Taut: The Ford Book

by J.A. Huss

[Angie]

Despite my hate for all things baby, I quite enjoyed Taut. In fact, I loved parts of it. Ford was my favorite character from the Rook and Ronin series, so getting into his head, and witnessing his journey to love was a special treat. However, as much as I love Ford, his book has a lot of things that just didn't work for me. Yes, I liked it overall, but I felt like the story derailed at the end.

Taut starts out with Ford leaving Rook behind. He realizes that she loves Ronin and isn't going to leave him, and it's just too painful to watch them together. He's suppose to be on a flight to LA in the morning, but he can't wait, so he jumps in his hunk-o-junk truck and drives. Of course, his crappy truck can't make it through a blizzard, so he calls for a tow and stays in a crappy hotel in his home town. There he sees Ashleigh, who's sitting in a car with an infant and no heat. He invites them back to his room, and then offers to pay for her car, and drive her to LA since that's where he's going anyway. It doesn't seem like very Ford-like behavior, but he needs a distraction from Rook, and Ashleigh needs a ride. He's just taking advantage of a mutually beneficial situation.

The baby road trip was weird for me. I do not enjoy reading about crying infants and dirty diapers. Ford isn't a baby person, but little Kate ends up growing on him. Who'da thought a baby would melt Ford's cold heart? But, who cares about the baby. Let's talk about the breastfeeding. Ashleigh does this a lot (of course, baby's gotta eat) and Ford unabashedly watches her and gets turned on by it. I started to feel like a bit of a pervert since I liked that he liked it, and was actually hoping this would trod over into lactation fetish territory. It doesn't really, but there is some milk involved during their one super, duper, insanely hot night together in Vegas. So...yeah, BDSM and lactation. If those aren't your thing, pass on Taut.

Now for what kept me from loving Taut (aside from the dirty diapers). First, there was Rook. She seriously got on my nerves even though she was only in the beginning chapter and a chapter near the end. She was so whiny and clingy and I wanted to slap her. Ford made his feelings very clear, but she will not let go! She's all "I need you," "I love you," "don't leave me!" Bitch, give him some space to get over you! My gosh! Second was Ashleigh's backstory which comes out close to the end. It's pretty ridiculous and felt random. Finally, the twist at the end involving Ashleigh's deep, dark family secret was weird and honestly, it didn't make sense to me. Was her family exaggerating or lying? Were they telling the truth? I have no clue! Then Ford's solution to that actually made me laugh, since it was so out of nowhere.

I love Ford and I almost loved Taut. My rating is more like 5★ for getting into Ford's head, coming to understand him more and the sex (and making me fell dirty yet intrigued). Then 2★ for everything else. Sometimes less is more, and everything in the last part was too much.

Read more of my reviews at Pinkindle Reads & Reviews.