Page 2 of Money Shot

SIENNA

June 8th,2014

With my heart beating out of my chest and my mind racing in ten different directions, I brushed my hand across the face of the screen anxiously. The page didn’t move. I carefully pressed my finger against the screen and flipped the page in the other direction. After a quick study, and confirming it was the page I had previously read, I swept my finger across the screen again and stared at the end of what appeared to be the last page.

There was no doubt.

I had reached the end of the book.

“Are you fucking serious? A cliffie? You bitch!” I screamed as I tossed my Kindle across the room and into the wall.

My favorite author had just become a worthless heap of steaming shit. After falling deeply in love despite all of their differences, being torn apart and then reunited, the hero proposed marriage; and I was prepared for a wedding. Instead, in the last chapter, out of the fucking blue, the hero was arrested for murder. Who in the fuck would end a story in such a place, leaving the reader to wait anxiously with knots in her stomach for the next book?

A fucking idiot, that’s who.

Although I generally tried to give myself twelve hours to digest a book before writing a review, I rolled off the edge of my bed, grabbed my glass of wine, and commenced to downing it as I walked over to my desk. As I waited for the computer to go through its startup procedure, I walked to the kitchen with my empty glass and grabbed the remaining bottle of Madeira.

After roughly two seconds of considering how much wine I should pour into the glass, I uncorked the bottle, raised it to my lips, and took a much needed drink. I tossed the cork on the counter beside my empty glass and stomped toward my bedroom with the bottle dangling from my loosely clenched fist.

I walked into the room, sat down, slammed the bottle against the desk, and began to type.

*Kindle throwing alert*

I’ll be taking donations from anyone wishing to fund a new Kindle purchase, because after reading this book, my Kindle is in a thousand pieces.

Can you imagine the story Cinderella ending with the prince finding Cinderella’s glass slipper, but not searching for – or finding – her?

Or maybe in The Notebook, the story ending with Allie receiving Noah’s letters from her mother, but not acting on her feelings?

You can’t, can you?

Neither can I.

The reason I can’t imagine it, and I’m sure you’ll agree, is because most authors follow a proven pattern in the crafting of their stories for romance novels. They have a hero and heroine meet, fall in love, and eventually some type of conflict tears them apart. We frantically flip through the pages, saddened by their separation, and jump with joy when they eventually reunite. At some point the book ends, alluding to them living happily ever after.

I reached for the wine, drank a quarter of what remained, and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. I slid the bottle beside my monitor, inhaled a shallow breath, and turned on Bruce Springsteen’s “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town.” After a few minutes of bobbing my head to the music, I commenced typing.

That, my friends and followers, is not the case in this book.

Not at all.

The author seems to have misplaced the memo explaining the necessity on not only writing a novel, but completing it.

When I reached the point where the book stopped (I refuse to call it an ending)…

I stopped typing, searched through my files, and inserted a .gif of a wide-eyed woman’s head exploding. After laughing to myself for a few long seconds, I took another drink of wine and continued.

I realized the author must have run out of time. Maybe she needed to meet a deadline, and decided finishing the book would push her past her date or time. Who knows? But what I do know is this…

She sure as fuck didn’t finish writing it.

Now, for the beginning of the book, and what transpired between that point and when the book simply stopped?

I loved it.

As I read through this book, I was relieved that it had it all. A hero I could sink my teeth into. A heroine I wanted to sit down and have a glass of wine with. Scorching hot love scenes, more scorching hot love scenes, and conflict I saw coming, but hoped never came to fruition. After a hundred or so well-written angst-filled pages, the H and h were reunited, and then…

Something ridiculous happened and the book just fucking ended.