Shelly Gilmore chose Aiden Mitchell to be her male friend for three months to get over her fear of men. After living with a father who was abusive towards her mother and herself, and seeing her mother stay and take the abuse has given Shelly a warped idea of what a relationship was supposed to be like.
Aiden has given up women after having an altercation between himself and one of his past hookups. Aiden was devastated that he could not remember the woman's name. This had him evaluating how he sees women and to understand exactly when he became the one night hook up guy.
This experiment that Shelly has come up with will help them both explore the opposite sex without the pressure of feelings or sex. Aiden was quite happy to help Shelly since he would also be helping himself in the long run.
Shelly was sweet and a genius to have come up with a healthy plan to get over her fear of men. She wants to fall in love and start a family, but she tends to go for complete jerks. She chose Aiden since he seems to really feel bad after what happened to the out-of-towner.
I liked that Shelly said that she wanted to try her plan out for three months, it gave them tons of time to know each other before they started wanting to rip each other's clothes off. Because come on, it's a romance story, it was bound to happen. I just like that it happened later rather than sooner.
Aiden is suffering from abuse as well, just in a different way. If you are a fan of the Fools's Gold series, you'll know that Aiden's father is an artistic genius with a God Complex. Aiden did not show any signs of artistic talent, so he was ignored by his father. That would not have been so bad if their father did not tend to lose his temper most of the time and instead of his mother trying to protect her children from him, she instead tried to always make him happy. Bad moods and all.
Aiden's parent's relationship is weird and not a healthy one, but it seems to work for them. I blame his parents for his unhealthy view on women, and I am proud of him for wanting to change.
Aiden and Shelly were good for each other and their "friendship" confused a lot of people. No one wanted to believe that a man a woman can just be friends without dating or at least having sex. The experiences they shared brought them out of their comfort zone which made them realise new things about themselves.
Their feelings felt right and had time to grow in a more natural way, rather than the instant attraction that seems to be really common in most romance books.
This book will have you laughing, especially the parts where Aiden does some very feminine things (I'm still laughing about it). There are also parts that are relatable to people and would make your heart ache.
When I first started to read +Susan Mallery books, I was not that in love with it. It was the okay but not something I was anticipating to read, but something changed, either in her writing or in my taste, because now I can't get enough of her stories.
Her books leave you with a warm feeling inside, like when you eat comfort food and warmth spreads all the way throughout your body, her books are like that. I also like the twist in the book where the woman was in the wrong and the guy was right, it was a refreshing change. It has so few books where the woman has it all wrong.
Fans of Susan Mallery and Fool's Gold are going to enjoy this and when you read the book, please leave a comment asking any questions you might have and I would be happy to answer them.
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