PillowByRiver

The original sinner series by Tiffany Reisz is my favorite erotic series I've read. So when this book popped up on my library's recommendation shelf, I was excited and immediately took it home. However, the book did not quite meet my expectation. 

The whole book starts and ends with a mysterious woman sleeping with a millionaire who loves collecting rare bourbons. She stole one very rare Red Ribbon bottle and hence the book title. After getting caught, she promised the millionaire that after hearing her story, he would be more than willing to voluntarily give her this bottle.

------- Now begins the spoiler ---------

The sex between she and the millionaire is not very natural and feels forced. The story she told, which occupies most of the book, is not so capturing. The beginning of the story is quite intense (the almost sex at the horse stall, and the flood night when Tamara's grandfather tried to rape her). It raised my expectation that this would be as good as the Siren despite the disappointing beginning. But the story took a turn and for the following half of the book the story falls very flat without any fluctuation. The author maintains a suspense tone that anything could go wrong at any moment. But it's not until within the last 80 pages. The final revelation is out of my expectation, but not shocking and good enough to keep me very interested. 

In general, too many witty talks were sprinkled throughout the book without pushing the plot line moving. The characters are not so likable and their motivations feel a little forced for the sole sake of twisting the story. This reminds me of the too many animated movies now with multiple small jokes (which are all put in the trailer) without a coherent plot and lovable characters. I admit these witty talks are part of Tiffany Reisz's style, and I love it sometimes. But the overall plot is not moving at all for almost half of the book so it felt quite short of my expectation. Hope she can do better on her next book.