All She Wants by Larkin Rose

All She Wants by Larkin Rose

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I genuinely really liked this book. The story remained interesting the whole way through, though a little bit predictable. This being an erotica novel, I expect there to be a lot of sex and little plot, but this one delivered on both fronts. The sex scenes were tasteful and the attraction between the two main characters felt believable. I liked that a couple of sex scenes were alluded to instead of described in detail. It helped the story flow more smoothly.

One small detail did feel a little off though. The fact that the party planning contest was a reality tv competition wasn’t a factor at all in the book until the very end. This didn’t really hurt the story in any way, just something that I feel could have been made more apparent in the earlier parts of the book.

Overall I really enjoyed this book. It was interesting and well written.

Full Review with Spoilers

When I started this book, I wasn’t sure what sort of plot I would be getting into. I was pleasantly surprised though. While the plot wasn’t super deep it was still interesting and engaging.

Main character Tessa is a wedding planner working with her sister. She wants to strike out on her own and make it big by her own merits. At first I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about this character. Wedding planning didn’t seem all that exciting to me. Honestly though, her part in the plot had almost nothing to do with that. Tessa joins a contest where she’s put in a team of event planners. Weddings, parties, general vacations, whatever. Her team just has to be scored higher than the other teams based on the clients satisfaction with the events. I’m not gonna lie, this is a wee bit convoluted, especially since this whole competition is a part of a television reality series. I don’t even think I realized there was a tv crew around because it’s not really brought up until the very end. I found that a bit odd. Seems like a big detail to overlook, especially since Tessa and other main character Marci are all over each other a lot.

That being said though, it was the characters that I felt really made this a good story. Tessa is a kick-ass woman with goals. She doesn’t settle for less than what she deserves. She has morals but isn’t judgmental towards others. Which is why she can loathe her younger sisters tendency to hook up with married women, but still engage in a one night stand when both parties are on the same page. For me I find it to be a good character trait. She loves her sister, but not the behavior. She’s an adult, she can hook up if she wants. Tessa’s one major flaw is that she doesn’t believe in love due to her own family falling apart.

This leads her to hook up with Marci her first day in Colorado at a bar. Neither of them realize that they are going to be seeing a lot of each other starting the next day. Tessa is looking for a good time and someone to scratch and itch. Marci however has other reasons. She’s basically drowning a broken heart with lots of one night stands with no commitments or emotions. Both of them feel like they connected sexually with each other after their night together, so when they meet up again, the sparks are flying and they can’t wait to get in each other’s pants again.

Marci I liked slightly less. I totally understand that she walked in on her wife of 11 years cheating on her in her own bed, but she still started grating on my nerves just a bit. Her constant need to remind herself that she didn’t trust women any more and that she didn’t want to put emotions into anything got a little old. It wasn’t awful exactly, just a bit repetitive.

They have a couple of moments where they want nothing to do with each other. Both think the other is lying and using them for some reason or other a few times. This actually felt believable to me, not overplayed are shoehorned in for drama. The fact that it was Tessa’s younger sister that slept with Marci’s wife was predictable the moment I learned that Marci’s wife cheated. I actually really looked forward to getting to the moment when everyone realized that fact. It was handled pretty much how I thought it would. Lot’s of anger. Both of them being so damn stubborn. In the end though both realize they love each other and they need to let go of their pride and take a chance.

Honestly, this was a really good example of plot with sex. The sex scenes were well written and believable. I was happy too that some scenes where lead up to and basically cut away to after the fact. Too many more scenes would have bogged down the pacing for me. This book was a solid blend of both plot and sex.