PARIS LOVE MATCH BY NIGEL BLACKWELL BLOG TOUR + REVIEW

Follow Paris Love Match on tour. More details here

Piers Chapman had seen Paris,
In pictures, 
In movies, 
In books.
What he hadn't seen was the mobster.
Or the dictator.
Or the trained killers.
Or the diamonds they were chasing.
But it was Paris,
The city of light,
The city of love.
And a girl had already stolen his heart.
What could possibly go wrong?

Getting a taxi in Paris can be hell. Piers Chapman expected a boring business trip to Paris. What he didn't expect was to fight over a cab with a beautiful girl. After a bad meeting, Sidney Roux just wanted to hail a cab, go home, and have a glass of wine. She didn't expect to fight over a cab with some pompous British tourist. Neither of them expected another man to jump in their cab. Or to be involved in a gun fight. Or a car chase through the streets of Paris. Or for the man to die. But they're thrust together when the mob demands they return what the dead man stole. Will Piers and Sidney work together? Will they find what he had stolen? Will they stay alive? And will they do the last thing they expected? Will they fall in love?

Title: Paris Love Match

Author: Nigel Blackwell

Publisher: Bandit Publishing

Release date: May 2, 2013

Genre: Romance humorous

Age Group: New Adult

Tour organized by: AToMR Tours

Source: Copy received from Bandit Publishing for tour + honest review

Where to Find Paris Love Match:

Goodreads | Amazon | B&N

Nigel Blackwell was born in rural Oxfordshire in England. He has a love of books, a PhD in Physical Chemistry, and a black belt in pointing out the obvious. As a teenager he toured Europe and loved seeing the wonders of the world and the people in it. Since then he has been fortunate enough to travel across Europe, North America, the Middle East, and Japan, and hasn't been anywhere that doesn't have the potential for a story. He now lives in Texas with his wife and daughter, where they enjoy the sunshine and listen to the coyotes howl at night.

                          


Where to Find the Author:

                          Website | Facebook | Twitter

Our Review:

Paris Love Match is a little action, a little adventure, and a little romance. To get in the right headspace for this, I'd say to approach like you would a James Bond or Jason Bourne movie--there will be many scenarios that are unlikely ever to happen in real life, so you just have to go with it! It's a book about how two people unlikely to ever be friends or even know each other are thrown together in an impossible situation and must work together to stay alive. I would say they have to work together to stay out of trouble, but it's evident really early that they cannot seem to do this.

No, they can't seem to stay out of trouble! It's one bumbling scenario after another, but creates a fun race through Paris running from the bad guys, but not knowing what on earth they are looking for. The first scenes are set with a horrible dictator making plans to sell something to go where there is no extradition and leave his country in ruin, and the people buying said item and what they each will do to keep what they want and not actually have to pay for it. I liked the story put together with the writing and always like a clear picture of where we are, what is going on, and just enough intrigue to keep the story moving at a nice pace.

Piers, a momma's boy in Paris for business, and Sidney, in Paris trying to launch a fashion line, meet while arguing over a cab. As the argument escalates they unknowingly get caught up in the middle of a heist gone terribly wrong and over the next 48 hours are chased by criminals and police. As I tried to visualize it I imagined it to be a mix of The Three Stooges and Burn Notice--some physical comedy paired with action--because of the goofy bad buys and the crazy action sequences.

Perfect examples! The Three Stooges in this case would be Two Stooges in what Sidney and Piers double as Little and Large, obviously by each of their differences in stature. They are the worst "bad guys" in the history of the world, but I found myself really enjoying their sporadic appearances. Several different events throw a loop in their plans for figuring out who the guy who died in their cab was and why he was getting shot at in the first place. And oohh, Piers was definitely a momma's boy...Wow, if I was Sidney I would have chucked his phone in the Seine at my first opportunity and helped him with a little bit of tough love. There's nothing wrong with being close with your parents, but his mother talking to him like he was still 16 was grating for me...his growth to becoming a James Bond type guy made me like him a little better after these situations.

The chemistry between Piers and Sidney wasn't quite what I expected. They were both snarky and snippy and sarcastic with each other so when they had these little flickers of romantic thoughts it felt almost like an afterthought. When they had their big romantic moment at the end, I wasn't quite sure if I was ready to see them feel so interested in each other..but as I said before, I just went with it. 

While I too was surprised by their feelings at the end, since they wouldn't say anything to each other along the way about any attraction they might feel, I was glad that it didn't go further than that. Declarations of love after two days would have seriously lessened the appeal, so I am over the moon glad that did not happen. It was a fun journey of opposites attracting though, so I am always rooting for the normal guy! (AKA non-Christian Grey-esque guy).

This book is a fast paced action novel with a little taste of romance thrown in. It's a quick read with lots of dialogue and the always lovely city of Paris as a backdrop. 

Shelley: 3 Stars
Courtney: 3 Stars

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