Peace Love Books: Blog Tour + Review/Giveaway: Can't Always Get What You Want by Chelsey Krause

Can't Always Get What You Want

By Chelsey Krause

Release Date: January 13, 2015

Source: Tour

Summary: Sophie Richards has been looking forward to a much-needed girls’ night out: a Rolling Stones tribute-band concert, a few drinks, a distraction from her grueling nursing shifts in acute care. But when her best friend bails, Sophie gets stuck with a blind date.

Although Brett Nicholson may be the hottest carpenter alive, and Sophie may technically be single, she isn’t exactly on the market. Six years ago she found The One. He was everything Sophie dreamed a man could be—and then she lost him. In an instant, her whole life changed, and she forgot all about happily ever after.

But as she gets to know Brett, Sophie starts to wonder about the future for the first time. With a broken heart still clouding her mind, jumping into a new relationship feels impossible. When she’s in his arms, walking away feels even harder. Now Sophie faces an impossible choice: living in the past or choosing love in the here and now.

Review: It's no secret that I'm a sucker for a gorgeous cover. So when I saw this one, I just couldn't resist picking it up. It turns out that the cover pretty much has nothing to do with the story except for the fact that it's a romance. And I'm sad to say that the romance was a bit too lackluster for my taste.

Sophie Richards is a nurse who's learned to be content with her life. She has a best friend and a roof over her head, so what more could she want? When her best friend bails on their girls night out to a Rolling Stones Tribute Band concert, Sophie ends up acting totally out of character and sets herself up on a blind date with her best friend's boyfriend's colleague. Sophie hates meeting new people, but she's pleasantly surprised when she meets Brett and as they spend more time together, she finds herself falling hard. Sophie has already loved and lost once, though, so is she really ready to let someone completely in?

When I read the first page of this book, I thought I was going to love Sophie. She's a nurse and has a pretty good sense of humor when it comes to her work, so I instantly loved her nursing anecdotes and her personality. As the book progressed, though, and Sophie started dating Brett, I became less and less interested in her story. Her relationship with Brett wasn't as naturally romantic/emotional as it was supposed to be and their storyline didn't feel like the main focus of the story. I felt like some emotions in their relationship were forced and just lost my interest.

About halfway through the book, this huge tragic past event in Sophie's life is revealed and I felt like the timing/how it was revealed was a little off and the flashbacks were a bit forced. I wish the story had more flow and a better integration of past and present romances. And when her past came out, I really didn't like Brett's reaction. I felt like some characters/reactions were way too overdramatic and were made that way as a convenience to the plot. Sophie's ex Joel, her best friend's other friend Emmie, and Sophie's doctor boss has such over the top personalities that were to the point of ridiculous and unrealistic. I wish the plot could have gotten to where the author wanted it to go without such unrealistic characters to get it there.

For me, this was between a two and a three star book. While some parts were cute and I really did like Sophie's character in the beginning, there were too many things that annoyed me. As I was reading, I just couldn't wait until I could get to the end because I was already over Sophie's character. The plot started to become too cliche too quickly and some characters acted out of line just to move the plot along. While it sounded promising, I wasn't as big of a fan of this one as I wanted to be.

About the Author

I was born and raised in Canada, and live with my husband and two children. I’ve been a nurse since 2009. An essay I wrote on intercultural nursing has been published in a nursing anthology.

I love thrift shops, repurposing old junk and learning new belly dance moves. I can’t decide if my favorite movie is either “Bridget Jones’ Diary” or “Fight Club.”

I’ve always wanted to be a writer and in the spring of 2013, I finally sat down and wrote my first book. Now that that’s done, I’m working on my second.

I believe that the best way to become a great writer is to read.

A lot.

And then read some more.

I absolutely love books and would live at the library if they’d let me.