Monday 9 January 2017

Blog Tour, Review & Excerpt ~ Separation Games (Games Duet #2) by CD Reiss


Separation Games by CD Reiss
Series: The Games Duet # 2 
Release Date: January 3, 2017 
Genre: Contemporary Romance/Erotic Romance


"CD Reiss writes the best erotica I have ever read."
Meredith Wild, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Hacker Series

Book Description: 

The stunning conclusion to the New York Times Bestseller. 

There’s one, unbreakable rule in the game.

Stay collected. Compartmentalize. Think your next move through. Never let your heart dictate your tactics. 

The heart is impulsive. 

The heart makes bad decisions. 

The heart doesn’t see the long game. 

Because the heart may have decided to get Adam back, but when the endgame comes, the heart’s going to be the first thing to break.

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Our Review:

Reviewed by Donna ~ 3.5 stars
***ARC received for an honest review***


“Either love me or set me free.”


Wow, CD Reiss certainly puts you through the mill with this one. After the Marriage Games, you knew that the road back to happiness for these two was never going to be easy and that is definitely the case. Albeit that these two belong together, and deep down they know it, they both have a few issues that they need to fix for themselves before there is any chance of a happily ever after. For these two it boils down to three things…compromise, compromise and compromise.


“I wanted to love him more than I wanted to be loved.”


This is still a journey for Adam and Diana and these two are as stubborn as ever. The constant whiplash of emotions, thoughts and feelings was exhausting at times and no wonder these two didn’t know whether they were coming or going…because neither did I. There were parts of this book I adored, parts I loved and other parts that for me, didn’t work, but overall, this was a book I couldn’t put down as I was emotionally invested in this couple. I wanted them to work.


“You made me like this. You woke me up. You dragged me out of the darkness and now you don’t want me in the light. Well, fuck you.”


This book in the first instance is told in Diana’s POV and for me this is where I lost that intense, emotional connection I had in book one. Diana was very wishy washy in this book and where she started to grow a back bone in Marriage Games she had gone back to a limp noodle in this one. While Diana certainly knew what she wanted, the way she went about it was frustrating, albeit she did stoke the jealous side of her husband which was the kick up the ass he needed.


“Manhattan Adam loved me, and I still didn’t love him.”


Adam, I missed the Adam we had in Marriage Games, he was the alpha, the dominant, the aggressor in the bedroom. While I appreciated Adam trying to get in touch with his vanilla side a bit more, the alpha, for me, didn’t show his head enough. I missed that tangible, sexual aggression from Marriage Games and while we do get some, I wanted more. Maybe that is me being greedy though, dominant Adam was off the charts.


“If I ever love a sub, it’s going to be you.”


One thing though that I adored in this book and it does kind of contradict the above was the insight we were given into Adam as a person. These snippets of his softer side, his fears, his reasoning’s, his motivations went a long way to getting in touch with Adam’s vulnerability and emotions, understanding his conflicting thoughts and feelings while never doubting the intense love he had for his wife. These were more than welcome and I soaked up every single word.


“Your problem isn’t that you don’t love. Your problem is you love so much it scares you.”


As usual CD Reiss’s penmanship was first class, this author has a way with words that totally engulfs you in the story she is telling. Stunning prose, fantastic dialogue and a unique story that has been captivating from start to finish. Loved this duet.


Excerpt:

He took my hand, putting it in his lap as if it was finally home. “What are we doing?” he asked.

“Screwing up.”

“Like it’s our job.”

“If you’re going to do something, I say, do it all the way.”

He squeezed my hand. I was jarred by the way he looked in the direction of the window, but not through it. He didn’t look like the commanding Dominant who had been my partner for the past few weeks. As handsome as ever, and graceful and sharp, a leader and a decider, but not the same. 

He faced me. “I don’t know how to fix this.”

The streetlights glinted off the light in one eye and his jaw locked, catching things he’d never say. He looked like a man I knew and abandoned. Manhattan Adam.

“We can’t fix it,” I said, putting his hand in my lap, watching our clasped hands make a new form. I rubbed the outside of his thumb with mine, feeling it’s familiar shape, the strength of the knuckle and the texture of his skin on mine. “We have to build something new. And we can.” I looked up from our hands to his face.

Could I make him feel my optimism? Could I take a piece of it onto a fork and lift it to his lips? Would they part? Would he let me lay it on his tongue? Would he chew and swallow, saying “I do. I do believe we can, I do.”

He didn’t say that. He didn’t believe, but his lips needed to touch my belief and his tongue needed to taste my hope.

I don’t know if I kissed him or if he kissed me, but it felt like a first kiss, with full quivering that left me paralyzed at his nearness. The act of two tongues tasting each other was so intimate between strangers, so taken for granted over time, and so rarely is the wonder of it felt through to the bone.

He was licorice. Fennel and leather. And he moved like cool water, reacting to my movements, countering with his hands and his mouth, covering me with his attention. The kiss was the sway of sex, the smell of it, the carnal desire without the promise of anything but another dance.


About the Author: 

CD Reiss is a New York Times bestselling author. She still has to chop wood and carry water, which was buried in the fine print. Her lawyer is working it out with God but in the meantime, if you call and she doesn't pick up, she's at the well, hauling buckets.

Born in New York City, she moved to Hollywood, California to get her master's degree in screenwriting from USC. In case you want to know, that went nowhere, but it did give her a big enough ego to write novels.

Critics have dubbed the books "poetic," "literary," and "hauntingly atmospheric," which is flattering enough for her to put it in a bio, but embarrassing enough for her not to tell her husband, or he might think she's some sort of braggart who's too good to chop a cord of wood.

If you meet her in person, you should call her Christine.

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