I received this book for free from Netgalley, the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Not Your Average Hot Guy by Gwenda BondPublished by St. Martin's Griffin on October 5, 2021
Genres: Adult Paranormal Romance, Adult Romantic Comedy
Pages: 320
Source: Netgalley, the publisher
Format: E-galley
My Rating:
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Synopsis:
A paranormal romantic comedy at the (possible) end of the world.
All Callie wanted was a quiet weekend with her best friend. She promised her mom she could handle running her family’s escape room business while her mom is out of town. Instead a Satanic cult shows up, claiming that the prop spell book in one of the rooms is the real deal, and they need it to summon the right hand of the devil. Naturally they take Callie and her friend, Mag, along with them. But when the summoning reveals a handsome demon in a leather jacket named Luke who offers to help Callie stop the cult from destroying the world, her night goes from weird to completely strange.
As the group tries to stay one step ahead of the cult, Callie finds herself drawn to the annoying (and annoyingly handsome) Luke. But what Callie doesn’t know is that Luke is none other than Luke Morningstar, Prince of Hell and son of the Devil himself. Callie never had time for love, and with the apocalypse coming closer, is there room for romance when all hell’s about to break loose?
From New York Times bestselling author Gwenda Bond, Not Your Average Hot Guy is a hilarious romantic comedy about two people falling in love, while the fate of the world rests on their shoulders.
My Review:
I am a huge fan of Gwenda Bond, and this was one I was dying to get an ARC of. I didn’t, even tried looking thought books for trade on Twitter, and nothing. So I gave in and requested the e-galley on Netgalley. And I’m so glad that I did! I really enjoyed this one. And I’m excited to see there is a sequel.
Now I started reading on Thursday at my lunch break, only a teacher decided to come sit and talk to me just as I started my break. Even when I told them I’d just started my lunch. They sat down and said, “Oh, I’m just here for a chat.” Uh, yeah, great, but I want to read my book on the e-reader sitting right in front of me while I’m eating.
But anyway, on with my review. I really liked the different characters. I loved Callie, many things about her reminded me of myself. In a not demony type of way. lol And then Luke. How do you not adore the son of Lucifer when he’s really kind of a good guy? Although if you think about it, in a way, the bad guys seem pretty much to stick to their own rules, or at least he does when he has to hold up his ends of deals even if he wants to protect Callie.
I loved the different take the author did for Hell and demons, and all the mythology that goes with that. Even though when I tried to read Dante’s Inferno I could not get very far, so bored, and not easy to read, it was interesting to see parts with him interspersed with the underworld in this story. Also, I adored the fainting goat.
There were parts I had to go back and reread to see if I missed parts, because surely she heard when Luke was talking about how “his father” wouldn’t be happy, and that should have clued her in? But at first it seemed as if Callie missed that. However I was wrong, as she did think about it as she was trying to figure out what to do once she tried to split from Luke and take care of things on her own.
So while in the end an apocalypse was what they were trying to avert, and things may have been a mostly HEA, we got the hints and clues of more to come. And that’s so cool!
A final bit that I really liked the way the author did was how she showed that it might be okay to still love the Harry Potter world, but just stay away from the author if possible. So often I think that is the case with a lot of art. My ex-co-librarian and I used to have those kind of discussions all the time. Artists are human, and so unfortunately, sometimes you have to separate the two, or you’ll never have any art left to enjoy. Especially when up to a certain point of your life, said artistic product may have been a huge part of your life.
Loved this one. Will be buying a physical copy to put on my bookshelf for sure. Hoping for a physical copy of book 2’s ARC, but it won’t matter because I’ll have to buy a finished copy to match the original too!
[…] I asked for The Date from Hell on Netgalley as soon as I saw it! I really enjoyed the first one, Not Your Average Hot Guy, so can’t wait to read this one. I signed up to do a blog tour for the second one, my review […]
[…] In the end it was a fun read and it made up for the simple writing, and I hope to read more by this author in the future! It reminded me a bit of Gwenda Bond’s recent supernatural romance, which I also loved, Not Your Average Hot Guy. […]