cringe worthy

NEW ALC REVIEW FROM DANA

Property Of the Mountain Man

(Montana Mountain Men #1)

By Gemma Weir

Narrated by: Sara Hannan & Adam Drew

Genre: Contemporary Romance, age gap

The blurb pulled me in, and I just had to ALC this one. I mean, who doesn’t love a tall, dark, and muscled mountain man, right? Well apparently, I don’t. I hate giving low star reviews, but unfortunately this is only a 3 for me. And only that high because the narration was so great. As far as that side of it, Sara Hannan and Adam Drew were great. Their voices were distinct enough to differentiate between the characters. The pacing, timing, flow, and pitch were flawless. I thought their characterizations were spot on. While I felt the narration was a 5, the story itself was a 1 for me. So, the 3-stars I’m giving this book is out of respect for the narrators and for Pink Flamingo Productions, who gifted me this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Bonnie is an immature idiot and Beau is a manipulative sob. He has major control issues, and I mean MAJOR. He keeps using the phrase “No space, no distance”, and boy does he live by that when it comes to Bonnie. Bonnie has said things to him such as: “You don’t get to pick my priorities just because they’re not a priority to you.”, “Am I seriously not even allowed any privacy in the gd bathroom?”, and “Even prisoners get to use the bathroom on their own.”  I used to volunteer at a battered woman’s shelter. Beau’s actions are 100% on-line with a control abuser. His actions aren’t that of the sexy alpha male I thought I’d get. They’re the actions of a jerk with control issues. He isn’t relentless when it comes to Bonnie, he’s a stalker. He seriously would not allow her to go to the bathroom without him. The bathroom is inside his bedroom, but that was too much distance for him. Sir, you have a serious problem and need therapy. He followed her to work every day and then followed her home every night. One time she told him she was sleeping over like he wanted but was going home to get clothes first. He couldn’t even handle that and had to follow her home and help her. She can’t even pack a bag on her own. He texts and calls a ridiculous number of times while she’s working and gets extremely angry when she doesn’t reply to the texts or answers the phone. Dude, she’s working! And at a coffee shop no less, alone, where she’s dealing with customers all day. She CAN’T answer her phone all day long. Once, when she wasn’t answering his texts or calls while she was working, Beau sent his brother there to tell her she better answer her phone, or he was coming down there! In my head I’m screaming, omg Bonnie run for the hills! She gives him a little resistance, yells at him and tries to hold her ground. But he manipulates her and wears her down until she just gives in. This 43-year-old man completely steamrolls this 21-year-old. The seggsy times were incredibly steamy, but that wasn’t enough for me to get past Beau’s gaslighting. He tried to change every single aspect of her life. She has a routine on her dad’s farm, and he completely derailed that without any concern to her wants or feelings. In real life, his actions at her job would’ve gotten her fired. On her days off from the coffee shop, she liked to work on her dad’s farm. That’s her routine and she enjoys it. Beau doesn’t accept it at all. He wants her to quit working, including helping her dad, to be with him 24/7. I’m not exaggerating either; that’s literally what he wants. There was one red flag after another. And the HEA… it even says at the end that he never gets past or learns to accept her working or seeing her friends. The only reason I didn’t dnf this one is because I kept praying Bonnie would stand up for herself against Beau’s abusive control. Spoiler alert, she doesn’t.

3 generous but cringe-worthy stars.