Real (The REAL, #1)

by Katy Evans

The New York Times and USA TODAY bestseller, the first in a scorching series about a beautiful young sports rehab specialist who can't fight her attraction to a dangerously sexy underground fighter.

Remington Tate has a bad-boy rep in and out of the ring, a granite-hard body, and a raw, animal power that sends his female fans into a frenzy. But from the moment their eyes lock, the only woman he wants is Brooke Dumas. His desire is pure, all-consuming, and REAL.

Hired to keep his perfect body working like a machine, Brooke finally has the lucrative sports therapy job she's been dreaming of. But as she tours the dangerous underground fighting circuit with Remy and his team, Brooke's own body becomes alive with the most primal of hungers. If what happens between Brooke and Remy is ever as light as a flirtation, it quickly becomes an erotic obsession for them both, and promises so much more.

But their white-hot lust has a dark side-and when Remy's deepest secret comes to light and Brooke's familial duties demand action, will the pair be able to hang on, or will everything that once seemed so real suddenly fade away like an illusion?

• ISBN10: 1482335395
• ISBN13: 9781482335392
• Publish Date: 9 April 2013
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Createspace
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 266
• Language: English

Reviews

[starbell]

Remy gets a 5. Brooke? A 1 if that. I've never hated a woman in a book as much as I hate her. She talks about how she feels so bad that everyone has left Remy his whole life and no one has been there for him, and then what does she do? The exact same thing, and then she has the nerve to feel so sorry for herself and so sad. And of course he takes her back because she's the first girl he's loved and let in and I guess he probably thinks he'll never find someone else because she "accepted" him for a little while when she first found out.

I hate that she left after promising she wouldn't and I'm hoping the next books in the series improve. I gave this a 4 because I love Remy and I think he's amazing, even though he obviously has his problems. I like that he'll go to any length to do things for her. I also love the whole music situation where they play songs for each other. I think that's really cute.

But Brooke is the worst.

[ellieroth]

El Extraño Gato del Cuento

1.5 en realidad.



¡El suceso del momento! ¿? Real es un libro bastante comentado en toodas las redes sociales. Es uno de estas cosas virales de las que por más que intentemos no estamos ajenos. Y, bueno, quería saber que era toda esta fiebre por el chico Remy. La curiosidad mató al gato, dicen. Lo primero, yo en realidad, de verdad, de verdad quería que me gustara el libro, por más que cuando leí la sinopsis no me gustó exactamente, y como no soy de guiarme del todo de sinopsis, dije, bueh, y entré como corderito al matadero, con todas mis buenas intenciones de ser seducida. Pero no.

Luchador, mujeriego, tatuado... ¿dónde leí eso? Ah, sí, un maravilloso luchador en desastre de otro libro, no soy del tipo que compara, al contrario, si encuentro un libro que se parece a otro que me gustó bastante, tiendo a leerlo o lo espero ansiosa para saber como el/la autor/a me va a llevar y asombrar por un escenario que ya conozco. Pero empezar Real, esos primeros párrafos ¡son un maldito dejavú!


1. Protagonista fue arrastrada a la pelea por su sobre excitada amiga
2. Protagonista NO está vestida como todas las demás

Y así algunas otras cosas que hacen imposible no pensar "¡Esto ya lo leí antes!", pero seguí adelante. Y no solo con el libro mencionado antes, es la primera vez que encuentro tantas similitudes con otros libros, mejor dicho que lo haya sentido así.

El dúo dinámico, las BFF, Brooke y Melanie, yo las definiría como, déjenme busco en mi diccionario la palabra... sí, aquí está: ZONZAS. OH, Brooke, querida mía, pequeño petardo (así le dice el chico sexy, creo que es el peor apodo cariñoso que he leído. Petardo, que alguien me diga así y lo estrangulo), estoy considerando regalarle un diccionario. Sería bonito que encontrara algunas otras palabras para describir la "hermosura salvaje y ardiente" de Remy. Y quizá unas clases de narración para la escritora no estaría mal. ¿Por qué? Dirás tú inocentemente. Bueno, una de las grandes razones por las que el libro no me gusta es esto: la pésima narración. La manera de describir de Katy es demasiado de principiante, es como.. como... como E.L. James *CHA-CHAN* Sé que eso es malvado de mi parte, pero es la verdad ¿Qué gusto de separar oraciones con puntos aparte y/o seguidos que no tienen sentido? ¿Por qué utiliza cursiva tan descaradamente donde no se debe? ¿Por qué no encuentra algunas otras palabras para describir lo hermoso y sexy que es Remy?


¿.
Por.
Qué. ?.

Y los diálogos son tan forzados, las BFF (a.k.a. las Zonzas) tienden a hablar como unas adolescentes en una mala película romántica de los años ochenta ganadora del premio al peor guión de los Razzies. Y hay varios, así que mucho valor para leer eso. Luego el soliloquio de Remy casi al final, quise arrancarme los ojos.

Y llegamos a Remy, lo único bueno del libro. Tan bueno que es DE LO ÚNICO QUE SE HABLA EN TODO EL LIBRO. LO ÚNICO. La ventaja del libro es que es fácil de leer. Porque los párrafos se repiten y puedes saltarte varios. ¡Pero, eh, que le he dado un cumplido!

De verdad es una pena que el libro no me haya gustado. Tenía aparentemente todo para gustarme, pero la narración tan pobre y la trama por demás predecible y sin nada nuevo, solo me hizo renegar y confirmar que escritoras buenas de género erótico son escasas, como unicornios casi. (Sí existen, los unicornios digo, conozco varios)

Spoiler 1 || Spoiler 2 (en el blog)

¿Leeré el segundo? ¡Sí! Yey, soy terca y masoquista. A pesar de que la narración es horrible (como me corroboraron muy bien en goodreads, así que no solo es cosa mía) quiero leerlo porque como TODOS los párrafos de Real señalaba: Remy es sexy.

Nota: Katy si necesitas editora, aquí te ofrezco mis servicios, no cobro muy caro.

Reseña completa (o reclamos en): El Extraño Gato del Cuento

[nitzan_schwarz]

3.5 stars

Real is a book that has swarmed the net (and the blogs) when it came out - with almost all positive reviews. Add to that a hot boxer and I'm in. To my delight, Real was a good story, and I'm already looking forward the next in the series.

Brooke is the one who tells the story. She's a well put girl, used to be an athlete. She's not into the whole boxer scene, and never felt a strong attraction to a man or went totally crazy with it. Until Remy comes into the picture, that is. Through her interactions with Remy, his crew and her sister you find out what a good person she is, and how much she's been through.

What I didn't like about her, though, was the fixation on how hot Remy is and what he does to her physically. There couldn't be one time they were together that it wasn't mentioned at least once or twice, and even when he wasn't there she was thinking about it in either terms of wonder or fantasy. That kind of got on my nerves.

Remy was 100% alpha male deliciousness. He was also bad at expressing himself, so a lot of the communication in the book was through songs, which I found lovely. And, alpha or not, he was just so freakin' adorable! I loved all the times Brooke described his lion-like actions, and they all made me want to curl next to him like a cat.

But my favorite part in the story wasn't the hotness, or the sexiness or any of that. My favorite part was the disorder...

To read the rest of the review go to my blog here

[Cocktails and Books]

Intense. Review to come

[Ashley]

Nose Graze — Young Adult book review

Real is a conflicting book for me. Overall, Real has very little substance to it other than "Oh my god, he's so hot. Oh my god, I'm so wet." It's the kind of book you read when you want pure, raw sex... and that's about it.

His lips curl and he meets my gaze. "Brooke Dumas." He just fucked my name right in front of me.
—Page 14

The first half of the book was like one big, giant sexual tease. There's not a lot of action, but there are plenty of descriptions of hard, solid, sweaty muscles. Oh, and don't forget clenching sex organs. At first I was enjoying the tease, but it got really old after a while. Anytime Remington was fighting, we got descriptions of his muscles and how they looked when his body moved. Then we'd get Brooke monologuing about how her sex organs were clenching and her panties were soaked. Every. Single. Time.

My sex muscles clench.
—Page 62

and my sex organs throb so fiercely.
—Page 69 (lol)

However, once the tease was over and they finally had sex (at about 50%), I kind of felt like I was satisfied and almost 'done' with the book. It's like the author drew it out for so long that it felt like that's what the book was aiming towards. And when we got there, I was like, "Okay, that was great. Now we can go home." I mean, don't get me wrong, the sex was freaking HOT, I just felt like there was very little left tying me to the book once I got my fix.

As for Brooke and Remington's relationship, it had pros and cons. On the one hand, Remington could be super sweet. He's pure, hot, alpha male, but he had a really sensitive side to him. I love the way he fought for Brooke and did so many selfless things to try to make her happy. But on the other hand, Remington said like 3 words for 70% of the book; I felt like I didn't know him at all, and Brooke didn't even know him at all... And yet, she was "so in love with him". Remington spends most of his time grunting, groaning, punching, and licking. Now, once we got to the end of the book, Remington had this huge like 2 page monologue that I thought was AWESOME. I was like, "Where has this guy been for the whole book?" He basically gave us a recap of his thoughts through the entire story. I really liked what he had to say and I enjoyed hearing from him, but I kind of felt like it was too late. It would have been perfect if those words and thoughts were intertwined throughout the story, but it was just all mushed together at the end.

Speaking of licking, by the way, there are a couple really strange sexual scenes in here that didn't do it for me. First, Remington is a LICKER. As in, Brooke constantly refers to him as a lion.

He scents the back of my ear. Then I feel his hand, scraping down my hair, softly petting me. His tongue follows, lightly lapping the place on my neck he bit in the shower. He drags it along the curve of my shoulders, my ear, awakening every inch of my skin.

I feel like he's a lazy lion, bathing me with his tongue, licking and nuzzling me.
—Page 186

He slowly, wetly, licks my jaw. My chin. And then... my lips.

Now I don't know what this is supposed to mean, but I'm literally imagining him tongue out licking her up and down. Her chin and jaw are probably wetter than the panty region.

Then, secondly, there's this extremely odd scene where she like humps his leg and orgasms. By humping his leg. Yes.

"You have no right to me," I say in a breathless anger.

His hand clenches. "You gave me the rights when you came on my thigh."
—Page 139

I obviously had several problems with this book, and not everything clicked with me, but I honestly enjoyed Real too. I read it really quickly, and other than the 50% post-sex-lull, I was entertained. The drama and plot do get amped up a bit at the end, even if it's not all completely realistic. (show spoiler)[It turns out that Brooke's sister is a crazy cocaine addict and is Remington's enemy's groupie. She's cold, emotionless, and kind of bitchy. But at the very end, Remington gets her back for Brooke, sticks her in rehab for like a month, and she comes out completely squeaky clean, as if she's her old, pure, naïve self. No longer interested in cocaine, suddenly all happy and cheery and delighted to see Brooke. She did a complete 180.] (hide spoiler) If you're looking for something that's pure, raw sex, then I do recommend you give Real a try. If nothing else, it will satisfy that urge. It doesn't have a lot of substance plot or relationship-wise, but it is an entertaining enough book that it's worth reading if you're in the right mood.

[stacey_is_sassy]

I enjoyed this book.

There was a lot going on and I felt a little overwhelmed with it all. Remy was a very likable character and by the end of the book I loved him more than Brooke.

The additional character were great and I hope the author will give us novellas or keep us informed on what happens with Riley and Pete. I think they both deserve a HEA as well.

Great book and I think I will be looking for Mine when it comes out later in the year.

The author should feel very proud.

[leelu92]

Apparently I read a completely different book than most everyone else. Too much internal dialogue for me. I skipped paragraphs. Stilted language and some grammatical errors. Made up words and some stuff that didn't make sense.

-One does not bounce on their calves... one bounces on their toes.
-One does not hit a speedball...one hits a speed bag.

There is great potential for this book. Remington is a fantastic Alpha. I liked him A lot. He needs professional help for sure ( don't want to be spoilery so I won't go into why)

Crap- I don't want this to be a mean review, that is not my intention but this book had potential but was held back by things that could have been changed/avoided. I know there is another one coming out and I hope it's tighter.

(I also hope that the book blogs review it (the next book) more fairly. I read several reviews that said this was a phenomenal book and was soooo hot. Yes, it was hot!!! No doubt about that but let's be honest that it needed some work as far as sentence structure etc.)

*sigh*

[Ing Cruz]

Yummy Remy. Review to come for this one too.