ARC Review: Fire Me Up by Rachel Johns

Ok, I really really try not to give a book 2 stars but I just didn't know what else to do with this one. This book starts out when Travis, a former member of the Deacons of Bourbon Street Motorcycle Club, returns to NOLA. Travis is a bossy, brooding, alpha male MC guy. I thought that was all I needed to love him and the book, I was wrong. Travis' goal is to sell the former Deacons clubhouse, enter Billie. Billie is the current tenant in what used to be the clubhouse. She is a hippie type chick who runs some...eccentric art gallery out of the house and she has no interest in moving. So in a strange twist, Travis declares that because he owns the house (along with the other former Deacon members), he is going to move in until he can sell it-with Billie.

I think from the moment of the Travis move in, I started struggling with this book. I don't mind using my imagination to help things along when the story stops making any sense but this was too much for me. How do you just let a total stranger move in with you? I don't care how much your "lady parts" quiver at the thought of the guy, Ted Bundy was attractive. I told myself to get over it but when Billie was disappointed that Travis wasn't "home" yet, I felt my grip on calm slipping away.

I appreciated the author's efforts in depicting a love-hate drama between Billie and Travis. Billie loves him because he's hawt and hates him because he's trying to EVICT her. Travis loves her because she's hawt and hates her because he wants to EVICT her. Yeah, good effort with that line of thinking but it just didn't work out. The conflict between the main characters wasn't compelling. Something about the way Billie responded to Travis was just kind of silly. What really makes this book hard to get into as a romance is that there is very limited interaction between the couple. Half or more of the story is Travis and Billie with other people. Their on paper chemistry was already tenuous. Keeping the two separated for most of the book was the nail in the coffin. I just didn't relate to the couple at all. I didn't feel any chemistry and by the end of the book I just didn't care. I'm sorry, I really tried to hang in there but this just did not work for me.

**ARC provided by Publisher**

Purchase: | Amazon | B&N | iTunes |