Beginner's Luck (Chance of a Lifetime #1) by Kate Clayborn Series: Chance of a Lifetime #1
Published by Lyrical Shine on October 31, 2017
Pages: 246
Genres: Contemporary, Romance
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When three friends impulsively buy a lottery ticket, they never suspect the many ways their lives will change—or that for each of them, love will be the biggest win of all.
Kit Averin is anything but a gambler. A scientist with a quiet, steady job at a university, Kit’s focus has always been maintaining the acceptable status quo. A sudden windfall doesn’t change that, with one exception: the fixer-upper she plans to buy, her first and only real home. It’s more than enough to keep her busy, until an unsettlingly handsome, charming, and determined corporate recruiter shows up in her lab—and manages to work his way into her heart...
Ben Tucker is surprised to find that the scientist he wants for Beaumont Materials is a young woman—and a beautiful, sharp-witted one at that. Talking her into a big-money position with his firm is harder than he expects, but he’s willing to put in the time, especially when sticking around for the summer gives him a chance to reconnect with his dad. But the longer he stays, the more questions he has about his own future—and who might be in it.
What begins as a chilly rebuff soon heats up into an attraction neither Kit nor Ben can deny—and finding themselves lucky in love might just be priceless...
Well…yay! Beginner’s Luck feels like it belongs on that shelf with Act Like It or The Hating Game (if anything belongs on that shelf with The Hating Game) in terms of contemporary debuts. There were so many great things about this book.
The heroine (Kit) and her relationships: I’m including her relationship to her job, her friends, her town, her brother (they had me tearing up-sibling relationships are so crazy deep and this was well done IMO). What was wonderful is this all gave us a great idea of who Kit is. And who she wanted to be. And girl, I’m all for comfort zones and an ambition of having a stable, content life. That said, it was truly wonderful how this STEM heroine was portrayed, for that piece wasn’t at all glossed over.
And then there’s the hero, Ben. And Ben’s dad. And the Ben’s, well everything felt very purposeful here too. He had me when he told her upon first meeting “I like you.” And that first kiss..whew…He’s not perfect. He holds his hopes and wants close, but it is clear from the outset that he begins to care deeply about Kit. He humors and even adores her friends for being who they are to her, he LISTENS. I kept finding myself thinking how adored that makes people feel to have someone who pays such careful attention to them. There’s other touches about Ben- for example, he didn’t assume a doctor was male-that make him a winner of my heart.
This book delighted me with its secondary characters and debut author that made a splash with this fresh contemporary romance.
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