Book Review (#2) - The Prelude by KaSonndra Leigh

Title: The Prelude
Author: KaSonndra Leigh
Published: 2003 by KaSonndra Leigh Books
First in A Musical Interlude series
328 pages

"Love, I have this to say to you: "You tore open my heart. You made me feel pain when all I wanted to feel was joy. So now, I will remove your power over me. I'll never kiss anyone or trust in any dream that you can take away from me. I will never believe in you again.""

Erin has had a really hard life. Everything that she cares about has been taken away from her so she vows to never trust or love again, or kiss anyone on the lips(...who doesn't like kissing?!).  So to put the past behind her, she moves to Italy to pursue a career as a designer. Her company is hired on to design outfits for a show being put together by a famous Russian maestro. This is how Erin meets Aleksandr Dostovsky, (a.k.a Alek Dostov, although I prefer his full name better), the world renowned maestro from Russia. Both avoid emotional attachments, yet there is something there that can't keep the two of them away from each other.

Plot:
Okay so let's talk about the plot. When I first started reading this I kept thinking to myself "what on earth am I getting myself into, this is not my kind of story". But this book REALLY surprised me! This is so much more than a love story. There was so much back story, a Russian gang and family issues. It really covered a lot. So even though most of it was about the romance there were other things to distract. Most of the twists were surprises and a few you could see coming from a mile away, but all in all I was quite happy with how the story progressed.

Characters:
Can we just talk about Alek? I was hooked from the moment I found out he was Russian (I have some kind of weird obsession with Russia). He's got the dark hair and the sultry dark eyes with hints of blue and he is 6'2". Come on, I know you are interested already. He was probably my favorite character, even though I did mostly enjoy all of them. Although I didn't connect with Erin she was a strong character as well, even though she was a tiny bit whiny and cursed a little too much. Even all the smaller role characters were great. I loved learning about every one of them and I cannot wait to get my hands on the second book to learn even more.

Writing Style:
The authors writing style was quite simple (not that this is a bad thing), which made this book easy to fly through. I ended up reading it in just over a day. I also really like that she wrote in alternating points of views. Not often with romances do you get to see inside the mans head. I can't wait to read more by Leigh and see what she is all about.

Enjoyability:
Like I said in the beginning, I didn't think I was going to enjoy this book one bit, but I was pleasantly surprised. I already can't wait for the second installment in the series (The Crescendo, 2014, pictured below).

Overall I enjoyed this book and gave it a 4/5 rating.

And a warning, if you are under the age of 18, you should wait until you are of age to read this because of all the mature content.

A big thanks to the author for sending me this book for review!