The Gamble

Review ebook The Gamble

I made it to page 1354 of 1466 before I decided to stop torturing myself (Kindle pages! The book isn’t THAT long…though it sure felt like it).

The main character, Nina, is British (American really, but has a British Accent). I didn’t like her. It’s not that I disliked her, I just didn’t like her. I found her very one dimensional, without depth to her character. And she says Um a lot. A LOT. I tried to use the find button to find a specific paragraph that really irked me, but I gave up after the I made it to page 1354 of 1466 before I decided to stop torturing myself (Kindle pages! The book isn’t THAT long…though it sure felt like it).

The main character, Nina, is British (American really, but has a British Accent). I didn’t like her. It’s not that I disliked her, I just didn’t like her. I found her very one dimensional, without depth to her character. And she says Um a lot. A LOT. I tried to use the find button to find a specific paragraph that really irked me, but I gave up after the first 100 “Um..”‘s. Here’s how it went.

Max “So you knew?”
Nina “Um…”
Max But you didn’t tell me?”
Nina “Um…”
Max ” How could you not have told me ?”
Nina “Um…”
Max ” Didn’t you know how that would hurt me? Jesus Nina!”
Nina “Um…”

Ok, possibly not quite that bad, but seriously, there were quite a few “Jesus, shoot my head off now!” moments for me. If Nina wasn’t bad enough, the rest of the characters were. Maybe it’s because I’m from the west coast, and never been to Colorado,but none of them seemed real to me. Especially the way they talked. They were all over the top, and they were ALL eccentric. I can understand having a kookie mother, or neighbour, or main character, or sister… but when they’re all competing it hurts my eyes!

Max… I had to re-read his sentences SEVERAL times because they left critical words out. Not a grammatical error, either- as it was done throughout the book. I don’t know why, perhaps people in Colorado talk like this, but I sincerely doubt it. It aggravated me to no end. Oh, and Max also says “Yeah” a lot, which bothered me. It seems British or Australian. “Nina, just don’t do it again. Yeah?” But the main thing for me is that they ALL sounded alike, and none of them had any distinguishing characteristics. They were too cliche. Macho mountain man always protecting his woman, eccentric mother who wants to move in next door, crazy hermit neighbour…you get the idea.

And Max…I have nothing against domineering men. I LOVED Fifty Shades, and I think that’s why this was on my recommended list. But Max isn’t the same. Sure he talks dirty, but it didn’t turn me on. I didn’t feel the chemistry between him or Nina either- I mean, he falls in love with her because she gets pissed at his cabin? Really? After that it was over, and he’d die for her. Oh, taking her car keys away? That kind of did it for me. She wasn’t even angry (well,the book says she was angry, but I didn’t see it!). The moment his lips touched hers, she was happy. I would love to meet a man whose lips are so magical, no matter how angry I was, I forgave him instantly and jumped on my back. Ugh.

Take this review with a grain of salt, because I’m obviously a dissenter here. A book with this many 5 star reviews must have something going for it… I’m just not sure what. Maybe the sex scenes? They were pretty hot. But I can’t even bring myself to finish the last 100 pages to find out who did it (the murder, which apparently is the “plot” of this book). I don’t care- about who did it, or why, or even that the guy is dead. I grew up reading Harlequin romance novels, and while my literary palette has slowly graduated, I do still love to read beach novels and easy reads. I was hoping this would be one of them.

Alas, all I can think is ick- and I’m glad I don’t live in Colorado!

…more