Synopsis: Sophie has enough problems in her life without Spencer turning her blood to fire, without his eyes freezing and burning her, without his hatred of her. Since his migration into the house next to hers, Sophia Valdez isn’t sure whether she wants to toss him under a bus or kiss that smirking mouth of his. But even as the temperature rises around them, leaping flames of passion, want and desire,everything either has ever known will be shattered by the lurking shadow hounding their every step, wanting revenge.
Spencer Rowth moves to the sleepy town of River Port with his mother and twelve year old sister, Suzy, to escape a deceitful father, an unfaithful girlfriend and a life crumbling much too fast for him to grapple onto only to be smacked upside the head by the last thing he wanted again. Sophie was everything he refused to want. Her temper, her wit, her laugh, her smile, the way her entire body goes up in flames under his hands are things he would rather slam a lid on and forget. Instead, he finds himself falling for the smart-mouth next door. But how long will he have before the evil chasing them catches up? How long before the very thing he never wanted becomes his only thread to sanity? And who is after them? What do they want and why do they want Spencer and Sophie dead?
The Nerd's Ramble: This book blew me away. I've read one of Ms. Phoenix's books before and I found myself enjoying that one as well. However, Games of Fire is probably one of my favorite things I've read in a while. The set up is a little standard, good girl lives with good parents, attends Church each week, has good friends, and the best guy friend since they were all little. Enter bad boy hottie who moves in next door, who all in one instant manages to turn her on and shut her down at the same time.
There's more to this than that though. Loads.
Sophie and Spencer meet and after fighting their growing mutual attraction for a third of the book enter into a sort of relationship, where neither wants to take take the next step, but they find themselves becoming tangled together. Then the really weird things start to happen. Vandalism, creepy messages, and some truly disturbing things happen in this book. I figured out who was behind it rather early on in the book, but it didn't take away from the story. In fact it made it even more fun to see when the big bad thing was going to happen. And speaking of big bad things--this is a doozy. And it's interesting how it's resolved and the buildup to it is really well written. I think what I like most apart from the suspense and the fact that this story goes so much deeper than good girl/bad boy fall in love is that the characters grow and change and evolve. They are not the same people at the end of the story that we as readers meet on page one. The characters change and get stronger, and good things happen, bad things happen and it's just really an all around great story. I cannot get enough of this story. I really liked it. It surprised me and I'm glad that I read it.
Disclosure: I won this in a contest. I am not compensated for this review, and I don't even think the author knows I'm doing it.
Rating: ★★★★★
Total Length: 475 pages
Available Format: Kindle, Smashwords, Kobo, Paperback
Publication Date: February 14, 2013 (self published by Airicka Phoenix)
Author's Link: Airicka Phoenix webpage
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