Review by Wendy ♥ Stud in the Stacks by Pippa Grant

A Review by Wendy

 4 An Homage to Romance Readers Everywhere Stars
* * * * 

Spoiler Free

This was a Hoot! From the first tease of the Blurb to actual reading of the tale. Pippa Grant took her love of all things Romance and spread it over these pages. She gave virtual hugs to authors and appreciation to readers who love them. With ever nod to the Romance industry... a face palming smile erupted.

This book has characters from Mister McHottie and in this entry we are given Parker Elliot's and Knox Moretti's story....and it is a doozy.

You have a woman who was tortured and mentally scarred from her high school experience. Think Square Pegs...Think kids that never fit in...smart capable ones but are just this side of awkward...And are perfect fodder for all the bullies in the world.

These high school years of pain leave deep insecurities and sometimes no accomplishments can erase the loathing and self doubt those experiences cause. Couple that with mistakes young people make in romantic situations and you have the perfect recipe for a skewed vision of how life and romance is...Parker Elliot is this woman... she may have 2 masters degrees and 15 years in branding, marketing and business...but sees herself as a loser magnet.

Knox Moretti never had the experiences Parker had. He and his brother Troy did suffer the loss of their dad and the impact of him working all the time left a mark on Knox. He vowed never to work so hard as to lose himself. He became immersed in reading and romance was something that stuck. His mother was a librarian and when it was time for Knox to figure out what he wanted, he took the same path.

All those years of reading romance paid off... for Knox is not only the librarian who is loved by the community... he has created a blog devoted to matching readers with the right Romance genre and books. He is known as Mr. Romance and loves turning folks onto a much maligned form of reading. He has developed such a following that he was asked to participate in an auction for Literacy and no one could ever say no to that... so we are meeting Knox decked out in a Tarzan Loin Cloth...

Yes, that is correct...and he fills it out very nicely, indeed.

As the auction is happening, different heroes are being presented... the most recent being Batman ho raked in $5000. Knox knows of this Batman fella and he is an ass...The goal is to bring in a higher bid than that...it is for Literacy, after all...and maybe his ego too...

Parker Elliot is a woman on a mission. She found out about this auction and it was like an answer to her prayers. She had just been instructed by her boss to get a certain account for their company. With Parker only being promoted recently to VP, she felt her career was on the line...and to make everything oh, so much worse... the account she needed to get was owned and operated by the biggest mistake she ever made during her high school life. Now she needed to somehow get him to hear her pitch for acquiring his company. No one knew of her past with this guy and she aimed to keep it that way. She just needed to have a fake fiance to go with her to this reunion... and Tarzan was going to be her man....

Knox is brought up on stage and he begins to strut his stuff...and bam right away the bidding goes to $1000, $1500... then Parker goes $2000... and whoa... the numbers go higher and higher. It looks like Parker is going to get her wish... but at the last minute another out bids her.

Nooooo, this cannot be happening...Parker is besides herself. This strong in business woman, capable of holding her own through all sorts of seminars about organic foods, shooting down marketing campaigns that would not work...This woman who knows all of these things is shattered...Because the idea of not having this man go with her to her reunion is just to hard to deal with...

Parker decides the throw a hail Mary and approaches Knox and the winner of the auction as they leave the event. She starts to tell Knox about her situation and how she would give the money to Literacy if he would consider going with her to her reunion. She thrusts the program with her number on it and asks for him to call her.

Parker can barely remember what exactly she said because when nervous like this, she sometimes babbles...

Knox is not his usual self at work. He is enjoying his time with the readers and continues to assist with suggestions and answers but his mind keeps drifting back to the woman named Parker. She was something else and he was taken by her need and story...It was right out of all the Romance books he reads and talks about. He decides to text her. She calls him back...excited and shocked. They arrange to meet over coffee to talk about what she proposed.

There is so much with this story, I cannot go into a lot of detail without giving things away. I will say one of the main thing I loved was Knox...he is Book Boyfriend material if ever there was one. He just was this guy who was warm, charming, funny and sweet. Oh, and sexy as hell. Yeah... he was all that and a bag of chips...

Parker was a little more complicated. Her life path split her in two... on one level she had all the ability to handle any work situation. She had girlfriends and even played in a rock band...Yet she saw herself when it came to relationships with men as less than...She had certain notions in her head about how her life had to be... and it caused her to push others away.

I also loved all of the Romance mentioned. There was real discussion about how literary reviewers turn their noses up to the Genre and discount the importance of it to the Publishing world. It also highlights the relevance it has on people's lives. How a book containing real life themes can show their readers they too can overcome tragedies or how just reading about something can take their pain away. All of it has merit and needs to be give the respect it deserves.

This book has wonderful humor, current references to every media, amazing sexy times and even a cell phone that has a mind of its own when texting...There is much to enjoy in this tale and be prepared to have a grin on your face for most of it.

 A gifted copy was provided by author/publisher for an honest review.

 About Pippa Grant

Pippa Grant is a stay-at-home mom and housewife who loves to escape into sexy, funny stories way more than she likes perpetually cleaning toothpaste out of sinks and off toilet handles. When she’s not reading, writing, sleeping, or trying to prepare her adorable demon spawn to be productive members of society, she’s fantasizing about chocolate chip cookies.