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Book Blurb:

Free-spirited sex therapist Brianna Ballantine has four days to find a fiancé so she can inherit her birth mother’s Italian villa. Commitment is not on the agenda. Writing her sex therapy book and signing legal papers are. And once all is said and done, she’ll return home to Scotland.

For finance guru Tomas Richards, relationships have been a bad investment—give him stocks and shares any day. When Tomas offers a marriage of convenience to help Brianna secure her inheritance, the sizzle between the sheets promises an affair to remember, despite family complications at every turn.

But Tom must convince Brianna to stay, and make this Italian affair a lifelong commitment.

My Review:

Title: Italian Affair
Author: Annie Seaton
Series: Affair
Genre: contemporary romance
Published: 2013
Rating: 3 ½ stars

This book’s strong suit is definitely its characters. Both Brianna and Tom are very easy to like; you want them to find happiness. I especially quickly warmed up to Brianna—she arrives on a tiny Italian island to see her mother’s estate’s lawyer with nothing more than the name of the firm to go on—she doesn’t have the address, and she doesn’t speak Italian! Seriously, it was like we were separated at birth. She really is intelligent—she has a master’s degree and is writing a psychology book—but tends towards the clumsy and forgetful, and for that I just loved her.

Tom is uptight and more than a little fussy—the guy wrote himself a “to do” list to make sure he loosened up on vacation, for goodness’ sake!—but underneath it all he is a sweet guy with a wry sense of humor. I was soon rooting for him to get to a happy ending as well. His relationship with his family is especially touching, and I’d love to see more of the brothers’ interactions in future books. I haven’t read the first book in this series yet—Holiday Affair, Nick’s book—but it is in my TBR pile. Events in this book also make me hope that eventually we’ll see a book for the third brother, Alex, as well.

There were a lot of cute little scenes in this book, and many of my favorites were related to Tom’s list. He uses it several times to show his sense of humor:

Tom leaned over and typed #11… stop making lists.

and:

#12. Don’t insult beautiful clinical psychologists on planes. Sorry for being a jerk.

A row of little smiley emoticons was at the end of the typed words.

I also enjoyed watching him tick off his other “to do” items as their time on the island progressed, and loved watching him loosen up as he spent more and more time away from his old life.

The pacing of the novel as a whole, though, was a bit uneven. Everything would be going along at a nice pace, and then we find out that a new chapter begins weeks after the last one left off. I wanted to see more Tom and Brianna together time! In the beginning their relationship progressed nicely, but toward the end it became inexplicitly rushed, and therefore wasn’t quite as satisfying as I would have liked.

It also didn’t seem that everything was completely resolved at the end. I didn’t quite feel as if *I* knew enough about Brianna’s mother by the end of the book—her remaining family members were all around Brianna, after all, shouldn’t she have been able to learn more about her?—so I can’t imagine that Bri was satisfied either.

In all, though, who can complain about spending a lazy summer day on an Italian island? 😉

In a nutshell: great characters, but uneven pacing and development. Still, it left me wanting to see more of Tom’s family, so I will be reading the first book in the series and keep an eye out for the next. 3 ½ stars.

I received a copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Buy links for Italian Affair

Amazon :
http://www.amazon.com/Italian-Affair-Entangled-Indulgence-ebook/dp/B00CNTTEAI

Barnes and Noble:
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/italian-affair-annie-seaton/1115375432?ean=9781622661374

Author Bio:

Annie lives with her husband, and ‘Bob’ the dog and two white cats in a house next to the beach on the east coast of Australia. She sits in her writing chair, gazing at the ocean and writing stories. Their two children are grown and married and she loves spending time gardening, walking on the beach and spoiling her two grandchildren. She has always been fascinated by all things romantic and has found her niche in life writing romance novels, ranging from contemporary to paranormal with a foray into steampunk!

Her debut full length novel, Holiday Affair, a contemporary romance set in the South Pacific was released as part of Entangled Publishing’s Indulgence line in March 2012 and has been a best seller on both Amazon and Barnes and Noble. The sequel Italian Affair will be released in June 2013, followed shortly after by Outback Affair. Annie has more books being released in 2013 with Entangled Publishing in the Bliss, Entangled Suspense and Covet imprints.

Annie has also ventured into independent publishing with her de Vargas family steampunk series: Winter of the Passion Flower and Summer of the Moon Flower. Blind Lust (Musa Publishing) a paranormal novella is a sweet romance and one of Annie’s favourites.

In appreciation of the supportive author community, Annie has written a book on promotion to share the secrets of her success: Promotional Tips and Tricks for Aspiring Authors in the Digital Landscape.

Annie loves to hear from readers at: annieseaton26@gmail.com

Her website is

http://www.annieseatonromance.com/

and her blog is at

http://annieseaton.blogspot.com.au/

You can find her on Facebook at

https://www.facebook.com/AnnieSeatonAuthor

and

https://www.facebook.com/annieseaton26

and Twitter

https://twitter.com/annieseaton26

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