Rose's Food & Book Blog: Blog Tour - Clover by Braxton Cole review and giveaway

Clover Watson wants more from life than what she can find on her daddy's farm in southern Oregon. Young, smart, and driven, she has a plan and she refuses to be distracted from her goals. After four years at the University of Washington in Seattle, she heads home for the summer with her diploma and an acceptance letter to graduate school at University of Portland. She's sure she’s got things all figured out. Except for Jake Feldman. He was one of her childhood friends, and she hasn't seen him since she left for college four years ago. This summer he's back in town and all grown up -- sweet, handsome, and completely smitten with Clover. At first, she thinks a harmless summer fling is the perfect reward for her hard work at school. But as the summer continues and their romance grows, Jake challenges everything she thought she knew about herself and her plans. When the end of summer comes, Clover is forced to evaluate what she really wants, but can she find a way to write Jake into her life?

Clover Watson is driven, focused, and home for the summer working her old job until she is to return to school in the fall for her graduate degree at University of Portland. She doesn’t expect to run into Jake Feldman when her car breaks down on the side of the road, but the man he is today is not the man she remembers him being over the years.

Clover has always thought of Jake as her little brother’s friend, never giving him a second glance or thought until this summer when he returns to visit his aunt like he always does a nineteen year old man who is not the small child she remembers him as but a man that she is highly attracted to and wants to have a go at more than anything.

Clover isn’t looking for anything serious since she will be leaving in a month, but Jake wants more than just a casual fling with Clover since he has adored her since as long as he can remember. Her being three years older than he is, never thought of him as anything but a younger friend who spent more time with R.J. than anything else so she’s surprised when she wants to be more than friends with him. Jake helps Clover more than she can ever imagine putting her new boss at the pool where she works in his place when he tries to make a pass at Clover.

As Jake and Clover discover their passion for one another through touching and feeling one another, Clover begins to discover that she has feelings for Jake as well but with the summer coming to an end and both of them preparing to return to their schools for the upcoming school year can Clover find a place in her heart for Jake? Will Clover’s dad be able to accept Jake as her daughter’s boyfriend or will be think that Clover deserves someone better in her life?

I had mixed feelings about this book. I have read all of Braxton’s previous work and for me this story while it was sweet and enjoyable was not what I really expected to be reading. For me I will always think of Braxton’s work as passionate and erotic and this one was a far cry from that. Don’t get me wrong it was a great story that led up to great passion between Jake and Clover, it just lacked for me the same feelings that Blown and The List series have done for me. I look forward to reading more of Braxton’s work in the future but unfortunately for me this one fell a bit short, 3.5 stars.

Braxton Cole lives in the Pacific Northwest where she spends most of her time holed up in her office writing stories. When she's not writing, she can be found riding her bike, hiking the fabulous local trails, chasing her kids, or wishing that her thumb was a little more green. She has a bad habit of killing what she tries to grow, but hasn't given up hopes of one day being a successful urban farmer. Braxton writes erotic romance because romance is the stuff that makes life great, and sex is fun. The two belong together, both in life and in fiction.