Fight for Love

Real #1

by Katy Evans

Star de la ligue underground, Tate Remington est un boxeur à l'animalité exacerbée dont le pouvoir de séduction rend folles toutes les filles autour du ring. Depuis qu'il a croisé son regard, la seule femme à laquelle il pense, celle qu'il a choisie, c'est Brooke, ancienne athlète de haut niveau qui, suite à un accident, s'est reconvertie dans la thérapie sportive. Mais pour que leur histoire devienne bien réelle, Remington devra se dévoiler à Brooke... Deux caractères forts qu'un désir charnel intense, pur et obsessionnel consume. Une histoire d'amour sous tension et des personnages d'une rare complexité.

Genres: Romance, New Adult, Sports, Contemporary, Contemporary Romance, Sports Romance, Fighters

323 pages, Paperback

First published April 8, 2013

About the author

Katy Evans is a New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author. Her debut REAL shot to the top of the bestselling lists in 2013 and since then 10 of her titles have been New York Times bestsellers. Her books have been translated into nearly a dozen languages across the world.

***Katy doesn't respond to messages on this site, but you can email her at katyevansauthor@gmail.com or look her up on Facebook, Twitter, or her website.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/authorKatyEvans

Twitter @authorkatyevans

Website: www.katyevans.net

Reviews

[Katrina Passick Lumsden · Rating 1 out of 5]

Oh, how I wish this book were an underground boxing match. I've had so much fun thinking up names and special fighting techniques for Brooke and Remington.

Brooke "The Washout" Dumas. Weighing in at an arguably lithe 120lbs., Brooke's fighting style relies more on flexibility and trickery than sheer brute force. Having been denied her dream of Olympic gold thanks to an injury, Brooke's had years to save up all her bitter rage and coil it into a tight ball of hate that she's stuffed in "her core". Now she's wound tight and ready for action. Her hobbies are babbling incessantly about inane bullshit, stretching, and making stupid decisions. Turn ons are tacky tattoos, muscles, sweat, and mood swings. Her special skills include an almost unrealistic ability to contort her body (she can turn her head around and kiss a guy on the mouth while in the doggystyle position), and an overabundance of vaginal fluid which she directs at unsuspecting opponents.



Seriously, get that woman some Depends before she kills someone.

Remington "RageTurd" Tate is just your typical, musclebound gorilla.



Ragey's actual size is never stated, but if my impressions are accurate, he's roughly the size of a small barn. Left to fend for himself in the "loony bin" at the tender age of 13, Ragey has learned how to fight, fight, fight his way to the top (of the orgy pile!). His most valuable talent in the ring is his ability to throw out Super Pheromone, which makes every straight female and gay male in a five mile radius stupid with lust. Senses are dulled and inhibitions are destroyed. His hobbies include fighting, yelling, raging, table flipping, lamp smashing, marking his territory with his urine, and sniffing every woman of mating age in his general vicinity. His turn ons are pert butts, "honeyed whiskey eyes", and women with vaginal fluid imbalances.

The book itself has its own killer instincts. There are enough metaphors to sink a yacht, and the staccato nearly reached Fifty Shades levels. Between that and the term "my sex", I was suffering some serious "bad erotica" flashbacks. Thankfully, there was enough unintentional funny to keep me from completely losing (the rest of) my mind. Some of it is funny because the bad grammar makes it weird. Other parts are funny merely because someone not only thought them, but thought they were good enough to put on paper. For instance, the first named opponent of Ragey is a guy by the name of Kirk Dirkwood. Why that was so funny to me, I couldn't tell ya, but I did make a note in my Kindle: "Why didn't she just go with Clit Dickwater?"

The various story arcs are usually pretty ridiculous. In one twist, Brooke sees her younger sister, Nora, "in the Underground". This occurs during a match between Remington and his arch-nemesis, The Scorpion. Last Brooke knew, Nora was sending their parents postcards from Australia, but alas, there she is on The Scorpion's side of the ring, looking strung-out, pale, skinny...and with a scorpion tattoo on her face.

You know where that's going, right? Well, Brooke has to rescue Nora from Snidely Whiplash, and since Remington, in a manic hissy fit, bet "all of his money" that he'd beat Scorpion in the "Underground Championship"....wouldn't it just be so unbelievably sweet if he threw the match to ensure Nora's release from El Scorpio?



And now, without further ado...

"My legs wobble and I'm left with the distinct impression this man wants to pound me next. With his cock."

"He's so close the scent of him tears through me like a shot of adrenaline."

"I dip my head and murmur, "Thank you", and quickly leave, and I want to die because I swear to God he just ducked his head to smell me."



"I'm still not recovered from seeing him up close, and my blood stream already carries all kinds of strange, bubbly, hot little things."

"There is, literally, a ball of fire in my throat..."



"...and I'm so crazy about this man, I just want to eat him up with a spoon..."

"...and an entire farm full of animals awaken in my stomach, not just the butterflies."

"My head is spinning inside my cranium."


"I know. For Sure. One hundred percent to the tenth power."



At one point during their second sex scene, Brooke reaches down and feels the slickness of his "bloated crown" .



There's a part where Brooke goes to see her sister and has to kiss Scorpion's tattoo to get permission to speak to her. Well, of course his "goons" take photos, and of course those photos get sent to Remington while he's eating breakfast in a hotel restaurant.

My Favorite Scene in the Entire Book in 3...2...1

"I can't read his profile, but he has gone utterly still. Then it all happens in a blink of an eye."...



Yes. He flips...a table.



And here's me after being introduced to a new euphemism for 'clitoris':

"...and at the first scrape of my nubbin against the rock-hard quad muscle of his thigh...





I'll be serious for a minute. I don't understand how anyone can enjoy writing like this. I struggled to get through. The writing was simplistic, repetitive, and amateur, the dialogue was silly, and the corn and cheese quotient went well beyond what anyone would count as acceptable. There were moments when Ms. Evans just abandoned any pretense at actual storytelling. There are at least four instances where the story almost completely self-destructs, and the book left me with more questions than it answered:

1. Did Brooke tear her ACL twice or break her ankle?
2. Is Pete's name Pete or Pedro?
3. Was the tension between Melanie and Riley because they hadn't slept together yet or because they had?
4. Did Melanie go home without us being told? One minute she's there, the next she's not.
5. Why did Remington, after an entire books' worth of silence about his feelings, go off for five fucking pages at the end about how much he lurves Brooke?
6. If a scorpion is an insect, why does Brooke refer to The Scorpion as "the reptile man"?
7. What the hell happened with Remington's parents? They showed up to see him, but he refused, and we never revisited that messy topic.
8. How did Nora manage to get rid of her tattoo and beat a cocaine addiction in a mere four weeks?
9. How is it possible for one man to spend a few million dollars a year? What is he spending all that money on?
10. He told Brooke he wants to be her "REAL". Her real what? Real vagey boyfriend? If so, mission accomplished.
11. Why was there so much poetic waxing about how utterly perfect and god-like and sexy and male and sweet and vulnerable and damaged and FUCK! WHY?!

Questions, questions, questions. The most burning question, however, is how in the name of Blackbeard's glory hole has this gotten so many high ratings????

Word/Phrase Count:
"My sex" - 35
"Sex" - 35
"Sexy" - 60
"Wet" - 37
"Hot" - 80
"Eyes" - 384
"Scent" - 18
"Lust" - 26
"Gaze" - 50
"Heart" - 103
"Love" - 177
"Hair" - 90
"Beautiful" - 47
"My core" - 11
"Erection" - 20
"Fuck" - 36
"Fucks" - 6
"Fucking" - 75
"Delicious" - 13
"Mouth" - 144
"Clench" - 28
"Clenches" - 33
"Clenching" - 8
"Naked" - 26
"Liquid" - 16
"Heat" - 21
"Between my legs" - 16
"Hard" - 95
"Tight" - 25
"Sweat" - 13
"Male" - 25
"Inside me" - 58
"Muscle" - 21
"Muscles" - 52
"Nipples" - 21
"NUBBIN" - 2

[Akanksha❤ Søren♰ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love him. He’s not just a star, he’s the whole fucking sky to me. He’s the sun and every planet in this galaxy.

NOW THIS IS WHAT I CALL AN AMAZING DEBUT NOVEL.
FUCKING BRILLIANT.

Remington Tate is so one of my top favorite book boyfriends. I love him, I more than love him. I want to lick him and eat him up.
Dump whatever you are reading for a while, and jump onto this book.. trust me, its WOW.

When the book starts and the author describes Remy; him walking, I swear to god I creamed myself.


I could imagine him in my head all muscles walking like he owns the world; Sexy tan muscles walking on the most amazing thighs I've ever imagined. *swooning*



For like the first half of this book I was YELLING at my laptop because seriously, there is only so much I can take of sexual tension. I could feel is seeping through my laptop screen their chemistry. It was BLOODY hot.

He tugs my earlobe with his teeth, licks the shell of my ear, and has forgotten all about playing music for me. While I shudder wantonly, wet and squirming as I keep glancing at his jeans, which burst with the fullness of his erection. The volume straining the denim is so staggering that my hands itch, my tongue wants to taste him, lick him, my pussy clenches in desperate desire.
Like seriously, what gets more sexual and sensual than this? ^^









A drop of water clings to one of the small, brown tips of his nipples, and it takes all my willpower to fight against a deep, soul-shattering need to lean over and suck it into my mouth. Not the drop of water. His nipple.
FUCK ME.

Author, I love you. This book was amazing.. ;)
You surely know how to make a person sexually frustrated from 0 to 60 in 3.5 ; LOL

His lips curl and he meets my gaze. "Brooke Dumas." He just fucked my name right in front of me.

This book is like a crazy ass ride of seduction, sexy fighting, madness, lust, sexual tension and WOW.
The build up, sexual tension, the characters, the story... everything about this book is just wow. I loveddddd how the book was written and the story it portrayed.
The way the story spoke about his muscles and body... I was drooling all over my laptop.

The chemistry Brooke and Remy share, I swear to god you feel it deep inside your skin.

This book had some maddass quote, like really intense and stuff. Powerful lines and even more powerful scenes. Loved every page of this book.


Remington Tate. Remy. Riptide. RIP
Call him wtv you want, he is by far the sexiest MMA fighter I've read about. Like ever..



All those lion talks and the licking, I could seriously imagine Remy being a lion and protecting his mate and licking her and marking her as his!

I can barely breathe as the smell of his soap envelops my lungs, drugging all my senses. His arms come out, and he tangles ten angry fingers in my hair as he yanks my head back in his fists and buries his nose in my neck, growling softly. His deep inhale reaches me, and a shudder runs through my body as I do the same, absorbing every color and flavor of his strong male scent into my body through my nostrils. His tongue flashes out to lick a wet path up my neck as an arm coils around my waist, and he crushes me to his body, whispering, “Mine.”

I loved the use of lyrics and songs. It showed so many more emotions. I love how a few authors add a playlist; totally makes the novel seem like a movie with amazing background scores.
'Iris' and 'I Love You' loveddddd them in the book, so properly placed and the meaning and everything behind it; so apt.

♫ ♪And I'd give up forever to touch you
'Cause I know that you feel me somehow
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be
And I don't want to go home right now

And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
'Cause sooner or later it's over
I just don't want to miss you tonight

And I don't want the world to see me
'Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am♫ ♪

♫ ♪I like your smile
I like your vibe
I like your style
But that's not why I love you

And I, I like the way
You're such a star
But that's not why I love you


You're so beautiful
But that's not why I love you
I'm not sure you know
That the reason I love you

Is you being you, just you
Yeah, the reason I love you
Is all that we've been through
And that's why I love you♫ ♪

The exciting surprise/present wtv you want to call it, we get at the end of this book, it was like cherry on top of the best sundae.

This book has no cliffhangers. I mean, what more could you ask for now a days!! ;)
Go read this book now. Its oh so worth it!

[Emily May · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am conducting what I'm shelving as a "New Adult (NA) Experiment". I'm going to work my way through some of the popular New Adult books and see if I can weed out the crap and hopefully find some surprising gems. Here's hoping!

This was bad. I know there's a certain lack of believability in all romance novels, but Real took it to an all new level. There's not a single character here who's anything other than a caricature, rarely a piece of dialogue that's anything other than cringy, and definitely never a description of the hormones and muscles in Brooke's body that sounds vaguely normal. On top of that, perhaps most damning of all, it was so so boring. I feel like I can sum this novel up simply as a 266-page description of Remington Tate's muscles.

I cannot deal with this level of physical description. Every time Remy walks into the room, speaks or breathes, Brooke's eyes are wandering over his perfect body, describing his perfect smile, just in case we didn't realise how he looks the last hundred times she's mentioned it. I find it amazing that there are four more books planned for this series! What can possibly happen? There's no plot beyond the adventures of Remy's rippling muscles. Books that offend me are more entertaining than this. At least I can see the root of the bestseller status with them - the intense (read: borderline abusive) relationships - but Real is just brain-numbingly dull. Also, I'd like to know what's going on with this weird trend in NA. Losing Hope, This Girl, Walking Disaster, Remy... these books are all retellings of the first book from the POV of the guy. Why? I don't get the appeal. What's the point? Where's the tension, the suspense, in reading the story again?

Anyway, let's meet our protagonist. Brooke Dumas. The woman who is plucked out of a crowd of screaming female fans by Remington Tate. The woman who, despite having plenty of evidence to suggest Remy is obsessed with her and only her, still claims to be oblivious to his affections. "Does he feel anything for me even remotely as strong as I do? There's this mean little part of me, the girl who broke her ACL and who failed to accomplish her dream, the girl who doesn't believe I can really have anything wonderful, makes me wonder if he really wants me at all."

Moving on. The physical description of Remy is predictably pleasing: tall, dark hair, muscles, panty-dropping smile. And, of course, the character description of him predictably ruins it: angry, violent, arrogant, controlling. "I can see he thinks he's the ultimate creation, and he seems to believe every woman here is his Eve, created from his ribcage for him to enjoy." He sounds delightful. His sexiness evaporates further when he storms up to Brooke, grabs hold of her even though they've never met before, and this exchange happens:

"Your name," he growls, panting, his eyes wild on mine.
"Uh, Brooke."
"Brooke what?" he snaps out, his nostrils flaring.

Then he kisses her because he can and he wants to and he will. SEE-WANT-TAKE. It's so rude and presumptuous and I understand why some might find his confidence sexy, but I can't. And I'll tell you why.

A couple of years ago there was this guy I knew. A guy everyone knew, actually. He was incredibly good-looking but it was more than that too. He had an arrogant level of confidence that many women (and some men, for that matter) found attractive. Unless you know someone like him, I imagine it's hard to understand what he was like and the way people responded to him. He had such self-confidence that he would walk up to women he barely knew and sling his arm around their waist, lean in for a kiss on the lips. He did it so naturally, with such an air of certainty in the action that no one questioned it. Looking back, I can't believe no one questioned it. He kissed people, he touched them so casually, and any surprise the person initially had quickly disappeared in favour of delight that this hot guy had his arm around them and acted like it was the most natural thing in the world. Sometimes he went further. No one but him could get away with saying to someone "I'll see you later" with a promising wink and have them instantly agreeing without question. No one said no to him. Not even me, though thankfully I only kissed him. His way of behaving like everything he did was just the most obvious, most natural thing to do made it so no one thought to question it. Until one night this girl I only vaguely knew back then did question it. Actually, no, "question" is an insult to her, she told him a very firm "fuck off". And, whether because he was a bastard behind the pretty smile or because he genuinely couldn't believe someone meant NO when it was said to him, he didn't listen.

And it is books like this and characters like Remington that trigger such negative associations from me. Whenever I read about these men who are so used to getting a "yes" that they assume it's okay to grab someone's face because they want them, they make me uncomfortable. Their SEE-WANT-TAKE attitude makes me uneasy. No one is so beautiful and charming that it is impossible for anyone to say no to them. No one is above other people's right to decline.

Mel, Brooke's friend, particularly pissed me off with this. Remy is so gorgeous that she refuses to believe for a second that her friend might say no to him. Honestly, she is one of the worst friends in the world. What kind of friend gives your number to a guy without asking you, especially when she knows you probably wouldn't want her to? Brooke actually says to her: "How could you give him my number? What do we even know about this man, Mel? Do you want me to end up murdered in some dark alley and my body parts tossed into some trash can?"

And what does Mel say? "That's never going to happen to someone who's taken as many self-defense classes as you." I can't even deal with the stupid in that statement. And then Mel says this gem: "Remington Tate may have a bad rap, but he's sexier than sin, Brooke. Yes, he was banned for poor conduct because he's a naughty, wicked boy."



Okay, let's get onto the "sexy" aspect of this novel. Sometimes these NA novels do that fairly successfully even if they fail at everything else. But, I swear, Brooke's descriptions remind me of David Attenborough describing mating rituals of some mammal or other. It's just bad, cringe-worthy writing. Like this: "I'm familiar enough with the subject to know that wired into my genes and DNA is a natural desire for healthy offspring, and with it comes a desperate urge to just full out mate with whoever I deem is the prime male of my species. I have never in my life met a man before who sparks up my crazy mating instincts like him."

And, oh my god, the clenching. The author loves the word "clench". If Remy's muscles aren't clenching, then it's Brooke's vagina. Every page someone is clenching. Hands clench, teeth clench, abs clench, vaginas clench, facial muscles clench. Things I didn't even know could clench somehow clench. This is from the second page: "My sex muscles clench every time he hits his opponent." Seriously, girl, you oughtta get that checked out. And you especially oughtta get this checked out: "Maybe the cramp I thought I was getting in my ovaries was not cramp at all."

o_O Ladies, do you all have this problem? Because, frankly, I'm not experiencing this confusion over whether it's cramps or horniness. Just sayin'. There's a whole bunch of eyebrow-raising phrases like this...

"He keeps making sexual foreplay to my ear."

"Remy inhales me."... "Remy scented me." I think this means he's sniffing her. Mmm 'kay.

"Why won't you take me, Remington?"
"Because I want you too much." - Give me a break.

"Remington, whose jaw seems even squarer than I remember, like it's made of the most gorgeous, most priceless piece of granite the world has ever found."

Real, in short, is just annoying, boring and poorly written. I have completely exhausted myself and I hope I never again hear anything about Remy's control issues and Brooke's "breast tips" and "nubbin". FYI, Brooke, that's your nipples and clitoris.

[Aestas Book Blog · Rating 3 out of 5]

Please don't lynch me!!

I'm a little scared to say this given all the passionate fans of this book but, if I'm going to be honest, I just wasn't feeling it.

I mean, I get it. I totally get why so many readers loved it. It had a hot Alpha (somewhat damaged) hero, boat loads of steam and all, plus he was a fighter (gotta love the bad boys, right?) but... I just honestly barely felt anything while reading. I also had several issues with some of the content and then found the ending absolutely predictable. Nothing ever surprised me or make my heart race so ... I just don't think this story was for me.

I know a LOT of readers loved it though, it's been getting so many 5 star ratings, so I know that in many people's eyes it's got something special and I fully respect that, I guess I just personally couldn't connect to it.

REAL follows the story of Brooke and Remy. Remy was the champion boxer who every woman just lost their heads over. He was hot, dangerous, and unbeatable in the ring. When Brooke's friend drags her to one of his fights, they have a chance encounter and from that moment on are hooked on each other.

But when she was called to his hotel room after the fight, the last thing she expected was to be offered a job to tour with them. Brooke specialized in athlete rehab therapy and Remy wanted her there to help him with his training and after his fights. Or so he says. What he was really looking for is something "real". A real connection. Not to Remington "Riptide" Tate, but to him, Remy. She agreed, and their story began.

I had several issues with the story but I'm just going to just list a few of the main ones then leave it at that so that you can get a feel for what bothered me.

My first issue was their connection, or lack of. For me, it was too much, too soon. The entire story was told from Brooke's perspective and I just felt there was SO much focus (right from like page 2) on how hot she was for him every time she even saw him that I felt there was no time spent on actually building a real connection between them.

My second issues was the repetitiveness of both the scenes and certain words. There was a lot of clenching, muscle bulging, drenching etc. I'm not usually one to nit pick, but the word 'clench' was used over 70 times in the book. That's a lot of clenching. And it began on page 3. Another term that I began to tire of was 'speedy'. Now the hero was bi-polar. And (I'll address my issues regarding that next) but whenever he had an episode, they called it him going 'speedy' and I just got tired of the word. And just in general, a lot of the wording really made me mentally 'trip' while reading. Here's an example of the kind of thing that just didn't work for me.

"Tonight we’re both naked and deliciously entangled, and my sexy blue-eyed lion now seems content to have petted me for a long while, until I feel groomed down to my bones."

Ok, next, about him being bi-polar. I won't give the details because I don't want to spoil them, but basically, everything regarding the way his medical condition was a bit of a stretch to the point that it wasn't even remotely believable. I felt that, if the author was going to use that plot element, she should have use it accurately. I normally try to look past this sort of thing but it really bothered me here because it was referenced several time and there was just no way it was remotely plausible. His condition was described as some sort of gene switch that flicked back and forth and could also be determined by looking at his eyes which switched from blue to black if he had an 'episode'. His eye color chance was also linked to this gene switch. In a paranormal story, sure, I'd buy it. In a real life story, no way.

And finally, I predicted the ending from about a half way into the story. To a tee. So there was no adrenaline rush or anything because I just knew exactly what was going to happen.

I thought this book had great potential. I liked Remy a lot as a character and I even think that in a different book, I could have maybe fully fallen in love with him. His back-story made my heart ache and it set him up wonderfully as a damaged/tortured hero and I totally understood where he was coming from in terms of wanting to find something 'real' in a relationship.

“Why’d you want to have sex with me? To have a fucking adventure? What was I supposed to be? Your one-night-fucking stand? I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that?"

“I want this. Very badly.” He nuzzles my nose with his. “I’m trying not to fuck it up, all right?”

See? Now that stuff is swoony! And the way I look at it is this. I liked Remy. I really did. What I didn't like was everything surrounding him - including the heroine, which sucked because the story was told from her perspective. But, the result was that it made it harder for me to connect to the book as a whole (including Remy).

I mean, there were a few awwww moments, a few really gorgeous lines, and a few moments where I felt the hint of a 'spark' in their connection but those moments were brief and didn't last long enough to sway me into fully liking the book.

I fully respect that many people loved this book, it just really wasn't for me.

3.5 - 4 stars for Remy's character.
2 stars for the rest of the book.

[Christy · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 SERIOUSLY SMOKING HOT STARS!!!



We’ll get right to it... The main attraction:

Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate

This guy is too much. Too much male. Too much masculinity and pure raw beats. Put together, he’s just like sex on a stick.

One thing you should know about him right away...


And just a warning, this book will get you


Okay, okay... now for the actual review.

Brooke gets dragged to an underground fight one night with her best friends Melanie. Brooke isn’t the type of girl that usually goes to these types of things. She is a recent college grad and is specializing in sports medicine/therapy. Brooke spent most of her life training for the Olympics, until she hurt her knee. Now she is just interested in helping other athletes. While watching the last fight, she see’s someone that gets her attention. Remington. He notices her right away. Remy is a very popular fighter. The whole crowd is cheering for him. But he only has eyes for Brooke.

“Your name”

“Uh, Brooke.”
“Brooke what?”

“It’s Brooke Dumas.
”
“Brooke Dumas.”

He just fucked my name right in front of me.


Brooke feels the heat from Remy. She has never had these types of feelings. Pure lust. Remy gets ahold of Brooke and invites her to the next fight. She goes, expecting to get with Remy. He offers her a job. Go on the fight tour with him for the next 3 months. She accepts. As Brooke and Remy get to know each other, they communicate mostly through lyrics. Each picking songs to play to each other on their ipods describing how they feel. (LOVED this)



The longer they are together, the more the sexual tension between them builds... and builds... and builds... It gets to the point where the reader is ready to combust, along with Brooke! But Remy knows Brooke is special. He wants to take his time with her, let her really get to know him.



Remy has another side to him. A side no one really see’s, except his PA Pete, and his two coaches. He wants Brooke to know everything, but he is afraid she will run

Brooke finds out,Remy is bipolar and has very drastic highs and lows, manic episodes to the extreme. but she doesn’t care. She is already in too deep with Remy. She wants to be with him.

He’s my fighter, and I really want to fight to be with him.

Remy wants to make sure things are REAL between them before they take that step.

“Why’d you want to have sex with me? To have a fucking adventure? What was I supposed to be? Your one-night-fucking stand? I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me- not Riptide!”

And once they do... HOLY HELL IT IS HOT!!!!!


Everything is good for a while... Brooke and Remy are inseparable. There are some smoking hot scenes... Seriously! Wow- Remy, wow. In the gym on the mats, shower, bed, anywhere and everywhere. Remy cannot get enough. It’s all good.

“It’s because of you. I am deliriously happy. Completely at home wherever you are.”

Then Brooke finds out that her sister is trouble... does something completely DUMB and Remy finds out... It triggers an episode from there. Are Brooke and Remy strong enough to survive one of his episodes, or will they crash and burn...

How I felt about REMY-

He’s not just a star, he’s the whole fucking sky to me. He’s the sun and every planet in the galaxy.

I freaking loved this man! READ THIS NOW JUST TO MEET REMY!!!! Never in my life have I been that turned on by a fictional character. He is hot, sexy, sweet, and damaged. My perfect man! He has a messed up and tortured past, his parents are awful, he’s been through a lot- but he is just all kinds of WONDERFUL!!!!!
I did like Brooke most of the time too. She aggravated me once or twice with her poor decisions, but she always meant well. I understood why she did what she did. I loved how she was with Remy.

This one is going straight on my favorites shelf!!! CANNOT WAIT FOR THE SEQUEL!!!! Looking for a hot read and a new book boyfriend- READ THIS!!!

[Angie - Angie's Dreamy Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

***WARNING THIS IS A SWOONTASTIC, RAVING, FANATICAL REVIEW!!! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!***

5 STARS ...NO WAY!!!!!!! THIS BOOK IS A MILLION STAR BOOK!!! FAN-FREAKING-TASTC

"When I take you, you'll be mine," he says, a soft promise in my ear. He slides his thumb along my jaw, then gently kisses my earlobe. "You need to be certain." His eyes are so hot that I'm on fire with the lust in them, and the word "mine" makes the empty place between my legs swell with longing. "I want you to know me first, and then, I want you to let me know if you still want me to take you." -Remy

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! REMY...REMY...REMY...REMY!!
**be still my beating heart**

HOLY SHIT!!!! This book has me feeling consumed from the inside out. Remy and Brooke have taken over every part of my heart. I can’t even begin to explain the emotional amazingness that it is. How do I describe a book that's indescribable? How do I put into words just what this book has created, stirred and induced within me? It’s without a doubt THE BEST book I have read this year. It’s made me want to go back and re rate all the other books that I’ve read because next to the feelings that this has produced, they can’t even compare. If you’re thinking about reading this book DO IT NOW. I know you have an epic TBR and I know the choice of books out there is HUGE but THIS BOOK, THIS MASTERPIECE, that’s packed with sexual tension, palpable emotion, sweat inducing sizzle and a love story that will stick with you, will become your new favorite book without a doubt.

When I fall in love with a book everything in me wants to scream it from the mountain top. Everything in me wants to share the way it made me feel. I want to share this feeling with YOU because it’s euphoric!!! The high it’s created in me is immense and intense. You know that feeling of being on cloud nine? That feeling of not being able to think about anything else? That feeling of being IN the book? When you experience something SO, SO, SO special!! That’s the way this book will make you feel.

I’m COMPLETELY obsessed with these characters!!!

What the books about? Here’s the blurb:

A fallen boxer.
A woman with a broken dream.
A competition…

He even makes me forget my name. One night was all it took, and I forgot everything and anything except the sexy fighter in the ring who sets my mind ablaze and my body on fire with wanting…

Remington Tate is the strongest, most confusing man I’ve ever met in my life.

He’s the star of the dangerous underground fighting circuit, and I’m drawn to him as I’ve never been drawn to anything in my life. I forget who I am, what I want, with just one look from him. When he’s near, I need to remind myself that I am strong–but he is stronger. And now it’s my job to keep his body working like a perfect machine, his taut muscles primed and ready to break the bones of his next opponents . . .

But the one he’s most threatening to, now, is me.

I want him. I want him without fear. Without reservations.

If only I knew for sure what it is that he wants from me?

Remy is F&@#NG hot!! I swear his name alone cause panties to combust, dampen and melt. He’s hot...ladies. HOT, HOT, HOT, HOT. I can’t even rate the hotness. Think Travis Maddox times 1 million. Yeah, yeah I know that’s a huge comparison but Remy is all MAN! He’s alpha, primal, sex on a stick, intense, sweet, possessive. He’s EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING you could ever want!! But you wanna know the best part about him? His tender heart!! He has a heart of gold. OH.MY.GOD...I can't even tell you. He's so freaking incredible with Brooke. The love he has for that woman is UNIMAGINABLE! It's the BEST thing ever!! Ugh...here I go swooning again. I can't stop myself!

I LOVE HIM!
I LOVE
LOVE
LOVE
LOVE
H.I.M!!!

He smells my neck and then buzzes the back of my ear, and whispers into me, "You're my mate, and I've claimed you." - Remy

Brooke see's Remy and it’s LUST and something even deeper at first sight. I swear the connection is INSTANT! Now I know we aren't all a fan of insta love right?! Well this my fellow readers is a case of insta love done right! It's PERFECT. Brooke see's Remy, the spark is there, and then she's offered a job with him, takes it and the sexy, steamy anticipation of them connecting and falling in love has you sitting on the edge of your seat. It's so freaking good!!

"My heart pounds when I reach out, my hand quaking as a touch the top of his head. "Have you ever been anyone's?" I ask, a feathery whisper in the bedroom. He lists his head to mine, and I want him so bad I feel consumed inside, like he's already possessed my soul, and now my soul aches for him to possess my body."-Brooke

Brooke is one of the best chicks in a book I've read. EVERYTHING she thought, felt or saw I experienced! I loved her, never got annoyed with her and completely ADORED every moment of reading about her. Her feelings for Remy where the same feelings that I felt. I fell in love with him in the exact same way she did! She's the girl that we want to be. Independent but real. How many times do we read books and HATE or get annoyed at the female lead?! Too many but Brooke is a girl in her own league. You will LOVE her.

Together Remy and Brooke DEFINE sexual anticipation. God they are a walking, talking ball of hotness. They are so fantastic together. Think Kellan and Kiera, Abbi and Travis, Ana and Christian amazing!! They’re just brilliant as a couple. They complement each other, were made for each other...swoon, swoon, swoon!! The relationship is so sexual BUT it’s more than that!! They don’t just want each other, they NEED, LIVE and BREATHeach other. It’s the love we dream about.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

It’s what every girl wants. I want it. Damn....what a book. Seriously WHAT.AN.AMAZING.BOOK!! It’s so flipping good. It's a love story on crack. It's going to be addictive the moment you pick it up. TRUST ME this book is going to be all you'll think about. It's all consuming. So what are you waiting for...GO, GO, GO!! BUY THE BOOK!! I'll even put the links at the end of this review. It's going to ROCK YOUR WORLD!

[Rachel (BAVR) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Nothing in the world could have prepared me for this book. It’s too much and too little and too fucking bad for my brain to wrap itself around. I like romance. Really, I do. But books like Real are twisting the romance genre to a place where the phrases “pussy lips” and “fucks my ear” are becoming the norm, and I can’t with that. I can’t.

And how about these “hot alpha heroes” the writers have been cranking out lately? What a bunch of assholes. Just empty, pointless shells of rudimentary DNA and 0% body fat. After another one of my forays into the New Adult world, my AXEL! experience, I wrote an ode to the New Alpha. However, after reading about Remy in REAL, it seems that my ode was incomplete.

With no further ado, BAVR’s Ode to the New Alpha: Remy Edition…

He's hot, ripped, and hung like a horse.
His dick slices through granite and punches ten sharks.
He likes a girl with a vagina that can gush like a geyser
and HATES any man who dares look sideways at her.
His sperm are like ninjas that make dragon babies.
He may speak like a child but fucks like 8 porn stars.
The New Alpha makes good girls fantasize about douchebags.
Who needs good characterization when - blah, blah, blah - 12 pack?

Hark! None of these douchebags prepared us for Remy,
who licks like a lion and plays with his semen.
His spiky black hair and his pants worn that way
make women have orgasms in public arenas.
He speaks through a series of grunts and gruff growls
but all of his street cred comes from his iPod – GOO GOO DOLLS!
They say that his cock moves faster than the speed of light.
There it is, behind you! You’re pregnant now, slut!

So, whatever, the moment has arrived to review this masterpiece. It’s time to stop being polite and start getting REAL. The REAL World: Brooke’s Vagina.



You know what makes books like Real most insufferable to me? They’re shallow. The plot of this is just a partially evaporated puddle of piss in the desert. There is no reality to “Real,” no substance. It is what it fucking is, and that is a poorly crafted self-insert fic with squicky sex.

Our narrator is Brooke Dumas, a sports rehabilitation specialist (or in simpler terms, a “stretcher”)who swore off men after hurting her leg in the Olympic trial. Her vagina could drown a small village if a hot six-pack walked by.

The first time she sees Remy:
My panties are soaked, and my pulse has gone haywire.

When Remy talks:
My thighs go watery when the answering voice slides across the shell of my ear, both velvet and chillingly hard.

At seeing acts of violence:
My sex muscles clench every time he hits an opponent.

Brooke’s sex muscles always clench. I’m surprised Remy never got his peen stuck in there, to be honest. The other thing we have to know about Brooke is that she doesn’t know what “literally” means. This is important because correct usage of words is KIND OF THE WHOLE POINT ABOUT BOOKS.

For example, Brooke can’t sprint anymore because she hurt her leg and WAH, WAH, WAH, that’s her tragic backstory. Then she thinks this:
I want to go crazy. Bungee. Sprint again, even if only in a literal sense.

And then Brooke implies that she may be a dragon:
There is, literally, a ball of fire in my throat, and I can’t even swallow my saliva.



Brooke uses words like a handless man wearing a blindfold uses a hammer – blindly and with no discernible precision. There are several very boring passages where she pretends to be all smart and shit by using anatomical terms to describe Remy’s glistening deltoids or whatever, but all of that “I R TEH SMARTZ” dies when she thinks things like this:

My head is spinning inside my cranium.

Time to submit that phrase to thingsthatcan’thappen.com.

Oh, and this:

For the past four evenings, he’s come get me from my room and carry me back to his, and on this last one, I even stayed the full day.

Seriously. Editing is not evil, writers. Give it a try.

So, anyway, Brooke is insufferable. The time that she doesn’t spend ruminating over Remy’s “perfection” and hot penis is spent feeling like she’s the cat’s meow for being the cure for Remy’s Bipolar episodes and beating out all the whores and sluts for his sexxors and love.

And then there’s Remington “Riptide” Tate, the PERFECT and UNBEATABLE underground fighter with the SOUL OF A LION. Or whatevs. Remy has “people,” and all that these people basically do is pay off the hotel and wait staffs when Remy goes manic and destroys shit and shoot him full of tranquilizers when he gets violent outside of the ring.

Yes, in REAL, Remy is bipolar, and it’s insultingly fetishized. A sensitive, nuanced issue like Bipolar Disorder deserves a far smarter book than REAL to pay it the proper respect. Brooke just fucking loves it when he goes manic, mostly because he gets really, really horny, and also because she likes to feel needed. Aside from the tranquilizers, Remy will NOT take medication for his very dangerous condition. Because this is real, you see, and making the true love with a man who could snap and kill you without remembering it in the morning IS TOTALLY NORMAL.



Brooke doesn’t give a shit about any of this, of course, because thinking about Remy’s mental illness in a thoughtful way wouldn’t make her wet. In fact, if this book mentions something other than how perfect, hot, glistening, hard, strong Remy is, it only lasts for a couple of paragraphs. Because we can’t tear our attention away from how HAWT this empty shell of a character with his Tragic Backstory of the Week is, can we? Note to authors: If you describe your hero as “perfect,” YOU’RE DOING CHARACTERIZATION WRONG.

But come on, Rachel, you say, thinking I seem like a huge bitch for being mean to this book. The sex has to be good. Right? RIGHT?

His expression is tense, ravenous, so hot as he scrapes his finger deep into my channel. "Do you want me inside you?"

WHY IS HE SCRAPING INSIDE OF HER VAGINA?!

"Sticky?" he asks in a gruff manner, bending his head and licking my shoulder as he pushes his semen back inside with one finger.

I SEE SO MANY INFECTIONS RESULTING FROM THIS. WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?

”When I get you in bed, I’m going to scrub you raw with my fucking tongue until there’s nothing anywhere on you from him. Only me. Only me.”



I’m finished with this. The secondary characters and sequel bait aren’t even worth mentioning because I know Evans will make them have all kinds of icky semen covered sex in future books. As for Remy and Brooke’s future book, I won’t be reading it. Because this first book is basically the same shallow thought on repeat for a couple hundred pages mixed with some very rough writing, I don’t see how the second one will be any different. Obviously, there’s a target audience for this kind of book, but I’m not in it. Not even close.

Read my status updates for more squicky excerpts. You won’t enjoy a minute of it.

Also: Read my buddy reader Karla’s review for some more fleshed-out thoughts that I don’t currently have the emotional capacity to handle. >:D

One more quote before I go:

"Do you like what I do to you ... with this...?" When he slides his sweatpants off, I'm fainting with the sight of ten Remington's butts in the reflections behind him, his powerful legs from behind, his narrow waist and broad shoulders.

And his cock, standing before me.

I've just died.

And a visual representation of how I feel about this book:

[Heather K (dentist in my spare time) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Oh Katy Evens, you made me laugh so hard today. Your brilliant satire on the state of modern women in their early 20s is an insightful critique of the unabashed shallowness and anti-feminist behavior spawned by such books as "Fifty Shades of Gray." Your tongue-in-cheek references to pretentious pop culture icons, and your commentary on the recent abundance of literary misogynists was riveting. The way you crafted your prose eloquently showed how hyperbole and hyper-erotic imagery can be used to destroy the innate sensuality of a character. Bravo for such a smart, funny, poignant work of art. It...

Wait, what?

This ISN'T a joke?

No way, are you serious? This is for real?

No, I don't believe you. There is no way she meant some of these lines non-ironically. No way.

You think so, do you? Well, let me see what other people thought.

Holy crap, people like this book?! Like seriously? They liked this slut-shaming, stereotype-reinforcing, panty-soaking, womb-clenching drivel? Huh...

Well, a round of applause for those of you who made it through this book. I only got through 25% before I gave up. Maybe it improves... and maybe pigs have started flying and bunnies have started conversing and unicorns have starting lobbying for some respect among the supernatural animal community. All I know is that I'm significantly dumber than I was when I woke up this morning.

**Copy provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review**

[KristenReviews · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review FINALLY posted.

3 to 3 1/2 stars

Looks like I'm in the minority here. I liked this book but didn't love it.

Real intrigued me, captivated me, overwhelmed me, baffled me, and annoyed me. It has to be the single most repetitive and overly sexualized book I have ever read. And that says something! Still, I couldn't put it down, so I guess that says something, too.

Overall, my biggest issues with this book—other than Booke's excessive babbling about how she looses control over her nether regions (the girl's a dripping faucet) and is all agog whenever she sees or is around Remington—is the fact that I never felt like I truly knew who Remington was as a character. I know this sounds strange but I loved him without knowing why I loved him. It was an odd feeling and one that left me somewhat discombobulated by the end of the book.

While this particular story didn't fully work for me–I found the heroine annoying and somewhat one-dimensional–I can see why others loved this book. It's an addictive read with an elusive hero that impossible not to love or swoon over.

[Jaime Arkin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Edited 7/17 - So I decided to read this for myself... all the love and fangirling for this book made me think maybe the quotes were not indicative of the full story.

Approximately 3 page in:



I'm in the minority in my feelings about this apparently:



Here's the thing... not a single thing about this story was sexy to me.
In fact, the majority of the time I spent like this:



and like this:



and like this:



And at one point, The first lemon had me doing this:


The writing itself was so ridiculous to me. The clenching, the quivering, the GOD DAMN SCENTING.... I mean:



I will be leaving all these quotes below for everyone to enjoy. And TBH this is all the time I'm going to put into a review for this thing. I just can't take anymore time away from quality stories and writing to put much more effort into it.

to Cosmogirl for reading this and supplying the quotes from the book. I appreciate you taking one for the team!! And thanks to Bri for compiling them!

"...and he keeps making sexual foreplay to my ear."

"So we're in the presidential suite with what feels like a thousand strangers, but of course, there can't possibly be so many for real."

"...my breasts feel so heavy and painful I swear to god I can't imagine what it will feel like when I'm lactating one day."

"I may be fucked up, but that guy eats virgins and spits them out like snake vomit."

"...a deep, soul-shattering need to lean over and suck it in my mouth. Not the water. His nipple."

(my personal favorite): "...at the first scrape of my nubbin against the rock-hard quad muscle of his thigh, I explode."

"His butt defies gravity it is so perfectly tight round and muscular. Every time I see it it any kind of clothes I drool about a small ocean."

"He buries his face in my neck and scents me..."

"All of my desire for him has not been appeased, and it had morphed into this sort of anger that will probably give me a disease and kill me."

"I eagerly push my breasts to his chest and anxiously rub my pained nipples against his diaphragm."

"...his cock gut-wrenchingly hard and sexy, rubbing all over my body and smearing his semen on me."

"I feel like he's a lazy lion, bathing me with his tongue, licking and nuzzling me."

"...still have the energy to position me in a way where he can spoon me or hold me and do all his manly, possessive, lion-like OCD things."

"Sometimes he washes his semen off my skin, but other times he gives me a series of slow, drugging kisses as he reaches between my thighs and fingers his semen back into my pussy like he always wants to be there."

"...I can roll to my side and drape myself all over him like a warmed gummy worm."

"Do you like it when I smear your skin with me?" God I love it when he calls his semen "him."

"I can't watch you suicide yourself."

[Jamie · Rating 5 out of 5]

COMPLETELY BLOWN AWAY!! THIS BOOK IS TO FREAKING DIE FOR!!! FANFUCKINGTASTIC!!!


This book is so much more than 5 stars.. It needs more stars!!!


The Chemistry Between Remy and Brooke was crazy, intense, hot, mouth watering, scorching , sheet burning, panty melting, eye's rolling back of your head total fucking hotness!!! The Sex was totaly AMAZING!! Once I got past almost dieing of sexual frustration..but man, once they finally hooked it up--damn.. it was game on!!!


The Story was so good..Remy is underground boxer with some deep emotional issues that have made him bipolar. He can go dark and turn violent but he lets it all loose in the ring which has helped him make it to the top of his sport.. When he spots Brooke in the crowd one night it was instant chemistry! Just BOOM! The connection was immediate. Brooke is into sports rehab and Remy uses this as an excuse to hire her to take on the road with him to help mend his muscles and joints after strenious work outs and fights.. it gets to a point where they just can't keep their hands off of each other. Brooke learns Remy's dark secrets but she falls so far in love with him that she'd do anything to be his anchor in the storm and be there for him.. to love him, to save him, to heal him...

This book so so soooooo good!! I ate this book up like a bowl of chunky monkey ice cream!! I could not put this thing down!!!!

I Love love love love Remy and Brooke! And what even more amazing is that there is going to be another book for them!!! HOLYCRAP!!! This one did not end in a cliffhanger.. It ended with them kinda riding off into the sunset--left me knowing I know their happiness will conitinue! But apparenlty Ms. Evans has more in store for MY REMY ( Mine MINE MINE MINE MINE MINE) Brooke and I'm totally down with that..

Definitly one of my all time favorites.. Remy has managed to push all my other book boyfriends back one spot so that I could place him firmly in my number one spot.

YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK!! IF YOU LOVE SEXY SUPER ALPHA POSSESSIVE (DID I SAY SEXY?) MANLY, SEXUAL GOD MEN THEN YOU WILL L-O-V-E REMY... BUT HANDS OFF, HE'S MINE!

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I'm every woman's adventure, damn you, and I don't want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL." ~ Remy <3

LOVED IT.

Can't wait for more Remy!!! ~

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

My Remington "Riptide" Tate --

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

My Brooke --


Full review to come.

[~ Becs ~ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Music plays a very important part in this book, most especially to Remy and Brooke and it does have its very own playlist but I want to dedicate this song to Remy for what he did in New York and what it meant - The Last Fight by Velvet Revolver. Damn you Remy, you made me ugly cry!

I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me—not Riptide!”

I have read and loved so very many books but, every now and then, a book comes along that stands head and shoulders above all the others, a book that simply takes your breath away, steals your ability to concentrate on anything else, a book that completely consumes you and owns you. THIS is that book. It’s such a soulful. beautiful and emotional story and even now, when I close my eyes, I’m right back with Brooke & Remy. Nothing is forgotten – this book will stay with me forever.

Brooke first sees Remy at an underground boxing fight. She’s been dragged there by her best friend Mel and she’s not prepared for what is about to happen. As Remington “Riptide” Tate takes to the ring their eyes lock and something passes between them – time stands still and they share an instant and unshakable connection. At this point, just a few pages in, I knew I was going to love this book. I knew it was special and even told my friend who I was sitting next to at the time. She gave me a quizzical look and said ‘What? After just two pages?’ and I just nodded. I knew instinctively this book was going to be exceptional.

Remy is a fallen boxer now competing in an underground circuit. He’s in prime physical shape – he’s pure masculinity and raw beast, sex on a stick, a six-foot-plus tower of testosterone. He’s tall, dark with piercing blue eyes – every girl’s dream and he has a reputation for going through women like a hot knife through butter. He’s a bad boy with a bad reputation. There’s a darkness within and he has an incredibly short fuse – he’s suffered so badly in his past. The people who should have been there for him and loved him have turned their back on him when he needed them most. Now, he has a small entourage of people close to him, those that he trusts and he is fiercely protective of them and is incredibly slow to trust.

I don’t think it’s even possible to find the words to express just now much I loved Remy but I will try. He’s an absolute tower of physical strength but inside he’s deeply flawed and is incredibly vulnerable and so unbelievably complex. Experience has taught him to observe, to hold back and to say very little but that steely blue gaze is incredibly expressive and conveys more than he could ever put into words. Despite his obvious powerful physical strength, there’s a vulnerability in there that is so mesmerising and brings out all my protective instincts – I wanted to run my hand down his face, rub my thumb across his bottom lip and tell him that it’s all going to be OK. He wants Brooke with a passion but knows he needs to hold back – he’s so incredibly intense that it’s going to be all or nothing and he needs her to learn about his ‘darkness’ before he can let herself go and allow him to take her.

“When I take you, you’ll be mine,” he says, a soft promise in my ear. He slides his thumb along my jaw, then gently kisses my earlobe. “You need to be certain.”

As a man of very few words, he uses songs to tell Brooke how he is feeling by playing her songs on her iPod so she can listen to the lyrics. I loved how Katy Evans did this, how carefully she chose her songs and, as the book progressed, the songs they chose for each other made my eyes shimmer with unshed tears. I was losing it and fast. This is the song that Remy chooses for Brooke - Iris by The Goo Goo Dolls.

And I’d give up forever to touch you …
Cause I know that you feel me somehow…
You’re the closest to heaven that I’ve ever been and I don’t want to go home right now…

“I want to say so many things, Brooke, and I just can’t find the words to tell them to you.”

He sets his forehead on mine and inhales deeply. Slowly, still breathing me in, he drags his nose along the length of mine.

“You tie me up in knots.” He presses my mouth with his. Briefly. Then he withdraws, breathing hard, and looks at me with heavy-lidded eyes. “I want to play you a thousand different songs so you get a clue of what … I feel inside me…”

I also completely adored Brooke. She’s had her hopes and dreams shattered at a young age and is now trying to carve out a new path for herself. She’s a tower of strength to Remy, represents everything he thinks he is not good enough for but she is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, falling irrevocably in love with Remy but she doesn’t understand what he is hiding from her and why is he is holding back. When she does eventually discover his secret, she chose to stand by her man through thick and thin whatever the future may bring and I loved her for it. Remy may be the epitome of a hard, tough masculine physique but the emotional strength and fortitude lies with Brooke. Remy needs her and will never be able to let her go.

“I’m so fucking in love with you I don’t even know what to do with myself anymore.”

As Remy continues to hold back and Brooke practically melts with desire and unsatisfied arousal, the sexual tension between the two of them built to such an incredible intensity that I was so unbelievably turned on and desperate for them to make good on all this pent up emotion. When they do finally come together it was everything and more that I hoped it would be. The sex is very hot and the scenes beautifully erotic but what makes this extra special is the emotion in those scenes is powerfully palpable and leaps right off the page. You know just how much this means to them and, now that they’re together, I began to fear what was ahead and what was likely to tear them apart and I couldn’t bear the thought of that – I knew how much it would hurt Remy and I cared so much about him by this time and my heart was breaking for him.

As the events of the final few chapters unfolded and I realised what Remy had done and why, my eyes once again started to fill with tears and by the time we got to the last few pages, I was all out sobbing, ugly crying. A book hasn’t made me cry like that in ages – it’s so incredibly emotional, so soulful, so heartfelt. The writing is sublime – I was right there with the characters in every single scene, I could see everything, especially the pulsating energy of the fight scenes and the raucous crowds. Most of all I could see Remy – he lived vividly in my imagination, he was REAL to me. There’s a scene when Brooke climbs into the shower with him and, of all the scenes in the book, this one lived the most vividly in my imagination – not really sure why but it seemed so incredibly intense and emotional.

I open the glass shower door, and step inside with his beautiful slick skin and big hard muscles, pressing my naked breasts to his back as I wrap my arms around his waist. He groans and tugs my arms tighter around him, and the words I love you are there inside me. I've never loved anyone in my life and I never imagined it could be like this.

This is just about the perfect book for me – it has just exact right mix of eroticism and emotion and it’s beautifully paced. I loved the way Remy’s eyes would slide to Brooke just before a fight, the way he would stare at her trying to read her, the way they shared songs to say what they could not put into words – I loved everything. The anticipation of them finally getting together was frying my brain and I could not put this book down and I read deep into the wee small hours to finish it with a pair of headphones on and sobbing away! It’s beautiful, soulful, compelling, powerful and quite simply just exquisite.

As I look back on my reading experience with this book and think about how it made me feel, I know that I have been in the presence of greatness.

There’s now a piece of my heart that will forever belong to Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate.

5 incredible stars




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[TinaNicole ☠ Le Book Nikita ☠ · Rating 1 out of 5]

Don't be fooled by all the 5 star reviews on this book!

I'm sure there's an okay story in there somewhere if you don't have any problem with digging through a bunch of nonsensical crap to find it. I don't want to spend my time trying to figure out what the author means, I just want to get lost in the story and characters.

For me this book was close to unreadable. It is riddled with bad grammar, long run-on sentences (some entire paragraphs are one long sentence) misused words galore, incorrect tenses, improper sentence structure and most of the sentences make little to no sense at all even if you rearranged them. It was poorly written with almost no character development and the h's inner monologue is juvenile and extremely repetitive and drags on for pages at a time.

Some examples.

"Because your smile doesn't even have any place on your face anymore." What?

"I spent extra time rubbing his deltoids, the roundest, squarest part of the shoulder." Roundest and squarest? Hmmm.

"We need to stop, sometimes we hear music, turn on the TV, or eat." Uh, I think she meant listen not hear.

"He buzzes his nose into my temple." I don't even know.

"and now he's just bouncing on his calves as if waiting for the next hit to come." He's got mad skills cause that seems impossible.

"Its hard to watch you fight but to watch you suicide yourself is..." Really? REALLY?

"She shoots some sort of tranquilizer up his IUV." It's just an IV. No U needed.

"That my floor was shaking under my feet. It was." Was there an earthquake?

"I'd do it a thousand times for you." He scents me. And I scent him." You mean smells, I'm pretty sure. Or else they're peeing on each other?

These are not single instances. They run rampant through the entire book and the same mistakes are made often, sometimes several on a single page, so it obviously wasn't an editing or typo issue. Just the authors lack of knowledge. The sex scenes had this same issue with wording that caused them to just be ridiculous. "Breast tips" Are you for real with this? Now this one's just personal but calling the bad guys "goonies". It's just goons. Every time she said that all I could think of was Sloth with Chunk and little Data standing behind him throwing gang symbols and trying to look tough. Goonies never say die! Not so intimidating.

I'm not even going to go into what little storyline there was. It's pretty much just the h's immature lusting over the H's muscles and jawline and sweatpants hanging off his hips just so, repeated over and over and over. She actually gushes a few times when he sips off her drink because their lips touched the same thing. *facepalm* Not much depth with any other character in the story either. Most of it was unbelievably boring. I will say there were some aspects i.e the song sharing & the H's illness, that had the story been better executed could've made for some great reading. But that didn't happen. The way the mental illness was handled was particularly off putting. He shouldn't put that poison in his body. She says. i.e medication. Again, for real?

Bottom line is, if you actually care about a story being well written and not just a bunch of barely legible nonsense with a semi-hot guy that hardly talks and an immature rambling heroine, then you should pass on this one. Honestly, I wish I had.

eta: to match Ammy review.

[Clumsy Storyteller · Rating 3 out of 5]

➦What i liked about this book :

-The last 15% of it :D that was AWESOME.

➦what i didn't like about this book :

- The rest of the book, Cheers!

[Jenny - TotallybookedBlog · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jenny: We can never get enough of MMA book with a tortured hero can we Gitte? But what I found with this one was that there was a twist with regard to the MC which I found quite different and, as sad as that was, I enjoyed that this delved a little further than being a romance. Remy was at the heart of this story and I found him such troubled and interesting character.

A fallen boxer.
A woman with a broken dream.
A competition…

Remington Tate. Remy. Riptide. We know him by many names, but knowing the man. What makes him tick, what drives Remy’s compulsive and at times unpredictable behaviour? Where does his anger, confusion and uncertainty stem from? Why was he so tortured and could Brooke be his salvation? Was she going to be the woman who sees so much more than the angry, manic fighter the fans see? That’s what I wanted to unravel and I couldn’t wait to find out.

Remy finds it hard to communicate, finding it hard to express himself and is most definitely a man of few words, and this again was something I really wanted to further explore.

“Your name,” he growls, panting, his eyes wild on mine.
“It’s Brooke Dumas,” she says, and then she happily shoots out my cell phone number. To my chagrin.
His lips curl and he meets my gaze. “Brooke Dumas.” He just fucked my name right in front of me.

Brooke knocks Remy for a six when he first locks eyes with her and continues to be confused by the intense feelings he has for her. Unable to precisely communicate his emotions through thought and words, Remy uses music/songs to express his feelings and this was such a poignant and beautiful part of the story and being an absolute music nut, I LOVED it!
The author put a lot of effort into having the right songs for Remy and Brooke, even so far as to obtaining lyrics, and I’m so glad she did because this really did add to the story. I know there is one song in particular I will listen to from now on and always think of Brooke and Remy. Somehow the author turned it into “their song” for me and I loved that.

Gitte: I loved this story Jenny, for so many reasons, not just for the obvious ones like the fact that we have a gorgeous tortured hero in Remy, but the fact that this one absolutely put a different spin to the typical MMA stories out there. Remy is a complete force of nature. He is F.I.E.R.C.E! Like the dangerous quiet before the devastating storm. There is something so utterly raw and intense about Remy that just traps the reader…he exudes this power that is unrivalled. He makes you miss a breath. He is like no other. He left me speechless!

What I loved most about him though is the way he communicates through music. Remy is a man after my own heart. He reduced me to a puddle on the floor by his feet in complete captivation and desire.

His immediate and intense attraction to Brooke, an attraction he is unable to communicate, gave me chills.

You cannot relax into this story completely as the danger is there and you just don’t know which way it’s going to go. Remy was complex and his story broke my heart…made me cry! This Author had me gripped and on the edge of my seat through the whole story, oh and the music…spot on!

He steps forward, and his damp hand slides into the nape of my neck. My pulse skitters as he lowers his dark head to set a small, dry kiss on my lips. It feels like he’s marking me. Like he’s preparing me for something monumental. That could both change and ruin my life.

Jenny: You’re so right Gitte. In a way, you do read this with some measure of dread in your heart because you feel so much for this tormented man. Brooke is a tough cookie and tries to deny her feelings for the intensely closed off Remy, who fights as a way of dealing with his aggression. This man brings out such a need in Brooke she is unsure of how to proceed with Remy but knows she has to proceed with caution.

As her physio it is her job to keep this man in peak condition, to make him ready for every fight on his calender, to take care of him and keep him in peak condition physically and mentally.

Remy relies on Brooke in more ways than one and his feelings are so extreme towards her she must be guard herself against the intense and unpredictable Remy. Remy, what can I say about Remy? Loved him. Remy will melt your heart. He will break your heart at times and you will want to just grab this big bear of a man and hold him. Hold him until you make everything right for Remy. His has not been an easy road.

Misjudged, used and misunderstood, but with Brooke by his side, can she help him tame his demons and be the Remy he desperately wants to be? I really enjoyed Real, it was a different take on a theme I love, the sexual chemistry was off the charts and I’m so glad I got to read Brooke and Remy’s story. A story with heart about a man who will steal it. The ending completely melted me.

Gitte: Brooke was a great heroine. She too has had emotional trauma in her past and it has shaped her into who she is the day she meets Remy and affects her actions from then on in respect to the intensity of feelings she has for him. Brooke has had to change her life and find her place and now has the added uncertainty of Remy.

Remy has so much turmoil within him yet lacks the words. The reasons for who Remy is, his struggles and his aggression he cannot put into words. By keeping Brooke at his side he tries to show her, tries to convey who he really is through music, show her another side. Brooke reciprocates and I thought this journey was absolutely beautiful and breathtaking at times despite the ugly and gritty rearing its head throughout.
The sexual tension was so intense, built up to the extreme so that you literally can’t take any more.

I loved this story and without a doubt I absolutely fell in total LOVE with Remy. I applaud this new Author for taking a different path in the genre of MMA romance. It worked and she nailed it!


“Brooke,” he growls softly, meaningfully, against my lips, as he draws back with a smile. “I’m Remington.”


ARC supplied by author for an honest review

[Anovelqueen · Rating 5 out of 5]

***5 STARS***

One of my all time favorite books/series.

Remy is an underground fighter. Brooke is dragged to the fights by her best friend because of how hot Remy is and his popularity as a fighter. Remy sees Brooke from the ring and he instantly falls for her but he has a secret and it has tortured his life. He is afraid to bring Brooke into a relationship with him because of this secret. Brooke can feel the attraction between them so she doesn’t understand the push and pul from Temy.

The sexual tension between these two is off the charts. It’s an emotional roller coaster and ends on a cliffhanger. Very well written and keeps you riveted to the pages. The entire series is 7 books although Brooke and Remy are primarily the first three books.

I highly recommend this book if you haven’t read it.

[Monica Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Be jealous...I was the first reader of this book and OMG you guys. IT'S AWESOME AND AMAZING.

Remington Tate is a sexy beast. Brooke is his perfect match - strong and sweet. It's an emotional roller coaster ride you won't be able to put down and the ending....OMG. I still think about the ending and I read the book months ago!

Katy, you're da bomb but you already know I have mad love for you. So there. :)

ADD THIS BOOK TO YOUR BOOKSHELVES PEOPLE. YOU WON'T REGRET IT.

[chan ☆ · Rating 1 out of 5]

the only meaningful reread comment i have is

nubbin
________________
Let's start with some quotes shall we.

"I moan feebly as his teeth graze my neck, undulate helplessly as he tugs my flesh so firmly, I think he's going to give me my first hickey."

"but he's massively big and drags thickly over every inch of my channel. A haggard whimper...."

"calling me a little chick-fil-a sandwich, because I'm so chicken."




Yeah. Um. EXCUSE ME. Part of me wants to reduce this review purely to quotes so you all can have a good laugh. One second the h refers to her vagina as a kitten, the next it's a pussy (are you 24 or 12). She lives for ear-lingus and being licked by her "sexy lion man."

I'm not here to kink shame, but the writing of the sex scenes and honestly just general internal monologue from the h (Brooke), kinda made me wanna gag.

Which SUCKS because this book could have been amazing. Remy, our dude (for lack of a more sophisticated word), was awesome. I love a good damaged goods story and Remy has a seriously messed up background. I even loved his crazy alpha male thing, and I LOVED that he communicated through music. Remy rocked.

But like I said, Brooke was a problem for me. Bland, uptight, whiny, but pretty damn good at waxing poetic about black spiky hair and blue eyes.

Also I think some of the characterization of bipolar disorder was a leeeeeettle problematic.

Whatever, if this writing style doesn't piss you off you might love this. And I might read the next one; glutton for punishment and all that.

["That's All" Ash · Rating 4 out of 5]

Holy.

SHIT.

(pardon the language) ;)

But there’s just no other way of describing this book. Actually, I’ve had several friends ask about the book I’ve been *locked* away in my room with. And those two words seemed to be my only response. In it’s entirety.

HOLY SHIT!

Katy Evans, the delicious author of this gorgeous, hormone-stimulating piece of work is a *drug dealer* of sexual angst. And I am heavily addicted, friends.

I might have to introduce myself during future meetings with, “Hi. I’m Ashlee; and I’m a drug addict. I also enjoy fanning my ovaries while standing in front of air-conditioners, and like to smell books for long increments of time so that I can inhale their sexy alpha male characters.”

That doesn’t sound crazy at all.

… Right?

Remington Tate



“Ladies and gentlemen, and noooww… the moment you’ve all been waiting for, the man you’re all here to see. The baddest of the bad, I give you, the one, the only, Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate!”

*He’s the guy who doesn’t speak much… but who does wonderful things with his mouth.
*He’s a high member of an underground fighting club, after getting kicked out of the pro-league.
*He’ll make your forget your own name right before he makes you scream his.
*Black savage-like hair, blue eyes that vary from neon to gunmetal, and a body that’ll give you a reason to go to church next Sunday.

Remington can’t be owned by anyone inside or outside of the fighting ring.

Until he meets Brooke Dumas.

“Have you ever been anyone’s?”

“No. And you?”

“I’ve never wanted to.”

“Neither have I. Until I saw this lovely girl in Seattle, with big gold eyes, and pink, full lips… and I wondered if she could understand me.”

Brooke Dumas is a firework show of a girl. And her little sister was always the one who was interested in boys growing up, while Brooke would rather have an Olympic gold medal.

Brooke has never looked at those with the ‘y’ chromosome as anything other than silly boys.

Which is why when her best friend drags her along to an underground fighting match, her world is ROCKED by a man with fighting gloves on his hands and sex on his smile.

I want to go crazy. Bungee. Sprint again, even if only in a literal sense. All those dates I never had, because I was training for something that never happened. Never drinking. Keeping my grades up so I could do track. Remington Tate is everything I’ve never, ever done, and I have a condom tucked in my bag and suddenly I know exactly why I put it there. This guy is a fighter. I want to touch his beautiful chest and I want to kiss those lips. I want to have those hands on me.”

Brooke is the beauty, and Remington is the beast in this wildfire of a book.

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But like every beast, he has his secrets.

Secrets that can push even a strong young woman like Brooke away.

And Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate will go toe-to-toe with the devil in himself to ensure that doesn’t happen.

You can’t, Brooke. You can’t leave.

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You’re mine.

[Alexis *Reality Bites* · Rating 3 out of 5]

SPOILER FREE REVIEW -mature content reader discretion is advised.
3.5 STARS out of 5
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Review Posted on 4/17/13



Okay, so before you throw tomatos at me in protest just hear me out.






Remington RIPTIDE Tate is #1 in the underground fighting circuit girls wanna scew him and guys want to be him. Brooke allowed her best friend, Melanie, to talk her in to going to the underground matches. As Melanie screeches her love for RIPTIDE, Brooke can’t help but be pulled into his magnetic force field of high electric energy. And she also can’t stop the fact that after one look from Remy she now desires him just like every other woman in the building. Of course she chooses that moment to flee.

After making quick work of his opponent Remy goes after Brooke. Melanie overhears the introductions and gives Remy Brooke’s number. Much to Brooke’s dismay. Dismayed no more, Brooke is unemployed at the moment and Remy not only offers her tickets for his next match he also follows it up with a job offer. She accepts.

She wants him and he wants her but before he has her, he must tell her the truth.



Can Brooke accept the REAL man who is Remington RIPTIDE Tate?



First let me be clear I did like this book, I will not sit here and act like Katy Evans did not get my panties all in a twist over Remy because she did. Had my ass wanting to hump something like a damn dog in heat.. No lie.LOL!! Remy put out some good swoon worthy vibes. I mean HELLO how can you not when she writes things like

'My legs wobble, and I’m left with the distinct impression this man wants to pound me next. With his cock.' ~Brooke

'He suckles, sucks, turns, twists. I fall in love with his kiss so fast, that soon I don’t know where my hands are, where I’m lying. My entire body is consumed by the way he fucks my mouth until my lips are raw and swollen and it hurts to kiss him back even though my frenzied body demands more.' ~Brooke

And then words like mind-blowing pleasure bolts

My arms clench around his strong neck as he teases the very tip of his finger inside, and a mind-blowing pleasure bolts through me. ~Brooke

I mean COME ON we all want to be sucked-fucked-plucked-twisted- bound-gagged and pounded into, right?!! Oh..wait may be that last bit is just me*shrugs shoulders* WHATEVER you get my drift! *wink,wink*


I’ll start with what I did like
The anticipation and build up to Brooke and Remy having sex had me horny as shit. I'm talking jump your man as soon as he walks in the door, HORNY. Now not everyone is a fan of the clenching uterus… Well it bothered me none. I was in deep deep anticipation and was pretty much panting until they sealed the deal. I think Evans did a good job of building up that climax and hit it out the park once the deed was done.
– I also enjoyed Remy and his alpha glory
– I adored the scenes where they swapped iPod's and played each other music that was so damn cute!!!
– I agreed with his decision to wait until after Brooke knew about his…condition for sex He is Bipolar
- My fave scene was the one with the roses. No denying that was pretty H O T and there was nothing sexual about it.

What I did not like so much was
- Brooke and all her damn muscle terminology
- Brooke and her stupid brain fart moment with Scorpio.
– Brooke's lusting became a bit repetitive along with her internal monologues. I am BIG on character interaction and this chick was in her head a bit much for my taste buds. It just made me want more Remy.
- Remy going from 0 to 60 in a millisecond was crazy and may be accurate.. but what’s the deal with him not remembering things… Is that accurate?? I need to look that up(thinks to self..)
- The entire plot with Brooke’s sister Nora fell flat for me. If anything I wanted to see Remy KICK DAT ASS. The whole Scorpio setup was to predictable. I don’t mind predictable but like I said it just fell flat for me.

OVERALL -I’m clearly in a very small minority here…so here is the deal, while I may have enjoyed REAL and all that is Remington RIPTIDE the fact of the matter is the story did not move me. And that is why I gave it 3 STARS. Believe me I love an alpha male just as much as the next girl,however I just found that the story itself did not take me to that place of being forever etched in to my brain. But whatever, it seemed to do that for mostly everyone else. Surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly, I loved Remy yet did not connect with Brooke. Go figure.

My Ratings
Characters- Loved Remy
Writing Style- Good, I actually like Katy Evan's style it was the story that I was not overly excited about.
Plot/Storyline- Fair
Steam Factor- High/Very Steamy
Overall- I liked it, I just did not love it!

Now go forth and read. Then come tell us about it on Goodreads!
For more reviews got to http://realitybites-letsgetlost.blogs...

[MelissaB · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first half of this book was the heroine having a walking orgasm every time she saw Remy - her lady parts were dripping, her womb was clenching, her boobs were swelling, her nips were poking everywhere. She was like a dog in heat, ready to hump Remy at the first sign of him saying yes. Then she finally humps his leg, yep she did. The second half, after she finally got the Remy loving she had been panting and dripping for, it wasn't as bad but I still wasn't impressed. She betrays Remy a couple times and basically acts like a dumb ass. I am not sure why Remy chose her as his insta-love of his life. The other strange and random thing was the thing with her sister and how unbelievably quickly and easily she got off drugs.

The idea of this story was good but the execution left a lot to be desired - the endless lusting of Brooke for Remy, the not-very-sexily described love scenes, the immaturity of both main characters.

I think Remy was an interesting character but we don't get to know him very well beyond Brooke falling into a puddle of goo every time she sees his hot bod. I see the next book is from his POV but I doubt I will continue with this series.

[Georgia ♥ · Rating 5 out of 5]

WHAT IN THE NAME OF ALL, DID I JUST READ??

5 Holy Hotness & Pure Male Deliciousness Stars

“Ladies and gentlemen, and noooww … the moment you’ve all been waiting for, the man you’re all here to see. The baddest of the bad, I give you, the one, the only, Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate!”







I am sorry, I got ahead of myself, let’s take a step back and see how I ended up hot and bothered, consumed by lust and frustrated if you add the additional trauma of my boyfriend being away on a business trip, in the other side of the FREAKING country…



Brooke, a twenty something college graduate, with a degree in physical therapy, knows how it feels to have your dream crash and burn right in front of your eyes. She had been training her whole life for a chance to compete in the Olympics only to have her body betray her twice.
Now she wants to help other athletes. She lives a quiet life, almost secluded, withdrawn in herself.

Until she attends an underground fight and a simple look in pair of stunning blue eyes that seem to claim her on the spot, will change her life forever. Totally possessed by a man with a boyish grin that will turn her world upside down, open her heart and make her body sing with every touch.



Remy, is a fighter in body, but inside he hides a tortured soul. Abandoned by those that should have protected him, unloved and almost alone except from a trusted few, he is also withdrawn and unable to express even the most simple feelings. He just doesn’t trust the world not to hurt him again.



Shy and introvert, as he is cocky and arrogant. Scarred and mentally unable to handle the kind of life he leads, together they will have to fight tooth and nail to defeat their fears, learn and accept each other and hold hands while sacrificing everything that once mattered, to be together. And emerging winners.



In the hot days, that is Summer in Greece, under the scorching sun, Remy & Real by Katy Evans totally finished me off. Aroused and having suffered severe burns, hot flashes and multiple orgasms, I can only stand in awe before them…





I know… Somewhere out there, feminists are pulling their hair out, but my inner female just doesn’t care. She has reverted back to prehistoric ages and is craving men to fight for her and bleed and then drag her back to claim her in the cave. She wants to be possessed body and soul and Remy can certainly do me any day!

And I am not just after his body (delicious even though it is...) The man is a walking orgasm just by talking.

“Protecting you is my privilege. I will protect you and anything that you value as if it were mine.”





Simple and emotional, alpha male hotness and drool worthy, you seriously, DO NOT want to miss this book. Read it and let Remy convince you. In the end…



On a more serious note, it will pull every string of your heart! And leave you craving for the sequel, that can’t come soon enough… *sigh*

[Sophia Triad · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is oozing testosterone...
All this sniffing, rubbing, growling and mating hormones...
hahaha

I loved it!

I was thinking of writing a detailed review, but then I had a look at all these 1-star reviews and I honestly laughed my socks off. Almost all of them are brilliant! Better than all the 5-stars reviews actually.

On the other hand, I am wondering what people expect to read when they start a story about an oversexed underground fighter and a sweet ex-athlete who doesn't understand what this bad boy wants from her. And moreover when this story is written by a female writer and it is given by the girl's POV. This is romance. And it is fun.

And as long as there are girls who watch Roman Reigns and scream "I love you. Take me. I want to have your children!", there will be girls who love Remy aka Remington ‘Riptide’ Tate and his growling.

“Why’d you want to have sex with me? To have a fucking adventure? What was I supposed to be? Your one-night-fucking stand? I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me—not Riptide!”

“I won’t ever be yours if you don’t take me. Take me! You son of a bitch, can’t you see how much I want you?”

So yeah, this book made my day...

[Elizabeth (Liz) · Rating 5 out of 5]

NOW LIVE ON AMAZON!!

KINDLE LINK:
http://www.amazon.com/Real-ebook/dp/B...

PAPERBACK LINK:
http://www.amazon.com/Real-Katy-Evans...




GENRE: Categorized as NA, but, honestly, it's adult contemporary. Both characters are in their early-mid twenties and have careers. 18+

HEAT LEVEL: I'm pretty sure it cannot be adequately rated! See my review.

*New* INTENSITY LEVEL: Un. Be. Lievable. See my review.

NOTE: Book #1 of The Real, Raw & Ripped Series, BUT this is a complete story!!! There will be a follow-up book from Remy's POV, as well as a third book. However, this story is whole, and there are NO CLIFFHANGERS!!


5 REAL Stars!!
My prediction? REAL is The Next Big Thing, and Katy Evans is going places! HolyfreakingOMG, people!! I have never, not ever, read the kind of insane chemistry and level of intensity that is in this book! I have a new obsession, and his name? The two words you wanna remember? REMINGTON TATE.

Remington Tate is THE star of the scary-dangerous underground fighting circuit. Once a former pro boxer, he fell from grace and has made a new name for himself in the underground. Brooke Dumas had been so close to living her dream she could smell, taste and touch it. But, all of that died with one serious injury. Now she's been hired as Remington Tate's sports rehab specialist. Brooke knows exactly what she wants from him. She simply cannot help herself because he attracts her mind and body in ways that she has no ability to fight. Remy is the single most compelling and confusing man she has ever encountered. There is something very different about him, and it drags her along in his wake. He often 'speaks' to Brooke in the choice of song he plays for her. She knows they have a connection unlike any she knew existed. But...what does he actually want from her and, more importantly, can she survive it?

WOW x 100 would not be an understatement when it comes to REAL. I don't even know where to start or how to properly do it justice in a review.

Until you have read and experienced the chemistry, the intensity, the heat...there is simply no way for me to even get close to adequately expressing what this story, this relationship, these characters...REMINGTON will do to you as a woman. My mind and body were buzzing while reading this book, and I've been feeling the aftershocks for several days now! I'm almost positive that my ebook was releasing pheromones! I LIVE for stories with fantastic chemistry and high intensity, and REAL was, OMG, both!!

REAL is written with a kind of rough and raw prose and style, and this is something else I absolutely adore, particularly for this story. It would not have worked any other way. Katy Evans (and all who collaborated to bring this book to life), amazing job. Amazing!

The characters? What can I say? I loved them ALL. The focus is absolutely on Remy and Brooke in this story, but the secondary characters do add something essential. Brooke...that girl reeled me in. I wasn't certain how I felt about her in the very early part of the book, but, once you get past the first chapter (and that's important...get past the first chapter and get into the meat of the story), I fell in love with her. She knows her job, and Katy Evans did an amazing job with Brooke's internal dialogue. I loved how she expressed her attraction to Remy, especially, in such a fascinatingly semi-scientific way. I know, I know. But, trust me. It makes her so authentic....and, strangely, it's hot ;-)

Then we get to Remington. Good. God. Almighty. I am thoroughly OBSESSED! What a complex individual. What a fighter. What a tease. What a sexual being. What a...MAN! He absolutely broke my heart, and he spoke to me. I got him. I really did. I hope everyone else will, as well. He is damaged, and he is dealing with a truly serious issue. Truly serious. He's also insanely raw and primal! He's obviously Alpha, but it's tempered with a resigned sadness and vulnerability that makes him unlike any Alpha I've read before. He's the most real Alpha I've ever read before. He is...REAL.

Please, whatever you do, give REAL a chance to work its magic and pheromones on you;) Honestly, I don't think I have to worry. This book is one you're going to hear A LOT about. Katy Evans? Girl, congrats. You know I'm waiting for my next Remy fix! You rocked this one HARD.


**ARC provided by the author in exchange for an honest review**

[Vika aka ♔ of GIF & Grumpy Smut-ateer *P/T Freebie Fairy · Rating 4 out of 5]

◊•◊ 4 Powerful K.O.s Rating ◊•◊

My Remington 'Riptide' Tate








My Brooke Dumas



What a violent, dark and totally hot story that made me wet and frustrated at the same time.

"Why'd you want to have sex with me? To have a fucking adventure? What was I suppose to be? your one-night-fucking stand? I'm every woman's adventure, damn you, and I don't' want to be yours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. i want you to give yourself to me-not Riptied!"

Brooke Dumas is dragged by her friend Mel to an Underground fight to run right smack into intense blue gaze of Remington 'Riptide' Tate. She is so captured by him that it takes him a second to knock out his opponent and run after her. Both hit with instantaneous lust... and we are taken on that hot right for good half of the book. My fridge wasn't fast enough in making ice to cool myself with their chemistry.

I feel like Beauty and the Beast, except I willingly locked myself in with my beast so he could kiss me senseless, and he's the beautiful creature who tortured me with wanting him.

A tortured... and I mean tortured fighter who swings between his blue and black gaze acting like a mood ring. Won't give more away but there is more to him and his possessive and in some ways insane nature. Not to loose her he signs her to be part of his team to be is PT. All day and everyday her job is to touch that gorgeous hunk. At this points I somewhat got tired of her talking about how she is turned on and how she is gushing.

This story in a way insta-love but not an easy one. Brooke is forced to learn real Rem and his condition. To accept him and love him with in and in spite of it.



As always there are complications and misunderstandings that take the couple apart only to bring them together at the end with a sappy HEA... so breathe easy when picking this one up! It may have continuation to their story (hopefully soon!) but there is no cliff hanger.

[SueBee★bring me an alpha!★ · Rating 5 out of 5]

★★★★★! REAL, book 1 of ? Debut by Katy Evans. Spellbinding tale of friendship, budding romance & lots of sexual tension with a larger-than-life hero, Remy who will hit you like a riptide!

“It feels like he's marking me. Like he's preparing me for something monumental. That could both change and ruin my life.”

Hero: Remington Tate, aka Remy, aka Riptide/26 years/famous underground fighter-College drop-out/black hair/blue eyes
Heroine: Brooke Dumas/24 years/recent graduate with masters in sports rehab/dark brown/hair/amber eyes

Story is told from Brooke’s POV. But in the epilogue we are treated to Remy’s POV. Though I have tried to keep my review SPOILER free, some of the quotes will be somewhat revealing.

The story opens up with Brooke and her friend Mel attending an underground circuit to watch its star Remy fight. Brooke has no idea who he is, but soon the fans chant:

“Remy! I love you, Remy!”
“I’ll suck your c~ck for you, Remy!”
“REMY, POUND ME, REMY!”
“Remington I want your Riptide!”

And Brooke almost chanted along when she got a look of him, his mesmerizing good looks, impressive physique and commanding presence:

“There he is, a woman's living, breathing fantasy, doing his slow, cocky turn, spiky black hair, darkly tanned chest, dimpled smile-killer smile-all in the package of Remington Tate. He's perfection itself…”

Remy caught sight of Brooke amongst the crowd that night. Her friend had yelled something maybe he thought it was her yelling. Or maybe it was due to her conservative clothing or maybe her unusual amber eyes. He ended up getting out of the ring to talk to her. Next she is invited back with front row seats followed by a job offer to finish up the season as a member of his team.

Brook had been an athlete whose career ended tragically. My heart bled for her:

“There's an awful video of me on YouTube.com, titled Dumas, her life is over! which was taped by some amateur during my first Olympic tryouts and has had quite a bit of traffic-like all videos of humiliated people do. This is where the exact moment that my life shattered around me was perfectly immortalized on film and can now be played and replayed, over and over, so the world can watch for their enjoyment.”

And so Remy’s and Brooke’s story begins. A friendship is formed and their connection runs deep. Their attraction is so strong; The way they look at each other is electrifying. But there is an innocence about it; Instead of talking they play songs for each other to express themselves and it was so special to follow. And this:

"Have you ever been anyone's?" I ask, a feathery whisper in the quiet bedroom…
…"No. And you?" The calluses in his palm rasp on my skin, and I find myself tucking my cheek deeper into them.
"I've never wanted to."
"Neither have I."

But Remy is not like many other heroes who cannot wait to get you in bed. No, he is about slow seduction, borderline torture for Brooke. He is holding back, holding parts of himself back. Some is tied to his fame:

“I'm every woman's adventure, damn you, and I don't want to be yours. I want to be your f~cking REAL. You get that? If I f~ck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me-not Riptide!"

And his fears:

“…it's all because I want to be the f~cking 'one' for you and as soon as you realize what I am, all I'll be is a f~cking mistake!"

And the rest is very much their journey of uncovering what his secrets are:

“From a man who fights like crazy, arouses me like no other, is the sexiest thing I've ever seen. From the man who plays me sexy music, gives me his t-shirt to sleep in, protects me as fiercely as a lion, and yet won't take me when I'm naked and trembling in his arms…”

Intense angst.! Are the words that come to mind. The build-up will keep you at the edge of your seat….but once Remy and Brooke took it to the next level it was everything and so much more! Sizzling:

"You wanted me." His breaths come fast, his eyes wild. "Here I am." He f~cks his c~ck into me ten times, fast and hard, making me yelp in delight of his claiming, and when my muscles seize up and my body prepares for another earth-shattering orgasm, he lets me come, keeping the frantic pace…

And possessive:

“His eyes glow in the shadows as he slides the soft liquid semen dripping down my thigh in a path leading back into my swollen entry, as if he doesn't want to come out of my body. "Sticky?" he asks in a gruff murmur, bending his head and licking my shoulder as he pushes his semen back inside with one finger.”

Unfortunately for Remy and Brooke there is more to come. It’s clear they are meant to be, yet there is darkness and evil standing in their way. Brace yourself for a bumpy ride ahead. This is book 1 in a series and though the story ends in a good place there is so much more to be told. I cannot wait for book 2.

I really liked Brooke in the beginning. My heart went out to her for how her athletic career had ended and how she somehow had managed to go on holding her head up. But I will warn you she disappointed me so deeply on several occasions Scorpion kiss and deserting Remy. that I am not sure she will be able to redeem herself, but at least she will have an opportunity.

I think I made myself pretty clear that Remy had me at the first chant. His beauty; pure perfection and strength yet so boyish. His friendship; unbending loyalty and fierce protectiveness. And underneath it all a broken man who despite it all rose above and became SOMEONE:

“He's not just a star, he's the whole f~cking sky to me.”

Spellbinding storytelling. And Remy, a hero you won’t soon forget. Thank you Ms. Evans!

***
Hero rating: 5+ stars
Heroine rating: 4 stars, then 2.5 stars
Sex scenes rating: 5 stars
Sex scenes frequency: 4.5 stars
Storyline concept rating: 5 stars
Storytelling skills rating: 5 stars
Story ending rating: 4 stars
Book editing rating (5 = no edits spotted): 4.5 stars
************************************************
Overall rating: 5 stars

Would I recommend this book: Yes.
Would I re-read this book: Yes.
Would I read future books by this author: Yes.

[Snow · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 *REMINGTON* stars

Re-read January 8th, 2017

And I don’t want the world to see me, it says, but I want you to know who I am…

And yes, Remington "RIPTIDE" Tate aka REMY, is still my absolute No.1 fighter *bows*

My first review:

I'm quite overwhelmed now...

ok, I slept it over! You know how they say, the morning is better than the evening, in a sense, your thoughts will be clearer in the morning after the hype settles down!

well, guess what? it didn't work for me!
who, said that anyway?! Probably a blunt person who didn't have anything to sort out in a first place!!!

ah, hell...lets starts from the end...LOL

it has a HEA, thank GOD, for that!
the book is actually NOT what I expected from a story about the fighter, I mean I knew there would be some issues and problems from the past and all, but this story actually dealt with a serious subject that also draws parallels from real life.

and that fact pulled me deeper into the story.

so, we have a fighter (boxer) Remington "Riptide" Tate aka Remy for short



and Brooke Dumas (a former athlete, tracker due to injury turned physical therapist)



it was a spark at first sight, an electricity that set the path of their ways and from then on...there was NO stopping for either of them

he's protective and possesive of her and he's a badass fighter to start with! duh? and he's not thinking twice...

“For the love of fucking god, don’t ever, ever, do that again. EVER. If one of them sets a hand on you, I’ll fucking kill them, and I won’t give a rat’s fuck who watches me!”

the intensity of the story was palpable, the anticipation was a hype, made me frustrated and anxious I was already sreaming inside...

...I find myself touching his mouth with a lone fingertip. His lips are so plump and firm, but at the same time, smooth and silky. I feel a quick, damp flick as his tongue flashes out to lick me, and a shudder shoots through my spine. He groans and pulls my whole finger into his mouth and closes his eyes as he sucks it.
“Remington…” I breathe.

...he grabs me and plants a kiss on my lips, quick and dry, but it bursts open a wealth of longing inside me he whispers, “You look beautiful.” He runs his thumb with desperation along my jaw, and tilts my chin up, kissing my lips, dry and quick again. “So damn beautiful I couldn’t take my eyes off you all evening.”

He cups my face in those big hands that make me feel fragile and tiny, and he hungrily recaptures my mouth. He takes it slowly this time, as if I’m precious and valuable. “Tonight you’re mine.”

His mouth grazes a path down my temple, to my chin, and his lips my buzz, fast and fevered, over mine. “I want you now. I can’t wait to get rid of these people. How do you like it, Brooke? Hard? Fast?”

Now I’m screamin’ OMFG, do it already!!!

I mean, you can't put smth like that to go on for a looooong time, it was killing me, Jesus, will you DO it already, i'm burning up over here...LOL

I'm ready to explode...

His hands clamp around me, and he crushes me to his body as he slides his nose along the shell of my ear. “When I take you, you’ll be mine,” he says, a soft promise in my ear. He slides his thumb along my jaw, then gently kisses my earlobe. “You need to be certain.”

“I want you to know me first, and then, I want you to let me know if you still want me to take you.”

“But I already know I want you,”

I need you to know who I am. What I am.”

and now I have a big question mark over my head! Like, WTF? What can be so horrible? So devastating? What is holding him back?
and I'm not the only one who's asking herself that...

“Why won’t you take me, Remington?”
He groans and pulls me closer. “Because I want you too much.”

again, please?



let's hear this, again! In case I've missed smth!

she asks:

“Why haven’t you touched me? Why don’t you fucking take me? Am I too fat? Too plain? Do you just delight in fucking torturing me senseless or are you just plain damn mean? For your information, I’ve wanted to have sexwith you since the day I went into your stupid hotel room and got hired instead!”

And then the handsome SOB throws this to her face:

“Why’d you want to have sex with me? To have a fucking adventure? What was I supposed to be? Your one-night-fucking stand? I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to beyours. I want to be your fucking REAL. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me—not Riptide!”

Now, that is just absurd! Remy, darlin'?



and then I think there's a catch, right?

“I won’t ever be yours if you don’t take me. Take me! You son of a bitch, can’t you see how much I want you?”

“You don’t know me,” he strains out through gritted teeth, his face anxious as he clenches my wrists at my sides. “You don’t know the first thing about me.”

“Then tell me! You think I’ll leave if you tell me whatever it is you don’t want me to know?”

“I don’t think it, I know it.
You’ll leave me the second it gets too steep, and you’ll leave me with nothing—when I want you like I’ve never wanted anything in my life. You’re all I think about, dream about. I get high and low and it’s all about you now, it’s not even about me anymore. I can’t sleep, can’t think, can’t concentrate worth shit anymore and it’s all because I want to be the fucking ‘one’ for you and as soon as you realize what I am, all I’ll be is a fucking mistake!”

Remy, you sorry ass, you break my heart, and now not only my carnal parts ache but my heart as well! Well, shit!!!

You had me at hello, you fucking asshole! You make me want you until it hurts and then you won’t do shit!”

Yeah, I feel you, Brooke! but then he just reveals this...

“Because I’m fucking you wish!!! LOL go read the book!

and YES! It's finally happening...

He brings his head to mine and pushes his tongue until I swallow my own gasps. “You wanted me.” His breaths come fast, his eyes wild. “Here I am.”

the story continues to grow after bursting, they both have so much to learn, to deal with, in an out, and YES, f*cking pride being the big asshole, right there...in their way

this was a beautifuly written story about emotions above all, dealing and recognizing them...and then acting upon them...woven real life problems just bring the dose of reality that is unescapable...but then you don't even wanna do that...cause you're already hooked!

they make mistakes, shit, they'll probably continue to do them as well, a lot of them, hell, you can make a shopping list but they acknowledge them all and they are coping...and that's the first step!

“I love you. I love you.” His breath seizes in his chest, and I continue in a rush. “More than I’ve ever thought it possible to love any other human being.

...it tears me open to ask you to be with me when I know I’m just going to do something to fucking hurt you again!”

“Yes! Yes you probably are, you idiot! And it’s going to be a damned skydive for me, and I’m going to hang on tight and just jump with you because that’s what you do to me.

...I’m crazy about you...
...it’s you I want...
...it’s always been about you...
...i want to be with you...

I want you to love me back, Remy. You’ve never told me how you feel about me!”

“I’m yours now, and you can’t ditch me like you just did. Even if I screw this up, I’ll still be your screw-up.”

“Not my screw-up. My real.”

I couldn't present this review any differently! There were so many things i wanted to say myself, and then I practicaly USED every possible line from the book, and if that isn't one huge spoiler, i don't know what is! LOL

#sorryNOTsorry

but I'm too lost in it, now!
And there's no going back!

Loved it, cause it was fuckin REAL (but not burdening...)

[Anu · Rating 1 out of 5]

Real Shit (Shit #1): How to Become a Successful "Writer" in the Modern Age

Chapter 1: Female characters
The story has to be told, at least initially, from the perspective of the female protagonist. She has to be a lost lamb, searching for meaning in life. It is imperative that she has one best friend for the following reasons; a) because there has to be a "snarky, sassy character", and b) because you have to write the next book from *her* perspective. The female character has to have eyes the colour of whiskey. No other colour will do. If she doesn't have whiskey coloured eyes, then the male protagonist will not be attracted to her. This is very important, the whiskey brown eyes. She must think herself plain and unworthy of the male protagonist. She must have no, or at least minimal sexual experience. Other traits that the female character may have include low self esteem, little or no money, no time for relationships, and a broken heart. Use your limited imagination to make your female character more appealing. Oh, and finally, she has to be touted as a "strong female protagonist" despite being an absolute doormat in front of the male protagonist.

Chapter 2: Male characters
The male protagonist has to be muscular, impossibly attractive, with a stubble, dark hair and blue eyes. The blue eyes are a must. The have to be electrifying, icy, brilliant, and all other synonyms of these words. He has to be an insufferable douchebag, always coveted by the ladies and hated by all other men. He should have suffered some deep injustice in his childhood; it is absolutely necessary that he has psychological problems, because that's attractive as fuck, even if you're being insensitive to a whole slew of people who have actually gone to hell and back because this is their reality. There has to be extra emphasis on the childhood trauma, because that is the reason he's all mysterious and douchey and attracted to the female protagonist. He has to a womaniser who gives up his wayward life to devote himself to the female protagonist. He absolutely has to be richer than the female MC, because yay patriarchy! He also needs to be a possessive, aggressive asshole who considers the female MC as "his". He has to own her. She has to be his possession. This phenomenon is termed as the "alpha male syndrome".

Chapter 3: Storyline
The storyline has to be one where sexual attraction between the protagonists is instant. Commonly used storylines that have proven successful include billionaire-employee, boxer-female "fan", biker-bimbo. There isn't much else required, except some unfoerseen (or foreseen) obstacle like rival boxer, sexual deviance and so on. There has to be one major fight where the two characters scream and yell at each other, and the female protagonist walks off on him. But then this should have all been a big sacrifice or a misunderstanding as a result of which our two characters realise they cannot live without each other, and end up professing their love for each other.

Chapter 4: Chemistry
The chemistry between the two characters has to be evident from the very first page. Actually, from the very first line. He should do things like fucking her name in front of her and kissing her after having just met her. There has to be some form of stalking involved, usually from the side of the male protagonist. She should be the superlative of sexually attracted to him, and this should make her wax poetic like "My panties are soaked, and my pulse has gone haywire" and "His animal magnetism is so powerful I think he just took my voice. He’s in my personal space, all over it, absorbing it, absorbing me, taking my oxygen, and I can’t understand the way my heart is beating, the way I stand here, shivering with heat, my entire body focused on the exact spot his hand is wrapped around me." This soon turns to mutual attraction that is represented by way of foreplay, or actual sex. Foreplay may or may not include sexual foreplay of the ear . Unprotected sex at least once is the way to go here. There has to be presence of some disgusting sexual activity, like him smearing his semen all over her. There has to be hot passionate sex for at least half the book, and each character must be capable of having 10 orgasms a day.

Chapter 5: The writing
Writing has to be repetitive. Words like "clench" and "my sex" have to be used a hundred times at least. Come up with "creative" ways of describing the vagina -words like 'inner goddess' and 'nubbin' always sell. Let the male protagonist say lines like "You're my real" , because even though it makes absolutely no fucking sense, it gives him depth, and of course all women are going to lap that shit up. Grammar isn't an issue because sex sells. It has to be a series; rewrite the whole thing from his perspective, and also pair every secondary character with every other secondary character and milk that up.

That's all folks. Now we can all get rich.

[Amy | Foxy Blogs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Meet Remington 'Riptide' Tate & Brooke Dumas




Remy is a fighter and he is all alpha!



Brooke is a sports rehab specialist and a former Olympic contender.



There are so many "lion" references and mannerisms throughout the book that I couldn't resist using the pictures above.

SERIES:

REAL - no cliffhanger | MINE - continuing story | REMY - Remy's POV of REAL & MINE | Rogue - Greyson's story | RIPPED - Pandora's story
To find out when the next book will be released click here.