Who hasn’t fantasized about catching a famous rock star boyfriend? 😉
Title: Hot Rock
Author: Annie Seaton
Genre: Time-travel romance
Pages: 200
Format read: ebook
Blurb:
Megan Miller is on a dream trip to research her doctoral thesis at a rock festival in England. When she arrives in town she’s stunned that her temporary neighbor is the spitting image of her 70’s rock idol, too bad he’s also a world-class jerk. So why can’t she stop thinking about him?
Seventies rock star Davy Morgan is a man with a secret: rockin’ in one time and living in another. He holds his privacy close to his heart, so when a beautiful girl who not only loves but truly understands his music moves in next door, he works overtime to keep her at a distance. Easier said than done.
Megan follows Davy to the rock festival, but it’s not what or when it seems. The lure of the music draws them closer, but can their newfound love span across the decades, or will it get lost in time?
Review:
I was really intrigued by the premise of this book. A rock star who travels back and forth through time, spending most of his time hiding out in the future, returning to his actual time only to put on concerts, record albums, and go on tour? Using ley lines and ancient standing stones to time travel? A woman meeting and falling in love with the celebrity her teenaged self worshiped? So very promising!
In execution the novel doesn’t quite live up to the promise–too many things are left unexplained. First of all, where is the actual 2014 Davy Morgan? We learn that one of the band members is dead–Davy sees his grave while in the present–but no mention is made about what happened to Davy. He’s supposed to be living in the Caymans as a recluse, but we know it’s actually Davy from the past who lives there. Can he exist twice in the same place? Or has he actually ceased to exist in the modern time? It’s never explained, and left me confused on that point.
There’s a huge drama at Megan’s place of work when the story begins–her professional reputation might be in tatters, and she may never be able to work in her chosen profession again. It appears that there was a very elaborate plot put into place against her, perhaps executed by a past boyfriend. When she does return home to finally fix the situation, it’s never explained how she managed to be framed in the first place–it seemed to be quite the accomplishment, and I really wanted to know how he did it!
Finally, I just didn’t really feel the chemistry between the two characters. Sure, Megan loved Davy as a teen (which wasn’t actually during the time that he was touring and producing music–he was actually more of a celebrity for her parents’ generation than hers), but I had a hard time buying into their love in 2014. Megan was likable from the first, and easy to identify with–who can’t relate to having a huge celebrity crush?–but in the end the romance was tough to buy into. It was all very quick, and didn’t seem to have much of a foundation besides lust.
In a nutshell: promising, but doesn’t quite make it. C rating/ 3 stars.
I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.