Book Lovers Inc.
Romance Novel Reviews, Author Interviews, Commentary
ARC Review: Beautiful Bastard by Christina Lauren
Format Read:e-ARC provided from the publisher via Edelweiss
Number of Pages:320 pages
Release Date:February 12th 2013
Publisher:Gallery Books
Series: Beautiful Bastard, #1
Formats Available: Paperback, e-book, Audio
Purchasing Info: Goodreads | Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Book Depository US | Book Depository (UK)
Book Blurb:
An ambitious intern. A perfectionist executive. And a whole lot of name calling. Discover the story that garnered more than two million reads online.
Whip-smart, hardworking, and on her way to an MBA, Chloe Mills has only one problem: her boss, Bennett Ryan. He’s exacting, blunt, inconsiderate—and completely irresistible. A Beautiful Bastard.
Bennett has returned to Chicago from France to take a vital role in his family’s massive media business. He never expected that the assistant who’d been helping him from abroad was the gorgeous, innocently provocative—completely infuriating—creature he now has to see every day. Despite the rumors, he’s never been one for a workplace hookup. But Chloe’s so tempting he’s willing to bend the rules—or outright smash them—if it means he can have her. All over the office.
As their appetites for one another increase to a breaking point, Bennett and Chloe must decide exactly what they’re willing to lose in order to win each other. Originally only available online as The Office by tby789—and garnering over two million reads on fan fiction sites—Beautiful Bastard has been extensively updated for re-release.
My Thoughts:
How could one describe Beautiful Bastard in just one word? Easy! Porn. I’m terribly sorry for being so crude and harsh but there is no other better word to describe this book. It’s porn in its very core, with no plot, no character development, no decent writing, nothing else. All there is in Beautiful Bastard is sex and name callings.
And here is why I’m still wondering why on earth this fanfiction would ever be published. It has little redeeming qualities (at least the way I see it and according to my personal taste). There’s an audience out there that really liked this book and even though I can’t fathom why, I respect that, so just bear in mind that this review is my personal opinion, expressing what Beautiful Bastard made me feel. And reading Beautiful Bastard was almost painful at times. I have nothing against a good smut, I do enjoy them when they are tastefully written. When we’re talking about a book that has something else going on apart from the f***ing parts. And in Beautiful Bastard, there is nothing else except those parts.
Anyway, let’s take things from the start. I had problems with this book from the very first chapters. I can’t remember now if it was the first or the second chapter where I rolled my eyes for the first time. Yeah, that soon. Because you see somewhere there, was when the main couple started the whole f***ing routine. A routine, that never stopped I’m afraid… We know next to nothing about Chloe and Ryan except that Ryan is the boss and Chloe is his assistant. Oh and the fact that Ryan is a bastard. I think that throughout the whole book he is referred to more often with the term “bastard” than his own name. You get the picture right? Chloe is having a really bad day, Ryan acts like an ass and before the day ends they have sex. Just like that. And note here that Chloe hates his guts, but, as soon as Ryan makes a totally inappropriate move on her she falls for it and bang the whole bang bang begins…
From there things progress exactly the way they began. With lots of sex, everywhere in their office, lots of cursing from both sides, lots of manipulation and little else. And when I say that in this book they cuss a lot, I’m not joking. I’m not a prude and to be honest, I myself cuss a lot. Probably more than I should. So imagine for me to notice that the cussing level in this book was pretty high, how the dialogues really were…
And speaking of the dialogues… They were cheesy and mind-numbingly stupid. And I think that it’s the first time I use such a vocabulary in any of my reviews, so I’m terribly sorry for that. But honestly, it’s the first time I can’t really help myself. Most of their dialogues went along the lines of:
” – Hey you bitch, suck my c**k
– Who do you think you are bastard? Do you like the way I suck it? ”
Get what I mean?
And now, let’s talk about the story of Beautiful Bastard. Oh wait, there is no story. We just have two people, hating each other, who fight a lot, but have lots of hot sex and in the end they get their happily ever after. After all, they struggled to get it. They had sex everywhere they could, so why shouldn’t they get their HEA?
And now one might make the very reasonable question: why on earth did I continue reading this book? Out of perversion. I was stupidly wondering how worse it could get by the end, so I continued. Sure, I skipped some sex scenes and that helped my case since the biggest part of the book consisted of those. And in case you’re wondering, no, Beautiful Bastard didn’t get any better and with that sweetened and completely unrealistic ending (which was so not consistent with the whole story), it just made things even worse.
So, I can’t possibly recommend this book to anyone. And in the end of the day, I don’t know if I’m feeling frustrated with this book (which I do) or if I should just start laughing about it. Because yeah, it’s so bad that I wanted to laugh. So, be warned.
I give Beautiful Bastard 1 star
Share This Post
Related Posts
Subscribe and stay up-to-date
6 Comments
« Interview with Tamara Morgan + Giveaway Next Post
New Releases: February 4-11, 2013 »
Unfortunately Google Friend Connect will stop working for non Blogger blogs at the start of March.
To stay up-to-date use one of the other options above to subscribe to the newest Book Lovers Inc. action.Thank you!
| |||||||||
| 5 Stars: Perfect! I Love It! | |||||||||
| 4 Stars: Awesome Book! | |||||||||
| 3 Stars: I Liked It! | |||||||||
| 2 Stars: Not bad, but maybe not for me. | |||||||||
| 1 Star: Didn't like it! Did Not Finish it. | |||||||||
 | | | | | |||||
Blog RSS Feed
Follow Me on Twitter
My Facebook
O Anna, this is horrible. And it states in the blurb that the book is extensively re-written. Perhaps is was better as a fanfic. I don’t read erotica, and for sure will never read this one.
Another reviewer mentioned on Goodreads that it was better as a fanfiction… I don’t really know and I’m not that curious to read it and see if that’s true. I’m tempted, but no, I don’t think I can handle reading the same bad story once more 😛
Yikes! You are a trouper for sticking with this one Anna.
Have you tried reading it Lea? I’d like a second opinion if that’s the case 🙂
I read both this version and the fanfic and they were pretty much the same up until the last 1/4, I’d say. Names and Chloe’s job circumstances may have changed but that was about it. I will admit to having enjoyed it in its original form but that was in my post-Twilight reading state, so I didn’t have much to compare it with and it was heavily underscored by the Twi characters. Here it lacked substance of any kind.
I don’t recall the original having the coarse dialogue that BB had, but in the book, it took away from the sexiness for me, too.
I felt the same way. By giving it one star, I was accused of not reading it and told I was a prude. Why is this half of what’s being published now?!