~Not The One is a full length standalone adult romance~
My name is Reyna Miracle.
Even though a part of my name is Miracle, there’s nothing miraculous about me.
My body portrays the tales of my life.
Every feeling, every heartbreak, every emotion.
Marked. Inked. Stained.
A walking canvas of my messed up truth.
But there’s one confession I can’t put in a tattoo.
A confession that will kill me to tell, but my best friend died before I had the chance.
Now I’m left with him.
The only one who can hold me in the night and squeeze that spot on my neck that feels like my lifeline between sanity and chaos.
But we don’t work together.
We’re absolute poison for each other.
We’re a stifling, suffocating, sickness of darkness.
But I feel safe...because I’ve made an art of pushing people away.
Now he’s pushing back…
And making me believe...
Making me wonder...
Maybe, just maybe...
I could be the one.
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“Christ, I hardly recognized you,” he seethes, the angry bulge in his jaw bone ticking violently. He grabs my arm firmly and pulls me off the concrete steps and into a covered archway away from all the other happy students. “What the fuck, Rey?”
“What are you talking about?” I ask in utter confusion.
He reaches beneath my chin, grabs the zipper and yanks it down harshly. I shove his hands away as my robe is yanked open.
“Fuck, Rey! You’re skin and bones!” Liam’s face is tortured and sickly. Dark circles reside under his eyes but he still looks gorgeous as ever.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Grabbing the edges of my robe, I cover myself back up, protectively. I’m wearing a short blue shift dress that used to hug every one of my curves but now hangs on me like a potato sack. I know I’ve lost some weight since Marisa but I’m not about to let him scold me like a child over it. “I’m a twenty-five-year-old adult, Liam. I don’t need you chastising me over this.”
“Rey,” he says my name on a sigh. “How can you expect me to ignore this?” His eyes are pleading and pained as they flash between my eyes and my mouth in utter agony.
“I’m not your concern!” I push back my dark hair and squeeze the back of my neck to try to gain some of my control back.
“You made that perfectly clear when you shoved me out of your dorm room. Fuck. How did we get this so utterly wrong?”
“Just leave it, Liam.”
“No.” He grabs my shoulders and turns me to face him. “Don’t you miss me? At all? I miss you like crazy. I feel like I’m mourning two deaths instead of one. It’s like you died on me two weeks ago. And now I see you today and it makes me sick to my stomach that I’ve left you the way I did!” His eyes are shimmering with tears and pain, only adding to the self-loathing I’ve developed the past fourteen days.
My eyes are dead and cold, my voice flat and unaffected. “I told you I wanted nothing to do with you, Liam. I meant it.”
“You’re lying to me. Again!” he roars, angrily punching the concrete wall beside my head.
Listen bookies, I am about to get really real with all of you. Not The One is a book that needs to be read by all of you. I promise. Let’s talk about the cover first. It is one of the most beautiful covers I have ever seen, and then the very first sentence pulled me in. I knew I was in for an amazing read after that. AND I was NOT wrong. I was sent on an emotional rollercoaster ride, riding the highs and the rockiest of lows with the characters in this novel. Every single one of them.
It’s not an easy task finding words for a review of a book that completely consumed you. I mean, I know what I want to say, but the words just won’t surface. There aren’t too many that can describe the feeling I have in my soul after finishing this book. They are nonexistent. Maybe on some level, I relate to Reyna’s self-destructive behavior, pushing and shoving people away; or maybe I relate to Liam’s need to fix everything…OR the intense need to find a Frank (and beans) to spend my days with. (He is so funny by the way!)
I cried with Reyna when it felt like she hit rock bottom, only to find those rocks slip away to fall further, and I felt her joy when she finally felt her worth. I loved that this novel is set in London. It’s a great change from the norm and all of the English verbage and slang was fabulous. Not The One is my First Amy Daws novel, and now I am itching to go back and read all of the London Lovers books.
So. In closing. Read this book. It has stormed in and added itself to my list of my top reads for 2015. Reyna, Liam, Hayden, and Frank have dug themselves into my skin, and I can NOT wait to see where the rest of these characters take me!
Wow!! What can I say!? Jamie has totally hit the nail on the head with this one! I loved everything about this book! I was going to insert my review that I had already posted but instead I wanted to share with you what I ranted in our book group All Is Read Books and Things the day I finished Not The One and hours before Amy Daws was scheduled to do a takeover later that day!!............
Lexy Storries with Amy Daws.
Holyeee Shite! I just finished Not The One!! Let me tell you how it went down:
I was devastated by chapter 6. "We can't control life anymore than we can control the hands of time. They both continue without our intervention."
Chapter 17 I was damn impressed. " Even good boys know how to be bad sometimes."
Chapter 21. I was all kinds of hot. I'm just going to say 'vertical slit' *wink emoticon*😉
Chapter 17 I was damn impressed. " Even good boys know how to be bad sometimes."
Chapter 21. I was all kinds of hot. I'm just going to say 'vertical slit' *wink emoticon*😉
Chapter 24. Why? Why can't it just work once?? "Not love. Not me. Never me."
Chapter 26. Location 2114 specifically... Dude, WHAT THE FUCK?!! That's just fucked up. Talk about being an asshole! But I get it. I would be spiteful too.
Chapter 38 I fell in love. 😍💞
Chapter 41. My heart broke on that bench. It couldn't be helped.
Chapter 43. I cried. Happy tears. Tears of loss. Tears for a pain I couldn't fathom. But also tears of evolution.
When I hit the words 'The End'...
I realized I read this book all day. And was consumed by all the words. All the feels.
WOW. Not The One, is one of my favorite books this year.
I realized I read this book all day. And was consumed by all the words. All the feels.
WOW. Not The One, is one of my favorite books this year.
I can't wait for everyone to meet Amy Daws if you haven't yet!!
Damn. I need to go back and start again!!
______________________________________________________________________
So as you can probably guess what my rating would be. If I need to make it a bit more clear,
Not The One was one of my BEST BOOKS OF 2015
Do yourself a service a read this story! It will consume you in the most satisfying way!
Q: Readers are calling Not The One a “painfully beautiful love story.” Why is that? What was the writing process like?
A: Writing this book was terrifying. I’ve never been so far outside my comfort zone with any other book. This storyline literally terrified me and I got pretty depressed during the process. It was crazy hard, but crazy cathartic. It feels good to sink into those dark corners sometimes. It makes finding the light that much more magical.
Q: What inspired this story?
A: Well, Reyna was a character in my London Lovers Series that I couldn’t get out of my head. I had an idea for an interesting backstory for her…a mother/daughter dynamic that I’d never read before but could relate to because of some of my own personal struggles. I needed to know more about her, so I wrote it.
Q: But this book isn’t a London Lovers Series novel, correct?
A: Correct. I’m calling it a spinoff. A cross-pollination so to speak. There are characters from my London Lovers, but it reads best as a total standalone.
Q: Who the heck is Frank? And how did you create him?
A: LOL! Ohhh, Frank and Beans. He is my London Lovers secondary standout. He’s a fantastical redheaded gay Brit that everyone needs in their life. Magically, he fit into Not The One like it was meant to be. Frank is the comedic lightness that this story needed, but he’s so much more. He’s special.
Q: Will he get a story?
A: He is my most requested story.
That’s not an answer.
LOL…Let me be “frank” when I tell you…it is a distinct possibility. ;)
That’s not an answer.
LOL…Let me be “frank” when I tell you…it is a distinct possibility. ;)
Q: Who designed your cover? It’s stunning!
A: I’m so glad you like it because I did! LOL. My sister in law took the photos. We do all of my covers together. We both come armed with cameras and click away until our models can’t take anymore. But I always end up using my sister-in-laws pictures for the cover. I just like to see through the lens instead of my eyes. But I do all my own layout and designing in Photoshop.
Q: And the cover models?
A: All of my covers have just normal people. I never shoot models. The cover models on Not The One are just a couple of local hairdressers that my sister-in-law knew! It’s funny…I had met the girl a couple of times and talked with her briefly about her incredible ink and through the writing process, her tattoos fit my story perfectly. It was kind of chilling.
Q: So what’s next for you?
A: I’m pretty sure I’ll be continuing on this London path for a couple more stories. Without revealing any spoilers, I’m really hoping readers will be interested in one of the characters’ HEA. I’d love to write his story next. And then…finally, Frank and Beans. :)
Amy Daws is a commercial producer and lives in South Dakota with her husband and daughter. The long-awaited birth of Lorelei is what inspired her passion for writing. Amy is a lover of all things British and her award-nominated romantic comedy series, The London Lovers Series, is centered around Americans in London. It's emotional and self-deprecating with lots of humor sprinkled in. On most nights, you can find Amy and her family dancing to Strawberry Shortcake’s theme song or stuffing themselves inside children’s-sized playhouses because there is nothing they wouldn’t do for their little miracle.
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