Customer Reviews

Just Toying Around... (Blaze Romance)

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

 

 

Rhonda Nelson's debut novel is fantastic! It's hot and sexy and just plain fun. Ms. Nelson has a unique voice that is laced with a wickedness that will keep you turning those pages all through the night! I can't wait for the next one!

This was my first Blaze and first contemporary romance. Pretty good!



I felt much like the unintentionally assertive and vulnerable heroine, Meg Sugarbaker, who is a pastry chef. I read it in late 2002, so lets see what I can remember. The hero is Nick and his brother is Ron. Ron is a good person, but is lacking discipline and goals, annoying everybody and himself. Nick is overall a very good man. Ron sends Nick to Meg's hotel during a conference to spy on her and find out if she really is an honest critic of his company's romance and passion products, all because she claimed to have experienced something terribly go wrong with some of his cheap items. Nick and Meg are instantly attracted to eachother. The hero seemed to find every inviting little thing or move about her worth gazing at, and she found him to be simply hot, especially since she hadn't been intimate in years. I was unusually attracted to him physically, and to the soothing front cover of the book. She has suffered some in the past, and her lifestyle isn't much to speak of, so I think most readers will have more here to relate to. I liked her open mind, related and sympathized with her. The hero has to keep his spying from her or she will never want to see him again. That's the tension spot in this book. There was an amazing scene in the hotel restaurant with dessert and footsie that got to me. Ahhh, I remember now... what a nice book this was! Wonder why I traded it off. Perhaps because of two problems with the Nick's mentality. For one thing, he was a homophobe, and whether a person approves of something or not, such irrational discomfort, fear, dread or hate is uncalled for. Meg's boss was a sweet gay man, but he never really hit on Nick, so why did the hero behave so childishly? Second, he was mostly closed off to the personal products she was critiquing, and to sexuality itself. Why? He had nothing against sex, so why against the beautiful innovative concepts that could enhance intimacy? And he seemed to be against self-loving, if I remember correctly. How could a nice handsome guy, who happens to be this unwantedly odd, be the object of a reader's lust? I don't know, but I assure you this was still somehow a very good book and still pretty hot. Just try it. Strange, I know.

Attorney Nick Deveraux hates his brother's plan because he feels it is sneaky going against his personal ethics. If Desiree Moon has acted libelelous towards Ron's Internet company, Guilty Pleasures, Nick prefers suing. However, Ron plays his only hand using their mother as blackmail. Nick knows that Ron has no compunctions to "borrow" from their widowed mom who cannot absorb another assault on her finances. Thus Nick is in a hotel ready prove on-line sex critic Desiree Moon is a fraud.

Meg Sugarbaker has no idea how a chef at Atlanta's exclusive Renaud became a sex expert writing about gadgets for the Emagazine Foreplay when she cannot get a date. When Nick and Meg meet in the hotel sparks fly. However, as they fall in love and he becomes her "boy toy" testing devices, he knows he will have to somehow reveal the truth about his sibling, but hopes that he does not have to choose between his beloved and his loved ones.

JUST TOYING AROUND is an exciting contemporary romance starring two delectable lead characters whose antics are fun, eminently refined when they employ sex gadgetry. Ron is a loser and his blackmailing Nick to do his bidding seems a stretch to accept especially since readers will see just how ethical one is and how sleazy the other is. Still fans will enjoy JUST TOYING AROUND, but should be forewarned that these are professional charcaters trained to use the gadgets so test the toys on him (not yourself) first in case you obtain one manufactured by Ron.

Harriet Klausner

For anyone who has an overactive libido, this is the book for you!! Meg/Desiree's exploits with Nick will have you turning the pages while you search for a fan to cool yourself!

This novel was the one that introduced me to Harlequin's Blaze series and, boy, am I glad I found it! Although, slightly predictable (as most straight romance novels are) Just Toying Around employs seduction, blatant sexual conversation and tender romance to entertain the reader and leave him or her wondering about how they can re-enact some of the scenes in their own love life!

I'm addicted to this author!!! Wow! This book was hysterical. Just the right combination of funny and hot. I loved it!

This book was an enjoyable read, right up until the hero's proud declaration of his homophobia. I was so startled and disappointed that I dropped the book and never made it past that scene. There are any number of things I find attractive in a man, but surpisingly enough, homophobia is not one of them.

It's always possible that the author somehow redeemed the male lead by the end of the book, but short of a miraculous epiphany, I can't imagine it. And I can't say I'm particularly interested in reading anything else by this author.