15 September 2013

Tour + Review + Giveaway: Change My Mind by Elley Arden






 

Change My Mind by Elley Arden
Contemporary Romance
Date Published: 9/9/2013

Nothing is going to stop Nel Parker from raising her fledgling real estate agency to the top of the heap. When she returns two dogs to a million-dollar mansion with a dumpster in the driveway, she thinks the house is her lucky break. But the owner turns out to be a moody professional baseball player with a complicated agenda of his own, leaving Nel to fear her plans for real estate domination are doomed.
 
Centerfielder Grey Kemmons is spending the off-season renovating the house he inherited fromhis father. It’s a miserable job, but he’s doing it anyway-because somebody has to pay back the money his father stole. When a spitfire of a woman in a surprisingly attractive package shows up wanting to list the house, he agrees to pacify her with a tour, never expecting the mutually beneficial business relationship that ensues.
 
As weeks go by, business turns to pleasure with Nel and Grey believing the temporary nature of their time together will protect their hearts. Too bad nothing can protect them from or prepare them for love.

 
Where to Buy Change My Mind: Amazon
 


Author Spotlight: Elley Arden is a born and bred Pennsylvanian who has lived as far west as Utah and as far north as Wisconsin. She drinks wine like it’s water (a slight exaggeration), prefers a night at the ballpark to a night on the town, and believes almond English toffee is the key to happiness.

 
Elley writes provocative, emotional contemporary romances for Crimson Romance.

 

I received a copy in exchange for an honest review! 

What I say (review): I enjoyed Change My Mind, it's a short story about misconceptions and love. It's the second book in the Kemmons Brothers Baseball series (I haven't read book one), but it works well as a standalone novel.
 
I confess I don't know too much about Baseball, but I imagine the players get treated pretty much the same as our Footballers (soccer players), in that they get paid a lot of money and have easy access to a vast amount of available women. It was a refreshing change to see Grey, for the most part, shy away from this aspect of fame. He was more interested in righting certain wrongs.
 
Nel was a funny mix of fierce and stubborn, yet vulnerable and loving. My favourite scenes were when she was ordering Grey around (which happened a lot). I loved Nel's brothers and how protective they were of her.
 
They say never judge a book by it's cover and it could not be truer in this case. I'm not a fan of the Change My Mind cover because however pretty the cover models are, they look much older than Elley Arden's characters (Grey is 29, but the cover model looks much older). This is only a small thing and doesn't affect the story in anyway. I often get sucked into buying a book by an exciting cover (not that I'm at all shallow) and I think Change My Mind is far more interesting than the cover implies.
 
Change My Mind is fairly short and I would have like the ending of the story to be developed more as I wanted to see what happened next. It's the sign of a good book when you don't want the story to end. I enjoyed the story and will go back and read the first book in the series.
 
3.5 Stars in my Sky:

Excerpt:


Grey dragged his gaze from the pet-shop-in-a-trunk to level narrow eyes on the blonde spitfire beside him. “How do you know my name and that this is my house?”
“Allegheny County tax assessments.”
He grunted, a feeling of unease hardening his muscles. “What else do you know about me?”
“That once this baseball season starts, you’ll be too busy to be tied to a home like this.”
Great. He roughed a palm over his face until his fingers tucked beneath his stocking cap, and he pushed the hat back on his head to release some steam.
It was always the same. People knowing every little detail about him before he knew anything significant about them. Yeah, yeah, he’d heard it all, how it was a fair trade for the money he made and the envious game he played, but as the years went by, he wasn’t so sure.
“Listen, I don’t want anyone to know I’m here or what I’m doing,” he warned. “It’s nobody’s business but mine.”
“And your realtor’s.” She grinned. “I’ll be completely discreet. Nobody will know this house is getting ready for listing until the sign post is driven into the front yard.”
He tugged his cap back in place, wishing he could pull it over his eyes and make her go away. But by the gleam in her eyes and the set of her jaw, he could tell she wasn’t going anywhere. She was a realtor; sniffing around his property. And here he thought she was a baseball groupie, sniffing around him.
Huh. He’d been bamboozled by a pixie in a wool suit with a trunkful of marrow bones.
“You need me, Mr. Kemmons.” She pressed her pouty lips together and nodded, making her sunny curls dance.
A spark ignited his belly, and he fidgeted against the burning, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.
“I know houses, and I know this market,” she continued. “If it’s a quick sale you want,
I’ll make it happen. If it’s top-dollar you need, I’ll make that happen, too.”
What if he wanted to find her naked in his bed? Could she arrange that, too?
He slammed shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose out of pure disgust. This wasn’t the time or place to be making decisions with his dick, but he was overworked and under the gun, and she was apparently an easy distraction.
This whole thing had trouble written all over it.

 Tour Giveaway to win an Autographed copy of Save My Soul and Swag Pack:

 


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