Signs of Attraction

by Laura Brown

[Angie]

Signs of Attraction was sweet, sexy, heart breaking, and eye opening. Carli has hearing loss, but she keeps it a secret. She hides her hearing aids under her hair and never uses any other accommodations. At least until she starts a class where she can't understand her professor at all, and then her hearing aid dies during class and she doesn't have any more batteries. Enter, Reed. He's a Deaf student in her class, and he comes to her rescue. Not only does he keep spare batteries for the kids he teaches, but he tells her about campus resources that could mean the difference between her passing and failing this class. And he's super hot.

Signs of Attraction was great! I loved how Carli and Reed's romance started out as him just trying to help her pass her class, and then introducing her to more Deaf people. He also shows her ways to make her everyday life much easier, as she's never used anything other than her hearing aids thanks to her family being super awful. He basically opens her up to a whole new world, and now Carli is able to truly be herself without hiding or being ashamed.

It's not all sunshine, rainbows, and making out though. Signs of Attraction does get dark once we start learning more about Carli's and Reed's families. For Reed, he's adopted and just received a letter from his birth father, but he's afraid to read it. He's also still struggling with the fact that his dad killed himself and hadn't let anyone know that he was struggling. As for Carli's family, they made her ashamed of being hard of hearing. She never sought help for anything, and she's been plagued with constant headaches which she's been self medicating for. I kind of figured out what was going on with her and her family, but I was still shocked when the whole truth came out. How in the world could someone do that to their child!?

There was one thing that really bothered me about Signs of Attraction. There's one scene where Reed has sex with Carli while she's super drunk. He's trying to put her to bed, but then things go from there. She does consent, in that she wants him, but it was still unsettling for me. Especially, given something we learn about Reed's past relationship. Additionally, there's another scene where Reed is helping to take care of Carli when she's having a particularly bad health day, and again, has sex with her. There's nothing blatantly wrong with these scenes, but they just didn't sit right with me.

Other than that, I adored Signs of Attraction. Carli and Reed are both great characters and I was invested in both of their individual stories as well as their romance. I also feel like I learned quite a bit about Deafness and the Deaf community. I had only know a little bit from the ASL class I took in college, but it was different getting to see day to day life.

Read more of my reviews at Pinkindle Reads & Reviews.