funny – Z. Elizabeth

Synopsis

Feather Hilborn is a style and dating coach. Despite what you may have heard, she is not a “kissing coach.”

Devin Nelson is confident and suave, not the kind of guy you’d guess has never kissed a girl. He’s cute, too, which is making it even more difficult for Feather to resist trying to kiss him.

Her first attempt sends him running. The second attempt doesn’t go much better. But you know what they say … third time’s the charm.

Coaching Devin is fun. The only problem is, once Devin “graduates,” some other girl will be benefiting from his new-found kissing skills.

3.5 / 5 stars

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My Review

Feather Hilborn is in no way a ‘kissing coach.’ Her job is a style and dating coach and she does a damn good job at it.

When Devin Nelson gets in contact, the confident and sauve guy has a little problem. He’s never kissed a girl before. And at 22, he wants to rectify his phobia. And he wants Feather to help him out.

It doesn’t help the fact that he’s cute and Feather is attracted to him, but she tries to stay professional and help him out.

Her first attempt makes him run away, the second isn’t that much better, but the third time…well it goes too well.

But what happens when Devin ‘graduates’ and some other girl gets the benefit of kissing him?

The Kissing Coach is a fairly quick and light read. I picked it because I wanted something fun to read and from the synopsis, it sounded like a great short book to pass a few hours with…okay, like an hour and a half, but you know me by now, I get sucked into good books and need to finish them asap.

This is the first book I have read by Mimi Strong and it won’t be the last. I actually have For You on my kindle too, which will be getting a read very soon. Ms. Strong had me laughing, swooning, crying, frustrated and over all enjoying every page of her book. Her writing is easy-going and will have you turning the pages wanting to know more about the story. Never once did I put the book down – I read it straight through, wanting to get to know what was going to happen next.

The Kissing Coach is about Feather Hillborn. She’s a style and dating coach, who gets paid for helping people out who come to her. She gets paid to dish out advice that could be given for free, but you’re more likely to listen to someone if you pay them…right?

Then along comes Devin, her new client and all of a sudden she feels this attraction to him. He’s confident and good looking but he has a phobia. He’s never kissed anyone and he wants to change that. He wants to be able to not be scared to kiss a girl so he comes to Feather for help.

Feather tries to keep her attraction to herself whilst helping Devin. But it’s obvious that there is chemistry between them as well as their fun banter between them both.

Feather has a rule that she won’t start a relationship when coaching a client, although she really wants a relationship or something with Devin. But she is perfectly find with coaching Devin on kissing, if it means she gets his lips on hers. But as she tries to ease him into the whole kissing situation, things get a little out of hand and he flies.

This happens another time after but the third time is the lucky charm. But then what happens when Devin isn’t so scared to kiss anyone anymore?

Feather is 22, she hasn’t been in a relationship in a long time and this never really bothered her. She was doing well with her job, liked dishing out advice and helping other people get into relationships but then Devin arrived and it changed her whole perception on everything. She wanted a relationship, she wanted a guy to call her own and she wanted to be loved.

Feather to me, seemed old beyond her years, maybe due to what happened in her past (You’ll find out). She was cocky, and knew how to banter along with Devin. But you could see her vulnerable side as well, the side where she is still a 22 year old woman who can be upset, who can make mistakes and sit in front of the TV with ice-cream and your pjs wallowing in self-pity. Despite the shortness of the book, you do see her journey. Journey through keeping her secret from her mother, see her bond with her mother, see her feel all these emotions she has hidden away, see her grow up and fall in love. I really like Feather as a character.

Devin is also 22. He’s a manager at this parent’s hotel. Hes confident, he’s cocky and cheeky but he’ also has a phobia of kissing. He doesn’t know what it’s stemmed from though but he gets anxious over it. This is why he wants Feather to help him. I really liked Devin. You could see just how afraid he was to kiss, how much he really wanted to though, and I could understand his freak-outs the first two times when he ran from Feather, yet he kept coming back. He was determined to get over this fear. Once he kissed Feather, he was like a different man, like a weight had been lifted and he couldn’t stop once he started. Wanting to take it all the way – ahum.

You do find out what made him have this phobia and I felt so sorry for him but I just couldn’t understand why he pushed Feather away. They could have saved the pain of not being together all those months if they had just spoken about it.

But of course, there is a HEA – well they should be or I wouldn’t be reading it haha. It was a great ending, one which had me giggly and pretty much summed up their fun and bantery relationship.

There are some sex scenes involved in this book. They aren’t heavy but they do notch up the steam factor a smidge. Their first time is funny – it was to me. I didn’t know if it was believable though (You’ll understand) but then maybe it was? Oh I don’t know but you can see how much they like one another; their chemistry and need for one another, especially the last sex scene where I was swooning over what Devin was saying to Feather. So sweet!!

Okay, now my favourite scene. I have to say it’s a part where they were role-playing in Feather’s house. When they were helping Devin and they pretended they were on a date and Feather was showing him around the house. Just the start of the role-playing had me chuckling and it was a perfect playing field to make Devin relaxed and kiss Feather whenever he wanted to without feeling anxious.

So if you are looking for a fluffy, fun and funny (Ooo alliteration ;)) book, then The Kissing Coach is definitely the book for you. You will love Devin, you will love Feather and generally, you will love this book too!

Synopsis

It’s stupid to fall for your brother’s ex. It’s even worse to enlist another’s help to win the ex over. But Brody is desperate and Hayley, his partner in American Sign Language, is more than willing to lend him a few tips.

She’s the school’s matchmaker,’ and with her bizarre and positive personality, Brody finds her easy to talk to, even about the most awkward situations. Hayley’s tips seem to be working, but as Brody learns more about his matchmaker, he starts finding reasons to spend time with her, and not the girl he thought he was in love with.

But Hayley isn’t ready to fall for anyone. Labeled the “Funny Fat Friend” within her group, her self image makes it impossible for Brody to share his feelings without Hayley shrugging it off as a joke.

Convincing her Brody can, and did, fall for the “Funny Fat Friend” turns out to be harder than simply falling in love.

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My Review

Brody and Hayley are partners in their American Sign Language class and although they hardly know one another, they seem to get on pretty well. Brody’s brother’s ex-girlfriend is also in the class, and when Hayley lends him a hand in trying to win Quynn over, he wants to spend his time with Hayley- not trying to win Quynn over.

He and Hayley spend a lot of time together, she’s easy to talk to, makes an awkward situation not so awkward and she has the best personality ever…but she isn’t ready to let go and love someone. She’s labelled the FFF “Fat Funny Friend” and she has no confidence in herself at all. Can Brody convince her that he really has no feelings for Quynn and that he wants her?

I loved both Hayley and Brody. They were great characters, with prominent voices that made me feel closer to both of them when they were going through turmoil throughout the story. Their banter and conversations were so funny and it felt exactly like how two friends should act together – they were having fun and slowly learning more about each other and becoming best friends fast – with the added feelings they had for one another down the line.

Hayley hasn’t had much luck on the boy’s side. She’s been labelled the Fat Funny Friend and in the past when she’s thought guys liked her, they have just used her to get closer to her friends. It doesn’t help when your mum wants you to change yourself too, hence having no confidence in her appearance at all. She has a bubbly and bizarre personality that no one can ignore and as a reader, you become engrossed in her personality and I really saw some of myself in Hayley. I think her personality stems from being labelled the FFF and being used but even if I’m wrong, there is no way those guys who used her could have done that, she was a gem and a sweetheart and I would love her to be my best friend and I would totally hook her up! But I’m glad she had Brody, he saw her, for her and liked her, regardless of her appearance. He fell hook, line and sinker for her and getting her to believe took a while, but I could understand why and when you read it, you will to.

Brody – albeit wanted to be with Quynn at the beginning – had me loving him from the start. When he and Hayley began to constantly hang out and when he realized that he didn’t want Quynn anymore and it was Hayley he wanted, ohh how I wanted to fist-pump him. He was there for Hayley through everything she went through and although it was hard for her to open up to him, he waited until she was ready to tell him what was up. I enjoyed how it was in Brody’s POV. I hardly ever read books where it’s in the guys POV but with this book, I loved it! It was refreshing to see/read how Brody dealt with his feelings for Hayley and her insecurities instead of it being in her POV throughout the book, never understanding Brody’s feelings for her, but his voice shone through and you could tell how much he liked Hayley and how much he wanted her to know that he didn’t care if she was fat, he thought she was the most beautiful girl ever and he just wanted her to believe him and be with him too!

Although at times he bugged me over his dilemmas between Hayley and Quynn. I understand that he wanted to get with Quynn, his brothers ex at the beginning, but the more time he spent with Hayley, the more he wants to spend time with her and he’s all cocked up over both of them, even though Hayley seems to dominantly wins every time. I could really see her hesitations when Brody tries to convince her he really does like her – as she’s been helping him try to get Quynn. I really did want to slap him at times but I suppose, when you’ve been crushing on one person for a while then another comes along and completely steals your thoughts then it’s going to be confusing, I’m just glad he sorted his feelings out and you could see they were genuine.

The ending was super great! He FINALLY manned up – you will see why I say this – and everything worked out perfectly for them. They are the most amazing and funny couple I have read and they definitely deserve to have one another because their chemistry is fantastic, their banter is off the scale and they truly do love one another. AWESOMESAUCE!

If you’re looking for a funny, fluffy and cute story, then Reasons I Fell for the Funny Fat Friend is definitely the one for you.