The Fix Up
The First Impressions series, Book 1
Tawna Fenske
Entangled Publishing LLC
Fiction, Humor/Romance
****
Description
The day Holly opened her PR firm, First Impressions, was the day her dreams came true... and the day her marriage ended, her ambitious (now ex-)
husband Chase unable to accept a successful, professional wife. Unfortunately, his name is still on the lease of the building she bought; she either
needs to sell out and give up, or land the most lucrative contract in her life.
Ben may be the latest in a long line of business tycoons, but he's far more comfortable in a lab room than a boardroom. He doesn't even like looking
people in the eye. Now, his father Lyle has made him CEO of the company, insisting he step up to the plate... but if that means acting like the
workaholic and incurable woman chaser who perpetually sacrificed family for greed, Ben wants no part of it.
When Holly sees Ben in a furniture store, being bowled over by a saleswoman, she steps in to help - and discovers a brand new angle for her PR firm.
Instead of a corporate makeover, Ben needs a personal one... and he's willing to pay triple her usual fee. There's just one catch with this plan:
she can hardly keep her hands off her hot new client - and that's bad news, because, luscious as he looks, she's learned the hard way that ambitious
businessmen and professional women can't mix. Or is Ben really destined to end up just like his womanizing father?
Review
The Fix Up promises fun, light romance, and it actually delivers. Ben isn't quite as socially inept as he thinks he is, a nerd who (in romance tradition) is also a hottie, but he lives in fear of becoming like his father, a man he both hates and admires; he was, after all, the one who lived with the pain inflicted by Lyle's old-school style of leadership, where family was just a prop for success and skirts were to be chased, regardless of marital status. Holly's a driven professional who has built a successful firm from the ground up, but the voice of her ex still haunts her, telling her she can't have love if she dares to pursue dreams outside the home. There's an underlying theme of dealing with long-entrenched sexism in the workplace, though - this being a romance - it's not really about the theme, but about two lonely people coming together, figuratively and literally. Sparks, of course, fly from the first meeting, with some amusing dialog and innuendo-riddled situations as they dance around their mutual attraction. The climax felt just a trifle contrived, but overall this title is an enjoyable, fast-reading, and somewhat steamy escape.