Review: Four Seconds to Lose

Title: Four Seconds to Lose (Ten Tiny Breaths #3)

Author: K. A. Tucker

Date of Publication: November 4, 2013

Formats Available: Paperback, E-book

Buy This Book: Amazon

Synopsis: When a gorgeous young dancer walks through his door, a strip club owner must decide whether to follow his rules or his heart in the third novel by the author of One Tiny Lie and Ten Tiny Breaths.

Owning a strip club isn’t the fantasy most guys expect it to be. With long hours, a staff with enough issues to keep a psych ward in business, and the police regularly on his case, twenty-nine-year-old Cain is starting to second guess his unspoken mission to save the women he employs. And then blond, brown-eyed Charlie Rourke walks through his door, and things get really complicated. Cain abides by a strict “no sleeping with the staff” rule. But being around Charlie challenges Cain’s self-control…and it’s been a long time since any woman has done that.

Twenty-two-year-old Charlie Rourke needs a lot of money, really fast, in order to vanish before it’s too late. Taking her clothes off for men makes her stomach curl but Charlie tells herself that at least she’s putting her acting and dancing skills to good use. And though her fellow dancers seem eager to nab their sexy, sophisticated, and genuinely caring boss, she’s not interested. After all, Charlie Rourke doesn’t really exist—and the girl pretending to be her can't get distracted by romance.

Unfortunately, Charlie soon discovers that developing feelings for Cain is inevitable, and that those feelings may not be unrequited—but losing him when he finds out what she’s involved with will be more painful than any other sentence awaiting her.

My Review:

I can't believe that I let this novel sit on my Kindle for as long as it did! For some reason life just kept getting in the way of me finally sitting down to read this one and when I finally did sit down to read it I didn't get up again until it was done. I adored every second of this novel and once I stared it was impossible for me to stop. My only regret is that I didn't get around to this one sooner, because it captivated me in every sense of the word.

The thing I was most excited for in this novel was finally getting a closer look at Cain. He played a bigger role in the first novel than in the second, but he always had a bit of a mysterious aura around him and I couldn't wait to see what was hiding underneath that. Cain had much more of a past than I ever imagined and as I slowly learned more about him I began to respect him even though I initially wasn't sure if I would, he is the owner of a strip club after all! Even though he's done his share of bad things he really made an effort to make a difference, especially for the girls who work for him, and I really admired him for that.

Charlie's story was absolutely fascinating and I loved reading about her. She had an intriguing life story and though I can't give much away without ruining the story everything she had to go through with her stepfather, and the strings that came with his marriage to her mother, really threw me for a loop, but it also made the story that much more interesting. Her relationship with Cain developed at the perfect pace and I knew from the start that she was absolutely perfect for him. Even though they both come from troubled pasts they are both able to put everything they've gone through behind them and take what they've gone through to create a more positive outlook for not only themselves, but for those around them too.

Finally, one of the things I really loved about this novel was getting a look into the life of a stripper. I feel like there is a very strong stigma against the whole idea and seeing what all the girls in the club had to go through made me start thinking about them as more than just the reputation assigned to them. A lot of the girls who were there had nothing else to support them and I loved Cain's compassion toward women who most people in society would have tossed to the side. I've never read a book about a stripper and I loved the fresh idea, I really felt for all the girls and what they had to go through; especially the events in their life that made them turn to stripping. I'm really hoping Tucker revisits some of them in upcoming novels!

Four Seconds to Lose is no doubt Tuckers best work yet and I adored every single second of this wonderfully written novel. Tucker has a true talent for writing in the New Adult genre and I'm so excited to get my hands on the next one in the series!

5/5