Heartbeat Girl by Michelle Gross Book Review
Title: Heartbeat Girl
Author: Michelle Gross
Genre: Adult, Paranormal, Romance
Rating: ★★★★★ (5/5)
Description: Desperate times call for daring measures.
At least that’s what I tell myself while packing up and hitting the road with America’s newest and most popular rock band, The Oppressors. The lanky tattooed men are suspicious. Before I stepped on the bus with them, they’ve always made me nervous.
Something’s not adding up, though. There are strange events I’m noticing like…
the hazy, vacant stare of the woman in their dressing room…
the blood on her shirt…
or the lack of a heartbeat when I lay my head on Liam’s chest.
I don’t think it’s safe to be close with the band, and most certainly not fall in love with a member. So why do they make me feel like I’m a part of them? Their close-knitted trio.
What happens when I figure out what I’m dying to know?
This is a dual POV steamy vampire romance standalone that centers around bonds of love and friendship. 18+ dark, explicit sexual scenes, and lots of blood. Although it is a standalone, characters from Soul Food are mentioned.
Disclaimer: This blog post is part of an agreed upon book tour. It will contain affiliate and referral links. This in no way impacts my opinions of the book- they are all my own.
I'm someone who can be very particular about paranormal romances in contemporary settings. This isn't to say there's anything wrong with the concept, just that it can be exceptionally difficult to perfect. I always go into any book I read with cautious optimism, even if a particular genre or storyline has burned me in the past. And that is how I approached Heartbeat Girl. Ready and willing to be blown away.
Heartbeat Girl is how you do a contemporary, paranormal romance right. I should have known that a conventional rockstar romance with swoon-worthy vampires couldn't go wrong. It was my mistake to ever doubt the author's capabilities.
The book is the perfect marriage between contemporary and paranormal tropes that can be, at times, unharmonious in other, less well-written, stories. It took all the best aspects of both and delivered a steamy, blush-inducing book that sweeps the reader off their feet. Heartbeat Girl not only gives the reader crush-inspiring leading men, but crush-inspiring leading men who are vampires that moonlight as rockstars. A mashup I wasn't aware I desperately needed until I read this book.
The core of the story lies in the dynamics between our leading trio of men and Jayne as they carry the story. Who knew famous, undead rockstars and frazzled PA's made such great companions? I certainly didn't. Heartbeat Girl doesn't even necessarily rely on the most romantic relationship in the group between Liam and Jayne. While their romance rivals any of the better romances released in recent years, the book wouldn't be complete without the group of Liam, Jayne, and the two other bandmates, Pete and Steve.
It's like watching a more adult version of all the sitcoms about a group of mismatched friends from the 90s with hints of an underlying darkness. Because it wouldn't be a vampire book without a bit of edge that TV shows wish they could capture.
Author Bio
Michelle is from a small town in Eastern Kentucky where possums try to blend in with the cats on the porch and bears are likely to chase your pets—this is very true, it happened with her sister’s dog. Despite the extra needed protection for your pets, she loves the mountains she calls home. She has a man and twin girls who are the light of her life and the reason she’s slightly crazy.
As a kid, she was that cousin, that friend, that sister and daughter, the talker who could spin a tale and make-believe into any little thing so it was no surprise when she found love in reading, and figured all these characters inside her head needed an outlet. They wanted to be heard, so she wrote.
The voices keep growing faster than she gets the time to write.
The stories are never going to end. That’s perfectly okay, though. We never want to stop an adventure.
She writes and loves many different genres so sign up to her mailing list to keep updated on her releases!
Author Links
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