Friday, June 28, 2013

Spotlight Review, Deleted Scene and Giveaway: Unbreak Me by Lexi Ryan


Synopsis

“If you’re broken, I’ll fix you…”

I’m only twenty-one and already damaged goods. A slut. A failure. A disappointment to my picture-perfect family as long as I can remember. I called off my wedding to William Bailey, the only man who thought I was worth fixing. A year later, he’s marrying my sister. Unless I ask him not to…

“If you shatter, I’ll find you…”

But now there’s Asher Logan, a broken man who sees the fractures in my façade and doesn’t want to fix me at all. Asher wants me to stop hiding, to stop pretending. Asher wants to break down my walls. But that means letting him see my ugly secrets and forgiving him for his.

With my past weighing down on me, do I want the man who holds me together or the man who gives me permission to break?


4.5 star review 

Being a fan of Lexi Ryan's writing I could not wait for Unbreak Me and I have to say that it is by far my favorite book by Lexi Ryan.  It is a beautiful heart warming story about a girl who is broken in so many way and how she finds the one man who wants to break down all her walls and make her see the beautiful person she truly is.  

At the young age of fifteen Maggie became known as the town slut, due to certain events that were not her fault.  It was at the age of 15 that Maggie became the broken person that she is today.  She was young and needed her family and instead they turned their backs on her.  Her family was disappointed in her and made her feel like she wasn't worthy of their love, when they should have been their to protect her and support her.  Maggie becomes the person everyone thinks she is, she begins to play the role of the town slut very well.  A year ago she left town and the man that she loved behind.  She was supposed to marry Will and live happily ever after with him.  Will loved her and wanted to fix her and she needed Will.  But she left him out of fear of him finding out the truth.  

It's now a year later and Maggie has come back to watch her sister get married, to the man she loves and walked away from.  Yes her sister is marrying her ex-fiance Will.  Not only does she need to face the two of them getting married but she also needs to face her past, face the town that has criticized her, labeled her and caused her so much pain and heartache.  Maggie isn't sure she can move forward though and tries going back to the only way she knows how to cope, by throwing herself at men and using her body to get past the hurt. When it comes to her body she is an open book, but it's her emotions and secrets that she keeps locked up inside.  Until she meets Asher Logan and he changes everything.  

"Something about Asher compels me to open up.  Something about the way his blue eyes take me in.  It's like he sees something good when he looks at me, and I want to throw my ugliness in his face to prove him wrong." 
  
OMG, how I loved Asher Logan.  Not only is he a sexy rock star but he is just sweet and caring and amazing. Ashton has been burned in the past before and it has been a while since he has been with a woman.  But when he meets Maggie he is drawn to her and wants to get to know her.  He sees so much in Maggie that most people don't.  He sees the sadness and the hurt, but he doesn't want to fix her because he doesn't think she is broken.  He thinks she is beautiful and worthy of being loved.  He wants to get beneath the surface of Maggie and break her walls down.  He knows that there was something there with Will and refuses to be with her in a sexual way while she is still in love with someone else. He tries very hard to resist her sexual advances, but he knows that what Maggie needs right now isn't sex.  They start hanging out and eventually things go beyond a friendship.  And slowly Asher starts to break down that walls that Maggie has built. Maggie has a past that isn't a pretty one and is afraid of what people will think if they knew the truth.  But with Asher things are different, she feels comfortable and safe with Asher and she trusts him.  But the biggest obstacle for Asher and Maggie is Maggie herself.  Asher loves her and wants to help her but Maggie has been so scarred by her past, her parents and the town she lives in, that she doesn't believe that she is worthy of anyone's love.  Will being with Asher make Maggie see how beautiful she is and that she is worthy of being loved by Asher and deserves a happily ever after?

Unbreak Me is such a wonderful story.  I admit that I loved Will, just not with Maggie.  He is sweet and caring and really loves Maggie but he also tries to fix her and that is not necessarily what she needs.  Asher on the other hand is what Maggie needs, someone to push her, to make her believe in herself and believe that she is worth it.  Asher and Maggie were perfect together.  The moments they shared when she tells him the secrets of her past were emotional and will break your heart.  Maggie opens up to him and he never judges her for anything that happened in her past.  It is in her past and now it's time to put it behind and look to a future.

"I'm terrified of how much he knows about me, how much he sees when he looks at me."

Lexi Ryan definitely out did herself with Unbreak Me.  It completely sucked me in right from the start and I found myself not wanting to put it down. I needed to know what happened in Maggie's past that caused her so much pain, I needed to know how in the world Will ended up with Maggie's sister, and I needed to know how it would end.  Would she get the happily ever after with the guy she deserved?  This book will bring out all the emotions, making you sad, happy, angry, frustrated and break your heart and then slowly put it back together again.  But the journey is worth it and in the end will leave you smiling.  

This is a beautiful story about love, forgiveness and moving on from your past.  About learning to love yourself in order to let others love you.  Maggie has a past that she is ashamed of, a past where she made mistakes and choices that she may not be proud of but they are her past.  And sometimes things aren't always what they seem. What happened in Maggie's past wasn't her fault but she is the one who has been suffering all these years because of it. She is trying to move on and be a better person. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone has a past, but despite what happened in your past there is someone out there who will love you for the person you are, there is someone who sees the real you and understands the heart ache and pain that you have been through.  There is someone out there that just wants to love you .  And for Maggie that someone is Asher Logan.  Amazing job by Lexi Ryan.  I cannot wait for Will's story!

"Normally, I back off when I start to feel something for a woman.  But the thing is,"  he whispers now, "It's too late.  I've already fallen for you."

Deleted scene from Unbreak Me

Maggie—April (13 months before UNBREAK ME begins)

     I have no right to be this happy when my world is falling apart, when I have totally FUBARed my own life. Again.
     But spring is here and I can’t help but feel optimistic when the sun is warming my skin and everywhere I look something new has turned green.
     Photosynthesis feels like this unexpected miracle after the long, cold winter. 

     Or maybe it’s Will who feels like the miracle. Will with his soft touch and easy smile. Will with his warm embrace and whispered reassurances.
     I can hardly believe it’s been two weeks since I showed up at his apartment, wishing I could cry. But I suck at crying, so instead I took off my clothes, and the next thing I knew, we were both naked and he was framing my face in his hands as he slid inside of me.
     He didn’t kiss me that first time. Or the second. I wouldn’t let him, and he seemed to accept, if not understand, that I could push the boundaries of our friendship in every way but that one. I needed to feel his steady strength, his constant heat. I needed to feel him move inside me, but I wasn’t ready for our mouths to touch—evidence, I’m sure, that I’m the worst kind of slut, but fuck the people who don’t get it.
     But today was different. I sat by the river behind my mom’s house and watched it rush by, fat with the spring rain. And Will found me there. He sat cross-legged beside me and entwined his fingers through mine. And even though I knew it was the perfect moment to tell him the truth about what brought me to his door two weeks ago, I was too drunk on sunlight and optimism to speak the truth he deserved to hear.
     When I lay down in the grass, he rolled above me, bracing himself on his elbows as he studied my mouth.
     “Let me kiss you, Maggie.”
     It was like one of those movie moments where the seconds before the kiss are so damn delicious you almost hope their lips never touch.
     I smiled up at him, all that messy blond hair framed in sunlight, and I tugged at his shirt in answer to his question.
     When his lips touched mine, there were fireworks. Okay, firecrackers if you want to get technical about it. Damn kids down the street are overly found of shooting bottle rockets over the river. But there may have been some metaphorical pyrotechnics too—because for me and Will that movie moment of the seconds before the kiss has been dragged out for five years. He wouldn’t kiss or touch me when I showed up to his dorm room at fifteen, and when he came back to New Hope for grad school, I wouldn’t kiss him. Until now. Until today.

***

Maggie—May (12 months before UNBREAK ME begins)

     I called off the wedding. Officially.
     There should never have been a wedding to call off, but this all happened so fast, and I saw an escape in his kindness and suddenly…there was.
     When I told Will it was off, I felt like the biggest piece shit.
     I did it in a text.
     I know! He deserved better than that, but I can hardly face him right now. I’m so afraid I’ll give in to the temptation to carry through with the original plan. I could tell him the truth, but honesty is for people who have nothing to hide.
     He didn’t reply to the text. He just showed up at Mom’s looking like a man who just lost his child. The irony of that moment was like a whip cracking against my raw heart.
     It was raining but he didn’t object when I asked to go for a walk. We didn’t bother with umbrellas, just walked down to the river in the rain, both of us happy for anything that might disguise our tears.
     His nearness was such a temptation. I can imagine spending my life with him.
     No. Scratch that. I can imagine someone spending her life with him. He’s going to make an amazing husband some day. All the more reason I need to bow out now, right?
     I sat on the wet grass and curled my fingers into the cool earth. I told him I couldn’t marry him.
He was a wreck, and I couldn’t look at him, couldn’t explain. But even keeping my eyes on the river, the hurt came all over again every time I heard his voice.
     And then he started making me promises. Amazing promises I know he meant, promises a girl like me just doesn’t deserve.
     I lost it.
     I wanted to tell him, But you deserve better. I didn’t say it—not when it’s an excuse so many women say and don’t mean.
     That’s when he dropped to his knees in front of me and I had to look him in the face. I had to see those soft, kind eyes, and I wanted a do-over more than anything. I wanted to start over from the moment he came home as a grad student at Sinclair. Hell, I wanted to start over from when I was fifteen.
     “Marry me, Maggie.”
     I told him no, just like I should have the first time. I told him no and closed my eyes because my aching heart was too selfish for company.
     His eyes—so blue, so sweet—searched my face, looking for something I no longer have to give. Because my heart is in someone else’s hands now.

 


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