This title may be purchased from Amazon
Shane
A cat is a man’s best friend, because they can’t be bought or threatened. If they don’t like you, they walk away, showing you their butthole. If they stick around, it’s because they find you interesting. Mimsy’s stayed with me through six years and across half the country, which means I’m not a total loser. We earn our daily bread and fishy treats by busking, and sometimes we get lucky.
Like this abandoned wine-tasting place we’re squatting in. California climate so we don’t need heat, running water still on, all the comforts of home. Sure, there’s a weird guy with mental health issues who shows up now and then, but he keeps life interesting and he’s not bad to look at. We might stick around Gaynor Beach for a while.
Theo
I finally have control of my grandparents’ legacy, which means I can give away all the things they valued more than me. I have enough money to live on without theirs. The vineyard’s easy. I’ll give it to Manuel, the guy who did most of the work while never being allowed in their showplace mansion. I love imagining his kids bouncing on Grandmère’s priceless antiques.
The wine-tasting parlor’s harder. I’d like to burn it to the ground, but the cops frown on arson, plus when I went to check it out there was a homeless guy living in it. Instead of being scared of me— because I admit, I was losing it a bit when he spotted me— he cleaned up the cut on my arm and listened to me ramble. He had no clue who I was and I liked that. Maybe I can turn my grandparents’ showroom into a homeless shelter. Or something for homeless animals. Shane loves his little cat, and I wouldn’t mind if they stuck around for a while.
Rating: B-
Impurrfections is one of five books in the multi-author Friends of Gaynor Beach Animal Rescue series, and I think this is probably one of those series where the books are only loosely linked, so it’s not necessary to read all of them or read in order. This one is a cute, low-angst romance between two guys from opposite sides of the tracks, and as I’m very much a cat person, I really enjoyed reading about Shane’s beloved feline companion, Mimsy.
Shane Webster has lived on the road for the past decade or so going wherever life takes him, and at the beginning of the book, he and Mimsy (who found him and adopted him about six years earlier) have just arrived in Gaynor Beach in California. He’s never been to the ocean before and decides that they should stick around for a while and enjoy the sunshine, maybe do a bit of busking to make some cash – he needs to keep Mimsy in treats and kibble, after all. Wandering around looking for somewhere to hunker down while they’re in town, Shane comes across an abandoned building that looks like it used to be some sort of fancy office space. It’s down a long-ish driveway so it’s quiet and not overlooked, which is ideal; he finds a way in and gets them both settled before heading out to find them some food.
Theo Lafontaine is the owner of the building, which used to be part of his grandparents’ wine-making business. He lived with them after his mother died and his father abandoned him to go and live in Paris, but it wasn’t a pleasant existence, as they regarded him mainly as not-hired help, someone to carry glasses and charm visitors, scrub toilets and clean floors. When they died two years earlier, Theo’s father crawled out of the woodwork to challenge the will that bequeathed everything to Theo, but now probate is complete, Theo can finally take ownership and decide what to do with the business and the properties that go with it. What he wants is to have nothing to do with it; he’s making a good living flipping houses and doesn’t need the vineyard, so he signs the business and his grandparents’ former home over to their production manager as recompense for his years of hard work for little recognition, meaning all that’s left is to deal with is the wine tasting building, a place where he spent a lot of time as a kid and that holds a lot of unpleasant memories.
You can read the rest of this review at All About Romance.
Caz's Reading Room 