Review: Bed of Roses by Nora Roberts (2/5)

Title: Bed of Roses (The Bride Quartet #2)
Author: Nora Roberts
ISBN: 0425230074
Pages: 358
Publisher: Berkley
Source: Froom the library

Synopsis...

#1 New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts cordially invites you to meet childhood friends Parker, Emma, Laurel, and Mac - the founders of Vows, one of Connecticut's premier wedding planning companies.

Since she was a little girl, Emma Grant has always loved romance. So it's really no surprise that she has found her calling as a wedding florist. She gets to play with flowers every day and work with her three best friends in the process. She couldn't ask for a better job.

And on the surface, Emma's love life seems to be thriving. Slim and sultry, she brings color into every room she enters, just like the arrangements she creates. Men swarm around her, yet she still hasn't found Mr. Right. And the last place she's looking is right under her nose.

But that's just where Jack Cooke is. He's been best friends with Parker's brother for years, which makes him practically family. The architect has begun to admit to himself that his feelings for Emma have developed into much more than friendship. And whn Emma returns his passion - kiss for blistering kiss - things start to get complicated at Vows.

Jack has never been big on commitment. Emma yearns for a lifelong love affair. If the two are to find common ground, they must trust in their history - and in their hearts...

taken from GoodReads.com

So I’m on this contemporary fiction, rom-com, chick lit, whatever you want to call it, kick right now and after reading four books over the weekend after needing a break from my regular reads (post coming soon) I thought I’d venture further a field from my usual chick-lit authors.

Now I had my pre-conceived notions of a Nora Roberts novel. The cover alone was enough to scare me away on a good day. But, I thought it was time to try something different. Sometimes when you do this you get something good, other times you end up wondering whether it was worth the risk.

Sadly this appears to fall under the latter.

Bed of Roses is the second in the Bride Quartet by Nora Roberts. I bypassed book one, as the library didn’t have a copy, breaking my ‘I must read a series in order rule’. I couldn’t even tell you what inspired me to pick this up.

Emma is one of the four best friends that run Connecticut’s premiere wedding service, Vows. She’s the florist, need a bouquet at the eleventh hour, she’s your girl. She can create a work of art with a few snips and a yard of ribbon.

She’s also a hopeless romantic, with her parents relationship ‘this’ close to a Disney romance who could blame her?

In walks Jack Cooke, architect and serial womanizer. There’s always been attraction there between them brewing under the surface. They’ve known one another for years, Jack is practically family – his best friend is Del, who happens to be Parker’s brother, one of Emma’s best friends and partner at Vows.

Unable to fight their feelings the pair gives in on the chance that there might be something worth discovering. Trouble is they both have differing opinions on what defines a traditional relationship and it’s not long before Emma realizes that she and Jack might be heading in two different directions.

How do you deal with loving someone that might not possibly have any intentions of loving you back?

This was an easy read for me and I finished it within a day of on and off reading. To me it fell flat; I didn’t feel any sparks between Emma and Jack. There was nothing there and I found her arguments in the last chapter ridiculous. Maybe it’s just me, but it felt like she was expecting far too much from a relationship that was only a few months old.

The details of the jobs she was working on through the book became too much of a focus. I know Emma is a florist, flowers are going to be mentioned, it’s her job, but the descriptions just kept going on. I don’t know how many guys would actually listen to so much talk about flowers? I just felt they were there to fill space.

Final Thoughts…

Now I’m not going to write Nora Roberts off completely, it’s not like she hasn’t got a trillion other books that I might get on better with, I’m going to reserve judgment until I’ve at least read one more of her books.

Sometimes some authors aren’t the right fit for some readers, while others it was like they were made for one another.

If you want an easy romance that requires little concentration (apart from when you’re trying to figure out who’s related to who and who’s engaged to who) then this is a good read to pass a couple of hours. But if you enjoy your romance novels with spark and fizzle, then I would maybe pass this one over.