Customer Reviews

Having Justin's Baby (Harlequin Super Romance)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I enjoyed every second of this book. I liked both Justin and Paige and I felt that they were well rounded and realistic characters. The plot makes sense and there isn't to many side plots that leave you wanting to pull your hair out.
I read the end of the book with a smile on my face...
...and then I thought about the ending and although I still liked the book I realized some flaws.
One is that the characters made a cute couple but I don't see why they were made for each other. You don't see a lot of the attraction thing going on between the two of them. It's not like it's not mentioned but it's almost like an afterthought.
It's not all that surprising that this book doesn't have any sex scenes because it happens, and for once the author made it fit. It's not like you feel like a scene should be there and was cut out. I liked that about the book. But where was the love? There was no passion. It's not something that didn't bug me until I got to the end. It was a cute happy ending but I was left wondering why they were together.
The author has talent because the book is good, but when you look back you notice some things. Like how every conflict in the book is mentioned and then it just sort of fades away and never gets resolved. When they're best friend finds out about them he's really mad that he wasn't the first to know. He was mad. And then he wasn't. He was also suppose to be in love with Paige, but you can easily forget that. There was conflict between Paige and her father and then there wasn't. There was problems between Justin and Paige and then that went away. If you read the book you might not catch it but if you think about it the conflict is almost never really resolved. It just fades into the backround.
This book is far from boring, but it's also far from perfect.

When she was in fourth grade Paige Stephens' mom died, her dad put her in day care after school. While she felt she was old enough to stay home alone, she found herself two best friends, Justin Collier and Kyle Landon. The trio has shared everything since that day, and now when Paige is planning her wedding, the two guys are trying to be happy for her. Justin and Kyle in their own ways have pined after Paige since they were kids, but neither wanted to ruin their friendship.

Paige is planning a reunion for her best friends from college and is awaiting their arrival the next day when she gets a note from her fiancé ending their relationship. He has gone to Las Vegas with another woman she believes. When she calls her best friends house, Justin comes running to console her. What they don't plan on is the attraction they find when emotions run high. After their one night together, Paige finds herself HAVING JUSTIN'S BABY and wonders what to do with her life.

HAVING JUSTIN'S BABY is a book filled with emotions that take the reader from high to low over and over again. This trio's friendship has weathered a lot of the years, but when Kyle feels betrayed by Justin and Paige, this reader was left in tears. Their friendship is one any woman would love to have; they are like two big brothers until one steps over a line that never should have been crossed. Once their lives begin to change they have to grow as friends or as lovers, and this change is one that is worthy of a story.

One of the biggest draws to this story is the setting. Minnesota is the land of ten thousand lakes, and their scenic qualities make this a perfect place. Pamela Bauer creates scenes that left this reader wanting to go camping to see the sunrise over the water and to climb the hills to find the perfect spot.

Pamela Bauer is a talented writer who gives the reader the feeling her characters are going to walk off the pages into their lives. This reader would love to see more of the characters from this story come alive in future novels - Not only Kyle but the other Bulldog Reunion attendees Amber and Ben.

Review Courtesy of LoveRomancesandmore

The strength of Having Justin's Baby is the fact that the author managed to paint a realistic and loving friendship between three friends. She draws them so vividly, the reader feels like he or she knows them. This goes on for a while, early on in the book. Then the shoe drops and Paige is dumped by her unseemly boyfriend weeks before the wedding. Of course, Justin steps in to console her and one thing leads to another and weeks down the line, Paige learns she's pregnant by one of her two best friends (who also happens to be one of her roommates). The problem I had, starting early on is that, after her one night stand with Justin, all of the qualities the two guys loved about her disappeared! Her laid back attitude was gone, and she was cruel to Justin.

I do like that the lead character isn't a millionaire or a billionaire... he's an ordinary guy with a small business. He wasn't cruel (like in so many romance/harlequin novels), he was supportive and loving. This seemed to be a reverse scenario because Paige just came across as ungrateful to everyone who supported her, all because of the anger she felt at the changes in her life. She was a completely different person than she was early on in the book and many of those changes immediate after her night with Justin so I couldn't blame it on her pregnancy hormones (and neither should the author have tried).

I wanted more PASSION and more feelings of unrequited love between Paige and Justin. Maybe Paige might have had some feelings for him that she'd been quietly aware of but never acted on. While we get the desired happy ending, the romance ends on a tepid note.

The writer can write, and the world she creates comes to life, and it is an enjoyable ride with plenty of ups and downs. I just feel that there needed to be "more" between Paige and Justin instead of the feeling that they were settling for each other, because of the baby.

Also, the reasoning behind [the other best friend] Kyle's anger was wholly unjustified. There were plenty of other reasons to make him angry, like the fact that it was revealed that he had a crush on her the whole time. But the author went with the "taking advantage of paige" route instead of simply saying he was jealous and heartbroken, surely that would have spiced things up.

Wonderful and hard to put down wanted to keep reading. Need to read to enjoy. The couple was meant to be together...