Title: True
Author: Erin McCarthy
Publisher: May 7th 2013 by InterMix
Format: ebook, 238 pages
Source: NetGalley
When Rory Macintosh’s roommates find out that their studious and shy friend has never been with a guy, they decide that, as an act of kindness they’ll help her lose her virginity by hiring confident, tattooed bad boy Tyler Mann to do the job…unbeknownst to Rory.
Tyler knows he’s not good enough for Rory. She’s smart, doctor smart, while he’s barely scraping by at his EMT program, hoping to pull his younger brothers out of the hell their druggy mother has left them in. But he can’t resist taking up her roommates on an opportunity to get to know her better. There’s something about her honesty that keeps him coming back when he knows he shouldn’t…
Torn between common sense and desire, the two find themselves caught up in a passionate relationship. But when Tyler’s broken family threatens to destroy his future, and hers, Rory will need to decide whether to cut her ties to his risky world or follow her heart, no matter what the cost…
Rory’s nerdy and shy and not able to make friends easily. Luckily, she’s managed to bond with her 2 dorm mates, even though they’re very different. They help her get out of her shell a bit. When they find out she’s a (gasp!) virgin, they secretly pay Tyler, who happens to be a booty call for one of them, to deflower her. At first, Rory’s unsure why Tyler is suddenly paying so much attention to her, but she likes it.
Rory was a funny person, she had a great sense of humor, though she sometimes had a hard time letting her hair down. She lost her mother when she was young, and you could tell that played a part in her personality. She loved her father very much, but they weren’t a loving family. She was smart and confident in her abilities.
Tyler was your typical bad boy – tattooed, dangerous, ladies’ man with a secretive home life that made him want to protect himself from further hurt, but a real softy on the inside. He really did have a horrible home life, no father and a drug-addicted, abusive mother. Luckily, he had his older brother to help him out, and his younger brothers to keep him grounded. He made some stupid decisions throughout the story (not the least of which was accepting money to take a girl’s virginity), but you could tell that underneath he was a pretty decent guy.
Rory’s roommates were pretty nice, until you realized that they’d paid someone to sleep with her. Why they felt it was so necessary for Rory to have sex was unclear. I thought that was a pretty underhanded thing, and it colored my opinion of them for the rest of the book.
The plot is pretty repetitive these days: girl is almost raped, boy comes to her rescue, they fall in love. Don’t get me wrong, though, it was entertaining. It was a little disappointing, however, that the near-rape wasn’t dealt with. No police were called, no counseling was sought, nothing. It was spoken of a few times immediately after, then once or twice later, then nada. That was a missed opportunity, as far as I’m concerned.
The story moved along at a brisk pace, and that was nice. It made it easier to overlook the parts that bothered me, such as Rory’s inconsistent behaviors, her roommates’ attempt to prostitute her out and Tyler’s inability to simply talk about what was bothering him. The romance felt authentic, like 2 college kids getting to know each other and learning to trust one another. The ending was a bit rushed, it could have used more attention. Otherwise, it was a nice quick read.
Predictable but entertaining.
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