Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Cream of the Crop (Hudson Valley #2) by Alice Clayton [Review]



Manhattan’s It Girl, Natalie Grayson, has it all: she’s a hot exec at a leading advertising firm, known industry-wide for her challenging and edgy campaigns. She’s got a large circle of friends, a family that loves her dearly, and her dance card is always full with handsome eligible bachelors. What else could a modern gal-about-town wish for? The answer, of course, is...cheese.

Natalie’s favorite part of each week is spending Saturday morning at the Union Square Farmer’s Market, where she indulges her love of all things triple cream. Her favorite booth also indulges her love of all things handsome. Oscar Mendoza, owner of the Bailey Falls Creamery and purveyor of the finest artisanal cheeses the Hudson Valley has to offer, is tall, dark, mysterious, and a bit oblivious. Or so she thinks. But that doesn’t stop Natalie from fantasizing about the size of his, ahem, milk can.
Romance is churning, passion is burning, and something incredible is rising to the top. Could it be...love?



4 Cream Please stars
Cream of the Crop is a standalone and is part of the Hudson Valley series.  This is Natalie and Oscar’s story. Oscar lives near Leo and Roxie (from book one). I love it when previous characters are brought in! I love me my Leo.

It’s the cute story of city girl meets country boy. To me, Cream of the Crop was written differently from Nuts. I still enjoyed Cream of the Crop and it was pretty funny. The beginning is heavily descriptive as the author sets up the tone and pace of the read. We get a huge character build-up of the main Heroine and Natalie is a very strong career driven average size eighteen city gal.
Natalie’s weight isn’t a focal point of the read, but it’s nice to have a full figure gal as the main character. She’s very confident in her appearance and I love that she loves to wear designer shoes.   She goes to the Farmer’s Market weekly to check out her crush, Oscar.

The interaction between Oscar and Natalie is very mild. They don’t really get into it until the thirty percent mark, so the author builds up a lot of tension. Each week Natalie would stop by Oscar’s booth to buy cheese, they exchange one or two words and that’s it. This part was my favorite part in the book because of Natalie’s inner monologue. She’s funny and cute. As confident Natalie is, she becomes a goof in front of Oscar.

Natalie is a straight forward gal and she approaches the whole Oscar thing kind of differently from what I’ve read in previous books. It caught me off guard, but it’s a good kind.  Once she becomes comfortable with Oscar, all bets are off and YAY the reading started to suck me in.

“This was moving beyond a toss in the hay and a grapple in the truck. I was feeling the feels. Which made me so very nervous… but I was rolling with it, dealing with it.”

Oscar is a big strong handsome man. He’s all muscles and tats with long hair. It’s interesting to see how he gets into the cheese business and it’s also interesting to see how the town reactions towards Oscar and Natalie. There are some obstacles that come the couple’s way, especially with the travel from city to farm life and gasp ex’s.

There are a few moments I didn’t agree with Oscar’s actions and Natalie’s reactions. I think it’s because I like the old fashion books with a possessive male and a damsels in distress female and this is not that kind of book. Overall, I enjoyed the light-heartedness of the read and I laughed out loud at a few moments. I honestly say Oscar and Natalie are a one-of-a-kind couple.



An ARC was provided

 


 


Nuts #1 AMAZON | REVIEW
Cream of the Crop #2 AMAZON


Cocktail Series

Wallbanger #1 REVIEW | AMAZON
Rusty Nailed #2 REVIEW | AMAZON
Screwdriverd #3 REVIEW | AMAZON
Mai Tai'd Up #4 REVIEW | AMAZON


The Redhead Series

The Unidentified Redhead #1 AMAZON
The Redhead Revealed #2 AMAZON
The Redhead Plays Her Hand #3 AMAZON




ALICE CLAYTON worked in the cosmetics industry for over a decade before picking up a pen (read laptop).

She enjoys gardening but not weeding, baking but not cleaning up, and finally convinced her long-time boyfriend to marry her.

Now, about that Bernese Mountain dog.



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