Narrated by Laura Jennings
Nothing But Trouble is the first in Amy Andrews’ Credence, Colorado series. It has a twofer HEA and does some set up work for coming books as well, so not everything in the book is about the romance between Wade Carter and his personal assistant, Cecilia Morgan.
Wade is a former quarterback for the Denver Broncos, with three Superbowl rings and the acclaim of Mile High Stadium to his name. He’s also the favourite son of Credence, Colorado, his hometown. He has a sign and everything.
Cecilia Morgan is his long-suffering PA. Five-and-a-half years earlier, Wade had offered her a crap ton of money to be at his beck and call 24/7. She signed a six-year contract. Wade pays for her apartment and her car and keeps her extremely busy so she has saved and/or invested most of the money he paid her. When the book begins, one of her investments has paid off big time and she finally has enough money to buy a house on the California coast – her long-held ambition. CC’s philandering father left her mother, CC and her five older brothers in the lurch and CC’s mother made a career out of being unable to do things on her own. That is not CC. She will be self-sufficient and will never rely upon a man to provide for her. So, a house is more than a house for CC.
Anyway, having reached her magic number, CC gives Wade notice that she’s resigning before her six years are up. When Wade’s father has a medical emergency, Wade negotiates with CC; they will split the difference and she will stay for another three months instead of six, and will accompany him to Credence where he will help his family on the farm and where he will complete his memoir. To avoid a breach of contract lawsuit in which she will have no leg to stand on, she accepts the deal. (That sounds like Wade was threatening her but he wasn’t really. This was more about CC being practical about the risks and her obligations.)
CC and Wade have never before mixed business with pleasure. For the most part, CC regards Wade as an annoying giant baby. She’s picked up after him, bought him Wonka Nerds at three am and been the shoulder to cry on for numerous women who did not believe him when he said he was not looking for a relationship. Wade pays her very well to do all of this but CC is less than impressed.
However, when CC and Wade land in Credence, CC begins to see a new side of him. Also, she is inspired by what she refers to as “farmer porn” which mainly involves Wade looking hot when doing farm work.
Similarly, Wade starts to see CC in a different way too and they gradually edge toward romance.
The author neatly works around the employment relationship, not ignoring it but also dealing with it in a way that it wasn’t hinky (well mostly).
Wade’s older brother Wyatt is very shy with women; he doesn’t have his brother’s gift of the gab or effortless charm. Credence itself is also suffering from a severe lack of women. The young people tend to move away and the school is in imminent danger of closing because there are not enough children in the town. The mayor comes up with a brilliant scheme to attract women to Credence, offering them business and accommodation incentives – which brings love into Wyatt’s life, as well as women to be the love interests for future books.
I admit Wyatt charmed me and I’d have happily listened to more about him. I liked his romance but would have liked him to get a little more airtime and for some of his story to be more fleshed out. There were large swathes of things which were basically handwaved away and I’d have liked to have heard about them.
The best part of the book for me was the banter between Wade and his friends, Tucker, Arlo and Drew – all future romance heroes no doubt. Amy Andrews writes great guy shit-talk and it frequently made me laugh.
There are plenty of examples of wit in the story which held my attention when it was beginning to meander as the plot slowed a little during the mid-section of the book. My favourite was this one, when one of his buddy’s suggests what is needed is a grand gesture:
“Wade liked that idea. It suited a guy with lots of money and no clue.“
The romance between CC and Wade develops very slowly and there was a bit of retconning at the end I had mixed feelings about but eventually, they find their way to one another. There’s also a baby pig called Wilburta and an intellectually challenged Border Collie called George and a lot of quirky small-town human characters. The town wasn’t completely white but I’d have liked a little more diversity in there – maybe in future books?
The narration, by Laura Jennings, had pluses and minuses for me.
It was my first experience with Ms. Jennings. In the plus column; her accent reminds me of the actress Holly Hunter and was pleasing to my ear. She deepens her voice sufficiently to make her male characters sound different to one another and believable and there was good distinction between the various other cast members.
On the other hand, the gaps between sentences were often rushed and the impact of what was being said was sometimes lost as a result. Conversely, there were occasionally too-long gaps between a piece of dialogue and the “he whispered” type tag at the end. There were also a couple of vocal errors and some odd pronunciation here and there. The thing which bothered me the most though was the rushing to get to the next sentence. It gave me the impression Ms. Jennings was a little impatient to get through the book.
Nothing But Trouble was a solid entry into the small town contemporary market, with cute animals, characters both sexy and sassy and plenty of witty banter. The narration was mostly good and the story enjoyable – although I would have liked a little more clarity that CC wasn’t going to still be at Wade’s beck and call once she became Mrs. Carter.
Kaetrin
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