I can’t wait for book 2!!!!!!!!!!!

I love Alexis Hall and when I saw How to Bang a Billionaire was going to be the latest title by this author, I immediately added it to my list of “want to read.” First the cover, yes it’s not a flashy in your face cover, but it spoke volumes for me. I like to see a man who can put himself together nicely and this cover shows me who Caspian Hart is. Or at least one side of him. The blurb; do I really need to read a blurb for an Alexis Hall book? Nope, but I did anyway because I like to torture myself by reading blurbs to books I don’t own yet and dreaming of the day they become mine. 😉 I was sold on the line: “Man Least Likely to Set the World on Fire.”

Let me start with the narration because I am a BIG Joel Leslie fan, and have listened to so many books narrated by him. At first I was a little puzzled because the book is based in England, and Joel Leslie is not English. But then I started to listen to the narration and was like, duh!!! He is one of the most talented narrators I have found who can do so many accents! I never questioned it after that and in fact forgot who was narrating because I was just lost in the voice. Joel did an incredible job of brining these characters to life and I can’t wait for the chance to listen to the rest of this series. I can’t picture anyone else doing the narration now.

As for the story, I will admit it had heavy vibes of Fifty Shades of Grey, but there were a few differences as well. I didn’t mind so much the parallel to Fifty, and in fact had been hoping an MM version would come out ever since I read the Fifty trilogy. At times it was a little off putting how similar the books were, but for the most part I was able to distance myself from it. Overall this was a very enjoyable story, and funny!! I did NOT expect to laugh so much reading this book. Arden St. Ives is a college student who doesn’t know what he is going to do when he graduates, and he can panic with the best of them, over anything and everything. His antics kept me going and the talks he had with himself about killed me because he would go round and round in circles over a possible scenario and drive himself crazy.

His relationship with Caspian Hart is…complicated. I was entertained by how they “met” but their continued interactions were a little weird. I didn’t see what Caspian saw in Arden, what drew them together. Caspian is a reserved man who is “HOT”, but distant. Arden is immature and suffers from crying jags at the littlest things. I can definitely see where Alexis was going with these characters, but I wish Arden was a little more self assured and little less drama queen. There were so may times I wish Arden had been more assertive in what he wanted from Caspian, most specifically in bed. Arden is completely open to some kinky sex, but is afraid to come right out and say or demand this or Caspian. True, Caspian isn’t even open to discussing being kinky and I can see how this would make Arden a little hesitant to broach this subject, yet at the same time, Arden isn’t 100% happy with the situation as it is so… I felt he should have at least tried harder to make Caspian understand. There were a few other situations I felt Arden was too submissive about his own wants and desires, but they were minor things.

I can’t wait to read the next book in this series because as a whole, I was totally and completely infatuated with this story. This ended on a higher relationship note between the two MCs and they actually talked about their feelings and wants and needs. It felt like a true beginning now between them, whereas the rest of the story felt like a hesitant prologue. I felt like they were more connected and in tune with each other and I was left with so much hope for them to finally find what they want and need.

Story 4 stars
Narration 5 stars