Author: Bethany Brown, Ashlyn Kane
Stars: 3.5/ 5
More info: Goodreads.com
Buy it: Barnes & Noble*, Alibris (No Ebook), Amazon*
Blurb: Perhaps it's a twist of fate when event photographer Cameron Walker runs into veterinarian Jeremy Montgomery at a wedding. Cameron has harbored a crush on the handsome man since high school, and he can't believe his luck. Jeremy asks him to dance, and Cameron's over the moon. Having admired Cameron from afar, Jeremy is just as thrilled to discover Cameron feels the same. After a few dates, Cameron and Jeremy (and their new dog) are ready to embark on a loving journey they both have dreamed of-a new life together. Cameron's best friend, Detective Patrick Hawkins, is very happy for the new couple. But he's equally worried when mysterious gifts with disturbing letters keep appearing, targeting Cameron. When the stalking escalates to a senseless and stunning act of violence, Patrick is there for the two men, both physically and emotionally. Working together, Cameron, Jeremy, and Patrick set out to find the stalker and put a stop to his actions, but will they be able to stop him before it's too late? Book Two in the Lost Boys and Love Letters Series
The Why : I read this book once already. I don’t quite remember why I picked it up, perhaps because of the photography topic or perhaps just because it was a M/M book that seemed interesting. I reread this book currently because I knew it was an easy read, I needed something to review, and I was possibly searching to read a scene with a threesome I knew I wouldn’t be appalled by.
My Thoughts: Now, before I start my review I feel I need to mention that this book is supposed to be part of a series and I haven’t read the first story. Picture Perfect stands decently on its own without having read True North but there may be something I’m missing that was described in the first book.
The first time I read this book I’m pretty sure I liked it well enough, but I also know that I saw problems with it. Rereading it now and writing a review for it I found more problems and my liking of it was reduced. While the writing is ok, the speech between characters seems a little unnatural at times. I kept questioning in my head if what a character was saying was something you would think they would say, because it was just a tad out of character. Beyond that some sentences were just plain weird to read when you thought about them, I know they didn’t bug me the first time because I unintentionally fixed them as I was reading along. Going back and reading them now the wording just seems off, forced, and unnatural. The other thing that bugged me as I was reading is some of the facts seem thrown in, almost as if they were an afterthought. Some of these facts seem as if they could have had more detail added to them to make them seem less random but most of the time they just seemed like small little facts that, while they explained some things, probably could have gone without.
I did love almost all of the characters, besides the obvious. Cameron and Jeremy are a sweet couple, but it seems almost too sweet. They join together very quickly, even with the very long attraction both men have had for each other. For holding off for so long, to suddenly just click like they do is something that stood out to me. For all the little details that I caught, like living in the same town, Cam owning a cat and Jeremy being a vet, Jeremy tutoring Cam in High school, and a few other non important thing, I feel as if one of them suddenly doing something on a whim is a little unlikely. And though I loved their relationship, I felt like they were too happy for too long. The story focused too much on their happiness before getting into something that had real meat to it.
These characters that I did love, I feel like I was pushed into loving them because the background characters were just that, completely in the background. There weren’t very good descriptions given for many of the non major characters. Many of them I didn’t care for, but for some I felt like it would have been nice had some more information been given for them. Then there were the characters that just seemed to appear out of nowhere. There was no warning or introduction given to these people who pop in. It was very abrupt to suddenly have to know these characters who weren’t in existence before.
The one last thing I have to say about this is that some of the animals are a little too human. While I’m a lover of all animals and believe most of them to be very intelligent, the amount of intelligence given to Cam’s dog sometimes draws me from the flow of the story because it’s just not believable enough.
All in all: As much as I really wanted to give this book a higher rating, I felt like it hadn’t quite gotten far enough with me to go higher. Picture Perfect was a nice easy story to read, while not the best it definably wasn’t the worst. It was enjoyable, particularly considering it was a book I actually went back to read. I would suggest this is you have some time to kill.
Much Love,
Samantha
*Hugs*
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