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Those Sexy O'Sullivans Trilogy by Kathleen O'Reilly
Those Sexy O'Sullivans is a trio of books set in New York City. They came out this spring, and after someone's good review (?), I bookmooched the first one, Shaken and Stirred. It sat in my bedside TBR pile until this last week when I could finally give it some time. When I'd finished that one, I mooched the second and third immediately. That is the upside to being behind the times - books are more likely to be found either at UBSes or on Bookmooch.
Shaken and Stirred is Gabe O'Sullivan's book. He is the youngest of the three brothers and co-owns/manages the O'Sullivan family bar which has been in the family since the early 20th century. He is happy and social and everyone's friend - especially Tessa Hart's. Tessa has been bartending for Gabe for four years, ever since she arrived in NYC with no job prospects or anything more than a dream.
Tessa's driving goal is to be able to support herself and live on her own in her own apartment, so she will never have to be dependent on another man, like she was on her old boyfriend who dumped her and left her regretting her choices. She attends classes and bartends and hopes that things will improve, when her roommate situation falls apart and she is left without a place to live. Tessa only needs something temporary, but she needs it fast, and so Gabe steps and in and offers her his spare bedroom. But will the two of them, platonic friends for so long, be able to maintain their "friends only" status living in such close quarters together?
Do I even have to answer? Obviously not. What follows is a very nice, very hot friends-to-lovers romance featuring a very nice, very understanding hero. Gabe is pretty much your beta hero to swoon over - happy, friendly, social, caring, hardworking, relatively selfless, and gorgeous. Tessa is a little more emotionally complex. She has a real need to prove herself and be independent, and (this is a bit unusual for a romance novel) it really does trump her need to be in love. What stands between Gabe and Tessa isn't anything solid - it is only Tessa's perception of what is good for her. She is desperately afraid of becoming dependent on a man again for her happiness and therefore goes out of her way to prove that she is not, often pushing Gabe away in the process. Some readers probably won't like this, but I thought she was pursuing a fairly smart strategy. And it's probably good for a man like Gabe to not experience instant gratification for once (although his patience with her goes above and beyond and shows a real maturity, romance novel or not).
My favorite section of the book was the beginning where things got hot and heavy very quickly and then nice and emotionally messy. The last half was longer, but ultimately satisfying, and I was happy to see Tessa succeed in her career choices and Gabe succeed at being a superior human being and supportive friend. Grade: B.
Sex, Straight Up is the second book in the series, and features the eldest and most solemn brother, Daniel. He has been grieving the death of his wife in the 9/11 tragedy for seven long years, holding on to his marriage vows steadfastly and his sanity a little less so. An accountant and introvert, grief hasn't changed his lifestyle so much, but nursing it has solidified some unhealthy patterns and kept him from healing. Desperate to get him out there again, his brother Sean asks him to take his place in a timeshare getaway weekend hoping that Daniel will meet someone and, maybe, get laid.
Catherine Montefiore is an art appraiser and the granddaughter of an art industry legend. Catherine would like to be a mover and shaker like her grandfather, Charles Montefiore, but she is quiet and solitary and insecure about her strengths. She is relaxing in the family summer house when she spies a handsome man sitting alone staring at the water for hours. His physical beauty draws her and she begins to sketch him. After a few hours they strike up a conversation, and, sensing he is miserable in his current company, she invites him to stay with her. She doesn't expect this to be anything more than a platonic invitation, but Catherine's appeal and Daniel's long celibacy combine and create an explosive sexual tension, and the two have a mutually satisfying weekend affair. Unfortunately the weekend finishes on a sour note when Catherine sees him digging his wedding ring out of his bag and assumes the worst.
This would probably be the end of Catherine & Daniel, except for a little authorial intervention. When Catherine returns to the city, she discovers that her grandfather's company is in danger of being accused of price fixing in the art industry - which, if proved, will destroy the family business. She is sure of her grandfather's innocence and welcomes the idea of independent auditors coming in to settle this. But when she finds out Daniel is one of the auditors and the evidence unearthed looks unhappy, she becomes unsettled both personally and professionally.
One thing I really liked about the book was the honest introversion of both lead characters. Catherine and Daniel aren't people who just need to be brought out of their shells, they truly like working with numbers and concepts and enjoy their own company. You see so few true introverts, people for whom introversion isn't residual psychosis from a traumatic event - in romance. It made for a nice change.
I also liked that O'Reilly didn't make the 9/11 tie in a these-colors-don't-run schmaltz fest. Daniel had suffered very personally from a national tragedy, but his grieving process wasn't any different from what it would have been had his wife died in a car crash. The other O'Sullivan brothers make appearances and stay in character from how they were drawn in the first book, but they do not intrude.
Overall, I very much enjoyed watching Catherine and Daniel interact and work together to get to the bottom of the Montefiore art financial dirty dealings. These two were genuinely decent human beings in need of each other, and it was satisfying to see an introverted, physically unperfect woman bag such a stud, wounded though he is. Grade: B.
Nightcap finishes out the trilogy. Sean O'Sullivan, the lawyer brother is charged with finding out who in city government has it out for Prime, the brothers' bar. Gabe has had to satisfy numerous city departments regarding the state of his bar, but now the city has closed it down entirely. So Sean, who has been clearing up all these numerous barriers to the bar's existence, decides to go to the top: to Cleo Hollings, NYC Deputy Mayor.
Cleo is a mover and shaker, a workaholic who loves her job and her life, with one real exception: she is feeling steadily weakened by her mother's losing battle with Alzheimer's and unsure of how to proceed in caring for her. When Sean appears needing his favor, she is surprised to find him connected enough that he can do one...or two...of his own for her.
I wanted to read the entire O'Sullivan trilogy, but of the three I looked forward to Sean's story the least. In the other other books it's made clear that he's a legal shark and a womanizer who has never even peeked commitment in the face. He's basically a Duke of Slut who defends his behavior as okay because he leaves his women sexually satisfied and is always honest about his intentions. Frankly, that just doesn't cut it with me. Maybe really promiscuous women don't expect anything from a hook-up other than an orgasm, but my suspicion is that he's left a trail of fairly broken hearts in his wake.
Cleo is the mannish type of heroine I really don't care for. I couldn't relate to her careerism or her desire to conquer city politics. Her initial attitude toward Sean is equally masculine - she's the perfect lover for him, given she expects nothing but temporary fun. When it turns out to be something more - because of course it does, this is a romance novel - she tries to put up a wall between them to keep him from finding her vulnerability. This was a little tedious considering how much she needs help and emotional support with her mother.
There were some nicely written moments between them, but their romance happened in too short a space, with too little actual time spent together, to be believable. Also I tend to harbor suspicion about power couples like Sean and Cleo. Go getters tend to be somewhat self-involved. It's hard to make a relationship work when no one is tending it carefully, and very ambitious people don't usually like to do this kind of daily maintenance.
Grade: C.
My grade for the Those Sexy O'Sullivans series as a whole is a B/B-, definitely worthwhile, but the series starts out stronger than it ends. I'll be keeping an eye out for O'Reilly's future series titles.