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Working Arrangements
Laura Martin has every reason to be absolutely happy. After four lonely years following the tragic accident that took the life of her fiancé, Joshua, she is finally ready to embark on a new journey, accepting a marriage proposal.The only obstacle in the way of her happiness comes in the person of Luke Manning, her boss and Joshua’s life long best friend. Luke rejects her engagement for more than one reason.
Torn and unable to shake her opinion of her boss as a brilliant yet unreliable womanizer, Laura goes ahead with her engagement party, choosing safety and predictability in her life.
Only the evening goes terribly wrong ...
Torn and unable to shake her opinion of her boss as a brilliant yet unreliable womanizer, Laura goes ahead with her engagement party, choosing safety and predictability in her life.
Only the evening goes terribly wrong ...
145 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 1, 2011
16 people are currently reading
61 people want to read
About the author
Ellen Wolf
22 books30 followersEllen Wolf lives in Toronto with her husband, three kids and two cats. When not writing her novels she enjoys gardening, hiking, meeting new people and of course reading...
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
September 19, 2011
Jane from Dear Author sent me this book to read to see if I also found it strikingly similar to Susan Napier's excellent In Bed With the Boss, released in 1999. I'm surprised she needed validation, as the similarities go beyond striking and into egregious.
In both stories the heroine is widowed young. Laura, in this book, has her fiance die in a car accident three years prior. Kalera, in Napier's book, has her husband die in a freak act of violence. Both books open with the heroine telling the hero, for whom the both work as personal assistants, that they have gotten engaged. Both heroes react angrily and both ask if she's pregnant. In both books, the heroine has gotten engaged to the hero's enemy, and that fiance is a jealous, controlling man in each book.
From here the sequence of events deviate from the Napier book, but they are still all but identical, Wolf just shuffled the timeline. There's a scene in both books where the hero drives the heroine home when her car breaks down at work then comes inside and makes her dinner. He kisses her, they get hot and heavy, and then the phone rings and interrupts them, with the fiance on the other line. Both books have a co-worker pointing out how the hero acts differently around the heroine and is widely assumed to have the hots for her. Both books have the fiance sending out fancy invites for the engagement party, have the hero show up with the fiance's ex, have the fiance try to prevent them from entering and have the fiance and ex have an argument at the party. In both books, the hero and heroine shared a sexual encounter not long after the tragedy in which she was the initiator and which she wanted to forget, out of guilt. Both books even have a scene where the heroine is prompted to reminisce after smelling the hero's cologne, which the heroine gave him as a Christmas gift.
I could go on. It would actually be shorter to point out what's different. Now, lots of stories have similar plots, but they tell different stories with them. This story took In Bed With the Boss and retold it, only shuffling scenes around and changing the names. The characters were the same people, doing the same things and reacting the same way.
And the retelling is not an improvement on the original. Poor word choice, comma abuse and too much internal dialog renders this a drag to read. If the author used "palpable" any more than she had, I was going to start a drinking game. It was far from the worst prose I've ever read, but it needed an editor, and badly.
If this had been an original work of fiction, I'd have given it a 2 or 3. Since it has copied an earlier work to a degree that constitutes derivation or plagiarism, I give it a single star. Fan fiction is only legal when it's free.
In both stories the heroine is widowed young. Laura, in this book, has her fiance die in a car accident three years prior. Kalera, in Napier's book, has her husband die in a freak act of violence. Both books open with the heroine telling the hero, for whom the both work as personal assistants, that they have gotten engaged. Both heroes react angrily and both ask if she's pregnant. In both books, the heroine has gotten engaged to the hero's enemy, and that fiance is a jealous, controlling man in each book.
From here the sequence of events deviate from the Napier book, but they are still all but identical, Wolf just shuffled the timeline. There's a scene in both books where the hero drives the heroine home when her car breaks down at work then comes inside and makes her dinner. He kisses her, they get hot and heavy, and then the phone rings and interrupts them, with the fiance on the other line. Both books have a co-worker pointing out how the hero acts differently around the heroine and is widely assumed to have the hots for her. Both books have the fiance sending out fancy invites for the engagement party, have the hero show up with the fiance's ex, have the fiance try to prevent them from entering and have the fiance and ex have an argument at the party. In both books, the hero and heroine shared a sexual encounter not long after the tragedy in which she was the initiator and which she wanted to forget, out of guilt. Both books even have a scene where the heroine is prompted to reminisce after smelling the hero's cologne, which the heroine gave him as a Christmas gift.
I could go on. It would actually be shorter to point out what's different. Now, lots of stories have similar plots, but they tell different stories with them. This story took In Bed With the Boss and retold it, only shuffling scenes around and changing the names. The characters were the same people, doing the same things and reacting the same way.
And the retelling is not an improvement on the original. Poor word choice, comma abuse and too much internal dialog renders this a drag to read. If the author used "palpable" any more than she had, I was going to start a drinking game. It was far from the worst prose I've ever read, but it needed an editor, and badly.
If this had been an original work of fiction, I'd have given it a 2 or 3. Since it has copied an earlier work to a degree that constitutes derivation or plagiarism, I give it a single star. Fan fiction is only legal when it's free.
May 27, 2013
I really liked this book. It even made me cry ;-) so I was very surprised to read some negative reviews on Goodreads. I've read books that weren't exactly my favorites but what I don't get is why people feel the need to "lash out". If you don't like it, fine move on, no need to be cruel about it.
Anyway, back to the book. For me it was an easy read and that I really enjoyed. I know that are books out there that have similar story lines but that didn't make it less enjoyable to me. Eventhough I expected some things, the way the author wrote it...it still made me cry. So my opinion...read the book, you will like it :-)
Anyway, back to the book. For me it was an easy read and that I really enjoyed. I know that are books out there that have similar story lines but that didn't make it less enjoyable to me. Eventhough I expected some things, the way the author wrote it...it still made me cry. So my opinion...read the book, you will like it :-)
February 13, 2017
This is my first time reading any of Ellen's books and would definitely read more.
I loved this book from start to finish.
I love the characters and the story.
I loved this book from start to finish.
I love the characters and the story.
April 20, 2013
It was something how Laura never realized that the man of her dreams was standing right in front of her. He never try to hide his feelings and it seemed that everyone else could see that Luke was head over heels in love with Laura. Just wanted to give her time to get over Joshua's death.
I enjoyed the writing style of the author and she did a wonderful job bringing out all the emotions of her characters. A story that I am glad that I had the chance to read.
I enjoyed the writing style of the author and she did a wonderful job bringing out all the emotions of her characters. A story that I am glad that I had the chance to read.
October 6, 2011
Having never read In Bed With the Boss by Susan Napier, as this seems to be being compared to, I didn't have the preset bias towards the plot of this story that others did and ended up enjoying it immensely. Well written and romantic, I can't bash it for being similar to other books out there. For predictability and a rushed ending, maybe.
January 21, 2012
Laura was as thick as a ton of bricks. How could she not see how Luke felt about her. I was hoping that this book got better, it didn't
March 25, 2013
Fun, easy escapist read. Nothing more. Twist at the end could be seen coming for a mile.
March 9, 2013
Very enjoyable.
April 3, 2015
I really enjoyed this book.
Great story and loved the characters.
Great story and loved the characters.
March 31, 2013
How disappointing!!! Characters and storyline didn't grab me.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews