Review of ‘Reaping the Benefits’ by EJ Noyes
Putting E.J. Noyes on the cover of a book alone is enough to make most of us want to read it. Noyes is one of the best current writers in lesfic and I could not be more excited every time I pick up one of her books. While I do have to be honest that this is not one of my favorites by her, it still was a really good read.
This is a quirky book. I would almost call it a rom-com with a slight paranormal twist. It reminds me the most of her book ‘Turbulence‘. It has a boss/employee relationship, some humor, and plenty of steamy scenes. But the real meat of the story is quite different. Actually, considering I’ve read more paranormal books than I can count, I was surprised how fresh this story felt to me. I’ve read books with Grimm’s before but Death’s Minion was new and I enjoyed the twist Noyes put on it. For those of you who might be worried about the paranormal factor, don’t be. This book is a love story, it’s a romance. The paranormal parts are just fun and add a twist to make the story different. As long as you are a romance fan you should enjoy this book.
This is the first book that Noyes has ever written in third person. I have mixed feelings about that. For one I can see why she picked third in this book and I feel third was a good choice for this story. But, I do love Noyes’ first person voice. There is nothing I love more than a well written first person story and Noyes is one of the masters at it. I love the intense feels you can get and how connected you feel to the characters. I was happy to say that in this book I did feel connected to the characters and liked both quite a bit. But I did feel like it took me longer to connect to the book as a whole. In the first quarter of the book, I had trouble really getting into the story. Once the book picked up speed everything was so much better. I don’t know if that was partially Noyes getting more familiar writing in third or what, but I enjoyed the final three-quarters of the book much more than the beginning.
The romance is really the heart of the book. Can a woman really get over losing the love of her life and be able to love someone else? For a book that was a little comedic and oddball at times, the romance and the reason for the conflict were more serious. The mix really worked though. The chemistry was nice and strong and I enjoyed watching the connection bloom in front of my eyes. This isn’t the steamiest of Noyes’ books, but there is plenty of heat to go around.
While it did take longer for the story to grab me than I expected, I still really enjoyed this. I would read certain parts and it would almost take my breath away and I’d think to myself “that is so Noyes”. I even found myself making some notes of quotes to remember which I only do very rarely while reading. This is one I would easily recommend to lesfic romance books fans.
An ARC was given to me for an honest review.
