Welcome to Sugarbeat’s Books – the home of the Romance Novel
Today I’m talking about a book that I completely enjoyed. Pushing Her Boundaries by Julia Rachel Barrett is a great read!
ISBN: 1610344243
Release: Mar 11, 2011
Source: I received a copy of this book to read and review for TRR. See link HERE.
Maggie is done with men. Flying to Minneapolis, she’s seated beside the type of man she always falls for. A sexy, arrogant alpha jerk. Mace Williams irritates the woman next to him. She’s so damn sexy, he doesn’t care. When their seatmate suffers a cardiac arrest, Maggie and Mace team up to save his life, but it’s too late. In Minneapolis, Maggie heads to a restaurant with her sister, only to find Mace waiting. Worse, she learns he’s the brother of her sister’s fiance. Stuck in her sister’s apartment with Mace, Maggie offers him one night of sex, anything goes. No obligations, no recriminations. Mace agrees…he wants more than Maggie’s body, he wants her heart. Thrown into a disastrous canoe trip, they must work together to survive. Maggie must face her demons and trust Mace with her life. Mace is determined to save her, regardless of what the future brings.
Pushing Her Boundaries takes great characters, sizzling chemistry and a great story line and combines them to produce a page-turner of a book! This author does an outstanding job of creating crisp, realistic characters that propel an engaging story. A great read for 2011!
Pushing Her Boundaries starts with a very familiar scene. Picture a crowed waiting room in an airport; people filling time, waiting for their flight to begin loading. Some moron fills his time by chatting on his cell phone loudly enough to disturb the people around him. Maggie, our heroine, is desperately trying to ignore the moron, but he’s being too loud to ignore. She figures out that he’s a doctor and he’s giving last minute instructions about his patients to the person that will be taking over his duties. Boy, does he remind her of ex-boyfriends! She’s determined that although she finds him attractive, she will ignore him and concentrate on her trip to Minneapolis to celebrate her sister’s engagement. She’s dated lots of THAT type of guy! Sadly, she finds herself sitting beside him when they finally board the plane. He (Mace) introduces himself and seems to be content to flirt with her. When their seatmate slumps over, however, she finds it handy to have a doctor close by to help her try to revive the older gentleman. She revises her opinion of him somewhat as they work together to try to save the man’s life. When she leaves Mace and the now deceased gentleman in Salt Lake City and her flight continues it’s way to Minneapolis, she tries to clear her mind of thoughts of him. As you can tell from the blurb, Mace turns out to be her sister’s fiance’s brother. So it seems that she is stuck with him for the visit.
Part of the celebration of the engagement is a short canoe trip in the wilderness. With Maggie’s sister in a cast, that leaves Maggie and Mace to head off together in a canoe following the couple that are to serve as their guides. Maggie’s sister, Lynn, and her fiance, Jeff, are going to spend some quiet time in a cabin in the woods while they are gone. Maggie is unhappy about having to spend more time with Mace, but her sister insists she needs time alone with Jeff.
I’ll leave the rest of the story for you to read yourself. This author has produced a story that I feel is excellent. She involves the emotions of the reader in the story. You join with Maggie in her annoyance of Mace on the phone. You feel their emotions when they are on their canoe trip from hell! I found myself reading quicker in parts trying to get to the end of a section of the story. The I liked the character of Maggie. She seems like a quiet, strong woman that’s dealt with alot of duds and deserves to find a keeper. Mace annoyed me at the beginning of the story. The type of person he was portrayed to be at the beginning had me grinding me teeth in annoyance! I’m not sure he changed as the story progressed or whether he allowed us to see more of the real him. The Mace that finished the story had me cheering!
Although I found this story to be very well written and engaging, there was one thing that had me puzzled. Much was made about the fact that Maggie and Mace HAD to go on their canoe trip; that Lynn and Jeff needed some time alone. We never found out why this was the case, or what the outcome of the alone time was. It’s possible that I read too much into that particular piece of information, but I’m hoping that another book is written that continues with this story.
All in all, a great story that I highly recommend!
