Review: Heartthrob by Willow Winters

My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Renamed Second Chance
Standalone - Expose #1
Release - August 24, 2017
Genre - Contemporary Romance
Dual POV - 1st person
Heat - 3 out of 5
Length - 210 pages

Nathan Hart is charismatic with a beautiful smile that makes women weak in the knees.
He's a former bad boy with a mysterious past and was made to be in Hollywood; on the cover of magazines and the star of movies.

But there’s more to him that he hasn’t told a soul.

Something that draws me to him unlike anyone has before.
Something that could ruin us both.

I can’t tell him no, even if I wanted to.
The moment he locked his eyes on me, I was his.
And that first glance was ten years ago in high school.

A decade later, fate saw fit to shove me back into his life.

I can’t deny the heat between us or the way my body remembers his. And neither can he. Seeing him brings it all back.

He whispers to play along; he promises it will all be alright.
I only pray our past doesn’t destroy us.

Find your copy of Second Chance here:
Goodreads | Amazon
FREE with Kindle Unlimited

MY REVIEW

Nathan was a bad boy. Or at least that’s what the rumor is. Indeed, he came from the wrong side of the tracks, but aside from that I didn’t see any evidence of him being ‘bad’. Harlow was the good girl who couldn’t get enough of him. They had a history of poor communication and fights over virtually nothing, which made their relationship volatile. A night of unavoidable pain drove the two young lovers apart. Hearts were broken and they never believed they would see the other again. And yet, 10 years later, both happen to be on the same set for a TV show that they’re both starring in. History really has a habit of repeating itself with these two and their lack of communication was causing problems again.

I spent most of this book confused. It was one thing to not know the big ‘secret’ that Nathan and Harlow shared. The huge ‘secret’ that drove them apart. I’m all for ‘secrets’. However, they spent so much more time being inside their own heads instead of talking that their story became a tad bit frustrating. To the point that when the gigantic ‘secret’ was finally revealed, I didn’t even care anymore. I was more concerned with Harlow’s immaturity. She was around 28 years old and acted like a young adult. Not acceptable. On top of that, I didn’t like how Nathan was made out to be the bad guy. He was a freaking hero! Much effort was made to set the stage for this story but I feel like not enough attention was placed on how the story would unfold. I wasn’t invested in this couple’s HEA because I was still flabbergasted by the lack of ‘realness’ in the end. I really liked Nathan but I guess I wanted more development of his story. Their story. It felt incomplete.

One thing you can never take away from Willow Winters is how original her stories are. From one book to the next, it’s almost like reading from a different author and no two stories are the same. I really like that. With overlapping tropes and so few tropes to choose from, I can imagine it’s difficult for authors to make each story seem unique. So kudos to her for achieving the almost unachievable.