Rocky Waters by C.M. Steele

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Wanting a quick novella late Friday night before bed and something summery, I decided to pick up the next book in the Lovers Lake series. This series have different novellas written by different authors. Book two is Rocky Waters by C.M. Steele. Update: I applied this to the prompt of black on cover for the 3rd board of Summer of Swoon.

Bennett is an author and returning to his cabin in a small mountain town in Colorado to seclude himself and finish his latest novel. Everyone in town knows that they need to stay away from the trails and natural areas by his house since he needs silence. Since his phone is off, he doesn't receive the messages from his friend that's a photographer. He has scheduled a shoot for romance novels at the lake by his cabin and wanted to give him a heads up. Bennett gets angry and stomps down to the lake. He gets one look at the female model Darcy and immediately lays claim. Darcy is actually a big fan of Bennett's books, and is more than happy to be "kidnapped."

This book had so many tropes going in that I was super into. We have a bookish heroine, author hero, she's a model for romance covers, he's a grumpy/broody alpha hero and she's a fan of his writing. This is also less than 30 pages long, and certainly needed to be longer. I didn't like that they were both virgins and their fist time was perfect. And that they went on a marathon. It was just too much. I wish that this book was longer to flesh things out a little more. 

I knew it was going to be a novella going in, but I didn't look at page count. That aside, the 2-stars is mainly for the writing style. It was so weird and felt more like telling than showing. It wasn't just telling though, but telling every little thing. This is isn't an exact quote, but it was things like the author's going to sit down to write. The author listed out every little thing like he gets dressed in comfy clothes, sits down and turns his computer on, checks his phone before turning off, pulls up his writing program and starts writing. I didn't need a second by second list of every little thing he was doing. It wasn't just once and happened for both of the main characters. I found myself quickly just skimming in between dialogue. I guess for that reason it's good this was super short.

I will try more of the books in this series, but I might look at page count and tropes before picking on up. I don't know if I'll pick up anything else from C.M. Steele, I just don't think her writing style is for me. Maybe after she's got more books under her belt I might try another novella and see if her style changes? Mostly likely not though, especially if they are just as short.

Have you read Rocky Waters?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: Rocky Waters, C.M. Steele, 2-stars, 0 days, eBook, 24 pages, published in 2021