Review: The Wrong Man

The Wrong Man by Natasha Anders
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is the third in a series about three sisters called Daisy, Daffodil and Dahlia who were labelled by their loving parents as the clever one, the prickly one and the pretty one. Poor Dahlia, all she wants is to love and take care of someone. She was engaged to be married until she found out that her controlling fiancee was also trying to blackmail her sister into sleeping with him. She gave up her job at his behest and since then she hasn't managed to get a full-time job. Instead she spends her time doing good. Entertaining at the senior centre, reading to children at the library, volunteering at the animal sanctuary etc. Her clothing reflects her homebody personality, all cardigans, longer dresses and buttoned up collars.

The set up for this book takes place in the previous book but in a nutshell, Lia acts totally out of character and has a one night stand with Daisy's future husband Mason's former business partner Sam Brand at the mixed hen and stag nights. Then, despite her best intentions she did it again at the wedding. Having only slept with the cheating fiancee before Sam, she is horrified at her lack of judgement, particularly because Sam Brand is a foul-mouthed, over-confident, brash man who she dislikes intensely.

Sam gets injured saving a pop star from a deranged stalker. Desperate to escape Hollywood. London and the paparazzi he asks Mason if he can stay at his cottage in South Africa, little even thinking that he might run into prissy princess Dahlia in town. truth be told he'd forgotten all about her and their one night stand. But then Dahlia is pushed into preparing the cottage for his arrival and is a witness to his inability to do the simplest of things like pour a drink or dress himself with his dominant arm in plaster. Irritable, in pain and bored, Sam decides it would be fun to get prissy Dahlia to act as his cook/ cleaner/ driver for a few weeks while he simultaneously tempts her into another torrid encounter in the sack.

When I read the start of this in the previous book The Best Man I hated it. I hated Sam and Dahlia seemed too prissy for my tastes. Boy was I wrong! I just love me a bad boy meets a goody two shoes story and this was a brilliant example. Sam never lost his foul mouth or his crudity, right up to the end he said some things which were just awful and (almost) unforgivable. In fact the only reason I forgave him (as a character) was because he seemed to be equally as horrified by what he said. Dahlia grew on me, from the sort of po-faced, do-gooder with an obsession about getting married that I love to hate she turned into one of the nicest, sweetest, funniest (and sexiest) heroines I've read in a long time.

After the angst-fest of the last book, this is back to the sparkling, frothy, delightful novels that I love from Natasha Anders. I devoured every page with glee. I loved all the characters and nothing felt contrived. A winner.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

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