Reading Write Now: Beautifully Awake by Riley Mackenzie with Giveaway

Title: Beautifully Awake

Author: Riley Mackenzie

Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance

Release Date: October 2, 2013

Hosted By: Love Between the Sheets

Synopsis

Diagnosis: Sleep-running

Treatment: Truth

Prognosis: Beautifully Awake

Lili Porter hates the rain. Bad things happen in the rain. As a small town social worker dedicated to protecting children, she is forced to start over to escape her rural disaster. Determined to follow her father’s advice—head up and chin high—Lili finds herself in a new city, taking on a new system, this time healthcare. In doing so, she gets something she never expected, an intimate behind-the-scenes look at life in the hospital.

Lili learns that a surgeon’s hands have the power to heal more than physical wounds. And a prescription for truth can cure three years of sleep running and leave you beautifully awake.

Excerpt

He was already dressed for the OR in his scrubs, looking ... amazing. The beat beneath my chest started again and my mouth watered, as I not so subtly roamed his body with my hungry eyes. All I wanted was to feel his body against mine, get lost in where I ended and he began. It was all I’d ever want. Forever. I finally got what he meant every time he said mine. He was mine.

“See something you like?” He smirked.

“Mm-hmm.”

“Baby, if you don’t stop looking at me like that I’m never gonna get out of here.”

“Truth. Sounds perfect to me.” Now I smirked.

“Ahh fuck, you’re killing me. You know scrubs don’t hide a hard-on very well.”

I laughed. He had a point there.

Leaning down, he kissed my nose. “Text you in a bit, see how your day is going...”

“K.”

So was this my life? I sunk back into the fluffy pillows and sighed. I wanted this to be my morning every morning.

Kota's Review

I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

Beautifully Awake is Lili Porter’s story, and is essentially about her journey back to life. This story is told with emotion, humour, sass and sex (oh the sex…phhhoooooaaaarrr here’s to wishing for a life in triple figures!)… and for me it was wonderfully told.

After leaving her home town three years earlier, after a life changing and traumatic event, Lili sets up ‘life’ in Philly near her best friend Sierra. She has a bit of a career change and finds herself working in a Philadelphia Hospital as a case manager. Lili has made some wonderful friends while there, but avoiding feeling and living have been her priority.

Enter Chase Colton… Surgeon extraordinaire of the neuro surgery kind. When these two cross paths, this story really starts to take twists and turns. Chase is an extremely talented Neurologist, by all accounts extremely wealthy, and one who does not tolerant things being done anyway but his… Chase is also living a life that is burdened by things of the past, and his guilt does not allow him to live.

The tension between Chase and Lili is palpable, and the connection these two have as they find their way on this journey is deep and intriguing.

Lili and Chase’s story take you on a journey of ups and downs, sharing amazing money can’t buy experiences, gut wrenching lows, and pure sweet! When life is good, bad sneaks in, and when bad sneaks in – good kicks it in the arse.

The things I loved about this story – well there was a lot… I couldn’t believe this was a debut novel. The writing was pretty seamless, the story flowed to perfection and truly took you on a journey – while there may have been instalust between Lili and Chase, the substance as their relationship developed was real, and the challenges they face confronting but not insurmountable. I had no idea until I had finished reading this story that Riley Mackenzie is actually two friends writing together, Again Seamless!!

These characters are strong, individually independent and broken. For once this genre has both leads emotionally stunted due to life experiences, and they found their journey mutually and respectfully together – it was a pleasant change from innocent girl fixes broken man….

The supporting cast was great, from Asher with his banter with Chase and his commitment to his best mate, to Sierra and her mouth without a filter, and never wavering desire to have Lili live again.. To the Team, Guy, Jack and Sam – with their idiosyncrasies and love of Lili…. Oh and the not so pleasant characters who all played such integral parts to this journey.. like Selfish fuck Face and Selfish Fuck Face’s cousin, and CJ…. Eeegggghhhhh these guys make you want to hop into your kindle and kick their arses, or chop of their balls…. Either one works!

Now what didn’t I like – well I didn’t like how my heart broke for Lili… and then for Chase… oh hell, there wasn’t much I didn’t like!

If I am being critical as a reviewer, I found that the Epilogue probably would have been better weaved into the story.. as I was reading and nearing the end, I felt that this neat little bundle of a HEA was too perfect and became a bit boring so I found the end chapters dragging a little… and while I liked where the epilogue took us… truly I did – I wish I didn’t lose the momentum of the story before it came.

I am so pleased that I had the opportunity to read this story. Riley Mackenzie – you two have woven a beautiful tale, and I cannot wait to see where these characters end up – I was so happy to read that Asher gets his turn next. I loved your humour, and spunk in your storytelling and your honest and emotional portrayal of guilt and heartache. I am going to rate this 4 ½ hearts – on my rating scale that places Beautifully Awake as an excellent read… I have no doubt you girls will hit exceptional in no time.

4 and a half hearts for a great debut!

Links

Goodreads | Amazon US |

Amazon UK | Kobo |

Barnes & Noble | iBooks

About the Authors

Yep. That's an “s.” There are two of us!

We’re East coast girls separated by Long Island Sound who met in Physician Assistant School and have been besties ever since. We can safely say that thirteen miles of water does not get in the way because we talk or text, no exaggeration, at least 150 times a day. No, really, we do—about everything and nothing. Shockingly, we never (we mean never) run out of things to say. Umm, ever. We definitely laugh A LOT and we’re a tad sarcastic. And if we’re being totally honest, one or two people might have, on occasion, used our names and ‘dramatic’ in the same sentence. But it’s hard to trust the sources since they married us.

It only took twelve years, two husbands, five kids, two dogs, and a two-week vacation in Cape Cod later to decide the romance world needed a splash of medicine. Write what you know.

So you can easily find us at 4 o'clock on Bank Street beach with a glass of cold Prosecco brainstorming. And guaranteed if we bump into you, literally, it’s only because our iPhones are glued to our hands (totally out of our control) either writing or editing our next novel (and yes, it is possible to do from your iPhone, we mastered it … damn those straight quotations).

When we are not working on our book or reading the latest angsty romance on our kindles, you basically name it and we have it going on. Soccer, lacrosse, golf, swimming, dance, gymnastics, football, chess, baseball, basketball, skiing, ice skating, school, homework, and more school.

Oh yeah, did we forget to mention our careers in medicine?

Needless to say, we realized fast that something had to go, so we opted for sleep. It’s completely overrated (yet so AMAZING) and delirium makes everything funnier. Good thing we share a brain and can pretty much complete each other’s sentences (definitely weird, we know), otherwise it might have taken us two years to write Beautifully Awake rather than one.

So that’s our story, who we are … just add AUTHORS to the list!