Customer Reviews

Stranger

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

After being devastated by love and as a funeral director seeing first hand how difficult loss is, Grace decides she'd rather pay for a lover than invest in a relationship. At a bar, she expects to meet her latest rentboy but unwittingly leaves with a stranger named Sam, and has the best encounter of her life. She soon comes face to face with Sam again when his family hires her to bury a loved one, and Sam doggedly pursues her, while she continues to exclusively hire Jack for weekly encounters. When she does finally hook up with Sam, she feels something she hasn't felt in a long time - love and security. But how will Sam react when he finds out the truth about her past?

Megan Hart is probably one of the best authors I have had the pleasure to read. The consistency of her writing and narrative is unsurpassed, delving deep into her characters motivations, not just finding the shortest way to get to the next lust scene. Most authors write at least one crappy novel in between a sea of good ones, however, each of her novels is as good as the last. She excels at writing erotically charged fiction that is so well written, you often don't realize the content. Unlike many authors who tackle similar subject matter, you could actually take out her sexual passages and still have a cohesive, well-written and entertaining story. Fans of Hart's novels will recognize secondary characters Elle and Dan, the protagonists from her novel "Dirty." While "Stranger" might be her least graphic novel, it is also one of her best.

© Tracy Vest, January 2009

I don't understand. I feel much more sad at the end of Stranger, which had a happy ending, then I did at the end of Tempted, which didn't. But anyway.

I had a knot in my throat towards the end of the book and that knot is still there. Tears are actually rolling down my cheek. I've never read a book that left me so emotional. Tempted was an emotional read, but this one was different somehow.

Grace is afraid of dealing with the loss of someone she loves (as in a spouse). She thinks that if she never gets close enough to someone, then she'll never feel the pain of when that someone leaves. But the heart sometimes is stronger then our minds want it to be and she ends up falling in love with Sam.

Sam made me so angry towards the end of the novel. I felt that he didn't have a right to be angry because he didn't know her. It didn't have anything to do with him. It shouldn't have mattered.

But she didn't break. She wouldn't let herself. She went on, because she had to. The thing that always hurts the most about when relationships end is the fact that we still are alive just the same. Naturally we function better as part of a pair, but we can still function by ourselves. That's what kills the most. I think that's why this novel touched me on such a painful level...because I know the feeling. I know the feeling of suddenly being alone and knowing that you'll survive. You know it's not going to kill you, but some days you just wish it would.

I didn't like the ending so much. Yes it was a happy ending...but it was too easy. Sam hurt her too much but he doesn't have to win her back. She just wants him so much. For someone who had so much trouble letting someone in her life and then losing them, she was quick to let them try again. And I'm not saying that she shouldn't have let him back in. Just that...it should have been harder for him.

Stranger made me feel lonely. Usually romance novels leave me feeling warm and fulfilled. But this one left me wishing that things had worked out with that last guy. It was real and I liked that. I wish more of the books I read left me feeling something real.

This review is really just a bunch of my jumbled thoughts. Just know that this book touched me on a level that I've never encountered before. I've read books that have left me feeling emotional and teary, but for different reasons. I've never read one that made me feel sad for me.

If you can handle the graphic scenes, then please read this book.

Megan Hart's characters continue to fascinate me. Her writing is both amazingly simple and intensely complex making her first person narratives flow seamlessly. While sexually erotic, her novels also embody a stark reality that resonates with real life and real people. Megan Hart is an author who deserves to be on top.

There is one garishly loud technical problem with Grace Frawley owning Frawley & Sons and that being the obvious. Living in a small town leaves Grace with limited clients. But after working tirelessly, cutting her pay down to the minimum, and ramping up marketing opportunities, she's been able to pull the business back from the brink of closing. This, of course is unrecognized by her anal retired father who needs to find a hobby that doesn't involve checking up on Grace's every move as far as the business is concerned. Yet despite her father's recriminations, Grace is good at her job and she loves her work. While some may think a funeral director and it's corresponding job objectives as being morbid, Grace would say the very opposite. She is there to help people through the most difficult time of their lives. Not only does she help bury their loved ones in the most respectable manner possible but she is also there to assuage their grief by lending them a hand of understanding.

Grace also has a little secret...

Grace awaits him at a local bar. She's there to meet a stranger, a stranger in fact but not in the sense whereby stars align and fate bestows the one. Grace has paid in advance for this meeting with her stranger and she hopes to get exactly what she paid for, and boy does she ever. His name is Sam and he gives Grace the most gratifying sex that she's ever had. The only problem - Grace didn't pay for Sam. Her hired rent-a-boy happened to be late and Sam truly was a stranger...

While confident in her own skin, Grace is not confident in her life. Death and grief have marked her soul, leaving her with only one option - protection. Terrified of one day losing a husband, Grace has made the decision that she'll never allow a man close enough to cause her pain when he is gone. Her paid escorts provide a scratch to an itch and the impersonal quality of their dates gives Grace comfort. But two men are going to change Grace's life, one is Sam and the other is Jack.

Jack and his jaw-dropping, pantie-wetting, and immobilizing megawatt smile steals Grace's heart from almost day one. Fresh after her wild night with Sam the stranger, Grace is looking for any man to take her mind off her lingering and arousing thoughts of him. Her escort service has paired her with a man who is different from Grace's general type with his tattoos and body hardware, plus he's young but boy can he smile. Jack, new to the business but eager to learn, takes Grace through some of her most daring sexual escapades that are heavy on the role play. Yet as the layers pull apart one by one, Grace finds that she really likes Jack. For the first time in a long time, a man knows her.

Meanwhile, fate has stepped in again. Sam hurls back into Grace's life with the tragic death of his father. After mistaking him for a burglar and nearly bludgeoning him with a golf club, the heat between Sam and Grace erupts with as much force as before. But Grace, terrified of Sam's effect on her, denies his attempts for a relationship at every opportunity. But Sam's persistence pays off.

For the first time in long line of paid dates, Jack and Grace have unpaid sex. Dropping their masks, the two have true sex and it's during this one moment of pure reality that Grace imagines that it's Sam, not Jack. It's at this moment that Grace realizes that her yearning for Sam has reached the ultimate crescendo and she decides to give him the chance he's been begging for.

Yet as their relationship blossoms so does Sam's drinking. While outwardly he may appear like his father's death has meant little, his drinking shows something else entirely. As her job and family pressure escalates, Grace finally breaks down and tells her secret to Sam. Now with the ball in his court, can Sam accept Grace's past or will it just be the icing on the cake that will send him along with his drinking to an early grave?

I loved this story. I stayed up all night reading it in order to discover whether or not Sam and Grace would be able to work out their differences and try to make a life together. Hart writes some of the best erotic love scenes in the genre. Each experience it new and each provides further growth of her characters. 'Stranger' was stunning and I challenge any new erotic romance or Hart readers, to give this author a chance.

In one of my usual shopping sprees I had to feed my Megan Hart addiction and got this beauty to reward myself. Don't ask for what because I already forgot. LOL But I'm so happy I bought it and I will never part with this book or any other of Ms. Hart's books - they are all keepers.

Back to this one: As every Megan Hart book I read so far, this one has a deep emotional background. It's nothing too fancy or overly imaginative but in my opinion that makes the whole experience more, not less.

The story is about Grace, a funeral director. I have to say that is an extremely emotionally straining job. I absolutely don't want to change lives with her. She totally loves her job and is fully committed to it. She knows that she does something important for the community and also helps the families of the deceased. She knows what to say and what to do in the situations that leave us completely helpless in our grief. But the one thing she decided for herself is a real mistake in my eyes: She doesn't want to find herself in the situation of being helpless after losing the love of her life to death. So what does she do? She calls one sexy gigolo after the next and doesn't regret any of her sexy adventures. You go girl! In her opinion it's the best way to keep love at bay. She never expected to find someone like Sam by accident. He's all she never wanted but craves nonetheless. He is her perfect match and she tries to find a way to get rid of him, although all she wants is him. Confusing? No, just typically female.

Sam thought he had the luckiest day in his life when he finds sexy Grace willingly in this bar. More fortunate when he meets her again. He's a very persistent specimen and doesn't give up in his pursuit of Grace. He knows how to tease her and he was really confusing from time to time with his frontal attacks and immediate retreats after. His character is a mystery through nearly the whole book so I won't tell you too much because I wanted to figure out why he acted the way he did myself and you will too.

Oh, and I nearly forgot Jack, Grace's new gigolo discovery. He's a newbie in the occupation and found a great mentor with our heroine. She shows him what a girls wants and likes and how to become an even better lover.

Jack is a really cute character. He's young, pierced and really tempting. Grace really likes him but more in a friendly way. He helps her to unwind and with his help she has something to block out her feelings for Sam. He's the shield to save her heart.

This book is full of fascinating side-characters but this review would really get too long if I mentioed them all. Just be assured Ms. Hart knows how to create a community of many different and complex characters. Sure, this book gets a bit emotionally hard to stomach because of all the families we meet at the funeral home. But I never had the feeling I would drown in my sympathy and compassion for the individual clients she had.

As always Ms. Hart created an emotional and sexy story that drew me in from the first page, didn't let go of my attention on the whole ride, made me cry in one of the last chapters but also made up for it in the end. Okay, I would have loved this book even more with an extra chapter at the end but I'm a HEA addict and always would prefer to read more about that.

I love to read her books- they make you think, laugh and even cry, while still offering up their fair share of smut too. So what is not to like?

I give Stranger 4.5 out of 5 stars.

This one was okay but I felt it was rushed. I didn't buy her paying for escorts. The story felt contrived to me and as a result it was hard for me to really care for the characters. I also didn't feel the connection between her and her "stranger." I really like Megan Hart, but this was my least favorite of her books.

I've read a few other Megan Hart books and really enjoyed them. The storylines are provocative and the characters are complex and interesting. In Stranger, Grace, a funeral director, prefers to hire male escorts rather than deal with the complications of a real relationship. The book follows Grace and her relationships with two men, Jack, a young male escort, and Sam, a man she sleeps with, mistakenly thinking he is her male escort. The sparks fly between Grace and both these men, each encounter teasing and erotic. By the end of the book, Grace's character does grow and lessons about life and love are learned. Stranger was definitely an interesting read, one I found hard to put down!

Megan has become a must buy for me.

I agree with other reviewers that its is a very emotional read which is why i love her books so much.I like some sex to go along with my emotion/story not the other way around.

With Stranger you "feel" along with Grace..Megan is able to write so that you imagine her characters are real people,which IMO is a gift.
Grace has lots of complimentary character traits but enough faults to not make her too perfect.
Sam is adorable! He definitely needs to mature but what a guy to wait for..and i LOVE tall men..yum.

It was great to see some previous characters in this book,we can see some threads staring to weave their way through..can't wait for Jacks story..

I am getting bored with the average erotica novel as there is just no connection to make me care..just lots of throbbing and thrusting :D
Stranger has plenty of hot sex but you don't feel as though it was shoved in to make up the word count - its an integral part of the story and tells you alot about Sam and Grace as a couple and individuals..

The motel card scene was scorching..really well written (kaz fans herself)
and loved the little Keanu Reeves references..heh.


ALL Megans novel have you feeling emotion one way or another..and this book is right up there as my favourite after "Dirty"

There are some spoilers in this review. Stranger, like Megan Hart's previous novels, is an action-packed, sexy, emotional romance that tears up the pages with heat while also telling a touching love story. Set in the unusual business of a family funeral home, protagonist Grace prefers men she pays for rather than ones she picks up randomly. When wires get crossed and she screws stranger Sam at a hotel, not realizing he's not the gentleman she's hired, she shrugs it off, until they meet again, when she's called to deal with Sam's father's death. Meanwhile, despite the lingering passion between them, she continues to see Jack, the man she was supposed to have hired, schooling him in the ways of doing his new job and making a new friend...who she happens to have sizzling sex with.

Yet Sam keeps calling, and calling and calling, and eventually she cannot resist. Grace's resistance to anything approximating a real relationship even as part of her longs for just that. She's a strong, proud businesswoman on the outside, trying to climb out from under her father's shadow, but she gets off (literally and figuratively) on being able to hire men at her whim. While it's clear to the reader that she yearns for something more, she isn't so sure. Hart puts plenty of explicit scenes here, and doesn't try to come up a generic happy ending; I like that she created a character who goes against everything women are "supposed" to do, and she certainly gets gossiped about, even by her own family.

She stands up for herself and her desires, both to her family, her employees, and her lover, and yet even the scenes with the rentboys, as she at one point calls them, aren't cold and clinical, as evidenced by the fact that she continues to be friends with the main man she's seen. That in a small town in Pennsylvania such a service would be available is a bit unrealistic, but still, wouldn't it be great if it were? Hart challenges those who'd think that only men pay for sex, yet also gives Grace enough of a heart to allow one special man to enter it, even if it's not always smooth sailing for them. Stranger has a unique, hot premise that Hart delivers on fully, with well-rounded characters, details about the funeral home industry, and enough passionate trysts (purchased and not) to warm up your winter nights.

I loved this book. Started reading it in the parking lot of my health club. Don't think I ever did go in to work out. It draws you in right away. Great opening chapter. Main character Grace has a lot of depth and appeal. Even if you don't approve of prostitution, somehow it's ok if Grace partakes because we like Grace and her rent boy likes her. It's more of a relationship, so we wink. Only a good writer can do that; take something essentially deplorable and make it attractive and the main character likable. Sex scenes are really, really good and varied, and not gratuitous at all. Well done. (Also first nod I've read in erotic fiction to the fact that there may be a physical price to pay for rough sex.)

This story also features the unique and interesting profession of funeral home director. I like that both Sam and Jack are well-rounded, and that co-workers Shelly and Jared are used just enough to show how their relationship affects Grace, without delving too much into their romance. I like in this book (unlike her book "Tempted") that the family is used just enough, but you don't get too into their issues, the focus is really Grace through and through.

Now the nit-picky stuff I didn't like. You get no physical description of Grace until about p. 136 -- this is something that drives me nuts with authors. I need some description right away or I fill it in. So not having one, I made Grace a short-haired, busty blonde for whatever reason, in my head. Then we find out almost half way in that she's brunette, long bangs, B-cup etc. Hard for me to change the picture of the main character in my head at this point.

** Caution Spoilers ** Great, heart-wrenching scene in the cafe, but the ending wrapped up too quickly. I had a lot of questions about Sam: Why's he back in town? What's with the blonde in the café? What's with the alcoholism? What epiphany did Sam come to to suddenly want to resume with Grace? Did he show up in court so she could get her bail back? I gots to know. I guess if the Grace I know and love is going to give her broken heart back to Sam, I need to know that he isn't going to pick up the blonds he seems to like to flirt with, have another tantrum over her past and walk out on her again etc. I don't quite trust Sam in the end--but maybe that's me. Again, I'm nit-picking. This is a really good, well-written book. I highly recommend it.

This was a eally good book.. an erotic tale with a good story.. the ending was predictable, but I would've bitched had it ended any other way I think.. I'll prolly read it a few more times if not for the love story, deffinatly for the smut factor..