Friday, January 16, 2015

Taking Chances by Alannah Carbonneau ~Randi's Review~ *****


Synopsis:
“Life isn’t about making it to tomorrow…it’s about making today count.”
Hadley Grades life is perfect.
She exists in a perfect world – with a poster board family. She has the big house, with the expensive cars, and lavish furnishings. Her family is healthy and happy.
She has it all.
Until she doesn’t.
After the death of her older brother, Hadley is forced to stand and watch her strong family crumble in the wake of sorrow. But as though facing the death of her brother, and best friend wasn’t enough, Hadley’s father has informed her that he can’t sit back and allow Hadley to meet the same fate her brother met. Unwilling to allow her to remain in the city, he sends Hadley to a Ranch in the deep Alberta Rocky Mountains where he’s certain no temptation will cross her path…and her life will remain intact.
Unable to fight the unstable man Hadley had always known as her rock, she agrees to allow her father to send her away for six months, to experience a different way of life than the Toronto city has to offer.
Hadley arrives at The Donnelley Wild Land Tours Ranch with a bad attitude and a broken heart. The Ranch is the last place she wants to be…until she meets Collin Donnelley in a most humiliating way. Somehow, the man gets under her skin with lady killer grins and cocky innuendos, and in him, she learns to view the world in a different way. He pushes her to experience and to live her life outside the box-like confines of how she thought she should live.
Before long, Hadley is losing her heart to Collin Donnelley, and the biggest player in the Rocky Mountains is losing his heart to a broken girl from the city.


Taking Chances by Alannah Carbonneau is the third in the Donnelley Brothers series.

We've seen the love blossom between Logan and Reese in book one and Kyle and Kami in book two, and all the while we've heard Collin Donnelley state, over and over, that he wouldn't get hit with cupids arrow, even if that arrow came from his very own mother.

But that was all before he met Hadley Grades.

Hadley is a young woman trying to find a way to deal with the crushing grief of losing her older brother and best friend Michael.
She's sent to the Donnelley's ranch for six months in the hopes that she will find her path in life without the pressure and dangers that come with city life.

Collin is that self proclaimed ladies man/womanizer; the one that we all love; and he likes it that way. He has no desire to change his ways and makes it clear to everyone around him that love has no place in his life.

After an awkward meeting Collin decides that he wants to befriend Hadley, and Hadley makes sure he knows, in no uncertain terms, that she's not interested in what he has to offer as anything more than “just friends” but she soon finds herself losing her heart to the unattainable Donnelley brother.

Collin's mother Gracie claims that her son is smitten, and Hadley can't help but wonder if she has a chance at a real future with the unexpected man of her dreams, or is she destined for heartbreak?


This is the book in the series that I've really been waiting for, I couldn't wait to meet the woman that would claim the heart of Collin Donnelley because I just knew she was going to be amazing. And Hadley Grades does not disappoint.

When I started reading this book, I had just gotten into a big fight with my own brother; who's always been one of my best friends; and hadn't spoken to him in a few days. As soon as I started reading this book I felt like crying, the thought of never getting to see my brother again, like Hadley had to go through, brought tears to my eyes and I knew that it was silly to let our argument put a wedge between us.

The loss and grief that Hadley goes through, it so beautifully written, I wanted to wrap her in my arms and give her a big hug to help ease her pain.

Then there's Collin, who you just know is a beautiful man and has a great heart, he's just scared of using it, and I wanted to give him a hug as well and tell him it would be ok and that he would have to take a risk sooner or later if he ever really wanted to be happy.

Thankfully though, they didn't need me for any of that, they found that in each other and in their family and friends.

And it wasn't a moment too soon, because when Hadley has another devastating even occur and doesn't know if her father will able to pull through, Collin is there to support her as he's never done with anyone else before.

If you've read the first two in this awesome series, then you know that this will be worth every second it takes to read it And if you haven't read the first two in this awesome series, than let me tell you right now that you are really missing out on some amazing reads and you should jump on these wonderful reads, because if it's possible, this third one is even better than the others.


I give this book 5 out of 5 stars.

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