Guest Reviewed by Ami
Title: One Kiss More
Author: Mandy Baxter
Series: U.S. Marshalls #2
Heroine/Hero: Emma Ruiz/Landon McCabe
Genre: M/F Contemporary Romance
Length: 352 Pages
Publisher: Zebra Books/Kensington Publishing
Release Date: February 24, 2015
Available at: Amazon and Barnes & Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads
Blurb: Emma Ruiz knows her father is innocent. But that doesn’t help her convince the law—not even smoking hot U.S. Marshal Landon McCabe. When McCabe bangs on her door demanding information about how her cancer-stricken father escaped from federal prison, she’ll have to distract him somehow—it may as well be with a stolen kiss.
Landon gets why Emma isn’t saying all she knows. What he doesn’t understand is why he’s putting his reputation, his case, and his badge on the line for a gorgeous person of interest. Much as he’d love to, he can’t let Emma play him. The stakes are higher than either of them can guess. The only way to survive is to trust their instincts. But their instincts want more than one kiss…
Review:
I enjoyed the first book very much, thus I decided to read the sequel. I liked Landon from the first book too, so I wondered about the woman that seemed to get under his skin. Unfortunately, I wasn’t as impressed. It was an okay read, but it lacked the kind of sassy banter that I enjoyed from the first book. The banter made up for the flimsy plot there, which kept me quite entertained.
My issue with this second book was that I felt Landon and Emma’s relationship was superficial and focused mainly on their physical attraction. How gorgeous he is/she is, you know? It lacked the depth insight of their character. So Landon comes from money – his family had wealth, privilege, and high-society clout and his trust fund was enough to set him for the rest of his life — but he wanted to do the honorable thing by being a U.S. Marshall, not just follow in his family’s path, but at the same time, he always wears designers clothes? He dislikes his family’s lifestyle but he enjoys his monthly stipend? What is that? Isn’t that a little hypocritical of him?
Emma is also described as very smart, that she is “a general computer-geek-gun-for-hire” and “one of the top programmers of her field”, but I didn’t get that vibe from her. In fact, I kept thinking that she was making some stupid decisions – especially related to how she handled the problem with her father and the bad guys. I was getting tired with her way of thinking, that she couldn’t trust McCabe because he was the one arresting her father. Well, honey, if you want people to believe that your father is innocent, you need to provide significant evidence! And you need to TALK to them and not just SAY that your father is innocent.
The bad guys were also a bit cartoonish – like they needed to use Spanish terms every time they opened their mouth? It was too much … not enough layers for the bad guys either. Hey, I like good guys, but I need convincing bad guys as well, those who don’t feel two-dimensional.
So yes, it was an okay read for me – I don’t know if I will jump immediately for the next book in the series though.
Overall Impression: It was okay
*I received a copy of this book from the publisher in return for a fair and honest review.*
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