Reviewed by Sadonna
TITLE: Web of Lies
SERIES: The Goode Life
AUTHOR: Isla Olsen
NARRATOR: Kale Williams
PUBLISHER: Moonwalker Press
LENGTH: 4 hours and 11 minutes
RELEASE DATE: May 27, , 2022
BLURB:
Jesse
My little brother is getting married and I couldn’t be happier.…
Well, maybe I could if I hadn’t just been dumped by the boyfriend I thought was about to propose, kicked out of my New York apartment, and, worst of all, lost one of the pediatric patients under my care at the hospital where I work as a nurse.
With the current sh*tstorm that is my life, who could blame me for going a little overboard on the cocktails at the bachelor weekend in Vegas?
Me. I could blame me. Especially when I wake up with the hangover from hell and the memory of marrying my arch-nemesis, Webster Goode, in a ceremony caught on camera by the reality show Real Vegas Weddings.
There’s only one clear path forward: get through my brother’s wedding, get an annulment, and get back to New York and my normal life. All without anyone finding out what Web and I did in Vegas.
But it turns out correcting that big mistake won’t be as easy as I’d first thought, and keeping our secret from the Finchley gossip machine could be damn near impossible.…
The truth is, the more time I spend with Web, the more I start to realize there might be a very thin line between love and hate….
Come visit Finchley, CA, where the sun’s always shining, the locals are always gossiping, and you won’t walk two steps without bumping into a member of the Goode family. If you’re lucky, you might find gold; or, even better…true love.
REVIEW:
Note: This is the second book in the series continues with the Goode family getting to the wedding of Zack and Slater from the previous story. It helps if you’ve read that book first to have a better sense of all the players in Finchley 🙂
It’s time for Zack and Slater’s wedding! Jesse, Zack’s brother is a pediatric nurse in a hospital in NYC and also Zack’s best man. He needs to get to Vegas for the bachelor party before the wedding back in Finchley. But in the run up to said trip, his boyfriend of two years takes him to dinner at a fancy restaurant only to dump him. He packs up his stuff and stays at his friend’s place for the night before taking off for Vegas, not sure what he’s going to do when he returns from the wedding trip.
He’s none too thrilled to see his former best friend Webster Goode as the other best man for his cousin Slater. They were best friends until high school when it appeared the Web didn’t have Jesse’s back after he came out and played a nasty prank on him. More on that later 😉 Jesse has spent the previous decade plus assuming that Web is a homophobic jerk. He assumes a lot about Web’s reaction to anyone being in his personal space.
Web has finally had enough and vows to prove to Jesse that he is NOT a homophobe. The thing is that Web has always and only been attracted to one person – and that’s Jesse. Jesse’s assumptions about what went on in HS are not exactly correct. But he decides to play along and as they spend the evening of the bachelor party by themselves, Web MORE than proves that he is not a homophobe. Nor is he straight. Nor has he ever felt like he has with Jesse. Somehow they goad each other into getting married in Vegas AND letting it be filmed for a potential slot on a reality program. And boy do they get the footage 😉 But after the hottest night either of them has ever had, things turn a bit shaky. Plus they CANNOT let anyone else know that they have secretly gotten married in Vegas.
Turns out what happens in Vegas does NOT stay in Vegas. This is especially true in the circumstances of this so-called marriage. Annulment isn’t an option, so they are going to have to get divorced and it’ll take about six months. In the meantime, Web and Jesse spend a lot of time together the week of the wedding and it finally dawns on Jesse that his assumptions may not have been valid about Web and his HS behavior. And maybe he has some things to make up for as well. It’s clear that they enjoy spending time together but Jesse has a life in NY, doesn’t he? Well he does have to return for one reason, but is there really anything holding him there if his future lies somewhere else?
This audiobook was great fun. Kale Williams does a fantastic job of performing this book. I loved the Finchley FB group. I loved Jesse’s relationship with Lily and her young son Joel. So much fun! Jesse’s reaction to the breakup is perfect 😀 Then there is poor Web. He’s spent his adult life being misunderstood and maybe not even being clear himself about his sexuality, but he knows one thing. There is only one person who really does it for him – and it’s the guy who hates him! Jesse 🙁 Once he makes up his mind to prove Jesse wrong though, things take off. There are plenty of sexy times but it still takes Jesse a while to realize exactly what happened back in HS. I really liked the dual POVs so that we knew what each character was thinking. Mr. Williams does a fantastic job with the many voices here in this large cast of characters. I also loved that we got to revisit some takes from the first book – including the dog parenting saga that just screams of a small town dynamic 😉
This is a low angst, fun and funny light read that gave me plenty of chuckles. With everything going on in the world, I really enjoyed being able to just relax and enjoy this story with a happy heart. Highly recommended for fans of enemies to lovers with a dose of humor.
RATING:
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