The Deal (Off-Campus #1), by Elle Kennedy
Publish Date: February 24, 2015
Publisher: Self-published
Format: e-book, purchased
Genre: new adult contemporary romance
To Buy: Amazon | Barnes & Noble
Rating: 5 STARS
(Synopsis) She’s about to make a deal with the college bad boy...
Hannah Wells has finally found someone who turns her on. But while she might be confident in every other area of her life, she’s carting around a full set of baggage when it comes to sex and seduction. If she wants to get her crush’s attention, she’ll have to step out of her comfort zone and make him take notice…even if it means tutoring the annoying, childish, cocky captain of the hockey team in exchange for a pretend date.
...and it’s going to be oh so good.
All Garrett Graham has ever wanted is to play professional hockey after graduation, but his plummeting GPA is threatening everything he’s worked so hard for. If helping a sarcastic brunette make another guy jealous will help him secure his position on the team, he’s all for it. But when one unexpected kiss leads to the wildest sex of both their lives, it doesn’t take long for Garrett to realize that pretend isn’t going to cut it. Now he just has to convince Hannah that the man she wants looks a lot like him.
I've got my new adult mojo back! After falling into sort of a funk and a general disenfranchisement with the new adult genre as a whole there for awhile, I finally succumbed to intense peer pressure and started to read The Deal. I really dig sports-themed books, and I had heard nothing but good things about this series from sources I totally trust. The Deal was one of my Christmas Amazon gift card purchases, and I have to say it was one of the best (so far, anyway).
The deal is an example of one of my favorite tropes - the smart-girl-falls-for-the-cocky-jock story line will always be one of my favorites. Mostly because I love it when these womanizing BMOCs meet their match in the most unexpected person.
Garrett Graham is the most popular boy on campus. He's hot, smart and a phenom on ice hockey skates. He's been pigeon-holed by Hannah Wells, a girl in his philosophy class. She assumes he's a dumb jock who has no brains except for the one he keeps in his pants. But, he can help her get the boy she really wants, and she can help him keep his philosophy grade up so that he can keep playing hockey. And so their relationship begins.
There is a definite progression in Garrett and Hannah's relationship, and I liked that. There was definitely no insta-love. Hannah had her sights set on another guy, and Garrett only liked Hannah for her brains. They clashed constantly. Hannah was the first girl who didn't fawn all over him, and Garrett just doesn't know what to do with that. But, slowly, the animosity between them grew to friendship. Then, to so much more. And that's when Garrett is REALLY thrown for a loop.
I never expected her. Sometimes people sneak up on you and suddenly you don't know how you ever lived without them. How you went about your day and hung out with your friends and fucked other people without having this one important person in your life.
The banter between Hannah and Garrett was my favorite part. It was so smartly written, too. Totally believable and adorable, the snark and snappy comebacks that constantly flew between these two kept me smiling and laughing even when things threatened to get heavy.
The Deal is written in dual POV. The sex is about what you would expect from a new adult book. It's not excessive, but what there is is pretty hot.
The biggest indication that I loved this book is in the fact that, immediately after I finished, I went online and bought book 2, The Mistake. If you're one of the few who, like me, had heard talk of The Deal, but haven't yet pulled the trigger, please go do it now. You won't regret it.
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