Pucked Up was a good story and it had moments of hilarity and the sex was certainly rocking, but for me the drama overshadowed the romance. ~ Slick, Guilty Pleasures
Description:
Miller “Buck” Butterson has been banging his way through life ever since a puck to the face fixed his messed up front teeth, and he was drafted into the NHL during his first year of college. After five years of deflecting goals on the ice and scoring them with puck bunnies across the Continental US and parts of Canada, Miller is ready for a girlfriend. A real girlfriend of the non-bunny variety. One he takes on dates and doesn’t jump into bed with after five seconds of conversation.
Miller thinks he’s found that woman in his teammate’s sister. Except, unlike Alex Waters, center, team captain and all round nice guy—who happens to be dating his step-sister—Miller’s manwhore reputation is well earned, and not blown out of proportion by the media. Beyond that minor detail, Miller doesn’t know the first thing about having a girlfriend. But he’s determined to make it happen.
What he doesn’t take into account is the amount of time and effort relationships require, or that constantly letting bunnies take selfies with him to post all over social media isn’t going to win him any points in the boyfriend department. Miller learns—not so quickly—that if he wants to make Sunshine “Sunny” Waters fall for him, he going to have to do a whole lot more than show her his stick skills in the bedroom.
So if you read my reviews you know I loved, loved Pucked by Helena Hunting and while I enjoyed Pucked Up quite a bit I can’t say that I loved it. It was a good story and it had moments of hilarity and the sex was certainly rocking, but for me the drama overshadowed the romance and while I was pleasantly surprised by how much I adored the hero, the heroine was another story. That all being said, I wouldn’t have missed Pucked Up for the world and Helena Hunting is by far one of my favorite new (new to me) authors of 2015.
I’ll admit I was worried if Ms. Hunting would be able to make Miller “Buck” Butterson in to a romance novel hero but she did a fantastic job with him. Buck has enjoyed everything that comes with being a pro hockey star and there’s a lot of proof out in social media to show just how much he’s enjoyed living large and loose. But ever since he met Sunshine “Sunny” Waters, his teammate Alex’s sister (Alex is engaged to Buck’s step-sister Violet)he has remained celibate because he wants something with Sunny and the only way he can do that is to prove she means more to him than the latest puck bunny. I loved that Buck was trying and doing his damndest because Sunny means something to him and I hated that Sunny’s best friend and her brother seemed to do everything in their power to see everything bad about him. Yes, he got into some trouble by not being careful of the people he was around or not knowing exactly what he was getting into but it bothered me that Sunny believed everyone but him. I’ll be honest in saying that about halfway through this book I was hoping he’d ditch her for Poppy a girl that helped him at the beginning of this story, that’s how much her behavior pissed me off. Buck had a lot of layers to him that most people never saw and he’d even admit he went wild and enjoyed that time, but he also did a lot of good with his fame and in addition coping with his learning disability while trying to maintain his life was a challenge he faced head on every day even though very few saw it.
I get that Sunny Waters was young and inexperienced and over protected by her family and I liked that she enjoyed Buck for the man he is not just because he is a hockey player with deep pockets, but that didn’t excuse the games she played to get his attention or the fact that she let other people tell her what she should do and she didn’t listen to her own instincts and her own heart. I hated that she never asked him about the pictures that were splashed all over social media, that she automatically always assumed the worst about Buck and that she never seemed to take his side when her friends and family were bagging on him. To me this was just inexcusable, petty and to be honest childish. It was obvious Buck was head over heels for Sunny and at times it appeared she felt the same way but overall I was disappointed in her actions and while he might have forgiven her for it, I’m not sure I have.
This book seemed to be a series of disasters all of which served as a backdrop to the relationship Buck was trying to have with Sunny. I really would have loved to see them spend more time together actually forging a relationship than the endless mishaps that seemed to be orchestrated to make Buck look bad and give Sunny reason to not trust him and go running. After awhile the behavior got old and I was kind of like Buck in that it seemed it didn’t matter what he did, it would never be enough to convince her or those who influenced her that he was good enough.
We saw many of Buck’s teammates and his family and I loved seeing how close he and his step-sister Violet have become and they way they support each other even when it is detrimental to their own relationship. Some of the best moments in this book are the ones between Buck and Violet, which is kind of sad.
While I didn’t find Pucked Up to be as raw, raunchy or quite as comical as its predecessor; I still very much enjoyed it and look forward to reading Pucked Over when it releases next year.
3.5 stars
Thanks for sharing your thoughts Slick