Reviewed by Sadonna

TITLE:  Taken by Storm

SERIES:  Palm Island

AUTHOR:  K.M. Neuhold

NARRATOR:  Iggy Toma

PUBLISHER:  K.M. Neuhold Publishing LLC

LENGTH:  5 hours and  20 minutes

RELEASE DATE:  April 1, 2022

BLURB:

Chef Storm is moody, antisocial…and he just asked me to be his fake boyfriend.

Most people on the island avoid the hot-tempered chef, but he doesn’t scare me. Sure, he’s prickly, but I’ve also caught him feeding a stray cat, so I know there’s more to him than the sky-high barbed-wire fence he’s built around himself.

When Storm’s ex-husband shows up unexpectedly during the off-season and refuses to go home, pretending to be Storm’s boyfriend is apparently my new job.

Faking it with my grumpy boss should not be this much fun, especially since the last thing I need is to make a fool of myself by falling for anyone else on the island.

Is there anything more exciting than being swept up in a storm? Maybe taming one…

Taken by Storm is a grumpy/sunshine, sort of boss/employee, definitely fake-boyfriend (except how fake is it if they’re actually hooking up?) romance, the second book in the Off-Season series where the residents of gay resort island get up to way too much fun once all the tourists leave for the season. Each book can be listened to as a stand-alone, but trust me when I tell you that you won’t want to miss all of these shenanigans.

REVIEW:  

Hennessy is a “local” on Palm Island, a gay resort island off the Carolinas.  He needed to get away from his rat race existence and it seemed like the perfect destination.  Then came a weekend fling with one of the locals, Easy, read too much into it and never left.  Chef Steven Storm is another local.  He runs the local restaurant and Henn works for him during the season – extremely long days – which is why they look forward to the off season 🙂  But one day during the off-season, Storm’s ex-husband shows up on the island.  He’s been doing his best to avoid Donny and he doesn’t want to deal with him.  He decides the best way to avoid Donny is to show off his new boyfriend.  His fake boyfriend who happens to be the man closest to him at the time, Hennessey.

Henn is shocked.  Storm hasn’t been with anybody (that anyone knows of) at least not since Henn’s been on the island – which has been over three years.  To be fair, aside from the ill-fated weekend fling, neither has Henn.  Storm is kind of intimidating, but Hennessy is not cowed by him having worked with him for so long.  They might be in a fake relationship, but the off the charts heat and chemistry isn’t fake.  While they are faking it and the rest of the guys are trying to trip them up every time Donny is around, nothing is fake when then are behind closed doors.  This start to get a bit messy when feeling get involved.  In spite of the way they started, things end up to be a lot more real than either of them bargained for 🙂

I am really loving this series set on a gay vacation resort island.  The characters are a lot of fun and I’m anxious to see how things will work out for the locals as they find their way into relationships 🙂 The interpersonal relationship are quite entertaining with this group of characters.  I’m anxiously awaiting the rest of the books in these series to see what will happen and who will end up with who in this group.  Henn and Storm are actually really sweet together and I kept hoping that they would realize that they were really made for each other.  Then there is Donny, Storm’s ex.  Maybe we will see him again.  He certainly could use some of his own island magic 😉  There is some wonderful foreshadowing for the next book.  And finally, I am really intrigued by the secrets 😀 and I can’t wait to match the secrets to the men in the next book.

Iggy Toma is an autobuy narrator for me at this point.  His performances in this series are a dream.  I absolutely love his interpretation of these characters.  Hennessy is stuck in a rut but he’s a pretty good sport about it and accepts things for what they are  – well, with everyone but Easy.  Storm is also stuck in a rut.  He’s a total grumpy Gus and everybody accepts that.  Really Chef Storm just has very exacting standards and he’s not willing to compromise the food or service at his restaurant.  The voice choices for these two MCs were just spot on and I could totally picture them in my mind’s eye.  Even Mr. Chubs the cat is perfect 😉  There are a LOT of characters in these stories and I cannot wait for each of these guys who stay for the off-season, the “locals” to get their own happily ever afters.  This is a really fun series with romances that are low on the angst, high on the heat with humor and tender feelings thrown into the mix.  Everyone is kind of feeling their way along and realizing that maybe their happiness is right there in front of them.  Highly recommended!  Can’t wait for the next book 😀

RATING:

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