Reviewed by Ro
TITLE: Shaken and Stirred
SERIES: Bottle Service Boys Book 1
AUTHOR: Lilly Atlas
PUBLISHER: Self Published
LENGTH: 340 Pages
RELEASE DATE: July 17, 2025
BLURB:
Alex
I’ve always despised Ryder Calloway. Eight years ago, at an elite summer program, Ryder and his prep school buddies made my life hell, never letting me forget I didn’t belong in their world. Now I’m juggling graduate school, a sick mother, a rebellious brother, and a job doing bottle service at one of Boston’s most exclusive nightclubs—where the last person I want to see is Ryder Calloway strutting through the door.
When he decides to apply for a job at my club, claiming he’d easily out-earn me in tips, I’ll do anything to prove him wrong. Even if it means accepting his ridiculous challenge.
Ryder
Alex Morgan hated me on sight, and honestly? The feeling’s mutual. There’s something about his perpetual scowl that gets under my skin in the best way. He thinks I’m nothing but a spoiled rich brat with no work ethic. I’ll show him.
With time to kill before starting a graduate program, my parents know nothing about—one that would destroy their carefully laid plans for my future—working alongside Boston’s grumpiest bottle service boy sounds like the perfect distraction. I can’t wait to see the look on Alex’s face when he realizes we’ll be working side by side.
What neither of us expects is how quickly hatred can turn into something else entirely.
Shaken and Stirred is the first book in the Bottle Service Boys series and book one of a duet. Alex and Ryder’s story continues in the next in series.
REVIEW:
This book begins in the past, where Alex is the scholarship student at an extremely exclusive and expensive robotics camp. A camp where the rich kids do not let him forget that he is not one of them and that he is only there because their parents donated. Ryder is one of those kids, and he is the one who begins calling Alex FL. Freeloader. I hated him (and his friends) immediately. The entitled assholes are relentless and I just kept thinking, it’s going to be very hard to like Ryder. I loved that Alex is not a shrinking violet though. “I suppose you paid for this with your lucrative job?” I snapped my fingers. “Oh, no, wait, your mommy and daddy paid for it. Just like they paid for your clothes and your Tesla and whatever else you have that you didn’t earn yourself.” I was proud of him! Of course, Ryder continues to be an asshole.
Fast forward some and Alex is working as a bottle server boy (which I had to look up because I didn’t know what that was). He’s making enough money as he grind through working, school, caring for his mother, and dealing with his idiot brother. He has a lot on his plate and definitely does not need Ryder showing up as a customer, let along deciding to get a job there and deciding he will outearn Alex. Seriously, Ryder deserves the hate Alex throws at him. But that’s what he does. After acting like the frat boy asshole he always was. “I’d bet my trust fund that our liason would have no problem servicing us outside the bounds of reason for a hefty tip.” Except Alex doesn’t play that.
But Ryder does start work as a bottle server boy, and bets he can outearn Alex on tips. The man has no idea of how much Alex carries on his shoulders and I wanted to smack him so many times. It is much later in the book when he finally realizes not everyone has a trust fund and no responsibilities. “Then I turned and fled to the house back to my fancy car, where I drove to my luxury apartment, replaying the loathing in Alex’s gaze and the murder in his voice while recalling how many times I called him a freeloader. No wonder he hated me.”
For his part, Ryder’s home life is rich, expensive, and controlled by his father. He has completely different plans for what he wants to do with his life, and they definitely don’t coincide with his father’s plan for him. His family is all about control and image. The conversation when he admits he is getting a job (neglecting to say he would be serving drinks wearing booty shorts) appalls his other. He does have his sister, Vera, who surprises him by being supportive and mature. I loved seeing that. You’d think he wanted to be an OnlyFans performer, but this awful change is major is because “Iwannabeateacher.” Ugh, he shows humanity! Ryder takes a long time to realize also that what to him is a little joke, like calling Alex FL or Freeloader, isn’t a joke to the one you are dehumanizing. Even after he is working as a bottle boy and getting some of the treatment, he makes excuses for himself.
There is a lot of things happening while these two finally start to give in to the attraction and to realize they were wrong about some things about the other. Working together leads to actually talking some, and that’s when they start to connect. Of course, they both are still carrying baggage – Ryder with his change of major and his impossible to please father; Alex with the weight of carrying everything for his mom and no-good brother. My heart broke for that poor man.
Please be aware, as I was not, that this is part of a duet of books so it is only half the story. It ends on a cliffhanger, with a HFN going on. I missed that somehow and was shocked when the book ended where it did. The next half of the story is due in fall.
RATING: 
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