Hard Time by Cara McKenna

Hard Time by Cara McKenna
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Annie Goodhouse knows she should stay away from bad boys. After all, her ex-boyfriend was the violent type and the reason she has stayed away from relationships. What she didn't expect was meeting, on her first day as outreach librarian for Cousins Correctional Facility, inmate Eric Collier. Annie knows that she should stay away from him. But then Eric starts courting Annie through letters...

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Erotica isn't really my favorite genre. Hell, I'm extremely picky when it comes to romance in books. But I'm weak when it comes to forbidden romance. So when I got the chance to read this book I said yes because of that. Also, one never knows, one could find a hidden gem...

I had hope in the beginning that I actually would like the book. It was not perfect, but I enjoyed reading it. (Sometimes I need something easy to read) but soon I felt that the story really wasn't up to my liking. That bothered me that Annie was so smitten by Eric that she fantasized about him being a bank robber instead of just checking up what he had done. I mean she only checked up what he had done do land himself in prison because he was going to get paroled. It was safe to fantasize about him when he was in prison, but as soon as he gets out, then she needed to know. I would have checked him up directly.

I felt that the story had potentials but, in the end, the books never addressed interesting issues like, how does the community see on a relationship between an ex-inmate and a librarian that works in a prison, can she keep her job since she met him in the prison? How will her family react to it? That bothered me that her parents never found out that she is dating an ex-inmate. They only got to know what she had met someone. Most of the story dealt with his family, she got to meet his mother and sister and but he never got to meet her father and mother. I would have liked to see how it would have gone.

I was a bit annoyed about his overprotective attitude towards his sister. Yes I know, he wants to protect his sister. But after spending 5 years in jail, for her, he is ready to do it all again if she asked him to? Seriously?

Also, one should never judge a book by its cover...but this cover...was not to my liking!

Thank you Piatkus for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!