Boozy Bookgasms - Lucky and Charmed

Episode Date: March 13, 2025

Kiss of the Irish by Lauren Hawkeye Who knew building confidence and finding the perfect guy meant dropping everything and heading to Ireland? From 'not my type' to 'let's go all night,' this one is quite a ride. Listen in as Jen, Lynn, and Kim discuss this cute Irish romance just in time for St. Patrick's Day. Signature Cocktail: Guinness Ingredients: A big tall glass of ice cold Guinness beer, don't make it hard! Go to the store and buy a Guinness beer and take a nice frosted glass and pour that baby slow and smooth, building it into the perfect drink for this Irish romance. Remember the head makes all the difference. 

Buckle-up literature fans. We're in for some boozy bookgasms today. Join three cousins creating a titillating headspace where steamy romance novels collide with strong cocktails. So sit back, sip slow, and enjoy the ride. Hey, literature fans. Welcome back to boozy bookgasms. I'm Lynn.

I'm Kim. And we are going to review the Kiss of the Irish by Lauren Hawkeye tonight. but before we get started, what are we drinking? Guys, as a person who just came back from Dublin not that long ago, I thought we'd take it easy to take the smooth way. We're going to go with a good old-fashioned Guinness. Ginnis. Tall, icy cold, a lot of froth.

I was between this and a baby Guinness, which is a shot, which is also one of my favorite. But there's a lot of Guinness drinking in this one, so I thought we'd stick to it. I like how they said they built a Guinness. Like it was a project. It's a process. Yeah. You can't just pour that shit. You got to like layer it in.

Yeah. All right. Well, and I've never been to Dublin and I've always wanted to go to the Guinness brewery. And you just went and it sounds so cool. It's amazing. And I'm not a huge heavy beer drinker, but I feel like in Dublin at Guinness. Yeah.

It's definitely an experience. Yeah. But happy St. Patty's Day to all our listeners. Happy St. Patty's Day. St. Patty's episode. So hopefully you can get a kiss from some Irishman. At least get lucky. Yeah.

So we start with our main female character, Sarah, who is going through a bits of a personal crisis. She's from Boston. She's always done all the right things, majored in the right thing, got the right job, bought the right condo in the right neighborhood, all the things. And she has left Boston because her fiancé and her have broken. off their wedding a week before their nuptials. I don't think they broke it off together. Well, yeah. Well, he broke it off. He shut that shit down.

That was his call. Yeah, because he was bored, because he, quote, got with a, quote, newer model, but a stripper. Burlesque dancer. I was like, she wasn't a stripper. Later on in the book, he says, she was burlesque, and she's like, is that supposed to make it better? But no, he breaks up with her for a stripper. Yeah, it's a mother. Yeah, but she's an art curator. She lives in this small condo in this Uber chic kind of part of town. She's having this kind of quarter-life crisis. She's in her midish 20s. And she decides, you know what? I've always done the right thing. I have just, you know, been jilted at the altar, essentially. I'm going to leave here. And I'm going to throw a caution to the wind. And I'm going to go to Ireland for a sabbatical. So she takes off from her job, flirts with an Irish landlord over the internet to get a flat in this tiny little town a few hours from Dublin. And so she picks up her

life for these few months to go there. She rents a car and she drives to this town. The book opens with this bolt of lightning crashing down like right in front of her rental car. And she gets like totally spooked. And that basically encapsulates her life but to this point. And she freaks out. She's in a panic. She finally pulls up to the inn where she's supposed to meet this landlord. That's more of a bar. That's true. It's a pub. It's a pub. And I think they're in, aren't they in Kilmore? I think That's where they're. Is that how it's pronounced? Kymour, Kilmore, yeah.

Yeah, something like that. But we also have to point out, like, she can't even do a sabbatical, right? She's, like, signed up for classes. Like, I'm going to take the sabbatical from my life in Boston. Start master's classes. And better myself and start my master classes. She sucks at vacation. I'm going to say that right now.

She's terrible. She's terrible. Well, this poor girl, and you do find out of this, she's always been on this path. And everyone has conspired to keep her on this path. Every time she tries to get off her path, somebody, her parents, her fiance, her friends are like, why would you do that? And it pushes her right back on this predetermined path. So she gets to the pub. It's called the Wild Irish.

And this is where she's meant to pick up her keys to her new flat. And this guy, Kean, is her landlord. And she's supposed to meet him at the Wild Irish. She's looking for somebody to give her keys. And he ends up being the bartender. And of course, Kean, very hot. He's got an eyebrow piercing. He's got arm tats with his sleeves rolled up.

He's looking really good. And she's a hot fucking mess. Totally like a drowned rat. He's the opposite of her type. She's stuffy. Yeah, he's a bad boy. Yeah. She like he.

Definitely. She basically says it didn't matter that the bartender had a raw sexual appeal that compelled her to sneak glances at him which he thought he wasn't looking. So she's super into him and she's totally drooling over him. And she kind of starts talking to herself, Sarah, get a grip. And he comes right up and ask her if she needs to converse with anyone or if she's got it covered by herself, which I think is really funny. And it kind of sets the stage for like Kean and like his cute personality. Ask what she wants to drink, but she literally can't form a sentence.

She is truly like a hot mess. She's jet lagged. She's massively jet lagged. Longfly raining. I love the setting of it all. I mean, was this the best writing I've ever read? No, but like the setting, it just seemed like a fun adventure. Yeah.

I loved it because I could see it because we went into these little pubs. We went in. We talked to the cool, hunky bartenders with the amazing accent. Oh, stop. And, yes, they're all tatted. They all have the piercing. They're all like very, they're very edgy. They're all yummy.

The punk rock. They were just delicious in Dublin. Well, damn. Now I've got an Irish like fetish. I know. That sounds like a good birth type party. Totally. Yummy.

But you're right. She does seem drunk. And I have traveled, you know, good parts of the world. I have never been this jet lag. But this poor woman is like dead on her feet. I mean, she can like barely string a sentence together. She's tired. She's falling over.

She orders a juice, like an order. juice. But she's basically falling all over the place. And so Kean, I think she's super cute and quote adorable and wants to help her. And so he asked for her keys. He goes and gets her bags out of her car, gets her a quick meal, walks her to the flat, basically carries her to the flat. They get to the door. He opens it. As he's like bringing her bags into her flat, she just leans against the wall and like falls down the wall. Slides down. And he's like, how you doing there in the hall? He leans down to pick her up off of the floor and she pulls him down and kisses him, which is super out of character for her. But he does get her inside.

He gets her into bed and he wants her to just go to sleep. But he's torn because she's soaking wet. And he knows that she's in these clothes that are going to stay wet. Not down there. Yeah. He didn't. He didn't check. But she's wearing a wool sweater.

He wants to help her. So he does take off her wool sweater thinking she has a camisole. or something underneath of it. And she doesn't. She just says this white bra with her little nipple sticking out. He freaks out and he just like runs out of the apartment. He strips her top off and runs away. And she's still in her jeans that are soaking wet and everything else.

So in the morning, she takes her a while, but she remembers everything. She's super mortified. She realizes that he obviously helped her take her top off, but she wants to go thank him. So she gets up and she heads over to the pub and runs into this very nice grandmother and her grandson and she starts to kind of be judgy like, why is there a grandmother with a son in a pub? And then she realizes this is like the only place. You have a baby. In a bar. In a bar. But she realizes this is the center of town, right? And so her judginess goes away pretty quick. And she runs into this woman named Ainsley. And Ainsley, it turns out, is Kean's sister. So she's shouting the Ainsley in the bar. Kian shows up, says he wants to chat with her. And so they do sit down in a little booth and they're flirting. And he wagers. And he wagers. a game of poker. If he wins, he gets another kiss. And if she wins, he'll kiss her anywhere she likes. And she is scandalized. But she doesn't. So they play this game. It's like a couple

matches or whatever. And anyway, he wins. And he grabs her hand and walks her back to his office. There's a ton of sexual tension. But she's a good girl. And so she's really hesitant. But she is into him. She thinks it's wrong. And so he starts to realize he's going to have to work at this a little bit. So he starts to rub her shoulders to get her to relax and kind of puts his hand down her back. And they do finally kiss. But he decides he really wants her to come to him. Like she needs to sort of make this effort because...

You know how much I hate this. Because you want him to crawl over her. I know. But I get it. Just be obsessed with me immediately. He was obsessed with her. But he needed her to take that. step for herself that he didn't feel like he was pushing her into it. And I am okay with it.

I'm not convinced she was a good girl as much as she was repressed. Yeah. Fair. I think she was repressed the entire time. Definitely. Mentally. Emotion. Yeah. Well, then she kisses him again after the poker game in the bar. I think he doesn't want to like push her into it. Like he's feeling reticence and he wants to say like, you need to get there on your own. Like I can't force you into this. He's a good guy too. He is a good guy. Yeah. He's a mama's boy. He talks about that. a little bit. My mom would skin me. Respect us. Yeah. And yeah, we haven't gotten into Kean's background. So he grew up in this small town, but he had wanderlust. And so he turned 18 and wandered the world for five years, went everywhere, had sex with all the women. With all the

women. All the women. His names he didn't know. Every nationality. He was real clear on that. But he could never really find what he was looking for, like to fill this hole. So he ends up coming back to this small town outside of Dublin. He buys the flat that she's staying and it's a four apartment sort of building. Ultimately ends up buying the Wild Irish, the pub. And so he's making a name for herself. He's only just 30. So he's finally coming to so on, but he still isn't found sort of what he's, quote, looking for.

So he is a gentleman. They do go their separate ways after the make-out session in the office. And Sarah goes home wondering, should I just give into this guy? What am I doing? I'm here to find myself. You know what? No, I'm going to go find myself. If that's what I'm going to do, I'm going to take my courses.

So she goes home and lo and behold, somebody knocks on her door. Knock, knock, knock. And she thinks it's Kean, but it's this woman, Nell. So Nell runs the shop across the street. It's like a trinket dress shop. Like it's just sort of the main street shop. And she brings over tea and cake. And she wants to befriend Sarah.

It's like a small town type thing to do. But Sarah doesn't understand what this means. And it's so sad. for her because it's like all these people just want to be friendly and she doesn't know what to make of it. It's also sad because she's hungry and like she never eats anything and like now there's cake. She's like, I can't, I can't possibly. I mean, she has so many restrictions on herself. Yeah. And I couldn't tell like, because they come calling her Kirby and I was like, she called herself Kirby.

Yeah, but he did too and I was like, what do you mean by Kirby? I think she has boobs. Bobs at a waist. I don't even think she has a waste. I just see her as like the hourglass figure. But her whole life she's been told, don't eat that. Don't eat this. Yeah.

It's very like body-changing. She can't possibly weigh anything because she doesn't eat crackers. Fairly. Like she lives on celery. But she did scarf down the cake. She did eat the cake. She loved the cake. She's like, I'm on vacay.

I'm going to do it. Yeah. She had two pieces. And that's a big thing with her throughout this whole sabbatical. is like, I'm on sabbatical. I'm trying to find myself. I need to figure out who I am. She only drinks wine.

And then she finally drinks a Guinness and realizes she's loved beer the whole time. Why has it been drinking beer? I like a girl after my own. Totally. I like it. So they do the girl talk and come to find out, Nell is a friend of Keens. It's a tiny little town where there's like 200 people in this whole town.

And she's best friends with Ainsley, the sister. So she starts asking her about Kean. And so Kean's not far from her mind. A few days later, Sarah works up some courage. He goes back to the wild Irish. Kean has basically been waiting for her. He's said after they're hot and heavy make-out session, it's on you. And he hasn't really been patiently waiting.

Like, he's been waiting for her to make the first move. So he walks up to her. No, she's nervous and asks, do you want this? Do you want me to take control? And she says, which I'm like, I'm in for it. Like, take control. Why are you even asking? Just do it.

some interest and he's like, okay, great. You've done the bare minimum here. I'm going to take it. Yeah, that's all you needed. He just needs you to crack the door. So he takes her back to his office. They get hot and heavy in there and he goes down on her. This happens a lot in these books. She's like, no, no, don't. And he's like, are you sure? And she's like, not really keep going. Maybe. You know what's interesting about these books? Time isn't realistic. So many things. So many things are interesting about these books. I often find that the guys go down on the girl. She gets off, right?

And they ask for nothing in return. That's because they're female writers. Hello. So it's not really that strange. It's always like the girl, the girl gets off and the guy is like, oh, wait. It's just for you. Yeah, totally. I don't need.

Yeah. Your pleasure is enough for me. They say this is enough. This is more for me than it is for you. And you're like, mm. But my favorite is also that the girl is always like, this has never worked before. This has never happened before. This has never happened before.

The guys never do this. You don't have to do this. The fuck you don't. Get your ass down there. I've never said those words. I've never said. As you should. Back to work.

So she is super embarrassed. She obviously does get off. And he gives her shirt to put on so that she feels more comfortable kind of to talk to him. And she admit that she has feelings for him and wants to, like, explore what this, quote, connection is. And he really takes the word connection as she's catching feelings. Like, maybe this is more than like we thought it was originally. And Kean decides he really wants to see her come out of her shell. He feels like she's repressed.

That was a good word. And so he enlists Ainsley and Nell, so his sister and the friend, to take Sarah shopping in Dublin. And Ainsley's like, woohoo, give me your credit card. Yeah, that was just solid. That was a win for anything. Perfect. Yes. And he's like, what am I doing?

And she's like, you're giving me a day off and your credit card. Thank you. He was a little crabby about giving the credit card, which was off putting. But he gave in. But he's not a billionaire. He's a pub owner at 30. But he's doing just fine because he still gave his credit card to his sister. But he was a little crabby about it.

I mean, what band isn't matter. He was hesitant. He was hesitant. Spend what you want. Yeah. Spend what you want. Please. I mean, he basically gave her carte blonde.

She said, like, make this girl have a good time. He did. He did. Yeah. So they get ready to go to Dublin. They're having a good time. And Sarah's realizing this is the first real girlfriend she's had, which is, again, so sad for this poor girl. They go to Dublin. They go shopping. They're trying on dresses.

They end up in front of a lingerie store. And she kind of blurts out. Ross would never let me wear something like this. And Ainsley and Nell are like, who's Ross? And why can he tell you what to wear? And so she ends up having to tell them all about the ex-fiancee who basically kind of kept her in line and told her what to do and not to do. And she let him. And then he left her for the stripper.

And they're like, screw Ross. And they go into the lingerie store and they buy all the pretty things. And my favorite thing is that they just keep saying screw Ross like over and over again, which it just. Yeah. They shout scour, Ross. He was a dick. I'm really surprised because everywhere we went in Dublin, everybody would say feck and f-in-f-it. And that's what you would hear, feck and effet.

Like, fucking effet, do what you want to do. Fucking fuck it. And every, yeah. Really? Yeah, it's about, we actually have a sign up in our bar. It says feck and effing. But it's F-E-C-K-I-N-E-F-F-E-T. Yeah.

And that is like literally, they'd be like, ah, feck and effing effet. And then they would move on. do whatever. So I'm really surprised there was more slang like that throughout the books. But I did love that they were kind of like Ross bashing. Yes. Oh yeah. The whole time. Oh, yeah. He's an arse. He's an arse. I can't believe you're letting him. They make her say screw Ross out loud so that she's like, we'll own it. It gives her a little extra boost of confidence. They do great shopping. And once she gets home from the shopping excursion, she has a package on her stoop. She brings it in.

And she realizes it's all the books that she bought for her correspondence classes that she was going to take for her vacation. Yeah. But Sarah is starting to come around and she basically says, what the hell have I been thinking? She packages those books up. She goes immediately across the street to the post office and mails them back to the U.S. I am not going to take these correspondence classes. So yay, Sarah's finally coming around to being a normal human. Well, and she had a lot of guilt about spending my...

money on her seat. Yeah, that's true. And she's kind of getting over it, which I love to see. I love that she went home and re-tried on everything. Yeah. I know. That was so cute. Same too. But it was such a sweet moment that she was like, I'm worth it. I'm now seeing myself as other people are seeing me versus, you know, Ross decided what her apartment looked like. Ross decided what she wore. Ross decided her undergarments. Her parents decided what major. What major to go into. she was miserable. Yeah. So it was a sweet moment.

And she didn't even realize how miserable she was, I think, until she got here. Well, you're on you're on autopy. Yeah. Right? You're just like, this is what I'm supposed to do. Yeah. This is what I'm supposed to do. Totally.

And now she's like, screw Ross. I'm in. Yeah. So I called it her screw Ross era. So while she's in her screw Ross era, so she goes and returns all of the books. And then, you know, speaking of the majors or her parents made her major in art history because she wanted to be. be an artist and she was quite good at it, but they were like, you'll never make money doing that.

You have to do something else. And so they made her do art history and she's a curator at this art gallery. But on her way back from the post office, she sees that the library is offering a free, all skills welcome art class. And so she immediately signs up for this art class and starts to get really excited about it. So after she does that, she goes back to the pub for dinner, essentially to see Kean. He sits at the bar, and to his surprise, this is the first time she orders a Guinness instead of juice. And he builds her the Guinness and he's all excited about it and she realizes that she has liked beer the whole time. And he tells her he'll eat with her, but he needs to wait until it dies down. Ainsley's got the bar covered. They go sit in a booth and he places her on his lap to flirt with her. She's super embarrassed, but she really likes it. There's this really cute exchange around the food where she's like, I want to order something. super Irish. So he orders her, what is it? It's like a bean and kidney pie. It was like kidney pie. Yeah. It sounded disgusting. It is. And he knew it was disgusting. And I was like, I know we're going to try it anyway. But she like the stew. I love a beef stew. Yeah, the Irish stew. Oh, I love. And did you have it when you were there.

I did. I actually had it at Guinness itself in. They have their restaurant in there and it was amazing. I love her. Really? So yeah. So he orders her the kidney pie and him, the beef stew, knowing that they're going to basically switch, which is super cute. But before the food even comes, they've flirted their way into having sex. So he calls her up, takes her into the back room. So far, they've only ever really kissed. Obviously, he went down in her in the office. But he takes her upstairs to his apartment. He lives above the pub. Of course, he does in this small tiny town. And as it turns out, earlier that day, he had already started a fire in his fireplace to make the apartment. apartment warm. So instead of a bedroom, he lays her out into the plush rug in front of the already started fire. Fire. As one does. Gist the couch cushion off and seduces her in front of the fire for the first time. And I will say it was super hot. I was ready to be Sarah. The spice was spicy. After they kind of do their thing, he says he finally found his home. Like she's his home. So, of course, now gives all the feels. I'm going to go ahead and call this a little bit of Insta-Love.

A little bit. Do you think? We need to go in with that expectation because it does get a little Insta-love. Lobby. Yeah. I mean, this has now been like a few weeks. Oh, you think? But, yeah, there are weeks.

Yeah, definitely. It's been at least two weeks. Because between the books arriving, the back and forth to the pub. The make-out sessions were days apart. I mean, how long was her sabbat? It's been weeks. It was like two or three months. And so this is like midway through the first-ish month maybe.

So Ainsley, the sister, has sprained her ankle. When Sarah comes in one night to just say hi to Kean, he needs help. And Nell apparently is kind of bad with glassware the last time she helped. She broke more glasses than money they made. Like she did. They run the hole after she helped. Wagercing isn't for everyone. She makes a mean cake.

She has her gifts. She has own shops. This isn't one of them. Yeah. Sarah's like, I can help you. And Kahn's like, no, no, don't worry. And she's like, you're an idiot. I will help you.

And just marches her ass back behind the bar. She's never bartoned and I don't think. She's basically just watched him pour beer and is like, I got this. And so she helps him behind the bar. And by the end of the night, she just takes off her shoes and, like, falls behind the bar and says, like, how do you do this at night? Which I thought was really cute. And he's like, you were perfect and picks her up and sets her on the bar and makes out what her and they have like this cute little scene. She now is like going between her art classes and helping

Keen at the pub and it's very cute. One day she's working and Keen kind of comes up behind her. This is so hot and like puts his arms around her and says, okay, I want you to go to the back room and take off your panties and she's scandalized. What do you want me to do with my panties? And he's like, I want you to bring them to me and I'm going to put them in my pocket and then you're going to work the rest of your shift without your panties and only I'll know. And she's like a, a thing. I'm kind of scandalized. She's like, hell yeah. She's like a prude, but she's like, this guy is breaking down all my walls.

So as she's headed to the bathroom, she looks up and Ross, the ex-viancee is just standing in the bar. I didn't see this. I mean, kind of predictable. I know. At some point, she had checked her email and a friend from back home had said that Ross and his His stripper girlfriend had gone out to dinner with her. We don't know this yet. He had given the stripper a ring.

Yeah, he proposed. They were getting married. Sarah just shut down her computer and said, I don't have time for that. So now, it's like a week later, Ross is in Ireland. Here for Sarah, he's broken up with the stripper, and he wants Sarah back. And she's kind of doubting herself. She knows that she doesn't want to be with him. She knows he's not the one for her.

Well, Kean is very territorial. Fair. realizes who Russ is and he's like got his arms all over her and he's very territorial, which I like that. He kind of came behind her and put his hand on her stomach and part of her throat and said like, what do you want? Sarah in her effort to sort of diffuse the situation says, let's go talk over here in the corner. And Kean and I actually do like this. Like he's like, you got this. He's confident in who he is and what they have and goes back behind the bar and pours her against us without her asking.

and then looks at her and he's like, what the fuck does that guy want? And she's like, I guess red wine because apparently he's super snobby about wine. She's like red. I don't know. Yeah. She ordered the house red. The house red. Never the best.

Not good. So she brings the Guinness and the house red over to Ross so they can have this conversation. And Ross is basically like, I messed up. And she's like, oh, you got done with your stripper. And he's like, well, she was a burlesque dancer. And she's like, okay, same, same. And then he drinks the wine and spits it out because he's a total snob. What a douchebag. He's a total snob.

And then he tells her that she shouldn't be upset about the stripper because he was just sowing his wild oats before their marriage. And she should just get over it and come back to him. She's not having any of that. And so everybody's listening. They get up. They start yelling at each other. And Ross then obviously shows his true colors when she says she's not going back to Boston. She's staying here and he kind of insults her.

Kind of. Yeah, I mean, a lot. Yeah. He outright insults her multiple times. About being a barmaid and low-light. You want to be with this guy. Because he has a big penis. I didn't think that's all that mattered to you.

Oh, that's right. Well, it doesn't hurt. I mean. Kean's like, thank you very much. So there's a whole situation with Ross and he gets pushed out by Ross. And then Kean gets really turned on by that and they rush off to hump like bunnies. They settle into their cute little picturesque life. Sarah's painting and she's working at the bar.

And so they're at her apartment one day and she's in the shower and he's just sitting at the table drinking his tea and he's really settling into this domestic scene that they have going on and realizing, holy shit, her sabbatical might be over soon. I wonder what she's going to do. I really want her to stay. She's so talented as an artist and she doesn't believe in herself. And so he gets this brilliant idea. Men are stupid to help her with her art. And so he calls his mama. And of course, his mama owes a favor to an art gallery owner. And so she calls it in for him. Convenient. So one day, our Sarah is headed to the bar for her shift because now she basically works there. And she wears her cute little professional uniform with her black skirt and her white shirt. And she's randomly looking for these two paintings that she can't find and she can't figure out why she's.

can't find them. And so she heads to the bar for that shift. There's this guy there who is an art dealer who says, hey, I've seen your paintings. Thanks, Kean for showing me your paintings that he stole and gave to this guy without her permission and says, I want to sell your stuff on consignment and open to more. And she's really struggling because she's kind of elated and kind of shocked that this is happening, but she's also really pissed off. And she thinks that Kean has taken away her choice of whether or not she should do this, wants to do this, wants to stay, wants to go. And she's had all of her choices taken away from her for her whole life. She storms off.

So cue the third act breakup. Right. Well, yeah, exactly. This is the big crescendo. She's finally got her footing. She's making your own choices. She told off Ross. She's feeling good.

She's got a new job-ish. Yeah. And she's got a fuck buddy. And now. And then Kean fucks it up. He fuchs it up. He takes away the choice. Yeah.

So she says to him, I can't be with someone who doesn't understand that I'm quite capable of making my own decisions in my own life. And she reaches behind her and unties her apron and throws it at him and says, come see me when you get that straight. So she's finally got a backbone. Yay, Sarah. She needed to be able to stand up to something like, fuck you. She started eating beefs, too, and drinking Guinness. She started eating and drinking. So the protein levels are higher.

Thank God. Yeah, celery doesn't do it. So, of course, Kian, you know, he's a pub owner, so he has to sit at the bar and drown his sorrows and some Jameson whiskey in his stupor. And of course his sister Ainsley comes in and kind of smacks him around and tells him he's an asshole. And maybe you should have, she's like, you're an idiot. He's like, oh, what? What do I do?

And then she basically says you could have just told her you loved her and that would have been enough. Did you think of that? And he's like, what? Like, I don't know what you're talking about. So he does finally get a clue. And he marches over to her flat in the rain. There's a lot of rain. Yeah, there is.

When he gets to her flat, he knocks on her door. She opens it. She's like, I told you I needed time. Go away. He's like, what you said was to come back when I figured out that you can make your own decisions. Yeah, I got it. You didn't tell me you needed time. Super fast learner.

I figured it out. My sister told me. I got you on a technicality, and I'm welcome to come in. So she's not super convinced, but he takes off all his clothes in the hallway because he's soaking wet, so shirt, his pants, everything, he's butt fucking naked. And his old crotchety neighbor from across the hall comes out, looks, kind of laughs, and shuts the door, which I think is hilarious. I can just picture this like little old guy.

Like, oh. So he comes in and she's not really convinced. So he walks over to her little paint area that. she has kind of set up in her apartment and he pulls out a paint and he puts in the little tray and then starts to paint on one of his arms, I am sorry. And she's like, what the hell are you doing? It's kind of weird. It was a little strange.

He's butt naked, by the way. So like everything's hanging out. He paints on one arm. I am sorry. We forgot to mention he has. I was thinking that too. I'm like he was pierced on his nipples, his and his dick and his eyebrow. But they didn't really talk about it that much.

Did, or she was pulling on them. Here's my question, because he also wore condoms when they had sex. Does it happen? Doesn't a piercing put you at risk of putting a hole in the condom? I think it depends on the piercing, if it's a barbell. Because it's dull on both sides. This is my nipple knowledge. I don't know.

That should be a thing, right? It extends to barbell penis piercings apparently. They're dull on both sides. It shouldn't do anything. But it might dull the sensation. They didn't get into that. So he writes, he writes, I am sorry on one arm. And then in a totally different color, he writes, stay or go on the other arm.

And then in a totally different color, he writes, I love you on his chest. And she, of course, says, you love me? Oh. And then runs and jumps into his arm. So now she's fully painted up. And then he says, let's. Let's go make naked art on those white sheets in your bedroom. The end.

Aw. The end. Messy sheets. But this time. I mean, with paint. This time it was a good kind of. And like, it wasn't like a multiple art without bathing. And, you know, they could frame it later.

You never know. With the art dealer might really love it. So all in all, this was a very hallmarky, cute Irish set. A hallmarked porno. But there was a lot of. good hot sacks. Can I make it a horno? But it was Gha. If we're tossed in the word, is it a horno?

I'm going, I think it's fine. I think we'd, yeah, a trademark that. Yeah, copyright. But I thought it was adorable. I got into it from the first second of this book. I thought it was so cute and very like, I was going to say wholesome, but it's not so wholesome. Parts of it were cold. It was cute. The spice was good. The spice was good. It took a while to get to the spice, though. There was a lot of the, like, sexual tension, which I didn't hate. Sex scene.

There was only two sex scenes, really. But I felt like the... I was just going to say that. I felt like you didn't... Like you said, it was insta love. They walk in. Oh, eyes meet, done deal. I didn't feel like we really got to know either one of them very much.

Yeah. We got all of her, woe, is me. But I didn't feel like we knew her. She was a little pathetic. It was sad. It was only 197 pages. This is my dream scenario. I'm going to give up everything.

I'm going to move to Dublin, maybe the outskirts, become a barmaid, hook up with a massive, a hot, pierced, beautiful man with an accent. And he's going to love me and give me orgasm. Yeah. Well, and also decide he wants to marry you. I mean, what are we six weeks. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Six weeks to two months. I mean, I don't know. Sign me up. I didn't hate the scenario at all. No, but I did appreciate things. Like you were making fun of him because he already had the fire going upstairs.

That's a standard thing because it's raining so much. It's so freaking damp and cold. Yeah. That is something that he would do. So I appreciated the writer. It was believable, though. It's believable. That's what I'm saying because you would know that.

And the building of the Guinness. So she definitely had some Irish tutorials. She made, yeah, she made a trip at some point. She did some research. Yeah. It was cute. It was cute. There was no mafia.

There was, thank God. But only 197 pages on my, on my eyebook. So it was short. It was meant to be short. You knew you weren't going to get a lot of character development during me a day to read this. And it was everything I wanted to be. And the sex was hot for being such a short book and for, like, The story really does kind of develop, but you don't get a lot of depth. But there is a story there. And it's very much I could see this being like a cutesy little Hallmark Christmas movie without all the sex, right? Hometown girl leaves it all behind and finds like a hunky bartender and the outskirts of Ireland and they fall in love in six weeks. I mean, this is a screenplay. So I'm going to give this book a four for what it is. It was exactly what I expected it to be. I thought it was light on.

character development, but I didn't expect a lot of character development. So I was okay with it. I'm going to go three and a half. I agree. It was light on character development. There were some parts of the book where I was like, oh, come on. I mean, it was easy and it was fun. So three and a half for me. Yeah, I would stick with a three and a half too. Again, character development was big for me. I loved the writing as far as like the details for Ireland. There were just parts where I was like, okay, so she's an artist now. Too cheesy. She's this great artist and he sneaks in and steals the paintings.

And his mom just happens to have a favor road to her. But there were parts where I was like, not so much. But again, 195 pages, 197 pages. It's exactly what we expected it to be. Did I want more horno? Yes. Yes, I did. The hunkiness.

I wanted a little bit more of a battle between Ross. More conflict. Yeah. I wanted more conflict there. But yeah, the... The third act breakup was kind of dumb. Like, I thought it was... Yeah.

I didn't love the reason they did that. No, and I felt like there was a lot of... And Jen, this is not your favorite thing. That cat and mouse, you know, just go get at it already. Just move forward. Just be obsessed with her. Is that so hard?

Yeah. Deal with your trauma later. That's act three shit. All I need is an unhealthy obsession. Like, why do you just... Why can't you just... do that. And he has to have lots of money. Yeah, and he needs to be a billionaire. That's helpful. An accent is also helpful. The accent probably was good, yeah. So was the accent

good in the, in the audio? It was okay. She was fine. She was okay. Oh, she played both, Oh, she played both characters. Yeah. So I prefer to that style, but this was a low budget production, so. Fair enough. She would have to switch into the Sarah character and she would still have the Irish accent and you're like, whoa, whoa. She did do that. Yeah, she did. That's wrong. And start over. But this was free on Audible for me. Yeah, me too. Oh. Nice. Well, so on the, so on the spice meter, I would say this was a three and a half for me, but only because there wasn't a lot of it. Like, I thought the sex was good and I totally wanted to be in every sex scene. He was very hot, in my opinion. Only a three and a half because there just

wasn't a lot of it. But what was there was exactly what I wanted it to be. Yeah. Same. And Same. Diddo. There wasn't a lot, but what we got was pretty good. It was good. Solid. Yeah, I gave it a three as well and spice. I mean, Irish. Yum. Yum. This was a solid for St. Patty's Day. I think it was a short, quick read. Incredibly enjoyable to me. It really was cute. I love the holiday theme. Yes. I love that we do this. They are a little shallow. Like, we're finding, like, these quick holiday reads. But that's what she want. And I think, doesn't she do a couple? Is there more to like the series? There are. There are. I think there are more. Yeah, I think these are like standalones within the same universe.

And it's so quick that you could just like throw it in your bag, have a cup of coffee and just power through it. And I thought it was pretty good. Oh, I read it so fast. Yeah. Yeah. This is definitely an airplane reading. Yeah.

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