Review: Flirting with Disaster by Ruthie Knox

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Title: Flirting with Disaster (Camelot #3)
Author: Ruthie Knox
Date of publication: 10 June 2013
Genre: Contemporary Romance


Author's links:
Website / Twitter / Facebook / Goodreads

My rating: 4 stars




Goodreads Blurb

In the latest eBook original novel in Ruthie Knox’s scorching-hot Camelot series, a no-strings fling looks an awful lot like falling in love—or flirting with disaster.

Fresh out of a fiasco of a marriage, Katie Clark has retreated to her hometown to start over. The new Katie is sophisticated, cavalier, and hell-bent on kicking butt at her job in her brother’s security firm. But on her first assignment—digging up the truth about the stalker threatening a world-famous singer-songwriter—Katie must endure the silent treatment from a stern but sexy partner who doesn’t want her help . . . or her company.

Sean Owens knows that if he opens his mouth around Katie, she’ll instantly remember him as the geeky kid who sat behind her in high school. Silence is golden, but he can’t keep quiet forever, not with Katie stampeding through their investigation. It’s time for Sean to step up and take control of the case, and his decade-old crush. If he can break through Katie’s newfound independence, they just might find they make a perfect team—on the road, on the job, and in bed.


My review

This is a typical steamy contemporary romance but what makes it stand out among its peers are the strong and complex characters and the realistic and engaging writhing style of Ms Knox.

What made this book work so well for me was mostly the hero, Sean. Don't get me wrong, the heroine, Katie, was a great character as well, but Sean just stole the show. He is a hot alpha male who stutters, hacks computers and has had a crush on our heroine since high school. Did I say he is hot? :)

I loved how complex and multidimensional the main characters in this book are. Katie is in bad place in her life - divorced, back to her home town, working for her brother's security company, not knowing who she is and what she wants to be. Enter Sean - he owns a successful Internet security company in California and is back to Camelot (temporary) to settle his mother's estate after her death and in the meanwhile starts working for Katie's brother. Put together on an assignment (more about later on) they get together more than just professionally.

Sean seems to be the exact opposite of Katie - he is in control of his life and at least on the outside, seems to know who he is and what he wants. Yet, as the story goes and his relationship with Katie develpes into something ore than casual fling, Sean questions his choices in life and facing his past, he turns out to be just as lost as Katie.

I liked the way Sean's problems with stuttering are presented. I can't tell if it is realistic or not, but his character is created with compassion and understanding. He is not just your typical super successful, possessive alpha male. He loses all his cool in front of Katie and becomes the awkward, lonely teenager he used to be. That's what makes him so cute and just irresistible.

Katie struggles through her own issues in this book. After a disastrous marriage where she sacrificed herself for the success of her husband, he is desperately trying to find her independence and is afraid to let herself care about other people (Sean, as well as their client, Judah) too much.

The struggles both Katie and Sean go through en route to their happily ever after feel very real. They both make mistakes which only makes them more human and even more likeable.

For me the weakest element in the story was the plot line with the security assignment Sean and Katie worked on. Judah is an ageing pop star who hires them because he was receiving threatening messages. He wants their help, but it takes him quite a while to share his true problems with them. I liked Judah's character and enjoyed his POV in the book but I found the whole situation with his protection/security totally unprofessional.

This was my first book by Ruthie Knox and I really enjoyed it. As a big fan of contemporary romances, especially well-written and character-driven ones, I definitely plan of checking more of Ms Knox's Camelot series.

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