Title: Until It Fades
Series: Standalone
Author: K.A. Tucker
Release date: May 2, 2017
Rating: 4 stars
Synopsis:
A sexy new romance about a small-town woman who saves the life of a mysterious man, and finds herself unexpectedly thrown into a whirlwind love affair, featuring bestselling author K. A. Tucker’s signature “well-constructed, pulse-pounding suspense” (USA TODAY).Twenty-four-year-old truck stop waitress and single mother Catherine Wright has simple goals: to give her five-year-old daughter a happy life and to never again be the talk of the town in Balsam, Pennsylvania: population two thousand outside of tourist season.
And then one foggy night, on a lonely road back from another failed attempt at a relationship, Catherine saves a man’s life. It isn’t until after the police have arrived that Catherine realizes exactly who it is she has saved: Brett Madden, hockey icon and media darling.
Catherine has already had her fifteen minutes of fame and the last thing she wants is to have her past dragged back into the spotlight, only this time on a national stage. So she hides her identity. It works.
For a time.
But when she finds the man she saved standing on her doorstep, desperate to thank her, all that changes. What begins as an immediate friendship quickly turns into something neither of them expected. Something that Catherine isn’t sure she can handle; something that Catherine is afraid to trust.
Because how long can an extraordinary man like Brett be interested in an ordinary woman like Catherine…before the spark fades?
The book introduces you to Catherine at the culmination of her string of bad choices and mistakes. As a rebellious young woman, her life took a disastrous turn that led her to a minimum wage job at a truck stop diner, and a child to take care of all on her own. I think getting her backstory through the flashback in the introduction immediately helps you to empathize and understand the path that she's traveled down to become the strong woman she is. She’s had to depend on herself for a long time, but she's just fine with that. She just wishes the loneliness weren't quite so consuming.
After an appallingly bad blind date, her late night drive home leads her to a man she'd probably never meet in normal circumstances. Son of a Hollywood star, captain of the Philadelphia Flyers hockey team, Brett Madden has led a very privileged life. He's well liked by everyone for his good heart and generosity towards those less fortunate than him. And right now, on this empty stretch of road, he is the one in dire need of help. Catherine is the one person who happened upon him, and risked her own life in order to get him to safety. This was such a great twist on your typical rescue scenario, where we'd normally see the hero charging in on his white horse. It was really refreshing to see the dichotomy in that theme.
I genuinely liked both main characters. Brett was a wonderful man, very giving, sweet, and concerned for Catherine’s well being during the media storm that developed because of his rescue. He wasn’t the type that let fame or fortune get to his head, in fact, he was someone whom you knew you could depend upon. Someone you’d gladly trust to have your best interests at heart. He was very patient with the heroine’s fears, and gentle with her heart. Catherine was strong, resilient, and a wonderful mother to her young child. Even after so much adversity in her life, she worked herself to the bone in order to provide for herself and her little girl.
An important thing to note about this story is that it’s a slow build romance. Don’t expect the relationship to unfold at a breakneck speed. The first half of the book heavily focuses on the heroine’s past, her present situation, and the stress of trying to come to terms with being the focus of public scrutiny again. The lack of real interaction between the two protagonists didn’t particularly bother me up until around 65%, and then I was starting to feel a bit impatient for a real build between them. I think the flashbacks seemed a bit excessive after a while, but in hindsight, there was a purpose and a direction to them.
This story was about mending family, and believing in love again after being knocked down hard searching for it in the wrong places. If you’re looking for a light romance with a fairytale feel, this could be the perfect book for you.
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