Title: Hot Under Pressure
Series: Rising Star Chef bk 3
Author: Louisa Edwards
Genre: Contemporary
Loaded with the hottest dishes and sexiest chefs, the Rising Star Chef competition is about to boil over for one pair of all-star cooks who can’t stand the heat—of working so close together…
SHE’S THE ONE HE LEFT BEHIND
Henry Beck thought he’d already faced the toughest kitchen challenge of his life. After all, what could top sweating it out as a Navy cook on a submarine? But when he learns his competition for the title of Rising Star Chef is the sweet hippie girl he married…and left…ten years ago, the heat is on.
HE’S THE ONE SHE CAN’T FORGET
Now Beck and Skye Gladwell are going head to head in the finals…and sparking up old flames every time they touch. But Skye wants more than a win over the man who abandoned her when she needed him most—she wants a divorce! Then her sexy almost-ex makes a deliciously dangerous proposition. He’ll give in to her demands, but if his team wins the RSC, he has a demand of his own…one last taste of the only woman he ever loved.
I have only read one other book by Louisa and it wasn’t in this series and I have no clue why, as I devoured this book.
I love second chance love stories. There is just something about them that gets to me. Beck and Skye’s story especially. The reason for their separation was heartbreaking.
Having not read the other books in the series and I have to say that even though I haven’t read the other books in the series I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. I also have to admit that one of my favorite tropes in romance is that of husbands and wives re-uniting and figuring out went wrong and how they can fix it to make sure it never happens again.
Beck is one of those characters that I absolutely love. He hasn’t had an easy life, but when he loves it’s with everything in him. When the event that caused him and Skye to stop talking and essentially caused the demise if their marriage happened he closed himself off from all feelings even to the point of convincing himself that he was no longer in love with her. However being back in the town where he fell in love with her has brought back all those feelings and memories he had for her.
I have to admit I wasn’t sure if I was going to like Skye. She seemed like a flaky whiny heroine, however after getting to know her I have to say she grew on me. The one thing I didn’t like was how she treated Beck in the event that caused their break-up and also now that he’s back in her life. She did however redeem herself in the end.
One of my absolute favorite scenes in the book is Beck’s love letter to Skye. I have to admit I cried as I read this because he ripped open all the wounds in his past and laid them open not only to Skye but to others.
If you have never read a Louisa Edwards book then this book is perfect one to start with, regardless of whether you have read the other books in the series.
Grade B+
