I just couldn’t do it. I had to DNF at p. 62 and I really just pushed myself to that point. The author tells too much rather than shows and yet, there is still not enough detail. Everything is too forced and trite. It’s like she’s trying to fit every single common romance cliché into the book, but it just doesn’t work.

For example:

“The rage in her eyes scared the hell out of him. He hunts down killers for a living and none of them ever caused this much fear to penetrate his body.”

Look, I like a strong woman whose man knows not to mess with her (Shelly Laurenston/G.A. Aiken, for example, is one of my ultimate authors and this is the norm in her books). But, not only is this a weirdly phrased cliché, but it doesn’t work because, I’m his owns words, she’s a small, soft, “innocent, and pure” social worker. For him to literally feel fear because of her is just ridiculous.

I could keep going on about all of the other cliché type tropes in the short 62 pages I read, but it’s not really about the clichés - I can like those. It’s just they’re all too forced and I can’t get past that.