Linda
Written on Feb 10, 2016
Thirty Nights with a Dirty Boy was delicious and intriguing, as Walker always manages to include very complex characters, even in her shorter stories.
I don't know how she does it, but Walker manages to draw me in from the start, and Thirty Nights with a Dirty Boy is intriguing, to say the least. Both Ella and Sean are fleshed out and realistic, even if there is an air of mystery surrounding both of them. Ella is accomplished, at least on the outside, she has an organization to help women in trouble, and she'll soon open up a safe haven for them to help them, the same way she was helped by her mentor in the past. However, beneath the surface, she is not as together as she seems.
Sean is a gorgeous bartender, but there is more to him than meets the eye, and when Ella figures out just how much more, she decides that she needs him to get over some of her hang-ups. It will all be safe, she's sure, because there will be no feelings involved. There is something in Ella's past that has left her with the impossibility to deal with people touching her. It's so bad she's always wearing gloves, and she wants to get past this and become more 'normal'. Sean is the opposite, touching people, handing out his phone number to female bar patrons, and not minding others watching him in intimate moments.
Written in first person point of view from Ella's perspective, in past tense, the story unfolds at a nice pace, and even though the story is short, I got a good grasp on both Ella and Sean, and I can't wait to learn more about both of them.
He glanced back, dark brows arched over his eyes. In the dim light, I couldn't see the color clearly, but his irises were pale. Pale and large, set under slashing brows. Combined with that mouth, that face, that body... Really, I didn't know how that much perfection managed to end up in one body.
I wasn't really doing anything but enjoying him from a distance. That was all I ever did when it came to men. It got kind of boring, really.
He braced his elbows on the bar and leaned in, his smile taking on an intimate slant that made me feel like I'd caught him looking at me while I was undressing - and he wasn't even looking at me.