Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for Riley Mackenzie's Beautifully Awake. My stop includes all the pertinent details for the book, a teaser, my review, and a giveaway.
This tour is presented by Love Between the Sheets.
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Beautifully Awake by Riley Mackenzie
Beautifully Awake #1
Release Date: October 2, 2013
Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance
Diagnosis: Sleep-running
Treatment: Truth
Prognosis: Beautifully Awake
Lili Porter hates the rain. Bad things happen in the rain. As a small town social worker dedicated to protecting children, she is forced to start over to escape her rural disaster. Determined to follow her father’s advice—head up and chin high—Lili finds herself in a new city, taking on a new system, this time healthcare. In doing so, she gets something she never expected, an intimate behind-the-scenes look at life in the hospital.
Lili learns that a surgeon’s hands have the power to heal more than
physical wounds. And a prescription for truth can cure three years of sleep running and leave you beautifully awake.
Beautifully Awake was an intense and very emotional read. There were a few things that were reminiscent of other books I've read, but that didn't make it any less enjoyable! The two ladies who are Riley Mackenzie have created very likable characters whose stories I definitely became invested in.
Lili Porter is an amazing heroine. She encompasses many admirable qualities - she gives an awful lot of herself to others - her friends, co-workers, even the hospital security guards. And she gives even more to her patients. But she doesn't allow anyone - particularly men - anywhere near her heart. Three years ago, she had her heart ripped to shreds and she's been 'sleep-running' ever since.
Dr. Chase Colton - ladies, here's your new book boyfriend. Chase is a complex and multi-layered man. He's a young, hot-shot neurosurgeon. He expects a lot of himself and his team and he's very intense where his job is concerned. Exacting - that's a good word to describe Chase. He's also kind and compassionate...the kind of doctor you want if you're having your brain operated on.
When Lili is assigned to Chase's team as the case manager, their chemistry lights things up. But neither is ready for the effect they have on the other. Chase isn't any more emotional available than Lili is. However, the pull between these two is magnetic and irresistible. As the walls come down around both their hearts, the result was powerful.
Both Lili and Chase have reasons for protecting themselves emotionally. As those reasons were revealed, it broke my heart for both of them. But I couldn't help but wish they'd been more open with one another. Honesty is always the best policy. Of course, that would eliminate angst. ;) Chase was really the more broken of the two, in my opinion. They both make huge strides in growing emotionally and it was so moving to watch them go from sleep-running to being beautifully awake.
The supporting characters were richly developed. They added so much in character development for Lili and Chase, as well. I was thrilled to find at the end of the book that another book is coming - Asher's story - and I can't wait. Lili's best friend, Sierra, provided the comic relief needed to ease the tension in the story. Asher revealed layer after layer of Chase's troubled past, without meaning to. The other doctors, particularly Guy, added depth to the hospital setting. The detail included in relation to the hospital - surgeries, medical supplies, terminology, etc., made the story all the more robust.
Note to Riley Mackenzie - that epilogue...ladies, that was cruel! You know what I'm talking about...
Beautifully Awake was an amazing read. The only reason it's not getting 5 worms is that I felt it dragged a bit about 75% through. I started thinking, 'geez, stop having sex and talk!' I know! But it picked back up and went out with quite a bang. I adored this book. I feel like it speaks to the intractable nature of the human spirit. And it definitely made me believe in the healing power of love!
**I received an eARC of the book, as part of the tour, in exchange for an honest review.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
**About the Authors**
We’re East coast girls separated by Long Island Sound who met in Physician Assistant School and have been besties ever since. We can safely say that thirteen miles of water does not get in the way because we talk or text, no exaggeration, at least 150 times a day. No, really, we do—about everything and nothing. Shockingly, we never (we mean never) run out of things to say. Umm, ever. We definitely laugh A LOT and we’re a tad sarcastic. And if we’re being totally honest, one or two
people might have, on occasion, used our names and ‘dramatic’ in the same sentence. But it’s hard to trust the sources since they married us.
It only took twelve years, two husbands, five kids, two dogs, and a two-week vacation in Cape Cod later to decide the romance world needed a splash of medicine. Write what you know.
So you can easily find us at 4 o'clock on Bank Street beach with a glass of cold Prosecco brainstorming. And guaranteed if we bump into you, literally, it’s only because our iPhones are glued to our hands (totally out of our control) either writing or editing our next novel (and yes, it is possible to do from your iPhone, we mastered it … damn those straight quotations).
When we are not working on our book or reading the latest angsty
romance on our kindles, you basically name it and we have it going on. Soccer, lacrosse, golf, swimming, dance, gymnastics, football, chess, baseball, basketball, skiing, ice skating, school, homework, and more school.
Oh yeah, did we forget to mention our careers in medicine?
Needless to say, we realized fast that something had to go, so we opted for sleep. It’s completely overrated (yet so AMAZING) and delirium makes everything funnier. Good thing we share a brain and can pretty much complete each other’s sentences (definitely weird, we know), otherwise it might have taken us two years to write Beautifully Awake rather than one.
So that’s our story, who we are … just add AUTHORS to the list!
Connect with the Authors
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