Book Review: Losing It

Losing It

By: Cora Carmack

Published By: Cora Carmack

Publication Date: October 15, 2012

Buy it at Amazon or Barnes & Noble

Source: Kindly Provided by Author

Audience: New Adult - Contemporary Romance
LOSING IT paperback releases in the U.S. on 2/26/13

This is only the second time I have ever immediately reread a book upon finishing it - the other time was when I read the Twilight saga. What will follow may contain serious gushing about how much I loved this book, but I'm going to lead out with a warning: I don't for a minute imagine that everyone will feel like I did about this book. Losing It seems to have caught me at the right time in my life, in the right mood, and it totally swept me away. 

Losing It is the story of Bliss; a heroine who I just adore. She's a late developer and makes things hard on herself, which is why she's at the end of her college years and still a virgin. She's pretty, intelligent, funny, and she doesn't really believe that she is. She is kind of desperate to lose her virginity, but at the same time she is totally freaked out by the idea. One night her BFF talks her into getting it over with, and with some liquid courage she finds herself talking to a hot stranger in a bar. This is the point at which I could have rolled my eyes and wandered off to make a cup of tea - if not for the writing. I loved the word play, the zinging back and forth and Bliss's inner dialogue which was almost exactly what I would have been thinking... a lovely mix of disbelief, glee, and sarcasm. 

My fangirl love was sealed when, following a ridiculously hot scene, Bliss freaked out, yelled something about a fictitious pet cat, and ran out of her own flat into the middle of the night in her undies. How could I not love such a lunatic?! Better yet that she recognized her own insanity and then berated herself. I think there's not a woman alive that couldn't relate to that, at least in part. I was sucked in by the romance but I stayed because Bliss totally won me over - she actually went out and rescued a cat to try and cover up her insanity! I seriously love that character! (I am also a sucker for a well written cat, and Hamlet was fabulous!) 

As for the lover boy... Garrick was such a swoonsome hero that it wasn't hard to lust after him like Bliss did. I usually get really irritated when people try to write British men in books, because the Hugh Grant stereotype hasn't ever done a thing for me, but happily although Garrick was British he wasn't a Hugh clone. He was just the right mix of sexy grinning and dashing gentleman, sprinkled with a smidgen of sexual predator that made both Bliss and I go weak at the knees. I also really enjoyed the forbidden nature of Bliss and Garrick's relationship. I first enjoyed the student/teacher angle in the Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead, followed it up with Half Blood by Jennifer Armentrout, and I think Losing It this is another great example, although I would say Losing It is definitely for older readers than those other stories. 

This was a hot HOT story. I won't lie - I wouldn't give this to any teenager. I would absolutely hand this out to young women in their 20s and give them a wink though! I am eager to explore other reads coming out in the New Adult genre after this book - the sexuality of the book was just the right side of the adult romance genre and just the wrong side of YA fiction to feel utterly pitch perfect to me. It left me seriously hot under the collar, covered in goosebumps and wishing I wasn't quite so single. There is a marvelous build up of sexual tension through the book to the inevitable departure of Bliss's virginity, and I wouldn't have changed a single word. It was fun, seductive and full of just the right amount of red faced humiliation to suck me in and keep me glued to my Kindle until I had finished the book... twice. 

Full marks to the Cora Cormack - she's on my 'to watch' list, and I will be watching and waiting to get a copy of this in hard back for my super special shelf in the bookcase. 

Summary:

Virginity.

Bliss Edwards is about to graduate from college and still has hers. Sick of being the only virgin among her friends, she decides the best way to deal with the problem is to lose it as quickly and simply as possible-- a one-night stand. But her plan turns out to be anything but simple when she freaks out and leaves a gorgeous guy alone and naked in her bed with an excuse that no one with half-a-brain would ever believe. And as if if that weren't embarrassing enough, when she arrives for her first class of her last college semester, she recognizes her new theatre professor. She'd left him naked in her bed about 8 hours earlier.