Book Review and GIVEAWAY: Just One Night, ends 2/18

Just One Night, by Kyra Davis.

I notice the button at the top of his jeans. It reads Dior Homme - $600 jeans - and yet the T-shirt could have been bought at Target. Like his youthfully muscular arms and conservatively cut salt-and-pepper hair, it's his contradictions that seduce me.

"I'd like to make you a drink," he says.

It doesn't take me a moment to grasp his meaning. I know he's inviting me to his room. I glance around the bar. I've never had a one-night stand. I'm the girl everyone can count on for her rock-solid, solemn consistency. 

Except tonight. Tonight I'm the girl who is going to sleep with a stranger.

Just One Night was originally published in three different parts, as an e-book, and now it's being released as one complete novel. The New York Journal of Books was quoted as saying it "gives Fifty Shades of Grey a run for its money ... this novel gives some depth, respect and sexual tension to the genre," and I would agree with that review.

Official synopsis:
Kasie Fitzgerald knows who she’s supposed to be. She’s a rising-star-workaholic at a global consulting firm. She’s the fiancée of a well-connected man who’s won the approval of her parents. People know that she’s reliable, serious, proper, cautious, pragmatic, and yes, a little predictable. She’s who Dave and her family want her to be.

But as her thirtieth birthday looms, buried feelings begin to resurrect. Her friend takes her to Vegas for one last wild and crazy night. In a dress much shorter and sexier than anything she has ever dared to wear before, she hits the blackjack tables. And meets him. Under the tailored clothes it’s clear that this is a man who is intense, powerful, and maybe even a little dangerous. With a touch of trepidation she accepts his invitation to get a drink, and before long, she’s in his hotel room.

She never gets his full name. Perhaps his anonymity is one of the reasons she’s able to give herself over to him and to the moment so completely. Perhaps it’s why she’s just had the most exquisite and passionate sex of her life. Shaken by her own behavior, Kasie tries to chalk it up to one crazy night. But when the mysterious gentleman she’s just had a fling with shows up in her office—as the CEO of a firm her company does a billion dollars of business with a year, demanding that she handle his account, and so much more—things will never be the same again. And there’s no telling where this will go…
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This novel was interesting because it had a few twists that I didn't see coming. Kasie is a smart woman, but after she meets Robert Dade, he turns her life around, and she has to learn how to push back and also how to stand on her own two feet and be more independent.

This book was MUCH better written than Fifty Shades, and is a good read if you like "the genre" (erotica) or want an interesting story that's more R-rated. Some of the characters managed to surprise me by doing things I didn't foresee, and we see the aftermath of Kasie's one-night stand (or what was supposed to be only a one-night stand) on her boyfriend of six years, Dave. There's also a backstory with Kasie's sister, Melody, who had a history of mental illness.

3.5 stars out of 5.

*Disclosure: I received a copy of this novel for reviewing purposes. The opinions expressed here, however, are my own.

GIVEAWAY:

Thanks to Gallery Books, I have two paperback copies of Just One Night for my readers to win. Enter via the Rafflecopter form below. Contest will end on Tuesday, February 18th at 11:59pm EST, and winners will be notified via email on February 19th, and must respond within 24 hours or alternate winner(s) will be chosen. U.S. and Canada residents only, please.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway