. Unless it’s pre-1980 in the story-line at least throw out a protection conversation.
I have no idea how I missed this review when it first went up, I check the CBR group blog at least once daily. So glad it was highlighted in Pajiba Love, so I got to read it. Your review was like revisiting my own experience with the book.
I absolutely both sort of loathed and loved this book. Having read all of the Wild Seasons books first, this was certainly a marked drop in quality. I was just as appalled by the constant unprotected sex, and his tendency to rip her very expensive underwear off, but still kept reading. Unlike Mrs. J, I have read no further than Hanna and Will’s (indeed very adorable) book, but I suspect I’ll get back to them at some point, as there is something incredibly compelling about Christina Lauren’s writing, and they do write extremely steamy sex scenes.
Dammit! Hanna and Will’s story is the one that slightly intrigued me, and now you AND Mrs. J praise it. I’m going to end up reading the other two I can just tell. Ugh. The compulsion is too much.
I did review the series if you want to check it out on my site.